Achievement - Possible Strengths

Do you have these strengths? If not, how strongly does this factor apply to you?

• Initiative - You like to achieve results yourself, either because you like the recognition or, more commonly, because of the intrinsic satisfaction of doing a job yourself. You are self-motivated: you like to think for yourself and you do not need to be told what to do. You get satisfaction out of a job well done. People with less initiative will prefer to share the load, hoping that others will take the initiative when they do not feel like it.
• Problem solving - You enjoy using your analytical skills and expertise to solve problems. You excel in digging into an issue and sorting it out. Solving a difficult problem is one of your greatest sources of job satisfaction. If you are not so keen on problem solving, you might see problems as a nuisance. Your might look for a quick fix or ignore the problem, hoping it will go away. Alternatively, you might try to get someone else to look at it.
• Follow through - You will exert yourself to do quality work, following through to ensure that whatever you do is done properly. You will not like to start a task and see it left unfinished. Less committed people will start many projects but have trouble finishing them, or their results will contain many errors and oversights. Because you like doing things yourself, one of your strengths is thoroughness, a willingness to get to the bottom of issues and sort things out properly.
• Ownership - Because you take pride in your work, you set yourself high standards and you are always on the lookout for ways of improving your own performance. People who are not so inclined will be happy to pass tasks onto someone else once they have got them started. They will see finishing off a task as getting their hands dirty or just boring.
• Expertise - This skill is simply the result of taking a high level of interest in being good at whatever you like doing. You like to think of yourself as an expert in your field and to be so regarded by others. Personal achievers do a few things very well rather than a lot of things superficially, hence they are specialists. The generalist is not so interested in going into depth on anything so he is often just as happy to get someone else to do things. You strongly value competence both in yourself and others. This drives you to continually upgrade your specialist skills and to have little time for those who do not but who want to tell you what to do.
  

Potential pitfalls

• Perspective - over specialization can lead to a narrow perspective
• Communication - not being able to communicate with other disciplines
• Interpersonal skills - too much emphasis on knowledge as the key to everything, not enough understanding of how to deal with people
• Teamwork - doing everything yourself, not fitting well into a team