What does “strengths-based organisation” mean, and how does it work in practice? A tenet of positive psychology is that everyone has strengths and the research (including our own) consistently shows that when people are using their strengths more, they perform better for the organisation as well as being more fulfilled themselves – a genuine double win.

Strengths-based organisation is a way of working that is designed to allow this to happen. It means allocating people who have the strengths that are required for a particular role (whether through first-time recruitment or subsequent role allocation), and then giving them the space to do the things they do best.

This isn’t some utopian view of work, where you only do the things that play to your strengths (the so-called “happy-clappy” critique). It is about trying to do more of what you are best at, and less of what you struggle with (which can be done by someone else who is good at it!).

And even for CAPP as an explicitly strengths-based organisation, our weekly scores for strengths use have never been above 70-80 per cent. What are the practical results of this? In both our direct experience and our experience of applying strengths-based approaches with other organisations, we have seen a number of consistent outcomes. People are more engaged and they demonstrate increased discretionary effort, because they feel valued for what they bring to the organisation. Conversations and feedback become much more open and honest and are given in real time, because these conversations begin from a foundation of mutual recognition and respect, rather than a position of defending one’s weaknesses.

The result is a high-performance culture that inspires people to give of their best and of themselves, which then creates fulfilled employees and thriving organisations.