Gallup Talent Mindfulness: The Trailer

Talent Mindfulness is a practice; an invitation to listen on purpose to your own greatest potential -- the natural patterns of thought, feeling and behavior that lead you to success, to thrive, to experience your own best life. CliftonStrengths measures the presence of talent across 34 areas called "Themes." And these Talent Mindfulness moments help you activate your Strengths. Don't try to force an answer or write down everything. Just experience the practice; you can always come back again. Strengths don't improve themselves; greatness takes a bit of effort, building upon who you already are. So lean in, get comfortable and listen to the insights your talents have to offer.

Below is a full transcript of the conversation, including time stamps. Full audio and video are posted above.

Jim Collison 0:00

I am Jim Collison. I'm here with Maika Leibbrandt, and welcome to the trailer for Talent Mindfulness. Maika, welcome!

Maika Leibbrandt 0:05

Thanks, Jim. Great to be here.

Jim Collison 0:07

It is so much fun to be thinking about launching a brand new podcast, Maika, and to be launching it with Talent Mindfulness. For some folks, maybe, who have not listened to our Talent Mindfulness episodes to this point, why do we do them and where'd they come from?

Maika Leibbrandt 0:22

Well, they originally started because we always wanted Theme Thursday to be something that helped people understand CliftonStrengths. And if you're truly understanding CliftonStrengths, you know that it's not enough simply to name your talents; we have to do something. And thinking about how you can honor that, either in yourself or in others, really take action. And so at the end of -- was it Season 5? -- of Theme Thursday, we added this idea of Talent Mindfulness. Quite honestly, I thought it would be just a brave moment that we only did once, but it really caught on. People have, we've received probably more feedback around Talent Mindfulness than we have about our 34-theme deep dives that we've done for years.

Maika Leibbrandt 1:03

And it really was meant to be a way to say, Hey, you don't have to clear your schedule and go to a retreat in order to get better at your strengths. If you say you're too busy, let's just meet you where you are. And let's give people 3 to 5 minutes just to focus on their talents and think about what, what their natural ways of thinking or feeling and behaving are telling them about how to solve problems, how to navigate what's in front of you right now, rather than waiting and putting strengths development on that "To Do List" of something you would do in the future.

Jim Collison 1:32

One of the biggest requests we got during the last 2 years of Theme Thursday was to break these out and make them individual episodes, like -- because currently, they're kind of wrapped up inside of Theme Thursday, you have to listen to the whole -- we kind of did that intentionally, right? We wanted folks to listen to the episodes on the way to get there. But the feedback was so overwhelming to make them individual episodes, we decided to do this. Maika, what kind of advice would you give to someone as we think about now having this short intro, the Talent Mindfulness, and then I'll wrap each one of those. What kind of advice would you give to people in listening to these? What, what do you think is the best way to consume them?

Maika Leibbrandt 2:08

Great question. I think treat it more as a practice, a habit or a routine, and less as something you want to consume. So don't think about these podcasts as chapters in a book. And you want to get through the book so that you can say it's finished or go to book club. See this, instead, as something that you should return to as maybe a daily activity, maybe even just a weekly activity. That was originally how they came out. We did Theme Thursday every Thursday. And some of them, you'll find, are even designed to say, Hey, over the next week, here's an action you can go take. Realize that they're never meant to be prescriptive, that they are -- you're doing it right if you're listening to yourself. You're getting it wrong if you're thinking that there's a right answer that I've somehow given you. And, I think, allow yourself to come back to it time and time again, especially if you're listening for that mind of How do I make a business better? Or how do I help other people?

Maika Leibbrandt 3:05

There can be that temptation to say, OK, I want to learn this exactly how it was so that I can repeat it. And that is not what this is designed to be. You can just share Talent Mindfulness with the people that you're serving or the people who you're leading. Because the beauty of it is, it should mean something different to you when you listen to it today, versus when you listen to it a couple weeks from now. And it should maybe spark something different in somebody else than it'll ever spark in you.

Jim Collison 3:30

So let me do the technical aspect of this. We're going to create these as a podcast, so you can listen to them on your Podcatchers, podcast applications on either your, on your phone, Android or iPhone. You can download them and use them how you want. You can take them with you, if you need to do it that way. They're gonna be available on YouTube as well as video. We thought that was kind of weird at first, just to be honest. We were like, "Really?" But I asked the community, and that's what they wanted. And so we're going to create YouTube videos and a playlist that will be available on the CliftonStrengths channel as well. So we'll have a variety of ways for you to interact with them. They won't be live; we're not creating new ones. These -- we're going back to Season 5 and Season 6, and pulling those out and re-presenting them to you. Many of you haven't even heard many of them. So you'll get an opportunity to rehear, to reengage with. And I think these aren't intended for "one and done." I think these are intended to be, to be used on a regular basis, for an opportunity for you to learn and to grow as you work your way through them. Maika, anything else you want to add to that?

