StandOut.

• Author: Sweeney, Paul
• Position: Corporate management

Diana is an enthusiastic, award-winning manager at a Hampton Inn & Suites in Ephrata, Pa., who credits much of her operational success to (are you ready for this?) turtles.

[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]

[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]

Sound a trifle strange? What does the humble tortoise have to do with lodging people in the heart of Pennsylvania Dutch country? But the innkeeper is as serious as the United States unemployment rate is high. The turtle, she says, sets a wonderful example. "Like the turtle, we won't make any progress until we stick our necks out," Diana declares.

Her employees embraced the terrapin as their mascot--so much so that "employees of the month" have been recast as "turtles of the month" --- and the program is so effective that Diana has been touting the amphibian mascot to colleagues elsewhere.

But management guru Marcus Cunningham has found that the magic is not easily transferred. The worst thing that a company can do, best-selling author Cunningham argues in StandOut, his most recent book, would be to standardize such a quirky campaign into mass production.

A practice that sprang up in the fertile soil of Amish country would likely wither on the vine elsewhere. The author cites numerous studies--one of high school principals, another of top leaders at Habitat for Humanity, yet another of emergency room nurses--that find a common thread: "Extraordinary results can be accomplished in radically different ways."

"What your organization wants are not the few innovations that can be scaled to the many," Buckingham writes. "Instead, what your organization wants are many (his italics) practical innovations and a way to deliver these innovations to those few people who share the strengths of the person who dreamed up each one of them."

In other words, organizations are at their best when managers can unleash the genius that lies within each individual. To harness those gifts and infuse organizations with creativity and drive, he proposes that businesses conduct a "strengths assessment" to discover each employee's "distinctive edge."

Once employees' strengths are recognized--there's an interactive website at http://standout.tmbc.com/gui/--Buckingham proposes fitting them into one of nine "Strength Roles:" Advisor, Connector, Creator, Equalizer, Influences Pioneer, Provider, Stimulator or Teacher.

There is not space enough to tally up the distinguishing features for each role. But consider just one, "Equalizer." The Equalizer is...