Forging and maintaining relationships: Every business needs relationship builders to attract customers, bind together teams and open doors for your company
Masters of empathy, building solid teams and attracting customers and talent to your business. People with skills in the relationship-building strengths domain are vital for creating and maintaining the one thing all businesses need – interconnectedness, networks and relationships.
Simply put, there wouldn’t be any business without relationships – cooperation and cohesion is the very foundation of what a company is. And, fortunately, there’s a simple and effective format for identifying the relationship builders among us, and for developing them so you can deploy them for maximum effect in your business. And it’s called strengths.

Building on Clifton Strengths (formerly StrengthsFinder), strengths helps us understand what people have to offer – see what are strengths. It features 34 strengths (themes), divided into four strengths domains. And Relationship Building is one of those domains. See the complete list of strengths.
Here we introduce the Relationship Building strengths domain, see what relationship builders bring to the table, discover the 9 specific strengths inside the domain and find out what kind of job types are best suited to people with relationship building skills. Plus: We show you how to find the relationship builders in your company.

THE RELATIONSHIP BUILDING STRENGTHS DOMAIN
People who can build and maintain relationships are what you need both inside and in your efforts outside of your company. They can be hugely important for finding and securing valuable relationships with clients and stakeholders but are internally also valuable for ensuring the health and performance of your teams.
We now know that your team’s ability to perform hinges greatly on their engagement and motivation, not to mention your company culture – all of those elements related to the social capital we know leads to increased performance. And that’s where relationship builders are most effective.

WHAT PEOPLE WITH STRENGTHS IN RELATIONSHIP BUILDING BRING TO THE TABLE
Although we tend to think of the employees in our businesses as a collective – our people, our staff. It’s important to remember that the team is still made up of individuals. And each individual’s drive and performance is what propels the entire team forward in the end.
Relationship Builders know this instinctively. They are the ones who bind together people to turn them into high-performing teams. And they do it, largely, with skills that may have been neglected in the business world of the past – they actually care. Possibly one of the most overlooked skill sets in business today, being authentic and relatable is turning out to be more valuable than intellect in business in the 21st century.
And that’s where your relationship builders excel.

THE 9 STRENGTHS IN THE RELATIONSHIP BUILDING STRENGTHS DOMAIN
1 Adaptability
People who truly live in the “now” – they’re more present, available and accepting of requests and others’ needs, which makes them approachable and able to build relationships faster.
2 Connectedness
A strong belief and understanding of the connectedness between all things – people, events, places. This skill sees them all as a valuable whole, which makes this person inherently tend towards fairness and harmony – great for keeping balance in your team.
3 Developer
People with this skill see the potential in others and live to help others achieve more. They develop people, moulding and shaping them into their potential.
4 Empathy
This skill talks to an innate ability to sense others’ feelings by being able to “imagine/see things from their perspective”. In popular media, empathy has been highlighted as one of the most vital skills in business in the 21st century.
5 Harmony
People with this skill always look for the middle ground, the consensus and agreement. They turn conflicts into resolutions. Great for dealing with customers, but also for reality-checking in teams.
6 Includer
This skill talks to people who are very aware of others – especially when they see someone is left out, they want to help include them. Vital for creating cohesion and cooperation inside your company, but also identifying possible connections outside of your business.
7 Individualization
It’s all about being intrigued by the qualities of different people – and finding ways to fit them together to make better teams. These people are good at assembling teams and assigning the right person to the job.
8 Positivity
Perhaps the ultimate image of the “people person” we have in our heads. People with this skill have contagious enthusiasm because they radiate positivity and people want to be around them. Wonderful for inspiring and driving teams forward.
9 Relator
This skill talks to an innate desire to work hard with a tight-knit group of people you know and trust. These people are good at binding together core teams that have to deliver on vital tasks.

WHAT KIND OF JOBS DO YOU NEED RELATIONSHIP BUILDERS IN?
According to Forbes.com, almost all businesses need relationship builders to create and maintain client relationships. Some specific careers are real estate agents, brokers and financial planners, doctors, any salesperson, personal services (like hairdressers, beauticians, stylists, barbers), your public relations people and business development manager.
Chron.com adds police officers, journalists, trial lawyers and politicians to the list. While Study.com advises therapists, teachers, arbitrators and mediators, as well as all your human resources staff.
In South Africa particularly, jobs portal Pnet.co.za lists specific jobs under the category of “relationship management”: Pharmacist, relationship managers in insurance, corporate and IT, account managers, trainers and customer experience staff.

HOW TO IDENTIFY THE RELATIONSHIP BUILDERS IN YOUR COMPANY
We at LifeXchange live and breathe the help businesses achieve sustainable positive change for all stakeholders. And taking a strengths-based approach in your business is proven to benefit both your company and your people immensely. Studies show that focusing on strengths improves your employee engagement, lowering staff turnover by up to 72% and boosting customer engagement by 7% and profits by up to 29%.
So, we at LifeXchange help you implement strengths in your company. We come in and help you identify all your staff’s individual strengths, and then we help you make it part of your company’s systems and processes, so you can get the maximum benefit.

Read more about LifeXchange’s strengths-based development, or speak directly to us by phoning 071 918 3217 or contacting us here.
Plus: Discover science-based organisational development with the No 1 future-first change management company.
Discover all 4 domains of strengths.

Also discover the strategic thinking, the executing strengths and influencer strengths domain.

Did you know that “conscious businesses” perform 10x better on financial indexes than their peers? It’s because they focus on building relationships. See how to do it with conscious contracts.

Here’s a simple tool to help you measure and understand company culture.

See strengths in action at one of our recent strengths sessions.

One of the big benefits of strengths-based development is that it boosts your employee engagement. Which is important, because the latest research shows that only 16% of employees are fully engaged in their work. And it’s costing you money.

Also explore: What is company culture really

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