## HOW YOU CAN THRIVE You have a need to collect and archive. You may accumulate information, ideas, artifacts or even relationships. ## WHY YOUR INPUT IS UNIQUE These personalized Strengths Insights are specific to your results. Driven by your talents, you periodically engage in conversations that might allow you to showcase some of your knowledge on a wide range of topics or in a particular area of specialization. Chances are good that you may want to acquire additional knowledge or gain new skills. Why? Perhaps you are naturally curious. Now and then, you work alone to help yourself commit information to memory. You might have a solitary place where you can practice a particular art, craft, sport, or science. Instinctively, you periodically seek out experts when you need information or guidance to decide on a proper course of action. You might study the difficult-to-understand words used most frequently by these specialists. Armed with a new language, you may approach several individuals to discover when your ideas about what to do align with theirs. Perhaps your intent is to benefit from their expertise rather than argue that your approach is correct regardless of what they think. Because of your strengths, you may be fascinated by the written word. Particular books, magazines, newspapers, correspondence or websites intrigue you. Whether you choose fiction or nonfiction, you might enjoy facts and insights into human behavior. Ordinary and extraordinary experiences, philosophies of life, or research findings might captivate you. Guided by your interests, perhaps you can add a few ideas to your storehouse of knowledge when you take time to read. By nature, you might expect to be kept in the information loop. Sometimes you want to know everything that is happening. You may desire to be kept abreast of any changes, even those that do not directly affect you. This partially explains why you can become upset or frustrated when someone accidentally or intentionally fails to pass along news about certain projects, deadlines, discoveries, problems, or successes. ## WHY YOU SUCCEED USING INPUT You seek and store information. Your pursuit of mastery and access to knowledge empowers you to make credible and well-informed decisions. ## INPUT STRENGTH – TAKE ACTION TO MAXIMIZE YOUR POTENTIAL ### Mantra > *“Keep exploring; always be curious.”* ^8c3455 - **Find out more about areas you want to specialize in.** Consider jobs or volunteer opportunities where you can acquire and share information every day, such as teaching, journalism or research work - **Regularly read books and articles that motivate you.** Increase your vocabulary by collecting new words and learning their meaning. - **Devise a system to store and easily locate information you have found so you can access it quickly.** Use whatever approach works best for you — a file for articles you have saved, a database or spreadsheet, or a list of your favorite websites. - **Position yourself as an expert.** Share your exceptional archive of facts, data and ideas with others when they need help or advice. - **Seek out subject-matter experts who would be interested in knowing what you are learning** and who would find it stimulating to hear about the questions and ideas you generate through your exploration. ## WATCH OUT FOR BLIND SPOTS - **Unrestrained input can lead to intellectual or physical clutter.** Consider occasionally taking inventory and purging what you don’t need so that your surroundings — and your mind — don’t become overloaded. - **You might have a tendency to give people so much information or so many resources that you can overload and overwhelm them.** Before you share your discoveries with others, consider sorting out what is most meaningful so they don’t lose interest.