Maika Leibbrandt 4:30

Yeah, you know, there might be folks who are stumbling across this and don't know anything about Theme Thursday or CliftonStrengths. So it's also important to mention that Talent Mindfulness were really born as a way to activate your CliftonStrengths. But that being said, you don't, it's not a precursor to getting the good that there is out of, out of Talent Mindfulness. You might hear whispers of different CliftonStrengths themes that show up in different Talent Mindfulness practice sessions, but none of them are really meant to be overtly tied to any one CliftonStrengths theme. A great way, if you're brand new to strengths, a great way to sort of get yourself into the mindset of focusing on your own talents is, A) to listen to all the past seasons of Theme Thursday; or B) just get yourself in a space and think about, What are you doing that really lights you up? What part of a recent project could you not wait to do again? What do other people say you do really well? And allow yourself the brave space to have that be different than other people around you.

Maika Leibbrandt 5:31

We know that the chances of having the same strengths as somebody else in the exact same order, are about 1 in 34 million. So if you've ever been told that you're 1 in a million, they were wrong; you're much more unique than that! So allow yourself to focus on what you do well, to realize that the greatest place to grow is not just from building a deficit model of plugging all the holes or fixing weaknesses, but that you're truly going to get to world-class performance by focusing on areas that are already strong for you.

Maika Leibbrandt 6:02

Lately, I've used this, this illustration to describe strengths-based development to people. It's focus on what you -- think about your strengths right now as being the worst you're ever going to be at those things, instead of saying, "Well, this is the best I'm ever going to get." Strengths-based development raises the floor of expectations. And when you do that, that's how you get to the kind of thriving wellbeing that we know focusing on, on CliftonStrengths can bring; the kind of teamwork, the kind of productivity and boosts in engagement that really makes a difference.

Jim Collison 6:35

Maika, I think, well said. I am really looking forward to producing these throughout the year. We will be releasing one a week throughout 2021 and be putting them in their own Talent Mindfulness feed. Good news is, if you're listening to this, you've probably already found it. So you don't have to worry about that. But they'll be available one a week, as we, as we pull them out and edit them for you and give them to you, Maika, I'm really excited about providing these for people in, in the new year, in 2021. Anything else you'd add?

Maika Leibbrandt 7:05

Yeah, Jim, if you are, how do we tell other people how to find it? So for those not-so-lucky people who are not already here, what's the easiest way to direct them to Talent Mindfulness?

Jim Collison 7:14

Yeah, so just search, go to any podcast app and search, "Talent Mindfulness," or you can search "Gallup Talent Mindfulness," because we'll put all three of those words in the title as we, as we do this, and a great opportunity for them, then to subscribe or listen. But really the best way is send them a link. Like you've consumed this, ask them how and then send them a link. Kind of encourage them to do it. Walk them through it. Do it with them. Talk about this. Use it as an opportunity, share this with those that you coach. Take it with you. Give it away. We intend for this to be used and given away and all the things that, that we do. So we're excited to give it to you. And then you're welcome to just pass this on to others that you know that need it. Maika, anything else?

Maika Leibbrandt 7:58

I just love partnering with you. Thanks for doing this, Jim!

Jim Collison 8:00

It's been a great journey to do it through the Season 5 and Season 6. And Maika, I'm really looking forward to getting these out, kind of as their own -- well, not live, like we traditionally would do. But still super impactful and super powerful. So with that, we'll remind everyone to take full advantages of all the resources we do have available. If this is -- maybe you're new, maybe you came across this just in that search term, "Talent Mindfulness," and you're wondering, What is this CliftonStrengths stuff? So all our resources that are available, go to gallup.com/cliftonstrengths. And while you're there, sign up for the CliftonStrengths Insight Newsletter, available in a link at the very bottom of the page. Just scroll all the way to the bottom, put your email address in and hit Submit. You get an opportunity, and we'll send that to you each and every month, spam free. If you have any questions, or if you'd like to know more information about becoming a Gallup-Certified Strengths Coach, or maybe you need some -- you're a current coach and you need some master coaching, send us an email: coaching@gallup.com. We'll get you set up with that as well. Join us in our Facebook group: facebook.com/groups/calledtocoach. You can search "CliftonStrengths" on your favorite social platform. And we want to thank you for listening today. Hope you enjoyed it, and we hope you enjoy this series enough that you'll share it, and you'll share it with others. Thanks for coming out. With that, we'll say, Goodbye, everybody.