STRENGTHS ACCUMULATOR

Purpose of the Strengths Accumulator

The Strengths Accumulator creates the opportunity for all leaders with the LAA Case Management Function to see the pattern of strengths across their team, other teams, and the overall function. This is helpful for a variety of reasons including:

  • Understanding your strengths in an explicit way is different than just on an implicit feeling level.
  • When you understand your strengths you can flex and grow them, to be the best version of yourself.
  • This can be the conversation starter for 1-1s, reviews, development, and performance conversations.
  • When you understand your strengths, you can use them to navigate situations and areas of work you find more challenging.
  • When you see the pattern of the strengths in your leadership team you can plan more effectively using all of the strengths and be intentional about how specific strengths get specific results.
  • When you see the pattern of strengths across your leadership team you can identify areas where you may need support from another team and where you can support them.
  • When you see the pattern of strengths across the wider leadership team you can untap potential and see connections between projects and strengths, change and strengths and strategy and strengths.

It’s a whole new lens through which to view the system that you are part of and provide a new language, a new set of questions which will in turn change the conversation. Big picture: change the conversation and you can change the culture. Small picture: each person understands their strengths and can use this knowledge to embark on development areas, career opportunities and challenges in a different way.

ACCUMULATOR RESULTS

STRATEGIC OVERVIEW

OVERVIEW CLIFTON STRENGTHS FINDER

The Clifton StrengthsFinder identifies three keys to being an effective leader: knowing your strengths and investing in others’ strengths, getting people with the right strengths on your team, and understanding and meeting the needs of those who look to you for leadership.

There are four domains, with 34 signature strengths presented and analysed for each team which will help to establish a universal ‘strengths’ language across the Legal Aid Case Management Function.

OVERVIEW TO STRENGTHS DOMAINS

  • Executing: Teams that have a dominant strengths profile in this key domain know how to rally around a goal and get things done. Differing strengths might dictate the style of getting to the goal, but teams who have strengths in this area make a massive contribution to things happening.
  • Influencing: Teams that have a dominant strengths profile in this key domain know how to share and embed the ideas both inside and outside the organisation. These teams are natural persuaders, inspire others to adopt their ideas and are vital to moving forward in communities.
  • Relationship Building: Teams that have a dominant strengths profile in this key domain tend to keep the team and wider stakeholder groups together. They’re the social glue: the mortar between the foundation building blocks. They know how to create and maintain groups such that the whole is much greater than its parts.
  • Strategic Thinking: Teams that have a dominant strengths profile in this key domain tend to force the team/organisation to look at the big picture and toward the future – what might be. Always reviewing the data and applying what they learn, strategic thinkers move the organisation forward – stretching its members to think beyond the here and now, to the possibilities of the future.

BIG PICTURE RESULTS

Within the LAA Case Management Function 165 leaders from all levels, across all teams, submitted their strengths to the accumulator.

CIVIL CASE MANAGEMENT

84 people submitted their strengths to the accumulator for this team.

CRIME CASE MANAGEMENT

52 people submitted their strengths to the accumulator for this team.

CASE MANAGEMENT IMPROVEMENT TEAM (CMIT)

16 people submitted their strengths to the accumulator for this team.

CASE MANAGEMENT OPERATIONAL LEADERSHIP TEAM

26 people submitted their strengths to the accumulator for this team.

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

  • There is no statistically significant difference between the strength’s profiles of the three large core teams, or the Operational Leadership Team.
  • Each team has 40%-50% representation in Relationship Building.
  • Within the Relationship Building Domain five out of nine strengths are covered: Empathy/Harmony/Developer/Relator and Positivity.
  • In the Relationship Building Domain, all teams have Developer, with 43% of people across the 157 people reporting this strength.
  • In the Relationship Building Domain, all teams have either Empathy or Harmony (with CMIT having both) with 77% of people across the 157 people reporting one or both of these strengths.
  • This dominance is visible in all the smaller teams that also have their dominant representation in Relationship Building.
  • Influencing has the lowest representation across the three large core teams and the Operational Leadership Team. This is in line with results observed across public sector teams at all levels within UK public sector organisations.
  • Executing is around 30% across all of the three core teams and the Operational Leadership Team, unsurprising given the process driven nature of the work.
  • Strategic Thinking is highest in the Operational Leadership Team and is otherwise comparable across the three large core teams.

WHAT DOES IT MEAN FOR LAA CASE MANAGEMENT AS A FUNCTION

  • Extreme talent for building relationships, internally and externally with customers and stakeholders.
  • A propensity to ‘not rock the boat’ impeding important conversations, assertiveness and clarity around expectations across the board, likely to be impacting culture, accountability and autonomy.
  • Consistent and accountable in how the work is done which may be at a cost to personal reflection, restorative practice, and learning.
  • Influence likely to be coming from the relationship building strengths, building trust, listening and caring.
  • Opportunities may be being missed to shout a bit more explicitly about what is being achieved, and to be more radical around change.
  • Strategically aware within each of core large areas. Potentially this strategic awareness is not across the wider whole function, missing opportunities for cross team development and relationship building.

OBSERVATIONS AND QUESTIONS: SEEK FIRST TO UNDERSTAND AND THEN BE UNDERSTOOD

  • Clear is kind. Unassertive feedback and challenge does not help anyone.
  • How might you ensure that you use the Relationship Building strengths to have the conversations that are being avoided?
  • Task drives behaviour.
  • How might you ensure that the Executing strengths, are aligned to the Developer strengths from Relationship Building (getting it done and learning as part of the process)?
  • Influencers spread energy.
  • How might you ensure that the people that have this preference are invited into spaces they currently may not be?
  • Culture eats strategy for breakfast.
  • How might you use your dominant relational culture to effectively make strategy meaningful at all levels?

IN SOME DETAIL

165 LEADERS FROM LAA CASE MANAGEMENT FUNCTION

EXECUTING DOMAIN

People with these signature strengths like to make things happen. They stay focussed on the goal and turn ideas into actions. 27% of the strengths reported are in this domain.

The team profile demonstrates a spread across the domain, Consistency, Arranger and Responsibility the dominant signature strengths.

INFLUENCING DOMAIN

People with these signature strengths like to sell ideas and get people enthused and motivated. They are confident and will willingly take charge and speak up. They are generally creative and energetic and love to work with and through people. 10% of the strengths reported are in this domain.

The team profile demonstrates some preference within this domain, Communication, Woo and Maximiser the dominant signature strengths. The majority of influencing will be carried out from the other three domains.

RELATIONSHIP BUILDING DOMAIN

People with these signature strengths like to make sure the team is working and care about the team wellbeing. They are driven and people focussed and like to get others involved. 47% of the strengths reported are in this domain.

The team profile demonstrates a strong preference within this domain, Developer, Empathy, and Harmony the dominant signature strengths.

STRATEGIC THINKING DOMAIN

People strong in these signature strengths are future focussed, decision makers, and opportunists who are always reviewing information and data and applying what they learn. 16% of the strengths reported are in this domain.

The team profile demonstrates a spread across this domain, Analytical, Learner and Strategic the dominant signature strengths.

COMING NEXT

Information and analysis on every team follows this overview. As leaders you can use this to help you to think about how you collectively impact each piece of work that you do. There will be an opportunity for each team to attend a workshop to look at their specific strengths pattern, how to maximise the impact and minimise the shadow side of these.

TEAM ANALYSES