What I Learned, and Didn’t, From my Personal Assessment

When Dave first suggested that we learn a bit about the assessment approaches used by Dan Kaufman, and Shannon Waller (see Dave’s CBS Money Watch blog, Finding Your Great Gift, for the details), my first thought was “ugh, another assessment to add to my collection?” You see, I know my MBTI, DiSC, Colors, MBS, CPI, LOTR, and a few other scores as well. Then, I remembered that each process had in fact taught me a bit more about myself. Cool. Finally, I heard the opportunity for us as a community to discover something new together. Great.

(Did you notice how quickly we could move from Stage Two to Stage Three to Stage Four in our own minds?)

Working with Dan was a personal journey from the beginning to the end. Working with Shannon added a couple of new assessments to the mix: Kolbe and Clifton’s Strength Finder. In the end, the discovery with Shannon became just as personal a journey as the one with Dan. Both were great experiences and I learned a quite a bit from each.

Here’s the thing. There’s always a little nagging doubt with assessments that rely solely on my input for the results. Recently, I completed another assessment and the issue of user error (mine) continues to plague the accuracy of the results.

The day I took this particular assessment I was blown away by a huge variety of business opportunities combined with the clarity that each of them would benefit from having a few more “get ‘er done” kind of people around the table. It was agitating. Not surprisingly, the results demonstrate my passion for structure, having an impact, and taking action. However, the results suggest that these are practically the only things I care about. My agitated state resulted in some pretty uni-dimensional results.

This is in sharp contrast to the experience with Dan, Shannon, and finally Dave. As I reviewed the process and outcomes of working with Dan and Shannon and compared their results, something magic happened. Dave combined those assessments with our shared experiences from working together. In the end his feedback created an even clearer picture of my great gift.

Do the new Seven Scenes Assessment and you will experience something close to what I did. Start with an assessment like Strengths Finder or MBS, and then dig into seven actual experiences from your life. In the end, you’ll have your own Great Gift Statement. When you follow the instructions you’ll share that great gift statement in a way that may change how you see yourself and how you present yourself to others. What you learn from the experience will bring new insight – and valuable feedback from those who already see your great gifts everyday.

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