Finding your strengths

Here’s a little exercise. Try and remember a time when someone approached you and tried to tell you that you were doing something wrong, or they tried to solve a problem for you because they thought you weren’t capable of solving it yourself.

How did you feel?

On the other hand, can you remember a time when someone acknowledged how good you were at something. Can you also remember how that sense of achievement and wellbeing prompted you not to give up on something else that you were struggling with?

When you focus on weaknesses, problems and faults (the experts call that a deficit approach) people tend to feel those weaknesses more acutely and the result is that the negatives become all embracing.

When you focus on strengths (they call this a strength-based approach) people will be encouraged and are more likely to find the strength to deal with the difficult issues.

I’ve been talking about person-centredness in the last few posts. The first principle was individual approaches, the second was self-determination. A strength-based approach is the third principle of person-centredness.

More about that in future posts. In the meantime try and remember what happened on those occasions when you were treated with a strength-based approach and how that differed from the deficit approach.

How to avoid paying the doctor ... and other matters of self-determination.

I went to visit the doctor the other day, and at the end of my short appointment I walked out the door. No sooner had I left the office, the receptionist had phoned both my mobile number and my home phone to remind me that I hadn’t paid the bill.

I started talking about self-determination last post as one of the aspects of being person-centred. But how far does self-determination go? The doctor’s receptionist certainly didn’t like my carefree approach to bill payment although it was probably more a case of absent-mindedness than self-determination.

Self-determination in the service sector, such as in an organisation like Baptistcare is not about whether to pay the bill or not, but it's really important that people can make decisions about their lifestyle. We need to ask, how a person can make decisions for themselves, rather than handing the decision-making process across to the organisation, along with their independence and self-respect.

What are some of the things service organisations have assumed were non-negotiable that are actually opportunities for individuals to exercise their right to self-determination? How do we hold the tension between person-centredness and corporate efficiency and a desire to keep costs to a minimum?

By the way, I went back and paid the doctor.