DataDome Blog

In our previous sales article we discussed some of the common mistakes made when hiring a salesperson. At the heart of that discussion was an assumption that not all products, services, sales cultures or industries are alike. What works well as a sales approach in one industry may not translate well to another. Each company has it’s own policies, systems, sales training methods, etc. and it is essential to understand that what makes a great salesperson at another company may make a misfit at your own.

To unlock the riddle of what makes a great salesperson at your company there are three critical questions to ask:

1) What are you selling?
Is it a product or a service? Complicated or easy to explain? Does it require training? Configuration? Ongoing support? Is it an impulse buy or require multi-departmental approval? Does your great salesperson need technical know-how, a skill at pushing for decisions, a meticulous approach to fact gathering, a knack for navigating the client’s bureaucracies, etc?

2) Who do you sell to?
Who are your buyers? Are there consistencies of personalities, communications styles, behaviors? How many decision makers are involved in the process? Is it B2B, B2C or B2G? Does your great salesperson need to make her case to fact-checkers or is he building up an emotional appeal? Or do they need to be able to communicate with both and every communication style between?

3) Who are you?
What kind of sales environment do you provide? Your training? Your procedures and reporting? Are your salespeople expected to handle their own administration duties? Do they work closely with technical sales engineers? Is your culture collaborative or competitive? Are they expected to bring back marketing feedback or follow up on support issues? Does your great salesperson have the skills to recognize different behaviors and the aptitude to adjust to those requirements as needed?

As you can see these questions open up doors to examining the behavioral requirements, attitudes and communication adaptability demanded of your salespeople. These become the foundation for creating a criteria for a great salesperson that is customized for your unique situation. Or to put it another way, it is hard to find the right peg if you don’t know whether you’ve got a round or square hole.

Improving sales performance requires educating your salespeople and improving their ability to recognize and adapt to behavioral and communication styles that may not match their own. At Data Dome we specialize in using the science of behavioral analysis to unlock the keys to better performance, improved team dynamics and creating the best fits for your organization to thrive. Data Dome has the tools and processes to help you build the target profile(s) for successful selling. We ask these three questions (and a whole lot more) so that we can help you bring in the best fits for your culture, market and growth.

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In a recent article in Fortune / CNNMoney.com author, Ethan Rouen, points out the importance (and challenges) of finding a cultural fit when hiring job candidates. We agree in general that attitudes, motivations and behaviors are highly important as predictors of a job candidate’s long term success in an organization, even more so in many cases than the surface description of skills and experience found in a typical résumé. However we feel that the author may not be aware of all the tools and best practices that have been developed to assist hiring managers in gathering data to make critical hiring decisions that encompass corporate values and cultural considerations.

The author refers to a source, Brian Kropp from Corporate Executive Board, as saying, “The use of psychometric tests to gauge a candidate’s fit continues to increase in popularity, especially in Europe, Kropp says. These tests are a somewhat more scientific way to measure something that is, in reality, immeasurable.” This statement seems somewhat contradictory and unintentionally misleading: there exists many tools backed by scientific study and years of field usage that are able to measure and provide profile data for such diverse concepts as behavioral styles, attitudes, and motivators. Although there is no single assessment that encompasses such a broad concept as culture, the use of multiple assessments can provide reliable data to make far more informed decisions regarding the cultural fit of a given individual.

The source, Kropp, also points out that “some companies are providing detailed information about the company and its culture in the postings” in an effort to provide the information required for a job candidate to self-select on cultural fit. The author makes the point that some candidates will try for a job even though they know they are not a cultural fit. This certainly correlates with findings such as those from executive recruiters Christian & Timbers, which found in a survey of 7000 résumés that 23% of executives misrepresented their accomplishments. However, we think it is also important to note that without the use of any objective tools to measure these factors, a candidate may simply not know whether they are a fit or not, and that there may also be times that the company is the one providing an unrealistic portrait of their actual culture due to either lack of true understanding or a deliberate attempt to paint a rosier picture of the working environment in the hopes of attracting better candidates (or indeed a blend of both of the above).

