What do you enjoy doing? What makes you feel energetic? What do you do well? These are no ordinary questions.

Answers to the above questions can lead you to the most precious asset you have for building a successful career: Your strengths.

Why bother about strengths? If you use our strengths, you will enjoy your work and give your best performance. Opposite is also true. Failing to use your own strengths is a recipe for boredom and mediocre performance at work.

You may wonder if you have any strength in the first place. Indeed, when people see a great musician, painter, orator or sportsman perform, they recognise readily his strength. But they fail to ask themselves what their own strengths are and quietly assume they have none.

There are three main reasons why people fail to leverage on their own strengths. First, what you are good at comes easily to you. Therefore, you may take it for granted. For example, if your strength lies in planning, you may find this activity so easy that it may not appear as anything special to you.

Second, your strengths may be such that you may not be able to publicly express them, unlike in the case of a painter or musician. Therefore, no one, including you, recognises them.

Third, since many people do not recognise their strengths, they fail to develop them. As a result, the strengths remain dormant, like an unpolished diamond.

Here's how you can spot your own strengths if you don't already know them:

1. Feelings
Pay attention to the activities that give you a feeling of joy or enjoyment. That's a clue to your strengths.

2. Energy
Do you suddenly feel energised while doing certain activities? If yes, that's another clue to your strengths.

3. Achievements
Look at all your past achievements and see if you can detect a pattern of specific activities. If you can, these particular activities are nothing but expressions of your strengths.

4. Excellence
Find out what you excel at consistently. That's a definite clue to your strengths.

5. Compliments
Interestingly, people can identify others' strengths (and weaknesses) quite easily. If you can notice others' strengths, they too can notice yours. So, if someone compliments you for good work, pay attention. He may be pointing at your strengths unconsciously.