EXOTERIC - Information Worth Sharing: ex·o·ter·ic
-adj
1. Not confined to an inner circle of disciples or initiates.
2. Comprehensible to or suited to the public; popular.
3. Of or relating to the outside; external.

My boss recently handed each of her direct reports a copy of Strength Finder 2.0. This book is a quick read about how most people tend to try to improve their deficiencies instead of improving their inherent strengths. This premise makes a lot of sense. If you know what you do well, then work on that to become even stronger, rather than try to become good at something that you may not have any talent for.

The book comes with a passcode to their online test where it asks you a whole bunch of questions that are designed to figure out what your top 5 strengths are. There are 34 identified themes in the book. After reading about all of these 34 different strength themes I was curious to see what the test would determine were my particular strengths.

It came up with these 5 strengths for me.

• Input
  People who are especially talented in the Input theme have a craving to know more. Often they like to collect and archive all kinds of information.
• Learner
  People who are especially talented in the Learner theme have a great desire to learn and want to continuously improve. In particular, the process of learning, rather than the outcome, excites them.
• Intellection
  People who are especially talented in the Intellection theme are characterized by their intellectual activity. They are introspective and appreciate intellectual discussions.
• Ideation
  People who are especially talented in the Ideation theme are fascinated by ideas. They are able to find connections between seemingly disparate phenomena.
• Maximizer
  People who are especially talented in the Maximizer theme focus on strengths as a way to stimulate personal and group excellence. They seek to transform something strong into something superb.

I think this describes me very well. I love to read, research and learn new things constantly. I like coming up with new ideas and applying them to make things better.

Unfortunately, the test only spits out the top 5 for you. I would have really liked to also have known what my weaknesses are from this test. Maybe that is just the "Input/Learner/Intellection" part of me wanting to know more! It would be nice if this type of test was freely available (instead of having to pay for a copy of the book), and it would be interesting to see the overall statistics from all who have taken this survey. I'm sure that there will be a 3.0 version coming in the future that hones these concepts further.