Are you aware your personal energy? What about your weaknesses?
One enterprise administration and management idea suggests that individuals and groups will obtain extra success by constructing on their strengths than by attempting to repair their weaknesses.
The idea doesn’t imply you need to ignore weaknesses. As a substitute, it suggests you need to make investments deeply in skills and strengths and reduce the consequences of any weaknesses. (You’ll be able to learn extra about it within the guide Strengths Based mostly Management, based mostly on the Gallup group’s 30-year analysis undertaking.
I’m all in on this concept. I’ve seen this concept work for content material groups that obtain success over the long run. However the alternative isn’t all the time clear.
Ought to #ContentMarketing groups double down on their strengths? Or attempt to repair their weaknesses? It’s not a simple alternative, says @Robert_Rose through @CMIContent. Click on To Tweet
Strengths vs. weaknesses
A brand new content material advertising and marketing technique brings individuals collectively below new charters, with new processes, tasks, and applied sciences. Folks name this means of getting everybody prepared for the brand new state of affairs “change administration.”
However, if we’re trustworthy, it’s actually “new administration.” None of these items has been executed earlier than.
One of many first issues I like to recommend to shoppers on this state of affairs is to do a expertise audit. A expertise audit finds areas of energy in addition to gaps the place further coaching, outsourcing, or new hires is perhaps wanted.
I’ve seen many firms make the identical mistake after the abilities audit: They double down on shoring up perceived (or precise) weaknesses.
However that strategy instantly builds a steep mountain to climb. Content material groups grappling with all of the “new” could really feel demoralized in the event that they must rent and practice new in-house or outsourced employees on the similar time.
But many specialists argue that focusing solely on strengths has its pitfalls. A number of years in the past, a Harvard Enterprise Evaluation podcast steered that “so many weaknesses are overdeveloped strengths.”
For instance, amplifying a politically astute crew chief’s strengths can create a manipulative boss. Specializing in the velocity or creativity of the in-house design crew can result in a crew that’s overworked and regarded idiosyncratic of their strategy or out of contact with enterprise realities.
Deciding whether or not to concentrate on the strengths or weaknesses uncovered in a expertise audit jogs my memory of the aphorism normally attributed to statistician George Field: “All fashions are mistaken, however some are helpful.”
There aren’t any straightforward solutions.
Which strengths and which weaknesses matter extra
In a manner, it’s a false alternative. Understanding which strengths and weaknesses matter probably the most tends to provide one of the best outcomes. You’ll be able to’t assess which strengths or weaknesses to concentrate on till you perceive which strengths and weaknesses have an effect on your operation’s probability of success probably the most.
For instance, firms constructing content material groups typically ask me, “Ought to we rent material specialists with deep data about our providers and business or nice writers who can study our enterprise over time?”
The reply to that query is sure.
Ought to #Content material groups rent SMEs who know the business or nice writers who can study? Sure, says @Robert Rose through @CMIContent. Click on To Tweet
Each approaches are equally essential – till you determine which is able to impression the crew’s targets extra. When you determine which is extra essential, you may concentrate on enhancing the strengths of the strategy you’ve chosen.
I’ve seen this first-hand in two conditions.
The primary concerned a brand new content material crew at a big Fortune 100 firm. After conducting a expertise audit, they recognized their strengths: creativity and journalistic storytelling. In addition they uncovered some perceived weaknesses: sales-enablement content material and advertising and marketing measurement.
As a brand new crew, additionally they understood that the enterprise positioned a excessive worth on the power to feed nice content material to gross sales and supply analytics to point out the content material’s effectiveness. A key piece of the crew’s enterprise case was centralizing content material and making it an inside energy. So, their impulse was to shore up their gross sales content material and analytics weaknesses.
To take action, the content material crew took over these areas from their outsourced company. They had been positive they may “determine it out.”
However they didn’t. And the crew’s status as a powerful editorial crew additionally took successful as they tried to stability their strengths with the dearth of promoting and analytical means. When the enterprise pivoted, they let the editorial crew go. They weren’t thought of able to taking over the required advertising and marketing analytics.
Would they’ve survived in the event that they’d let the company deal with their weak areas and continued to excel at editorial or constructed a phased partnership with the company to handle the abilities wanted for gross sales enablement and measurement?
I think so.
Within the second state of affairs, a expertise firm I work with had been rising and molding its content material crew for just a few years. They keep an acute consciousness of their crew’s strengths and weaknesses. Extra importantly, the crew chief has created transparency and understanding of their ongoing stability all through the enterprise.
At first, they centered on highlighting their strengths as a content material advertising and marketing crew (creativity, business thought management, and structuring content material for translation and reuse). They didn’t initially tackle sales-oriented content material – they left it to the demand technology crew.
Finally, they partnered with the demand-gen crew, which continued to create nice advertising and marketing content material. The content material crew helped them develop requirements and playbooks to facilitate translation and repackaging for a number of channels.
Years in, this mannequin works very effectively for them.
It’s a refined however crucial distinction. The primary crew thought its job was to excel at content material, and it centered on fixing the crew’s weaknesses to make {that a} actuality. The second crew realized its job was to make the enterprise good at content material, and it centered on its strengths to make {that a} actuality.
The usefulness of any content material expertise audit lies within the means to align the crew’s core strengths to the priorities and expertise of the enterprise.
Over time, in the event you can maintain this consciousness, your crew’s weaknesses can turn out to be its best energy.
It’s your story. Inform it effectively.
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Cowl picture by Joseph Kalinowski/Content material Advertising Institute
