How to Find Your Unique Strength As A Business Owner

Identify Your Entrepreneurial Strength In 3 Easy Steps

Figuring out what your unique strengths are can help you focus your time and organize your business. Here are some of the ways to find your unique strengths.

Originally published Feb. 28, 2017

As a business owner, you possess some unique strengths that can help you better run your business. I’m not talking about skills here. People can learn new skills. Instead, I’m talking about the things that you naturally do better than other people.

By figuring out your unique strengths, you can organize your business in a way that lets you focus on them. Here are some of the ways you can find your unique strengths.

Pay attention to what your clients say

I was recently on a business trip for a large client project. The project involved me creating business courses and then actually teaching the content on camera.

While on this trip, my client actually helped me find one of my unique strengths. We were heading to the studio on the third day of filming when he said, “You know, you’re a really good storyteller. And you’re a natural on camera, regardless of whether there’s a teleprompter or not.”

This got me thinking. How often had I mistaken my unique strength as a storyteller as just some basic skill? How often had I downplayed this strength because it came so naturally to me? Turns out I downplayed it all the time.

Now I know to focus on one of my unique strengths: the art of telling a story. This may look like more sponsorship deals that require on-camera work, and it certainly means more podcasting.

Pay attention to what lights you up

When my client said I was a good storyteller, I started thinking about instances in which I had told stories. More specifically, I started paying attention to how I felt when I was telling stories. I thought back to podcast interviews, media appearances, and even recent speaking engagements.

What I found was that I felt completely lit up and energized! For example, it took me about two hours to come down from a natural high after my last speaking engagement. It would also take me some time to wind down after filming because I’d get so into it.

I also noticed that while creating and filming the classes for my client, I’d sometimes get into this weird zone where everything around me would just stop. All that mattered was what I was teaching at that moment.

If you feel like this about anything, there’s a good chance it’s one of your unique strengths.

Start with your weakness

This may seem counterintuitive, but one way to find out what your unique strengths are is to start with what you suck at and remove it from the list. Sometimes this is actually the easiest way to go, especially if you aren’t sure about your unique strengths yet.

For example, I know I kind of suck at organizing, and I definitely suck at math. As a result, those were the two areas I started outsourcing first.

What was left over was the more creative stuff, like content creation and marketing. While I didn’t realize it at the time, I’m really good at these things.

Final thoughts

Once you’ve discovered what your unique strengths are, you can organize your business in a way that allows you to take advantage of them. Start delegating anything that isn’t aligned with your strengths so you can best use what comes naturally to you.

This article was written by Amanda Abella.