Perhaps the most troubling point in the article is again made by way of a quote from Mr. Kropp, “‘The best way is not to test,’ Kropp says. ‘Like people like to spend time with like people. That is where networks come in.’” This can actually be a dangerous approach for companies to take. In fact, we consider it to be the #1 hiring mistake due to an increased likelihood of creating unbalanced teams. For organizations to thrive they require a diverse set of skills and behaviors. While some cultural consistency may indeed come from a network-sourced approach, this must be counter-balanced by objective measurement and strategic selection to make sure that the behaviors and attitudes needed to get the needed work done haven’t been glossed over in an effort to simply find people who get along. As an example an employee tasked with recruiting from her network, who also happens to be a people-pleaser by nature, might be overly biased toward other individuals who share her people-pleasing habit. This might seem innocuous at first, however, it could lead to a misfit if the position to be filled is in fact better suited to a candidate with, for example, a less people-pleasing disposition and a higher emphasis on compliance such as a role that involves enforcement of rules and procedures even if that sometimes means making unpopular decisions.

At Data Dome we do believe highly in the importance of looking beyond the résumé data to more deeply understand the attitudes and motivators that are vital to success, however we disagree strongly with the notion that testing is unable to provide vital information for making hiring choices, not when objective and well-respected tools are available to take guesswork out of the selection process. Using these tools and approaches we’ve reduced turnover in some positions by as much as 75%, and turnover costs are just the tip of the iceberg: companies can suffer profoundly from the hidden costs of eroding morale, miscommunication, and poor productivity that can fester in these situations. Assessments, when used properly, have proven their effectiveness and dependability in matching candidates for lasting organizational fits. Studies have shown assessments to be 4 times as effective as information derived from the interview process, which is typically only between 12% and 20% useful:

“Most people are still hired on the basis of an interview alone. Statistics prove that decisions based on interviews alone are accurate only 14% of the time. That means we have the chance to be wrong 86% of the time in the hiring of top performing individuals.” Michigan State University Study, John Hunter and Rhonda Hunter, “Validity and Utility of Alternative Predictors of Job Performance”, Psychology Bulletin, Vol. 96, No. 1, 1984, p. 90 (links to pdf)

Building a hiring strategy based not just on pre-employment selection, but also developing a foundation of understanding behaviors, motivators and attitudes throughout an organization will reap substantial long term benefits in reduced turnover costs, stronger team development, increased morale and overall productivity.

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Before we get into the discussion of smiles and DISC behavior, let’s set the mood – Cue the music, you may remember the lesson from the classic old song Smile‘s lyrics: “Smile though your heart is aching
Smile even though its breaking
When there are clouds in the sky, you’ll get by…”

Or maybe not. In a recent article published by Michigan State University makes the case that there is a big difference for workers who “fake” a smile to appear happy when they are not, versus those who actually develop positive thoughts and smile as a result. According to Brent Scott, an MSU Assistant Professor of Management “Employers may think that simply getting their employees to smile is good for the organization, but that’s not necessarily the case. Smiling for the sake of smiling can lead to emotional exhaustion and withdrawal, and that’s bad for the organization.”

Looking at this information on smiling employees from the perspective of DISC behavioral styles the results seem less surprising. Let’s examine the I-column of a DISC profile. It is common to talk about I or Influence from the perspective of the High-I DISC style. Adjectives associated with the high-end of the I column are garrulous, effusive, magnetic,
gregarious, expressive – all words that speak to being engaged with other people. However, this is only a natural behavior for those who we call a High-I. What about the other end of the scale?

The Low-I DISC style brings up adjectives like withdrawn, guarded, unexpressive and aloof. It’s not difficult to picture the person who is naturally a High-I smiling frequently as they are quite at home, even crave, a high degree of social interaction. The Low-I DISC profile on the other hand, by definition, exhibits a behavioral preference for a low level of social interaction. Forcing these people into an unnatural behavioral style can be damaging. The well-intentioned manager could be sowing seeds of frustration, stress and anxiety (and all the negative outcomes that can go with them) by demanding behavioral adaptations that cannot be sustained by an employee.

