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 Donald O. Clifton (1924-2003) was cited by the American Psychological Association as the Father of Strengths Psychology. He was a Chairman of Gallup, Inc., and the inventor of the StrengthsFinder Psychometric Evaluation. One of his favorite sayings was, “Don’t try to teach a pig to sing. It wastes your time, and it irritates the pig.”
In the 1950s, Donald Clifton was teaching psychology at the University of Nebraska. During that time, he read a report analyzing POWs from the Korean War that changed his view of what psychology should study.
The report discovered that though the POW’s experienced the lowest incidence of physical abuse in military history, they had the highest death rate of any American war – 38%. The cause of death for the vast majority of the men was not physical, it was mental and psychological. This study inspired Clifton to spend the rest of his life studying strength and the positive effeects of psychology.
He developed a philosophy based on strength. His philosophy was that trying to train people to do things that they are not inherently gifted to do is like trying to teach a pig to sing. It is better to discover what people can do well and design a job assignment around those talents.
In pursuing a philosophy of strength, the Gallup organization asked two million people one simple question, “At work, do you have the chance to do what you do best everyday?” Less than 20% said “Yes.”
That is a lot of pigs being paid to sing when they should be doing what they do best.
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