The Difference Between a Gift (talent) and a Strength

The Gallup organization says a strength is the ability to consistently provide near-perfect performance in a specific activity. They define talents as naturally recurring patterns of thought, feeling, or behavior that can be productively applied.

Talent  x  Investment = Strength

Talent = A natural way of thinking, feeling, or behaving.
Investment  =  time spent practicing, developing skills, and increasing knowledge base
Strength = the ability to consistently provide near-perfect performance.

The Gallup definitions are the best I’ve found in my research. To create a Strength, you need to combine your talents with knowledge, skills, time spent practicing, and hard work. To build a fully developed strength, you need to identify your most dominant talents and then develop them by adding acquired knowledge, skills, and investment of time and hard work.

It’s important to note that talents are innate and cannot be acquired. In other words, talents are genetic. Because of that, talents are always the foundation of a strength. In fact, even though skills, knowledge, time, and hard work are all important, talent is more important to developing a strength than all of them. You always need a talent to develop a strength and without a talent, you can’t get a strength.

To show the difference between talents and strengths, Gallup uses the following examples:

“Being drawn toward strangers and enjoying the challenge of making a connection with them are talents (from the Woo theme), whereas the ability to consistently build a network of supporters who know you and are prepared to help you is a strength. To build this strength, you have refined your talents with skills and knowledge.

Likewise, the tendency to confront others is a talent (from the Command theme), whereas the ability to sell successfully is a strength. To persuade others to buy your product, you must have combined your talent with product knowledge and certain selling skills”

For more about Gallups work on talents and strengths, read their book, Strengths Finder 2.0