In some ways this is a classic “square pegs and round holes” problem. If the job requires a high degree of social activity such as a front desk clerk, cashier, receptionist, concierge, retail sales, etc. then hiring a Low-I individual is likely to be a recipe for disaster, or at least a conflict between management who wants a certain behavioral norm that is not sustainable for the Low-I, and the employee who to succeed must constantly muster the energy required to act against their natural behaviors. The situation is untenable and too often results in negative outcomes on both sides. If instead, behavioral modeling were made part of the hiring process this situation would easily be avoided by hiring a higher-I individual for the role that demands constant positive interaction with other people. Similarly if a job demands strict attention to detail and compliance to rules then a High-C would be a wise choice and an individual with a Low-C DISC style would be problematic.

In the MSU article, Scott cautions that “results of the study also suggest that if workers smile just to keep their bosses happy and do this over a long period, they start to feel ‘inauthentic.’” In DISC this relates to a naturally Low-I pressuring themselves to adapt a High-I behavior. It can be done, but not sustainably and not without damaging effects.

The lesson: managers should seek to determine the DISC behavioral styles best suited for the actually work to be done and hire employees whose natural DISC styles match those desired job behaviors, not try enforce policies or believe that training will somehow turn a naturally Low-I into a High-I no matter how much they are asked to smile.

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Keeping your top performers, those key employees that really help keep your organization moving, is an item that is always near the top of any executive’s priority list. Yet the workplace is always subject to change and sometimes yesterday’s motivated MVP can become today’s flight risk.

Shifting circumstances in the work environment can force changes in the default DISC behaviors of your people. This can lead the employee to experience one or more of these four states:

1) Frustration – the individual feels thwarted by the change, unable to act in a preferred manner or feeling that the opportunity to be successful has been sabotaged.

2) Elevated energy expenditure – the shift in the work environment has pushed the individual to adapt away from her natural DISC behavioral style to a new profile of behavior, this requires energy to sustain and can be draining if required for an extended duration.

3) Stress – change brings uncertainty, disruption of the status quo, this can provoke a stressed emotional state that can be expressed in multiple ways such as anger, fear, agitation, impatience, withdrawal, etc.

4) Boredom – change can shift an individual into a state of weariness and restlessness due to lack of interest.

Of the four, the last one, boredom, is the one to watch. It may sound relatively innocuous – certainly stress gets more attention than boredom due to the linkage of stress and health issues – however, it is boredom that is in fact the least tolerable state of the four. It can be a greater indicator that an employee is about to quit or otherwise change their situation than the other three change reactions mentioned above.

Consider for a moment, how well do you personally tolerate boredom? How would you react if confronted on a daily basis with lengthy periods of tedium? Most dynamic leaders squirm at the mere thought of enduring a boring meeting, let alone an extended work session. Many leaders, although not all, have a high score in the D column of a DISC profile indicating a behavioral bias towards action. They feel boredom is a harbinger of wasted time, inefficiency and a lack of productivity and they will do anything to personally avoid it. When boredom seems inescapable the individual will take action to shift the situation, that action is all too often announced with the phrase “I quit!”

Every day talented individuals quit tasks, projects, teams, and, yes, even their jobs because of boredom. The turnover and loss of knowledge and experience is incredibly costly for organizations and much of it could be avoided with timely intervention. But how do you know when someone is bored? It is easy for you to know when you, yourself, are bored, but it isn’t always easy to outwardly observe when someone else is bored. This is an area where DISC profiles can be a valuable tool not just during the hiring process, but in the ongoing development and retention of your staff. Using DISC assessments as part of a routine employee development process allows DISC styles to be tracked over time. When anomalous shifts in behavior profiles occur they will be recognized and may provide the critical insight needed to rescue an employee who is sliding down the funnel of boredom toward the door marked exit.

