In this post, I’ve collected the most significant data points I could find to help answer the question “Why strengths?” Simply put, you might just be the world’s next best, you name it, but we’ll never know. Why? … Because we don’t spend enough time in our strengths. Worse, very few of us even know what our strengths are.

If you’re not good at something, is it a weakness? If you’re good at something, is it a strength? No, it’s not that simple. There’s a difference between natural talents or strengths, and things that you learn over time by building skills and knowledge. There are many things that when you start out, you will be unskilled. That’s not a weakness. I’ll pause right there, to let that sink in. It’s a key concept when you’re trying to figure out your strengths and weaknesses.

Thinking is probably one of the simplest things to improve that can improve you’re overall impact. At Microsoft, I’ve seen first hand the impact of skillful thinking. I like the fact that with a few techniques, people can change their game when it comes to analyzing, assessing, and responding to problems. Here’s what I’ve noticed among the smartest people I know: they control their emotions, they know what to look for, they know the right questions to ask, they know how to test assumptions, and they know how to find a way forward.

A friend shared a simple technique for improving decision making and helping prioritize. It’s 10-10-10, by Suzy Welch. You basically test your decisions against time frames to make better decisions. You can use it to improve decisions at work, life, business, love or anything really. By testing your decisions against different time frames, you expose your needs, fears, desires, and unconscious agendas. This can help you identify and live to your deepest goals and values.

Editor’s note: What does somebody who spent a year test-driving principles, tips, theories, and scientific studies on happiness think are the real keys to happiness? That’s what I wanted to know. This is a guest post on lessons learned in happiness by Gretchen Rubin. Gretchen is a best selling author and former lawyer. What’s interesting to me about Gretchen is that she studied happiness by making it a project. During The Happiness Project, Gretchen spent a year test-driving lessons in happiness from Aristotle to Oprah.

I got an email from a GM (General Manager) at Microsoft, who will be giving a presentation at Microsoft on “How To Be an Effective IC (Individual Contributor)” and he’s collecting best practices. Scott Hanselman shared his thoughts and I thought I would share mine. For this post, I attempted to boil down some of the best lessons I’ve learned for myself, that I mentor others, and that I see others put into practice.

One of the most effective ways I’ve found to save a lot of time and energy is using mentors. While nothing replaces experience, mentors can help guide you to the right experiences and avoid some unnecessary experiences. They can also help you make meaning from the experiences you have, by providing a new lens or vantage point.

You can improve your decision making by adding criteria and weight. The key is making the criteria explicit. This is effective for personal decision making, and it’s especially effective for group decision making. It works well for personal decision making because it forces you to get clarity on your own criteria. It works well for group decision making because you create a shared set of criteria. When people know what’s valued, it’s easier to understand and weigh in on the decisions.

I wrote an article for Cincom’s Expert Access on Finding Your Eye of the Tiger. It’s really about how to get going when the going gets tough. When Steve Kayser, asked me to write an article, I tried to think of what might be the most relevant, given the economy and how many people are facing new challenges in their life. It seemed to me that the most useful thing I could share was how to find your inner inspiration and drive … your eye of the tiger.

This is a follow up post to Janine’s previous guest post, Discover Your Why. In this post, Janine shares an approach to help you find your how that supports your why. When you lead with your why and your how, you can bring your best game wherever you go. What you do is simply a channel for unleashing your best why and how.

Everybody has a super hero power (or at least I haven’t found anybody yet who doesn’t.) The funny thing is, not everybody knows what their super hero power is (or at least not off the top of their head.) The people that know their super hero power and use it, find work more rewarding and they get more rewards. Why? Because they are giving their best where they have their best to give. They stand out.

Here’s a simple model I’ve been using lately to help some friends think about the infamous passion vs profit question. I actually like to think of it as a passion AND profit … and value question. It really is a simple model, but it helps highlight a couple of key points. For one thing, the saying do what you love, and the money will follow, is misleading.

PM is short for Program Manager. At Microsoft, the PM role is a fairly common role, and it can mean a lot of things, so I’ll explain a bit about what a PM does down below before we dive in. To bottom line it, you can think of a PM as a technical leader that orchestrates a product or service through planning, design, and execution. As you can imagine, this requires a variety of skills from communication and interpersonal skills to strategic thinking and execution.

In my previous post, Likeability is a Skill, we learned that likeability is something you can work at and invest in, just like working out. We also learned that improving your likeability, improves your quality of life. Now it’s time to turn that into action. Great, so how do we get going? …

Every day you make a choice about how you show up in this world – at work, in your business, in life. Some of us show up because of what we do. We measure our success by the number of product features we build, how many goods we sell, how many client calls we make. Others show up because of how they do things. Their success is measured in quality and precision, speed and efficiency, even the depth of client relationships. The third, and smallest group – are people who show up for a distinct reason. They have a cause that drives them, a belief that inspires them.

Last week, I picked up the book The Likeability Factor , by Tim Sanders. It’s a book about how the single biggest improvement you can make in your life is likability. From winning elections to having the best job … it’s all about likability, based on research. The more likeable you are, the happier your life will be.

You might have noticed that I’ve changed my tag line on my blog a few times. My latest tagline is “proven practices for getting results.” Choosing a blog tagline sounds like it should be such a simple thing and yet, it’s really not. Your tag line can make a big impact for both yourself and others. For you, your tag line can help remind you what your blog is all about and serve as a source of inspiration.

If you’ve given up on self-discipline, this post is for you. You probably have a lot of things you don’t enjoy doing. Worse, you might have a lot of things you simply don’t do because they suck. It becomes a game of self-discipline versus just doing what you enjoy. You try willing yourself into it, or beating yourself up, or you just plain giving up. That is, unless you know the secret. The secret of self-discipline is to change the why or change the how.

Being different is a good thing. We all have unique skills we bring to the table. The key is finding your unique 20 percent spike. Your 20 percent spike is your super power. It’s that skill that people can count on you for. Maybe for you it’s writing. Maybe it’s figuring out the business of things. Maybe it’s designing things. When you know what your unique 20 percent spike is, you know your most powerful tool for creating impact or earning a living.

Here is a quick look at last month’s most popular posts. It’s purely based on traffic. I might make this a monthly practice. It’s a good forcing function for me to take a look at what’s popular as well as rekindle some sparks with some of my posts. A monthly rundown also helps me see the forest from the trees and it’s a good way to stop and smell the roses …