By Barry Morgan on 05/06/25

After discovering your interests with the JS-Interest Explorer, the next step on your job search journey is identifying what you bring to the table.

That’s where the JS-Strengths Identifier steps in. You can find it via the Job Search Intro/Self Discovery on the menu to the left.

Many job seekers — especially students and adults in transition — struggle to recognize their own strengths. They often undervalue what they're good at, overlook transferable skills, or get stuck using generic phrases like “hard worker” or “team player.” This tool will help change that.

What is the JS-Strengths Identifier?

The JS-Strengths Identifier is a guided GPT-powered tool that helps you:

• Reflect on your experiences — from school, volunteer work, jobs, or hobbies

• Identify personal and professional strengths tied to real achievements

• Discover how your strengths align with different work environments

• Translate those strengths into powerful resume language and interview stories

Why It Matters

Confidence in a job search doesn't come from a perfect resume. It comes from knowing why you're a great fit and being able to explain it clearly. Employers want to know how you'll add value — and this tool helps you show them.

Think of it as your personal spotlight: It doesn’t create your strengths, it helps you see and articulate what’s already there.

How to Use It

• Set aside 15–20 minutes in a quiet space

• Think of situations where you felt capable, energized, or proud

• Use the GPT to explore patterns and match your strengths to job types

• Capture the results in your Job Search Workbook or digital career journal

You can run the GPT multiple times to focus on different roles or industries. Many users repeat it weekly while building confidence for interviews and networking.

What Happens Next?

Once you’ve explored your strengths, you’re ready to move on to the next GPT in the JS-Series — the JS-Skills Profiler, where we connect your strengths and interests to specific career paths and build a map of the hard and soft skills you’ll need along the way. Keep an eye on this spot.  I will be adding a new GPT every week.

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Want to Try It for Free?
Contact us via our website

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When it comes to launching your job search, most people start in the middle — polishing a resume, scrolling job boards, or asking friends if they’ve heard of any openings. But what if your job search started somewhere better?

What if it started with clarity?

That’s what the JS-GPT Series is designed to do. This collection of customized GPTs guides you through every phase of your career-building journey — from discovering your interests to preparing for interviews and ongoing development once you land the job. It's a digital toolkit that empowers you to think strategically, reflect deeply, and act confidently. And it starts with one essential question:

“What do I want to do?”

That’s where the JS-Interest Explorer comes in.

Why Start with the JS-Interest Explorer?

The JS-Interest Explorer isn’t just a warm-up activity — it’s the foundation of your entire job search strategy.

Most job seekers skip this step and head straight for the application process. But without clarity on what energizes you, where you thrive, or what kind of work aligns with your natural curiosity, you risk spending hours chasing roles that won’t fit — or worse, landing a job you’ll want to leave in six months.

This tool guides you through a thoughtful reflection process using questions about your hobbies, past achievements, ideal workday, and preferences around tasks and environments. From there, it helps you:

• Identify top interest themes

• Explore what kind of work energizes you

• Clarify what kind of environments help you do your best work

• Begin mapping career paths that align with your personality and purpose

It’s not about picking one perfect job — it’s about unlocking a range of roles and industries that make sense for you.

How to Use It

1. Launch the JS-Interest Explorer from the Job Search Intro Menu

2. Answer a short set of guided prompts

3. Review the themes it generates

4. Use those results as your lens for the next tools in the series — like resume writing, LinkedIn updates, and job board searches

Tip: Once you’ve run the Interest Explorer, save or export your output — it can become your personal mission statement, a guide for informational interviews, or even the foundation for your LinkedIn "About" section.

Why It Matters

Today’s hiring landscape values authenticity and alignment more than ever. Recruiters and employers aren’t just looking for skills — they want to hire people who are motivated, purpose-driven, and aligned with the work.

The JS-Interest Explorer helps you show up that way — not just on paper, but in conversation and connection.

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Often we are told that the first step to building a solid business plan is to develop a future vision for your organization, and mission and values.  Perhaps!  But knowing what YOU want to achieve does not move you forward very effectively in terms of what your customers or members need and expect.  A better question than, "What do we want to do", might be "Which needs (of our customer) can we best fulfil".  To answer the former, we need to look inwards and understand our organization's capabilities.  However, to answer the latter we must understand our customer's needs intimately.  Armed with this information our introspection takes on more purpose and value and determining which of our capabilities will best deliver on the customers' expectations becomes a much more efficient process.   Conducting extensive research on existing customer is, in my opinion,  much more useful than corporate navel gazing in a vacuum.

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There is so much power and success locked away in every organization.  Drawing forth the employees' engagement and empowering their creativity is every leader's challenge. And a challenge that is only more difficult if the structure of the organization works against it.

By definition, a traditional top down hierarchy concentrates power towards the top.  Engaging the grass roots necessitates giving people a voice throughout the organization.  But consensus decision making tends to be an arduous process.  Herein lies the dilemma.

It may be time to begin to explore another alternative in how we govern our organizations. "Dynamic Governance" unlocks the trust, transparency and equivalence that is necessary to make distributed leadership possible. This approach facilitates the development of extraordinary leaders, focused teams, and effective operations.  Efficient, focused decision making at all levels makes the organization flexible without sacrificing the organization's Vision, Values and Mission.  In fact, organizations that use this method of governance spend less time in meetings, and create a working environment where employees are engaged, accountable and inspired.

