Clear Communication, Stronger Trust, Better Retention: Relationship Building Strengths for Agency Owners
A Deep Dive Into the Relationship Building Domain of CliftonStrengths
CliftonStrengths is a powerful tool that helps you understand how people naturally communicate, connect, collaborate, and build trust. It organizes these talents into four domains: Executing, Influencing, Relationship Building, and Strategic Thinking. If you need the full overview of all four domains, you can explore each domain here.
The Relationship Building domain determines whether your agency can maintain trust, cohesion, and emotional stability when the work gets chaotic. These strengths influence whether clients feel supported, whether Account Managers can handle tough conversations, and whether your team stays aligned rather than spiraling into resentment and miscommunication.
There are nine strengths in this domain:
Adaptability
Connectedness
Developer
Empathy
Harmony
Includer
Individualization
Positivity
Relator
Here’s how these strengths show up in a marketing agency and how to leverage them to prevent communication breakdowns, team conflict, and client churn.
1. Adaptability
Team members with the Adaptability strength stay calm when plans shift. They handle moving deadlines, shifting priorities, and last-minute client changes without panicking.
In an agency, this helps keep projects from melting down every time a brief evolves or a client pivots.
When used well:
They stabilize teams, absorb change without creating drama, and keep clients calm because they don’t spiral themselves.
When mismanaged:
They get stuck reacting instead of planning. They become the dumping ground for every urgent request. Chaos becomes normalized.
How to leverage them:
Put them in roles where flexibility is an asset, not a liability. Use them during messy transitions or when a client relationship is in flux.
2. Connectedness
Connectedness sees the bigger picture and how people, decisions, and outcomes tie together.
In an agency, they help teams remember that everyone is working toward the same client outcome, even when tensions rise.
When used well:
They unify the team, reduce internal turf wars, and help people find common ground in tough moments.
When mismanaged:
They get ignored as the team fractures. They get labeled as overly philosophical when things feel chaotic.
How to leverage them:
Use them to facilitate cross-team collaboration and restore alignment when teams start drifting into silos.
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3. Developer
A Developer spots potential in others and helps them grow.
In an agency, they help newer Account Managers, Coordinators, and Specialists ramp up without feeling lost.
When used well:
Your junior team levels up faster, feedback becomes normal instead of scary, and people feel supported instead of judged.
When mismanaged:
Developers burn out from being the team therapist. They spend more time coaching than doing their core job.
How to leverage them:
Give them structured coaching moments, not endless open-ended support. Use them intentionally to accelerate onboarding and skill development.
4. Empathy
Individuals with the Empathy strength read emotions quickly and accurately. They pick up signals most people miss.
In an agency, this is invaluable when clients ghost your meetings, get frustrated with deliverables, or start signaling dissatisfaction.
When used well:
They catch emotional cracks before they become churn events, de-escalate tense conversations, and help Account Managers communicate with nuance.
When mismanaged:
They absorb everyone’s stress, become emotional sponges, and quietly burn out.
How to leverage them:
Use them as early warning systems in client relationships. Pair them with more direct communicators to balance tone and clarity.
5. Harmony
Harmony wants alignment, agreement, and reduced conflict.
In an agency, this helps prevent debates from turning into turf wars or endless Slack battles.
When used well:
They defuse tension and help teams move forward without unnecessary drama.
When mismanaged:
They avoid necessary conflict until it turns into a blowup. They smooth things over instead of solving root issues.
How to leverage them:
Use them in conflict resolution and facilitation. Let them guide discussions toward shared goals, not toward avoiding hard truths.
6. Includer
Includers makes sure no one is left out or ignored.
In an agency, they ensure quieter teammates get seen, heard, and involved.
When used well:
You get better brainstorming, more diverse thinking, and fewer situations where someone quits because they felt invisible.
When mismanaged:
They overextend themselves or pull too many people into conversations that don’t need more cooks.
How to leverage them:
Use them to maintain cultural health. Let them run team rituals, onboarding experiences, or meeting formats that ensure equitable participation.
7. Individualization
Team members with the Individualization strength understand what makes each person unique.
In an agency, they help ensure Account Managers, Strategists, and Creatives aren’t treated like interchangeable production units and that they’re involved in exactly the right task.
When used well:
They match people to the right clients, right roles, and right responsibilities. Morale increases. Performance increases.
When mismanaged:
They get stuck customizing everything and lose efficiency. Or, they can’t unsee nuance no one else wants or is able to deal with.
How to leverage them:
Use them in staffing decisions, role alignment, and feedback discussions. They help people feel seen and deployed wisely.
8. Positivity
You can feel it when someone with the Positivity strength energizes the team. They keep momentum alive and bring optimism when morale dips.
In an agency, this matters more than most owners realize. Low morale kills margins in a thousand little ways, whether it’s team productivity, client churn, or closing deals.
When used well:
They lift the room, help people recover from setbacks, and make deadlines feel doable instead of crushing.
When mismanaged:
They get dismissed as naive or they become the unofficial cheerleader, expected to fix everyone’s mood.
How to leverage them:
Give them moments to energize the team without expecting them to fix systemic issues. Use them in kickoff calls, celebrations, or tough weeks.
9. Relator
The Relator strength builds deep, authentic relationships.
In an agency, they form strong bonds with clients and teammates, which can be a major stabilizer in turbulent seasons.
When used well:
They build long-term relationships with clients, teammates feel connected, and trust runs deep.
When mismanaged:
They become too enmeshed, lose boundaries, or take things personally when clients or teammates disappoint them.
How to leverage them:
Use them in long-term client accounts or team leadership roles where depth of relationship drives retention.
Why This Matters for Client Retention
Relationship Building strengths directly impact whether clients trust you, stay with you, and view your agency as a partner instead of a vendor.
When these strengths are missing or misused:
Clients feel neglected or emotionally disconnected from the agency
Account Managers communicate without nuance, damaging relationships
Team conflicts simmer and eventually explode
Misalignment poisons projects from the inside
Quiet contributors feel invisible and disengage
Burnout spreads because no one feels supported
Turnover increases, and clients follow the departing talent out the door
Every piece of client retention is human and humans rely on Relationship Building strengths to stay connected, aligned, and committed.
If you want clients to stay, renew, and refer, you need people who naturally build trust, strengthen communication, and maintain cohesion.
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