In the DISC vocabulary S stands for steadiness – If in our tracking we see a strong increase in an individual’s score in the S column it is often an indicator of entrenched boredom. They may shift from a low S dynamic style to a non-demonstrative high S style indicating that the individual may not have enough to do, or may require more variety of tasks. The individual may have grown in skills and is no longer sufficiently challenged by the current activity or they may have been moved into a role that runs contrary to their behavioral profile. For example take the DISC style of a high D person who is used to driving activity in pioneering ways and putting them in a role where they have large amounts of tedious “busy work” and no options to change things or delegate the activity – we’ll see the unchanging grind lead to boredom that is expressed as an elevation in the S column. It is in this state when they feel boredom is inescapable within the situation that they start directing energy toward getting out of the situation.

Without regularly administering DISC behavioral assessments, the bored amongst your key personnel can remain a hidden, yet “at risk”, population in the work force. I’ve compared my observations from teaching in management and leadership development classes, with those of other faculty in management programs; we concur that boredom is a prime motivation for a large number of the participants enrolled in such courses. We estimate that 45 – 60% of those paying for additional education around their current working situation are doing so because they are bored in their current position and are intending to use the educational opportunity to change their current situation. Doing whatever it takes to make a change.

In summary, to keep your top performers keep them interested. To keep them interested recognize when they’re bored. DISC assessments, if used properly, can provide the objective data to help you identify when your best employee is about to yawn their way out the door.

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We at Data Dome would like you to join us in welcoming the newest addition to our training team: Lisa A. Bouchard.

Lisa, a Certified Professional Behavioral Analyst, has over 15 years of expertise in applying the insights of DISC to the issues and practical realities of the business world. She has a unique ability to establish rapport at all levels of the organization, from the board room to the shop floor. This skill has made her a change agent for clients in the consumer goods, banking, health care, manufacturing, financial services, pharmaceutical and telecommunications industries.

“I’m delighted to have Lisa join the Data Dome family as a member of the faculty for our Advanced Experiential DISC Certification class.” said Art Schoeck, Founder and CEO of Data Dome. “Lisa has a knack for connecting with people. She is a dynamic trainer who can inspire people to reach levels of understanding beyond their own expectations.”

In addition to her consulting experience, Lisa spent 13 years in sales management. She knows the importance of getting results and that’s why she emphasizes in her training sessions that DISC isn’t just theory. She teaches how to use DISC profiles to decipher and improve the situations real businesses, and real people, face every day.

To find out more about Lisa please visit her bio on our About the Team page.

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DISC profiles help us understand ourselves and each other. In our continuing World According to DISC series we like to examine the lighter side of life through the lens of DISC core styles. As we bring 2010 to a close and begin to look ahead to 2011, it is a time when many will think about themes, goals and resolutions for the coming year…

Donny the high D is bold and ambitious, he’s not thinking about resolutions because he’s already got several projects in motion. He does have a goal though: to not just make the president’s club again this year, but to beat last year’s sales champion, by at least 10% thereby regaining the number 1 slot.

Irene has high I DISC profile. She loves to talk about the new year with everyone she meets. In fact, Irene just loves to talk. She has been talking with all her friends, asking what their plans are and comparing their resolutions for the coming year. When Jane paused her jog to say hello, Irene told her that she’s going to rejoin the gym and go every day. When Doris gave her a nice bottle of wine she shared her resolution to take a class in wine-tasting. When she ran into Bob in the frozen food aisle she told him how 2011 was going to be the year she stopped eating out so much and cooked more at home. She told Henry at the bank that she’ll be cutting coupons… Marcel at Starbucks that in 2011 she’s going to learn to make espresso at home…

Sylvia the high S was just starting to get comfortable with writing 2010 and now she’s looking at the new 2011 calendar she got from her college alumni association. She’s been hanging them beside her refrigerator every year since she graduated. Her father used to make 3 resolutions every year, 1 for work, 1 for himself and 1 for the family. She has continued that tradition every year since he passed away. This year at work she plans to start coming in earlier in the hopes that her boss will notice and give her a raise. For herself, she’ll finally finish that sweater she’s been knitting for years. For her family, she’ll continue to volunteer at the church to make sure her kids aren’t sneaking out of Sunday school.

