The Strong Week Plan
by Vic Wiens
Important new concepts often come to us through new terminology. Marcus Buckingham uses the terms “strengths” and “weaknesses” in a new way in his latest book Go Put Your Strengths to Work. According to Buckingham’s latest book,
"My strengths are those specific activities at which I do well and for which I still retain a powerful appetite." (p. 21)
This definition of strengths moves one step further from his previous definition of strengths in Now Discover Your Strengths. There he simply defined strengths as those activities in which I exhibit “consistent, near-perfect performance.” (p. 25) In his latest book he focuses on identifying and focusing on those activities we are very good at AND that we love to do.
Buckingham believes that productivity is the result of helping all workers carve a role for themselves where they play to their strengths at least 75% of a given week. He calls such an engaged week a “strong week.” Planning to achieve such an engaged week is called “The Strong Week Plan.” Chapter 3 of his book focuses on turning “the best of our job into the most of our job.” (p. 13)
I strongly agree with Buckingham that the week is the right unit of focus for any strategy that seeks to rebalance an aspect of work. There is something about the weekly rhythm of work and rest, of activity and reflection, that makes the week a powerful planning unit. Buckingham goes on to say that,
“Whether or not you use our version of a Strong Week Plan is less important than having one. Take a look at the people in your life who have achieved sustained top performance and you will see that they have filled their weeks with activities that strengthen them. …each week you’ll see them identify one or two activities that, no matter what the week throws at them, they will push hard to do, and one or two activities they will push equally hard to avoid.” (p. 33)
What I like about Buckingham’s Strong Week Plan is that it gives us a practical tool for moving our jobs incrementally closer to ideal jobs. Perfect jobs will rarely come to us on a silver platter. On the other hand, many jobs do lend themselves to being reshaped around our strengths and weaknesses over time. I strongly advocate this book to anyone who wants to maximize their impact.
