Does the world really need another gifts test? This I thought as I picked up Now, Discover Your Strengths (Free Press, 2001), the new business book and strengths inventory from Gallup Organization execs Marcus Buckingham and Donald O. Clifton. We already have the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, the DISC System, the Wagner-Modified Houts Spiritual Gifts Inventory, and forty or fifty competitors, cousins, and wannabes. If these haven't improved personal and team performance, what will?

Still, I mused, the dust jacket said this new inventory—dubbed StrengthsFinder.com—was developed by the Gallup Organization, based on 25 years of research and more than 2,000,000 interviews. The test could be taken online. And, hey, I'm a sucker for diagnostic tools. So I bought the book.

To take the inventory, you go to www.StrengthsFinder.com (http://www.strengthsfinder.com/) and enter a personal code that comes with the book (thus, the free test costs the $26 price of the hardcover book). There you ...