Christopher’s DISC profile reveals he is a high C – he is very mindful of rules and procedures. He only ever has one resolution, to monitor the 13 virtues as defined by Benjamin Franklin: Temperance, Silence, Order, Resolution, Frugality, Industry, Sincerity, Justice, Moderation, Cleanliness, Tranquility, Chastity, and Humility. He has been spending a good portion of the week between Christmas and New Year’s Day planning his calendar for the coming year to make sure proper time has been allotted for work, family, hobbies, personal development, exercise, and once a month he has set aside 20 minutes for spontaneity.

Remember, in real life people exhibit a blend of behavioral styles, not just one single dominant trait. Examining their DISC graphs and profile reports will reveal how much that blend of behaviors can adapt from a home (or natural) state to a work (or adapted) state.

No matter what your DISC behavioral profile we at Data Dome wish you a happy and prosperous 2011.

Happy New Year!

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Understanding how people prioritize their values can help in understanding how they make their choices. Just as we do with our World According to DISC series, we like to find ways to demonstrate Workplace Motivators in action. without taking ourselves too seriously. With that in mind let’s take a look at the bookmarks stored in six people’s web browsers….

Theodore the high Theoretical seeks truth and knowledge:
wikiHow – The How-to Manual That You Can Edit
MIT Enterprise Forum
Astronomy Picture of the Day
Science News
National Geographic

Ursula the high Utilitarian/Economic saves time and money:
Mint – Free Personal Finance Software, Budget Software, Online Money Management and Budget Planner | Mint.com
Tungle.me | Scheduling Made Easy
43 Folders | Time, Attention, and Creative Work
Lifehacker, tips and downloads for getting things done
Clark Howard: Save More, Spend Less and Avoid Rip-offs | www.clarkhoward.com

Alvin the high Aesthetic pursues form, harmony and beauty:
The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York
Beautiful Pixels : Unhealthy lust for UI design
Fashion net | the insider's guide to all things chic
DailyCandy is a handpicked selection of all that’s fun, fashionable, food related, and culturally stimulating
Fashion – Women's Fashion Magazine -ELLE.com

Samantha the high Social loves people and wants to help:
Facebook
Twitter
FriendFeed
Evite – Invitations, Free eCards and Party Planning Ideas
Care2 – largest online community for healthy and green living, human rights and animal welfare.

Ivan the high Individualistic/Political seeks power, independence and personal gain:
Entrepreneur – Business & Small Business
Robb Report – The Global Luxury Source
FastCompany.com – Where ideas and people meet | Fast Company
Business News & Financial News – The Wall Street Journal – WSJ.com
tompeters! management consulting leadership training development project management

Tammy the high Traditional/Regulatory is firm in her convictions and wants unity and order:
BibleGateway.com: A searchable online Bible in over 100 versions and 50 languages.
YP.COM – Yellow Pages, the new YELLOWPAGES.COM
The Traditional Values Coalition ::: Empowering People of Faith through Knowledge
Knitty is the longest-running free knitting magazine on the web.
Constitution of the United States – Official Site

Did you follow the links? Are some of these in your bookmarks too? Remember, everyone has a mix of values and their priorities can change over time, but combined with understanding DISC profiles they can provide valuable insights for a more productive and harmonious workplace.

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While most of our posts here are focused on DISC profiles, DISC alone doesn’t give a complete picture. DISC tells us HOW a person will behave, but values and motivators are essential to understanding WHY they behave they way they do.

In the spirit of our World According to DISC series, let’s take a look at the spectrum of motivators and how they might influence holiday gift giving choices:

The high Theoretical values truth and knowledge, don’t be surprised if their kids find a junior science lab under the tree this year. Got a high Theoretical on your shopping list this year? Delight her with a statuette of Thoth, the Ibis-headed Egyptian god of knowledge or maybe the complete Oxford English Dictionary.