For a brief outline of this concept: http://www.asaecenter.org/Resources/ANowDetail.cfm?ItemNumber=18309

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With the arrival of fall and the closing of yet another summer season, this is a great time to take stock of Member opinion and develop a list of priorities to improve Member satisfaction for next year.  Member's opinions are still fresh in their minds as the season winds down.  They welcome an opportunity to tell you what they liked and where services might be improved. 

Membership input is extremely valuable to the success of your operation.  By acting on what you will learn in an end of season survey, you are almost guaranteed that next season will be better than the last.   The winter season provides the time needed to implement strategies.  It also offers plenty of chances for you to communicate what you learned in the survey and how you intended to address issues raised by the Membership.  This alone heightens Member's awareness that the Management Team is responsive. 

In addition the survey will provide you with a concise list of Club strengths and membership concerns and opportunities for improvement.  Armed with a clear focus on what needs to be done you can budget accordingly, and direct your limited resources where they will have the most impact.

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The New Year is always a good time to stop, reflect, and move forward in efforts to enhance the service being provided to Members and guests.   In order to improve anything, in other words to get different and hopefully better results, it is usually necessary to do things differently.  And doing thing differently can only be achieved long term by changing the way you think.  Attempting to change the way you do anything, from losing weight to implementing a more effective communication system at the club, requires a change of mindset in order to succeed long term.  If how you think about a goal or process remains the same, and you attempt to take different actions, your results may change short term, but in the long run you inevitably slip back into old habits.  Facilitating real change, requires the courage to step back and look objectively at your past performance, be open to changing your systems to make the impossible possible.  For example, if you have resigned yourself to the impossibility of ensuring that every Member always receives a prompt and appropriate response to their input, it is unlikely that it can happen.  However, its not hard to accept that being continually in touch with your membership and being responsive to their concerns and issues is a great first step to enhancing the service you provide.  Armed with this overarching objective,  making improvements in responsiveness then becomes a simple matter of ensuring your systems are actually facilitating effective interaction. CCMIS has developed a Member Input Tracking System  for precisely this purpose.

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While occasional surveys of the entire membership are an good tool for measuring Member satisfaction, it is also important to keep tabs on ongoing issues that may arise between formal reviews. 

A system that encourages members to provide "on the spot" input offers the opportunity to capture immediate concerns in a timely manner.  A prompt response by an appropriate individual within your organisation helps reinforce the perception of responsiveness by ensuring that every comment receives a response and that nothing slips through the cracks.

Tracking input over an extended period can also be helpful in providing indications of recurring issues and possibly trends that warrant further investigation.

As a companion to a more comprehensive review, a system to encourage and track ongoing input can also serve as a means to test the results of action initiated in response to the review's results. To view such a system follow the surveys tab on the sidebar menu.

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The best time... no, the only time to conduct a survey is when you are prepared to act on the results.  Surveys which do not lead to action dash the expectations they invariably create.  When a survey is conducted, your participants make an effort to provide a response.  This effort deserves that something be done as a result of what is learned.

Determining what actions you plan to take in response what you will learn, prior to developing the survey, helps ensure that the questions you ask get you the information you need.

If your business is seasonal, be sure to time your surveys so that you will have enough time to meet the expectations of your participants.  Mid-season surveys offer an opportunity to address issues prior to the end of the season.  End of season reviews provide an opportunity to develop strategies prior to the start of the next season.  Early season reviews highlight deficiencies in training, or service that can quickly be addressed.

When the survey is ready for release, properly timing the release and reminders can improve the response and completion rate.  Studies by SurveyGizmo indicate that Tuesday surveys tend to get the highest response rate, but that more surveys are completed on Fridays.

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When you decide to conduct a survey of your organisation's stakeholders, the first questions to ask are, "What do I need to know?", "Why do need to know it?", and most importantly, "What do I plan to do with this knowledge when I find out?”

These questions help establish the goals you wish to achieve with your survey and bring focus and clarity to the survey development process.    If you know exactly what you are trying to learn as a result of this survey, the task of formulating the questions to draw an unambiguous response from your stakeholders is easier.

If the survey is properly designed, you may discover insights you had not anticipated when the results are tabulated and analysed. This additional wisdom is a bonus and may add depth and understanding to help facilitate use of the results.

But if you didn't know what you needed to know before you started, the challenge of recognizing what you may have learned increases significantly, and most certainly the opportunity to take action on these "unexpected" results is diminished.

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Survey results that do not spark meaningful action are wasted effort or worse.  When you ask your membership, residents, clients, or customers for input, a level of expectation is created, that someone will act on the results.  Actions taken based on what is learned, validate not only the purpose of the survey itself, but also the energy and effort put forth by those who participated in the survey.

Starting with a purpose in mind helps formulate effective research.  Knowing what you want to learn and what you intend to do with this knowledge, helps design appropriate questions and helps ensure that the initiatives based on the information gained are focused and more likely to succeed.

When considering a survey, establish clear objectives BEFORE you start writing out the questions. Once you have determined what you what to acheive, you are better able to decide what you need to know.  Armed with a plan you will be much more efficient in developing the tools and resources needed to succeed.

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