High Utilitarian/Economic people value money and time, things that are useful and practical. Be certain that they will be shopping for the best possible deal and the most efficient use of time. The high Utilitarian grandmother is giving all her grandchildren savings bonds this year getting the bulk of her holiday shopping done in one step. Are you shopping for a high Utilitarian? Consider getting him a membership to Costco or maybe just a nice thermos to carry coffee since he would never waste money at a place like Starbucks.

If you’re a high Aesthetic you are focused on form and harmony, beauty and inner vision. You might not know what you’ll be getting, but you can be sure that the gift from the high Aesthetic will be the most beautifully wrapped one in the bunch. If you’re looking for a great idea for a high Aesthetic consider a trip to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, or sign her up for a class in Feng Shui.

I’m sure you won’t be surprised to learn that the high Social values people. Altruism, empathy and generosity are important to them. It wouldn’t be out of character for a high Social to make a charitable donation in your name. Want to make a high Social happy this season? Lend him a hand when he volunteers at the local soup kitchen’s holiday meal.

High Individualistic/Political types value power and often view others as a means to an end. The high Individualistic/Political might give his boss a new set of golf clubs and a lot of hints about being available for his next power foursome. Want to make a high Individualistic/Political happy? Give her a copy of Machiavelli’s “The Prince”.

Last, but not least we come to the high Traditional/Regulatory who values unity, order and structure. They are likely to be very fixed in their beliefs. Your high Traditional cousin will be going to midnight mass and after will fill his kids’ Christmas stockings with chocolates and candy canes just like he had when he was a kid. If you’re shopping for a high Traditional consider getting her a keepsake ornament for her tree, or, if appropriate for her religion, a finely printed and beautifully bound bible.

As we often do when discussing DISC profiles, we are here in these examples simplifying the motivational profiles to isolate on a single value category. In reality multiple values will be a factor and the lack of motivator in a specific category can also be highly indicative of a person’s priorities.

We hope this post gave you a little insight into the spectrum of values and motivators and maybe an idea or two as you finish up your holiday shopping.

Wishing you and yours a safe and happy holiday season!

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‘Tis the gift giving season so we here at Data Dome want to help you find the perfect gift for all the different DISC profiles on your list. Not everyone has disc profiles as extreme as these, but thinking about DISC styles may help you choose a better behaviorally-fitting gift.

A high D DISC profile is likely to respond well to a gift that helps further a goal, but not if it adds complication to the process: Last year, Danny the High D was looking to start exercising more so his wife thought a new bicycle would be the perfect gift. It would have been if it had come pre-assembled, but Danny wanted to exercise not decipher an assembly manual. He’s now running 3 miles a day, but the bike is still in the box.

A high I DISC profile likes to be around people, interacting, talking and having fun. Good choices are gifts that either prompt a social gathering or elevate the high I’s social status, but follow through and attention to detail may not be strong with the high I. Last year, Irma the high I found out that several of her friends got together once a week for a knitting circle so she dropped a lot of hints about knitting to her husband. He dutifully got her a starter kit of knitting needles, a knitting video, several balls of beautiful wool and a book of knitting patterns. She was delighted and excited to join her friends at her first knitting circle, until she found out how hard it was as a beginner to knit and talk at the same time. She continues to enjoy meeting her knitting circle, but as of this writing she has yet to complete her first scarf.

Persons with a high S DISC profile aren’t very demonstrative and may seem hard to shop for because they haven’t outwardly expressed what they would like. Sam is a high S and last holiday season his wife noticed that the lining was shot on his winter coat. She thought it would be nice to get him a new coat that was more in-style than his old one, but she knew he wasn’t into fashion and that he tended to resist change so instead she got the old coat relined. When he opened the box he was confused for a second to see his old coat in a new gift box, but when he saw the new lining he smiled and quietly slipped the coat on over his pajamas.

The high C DISC profile can be intimidating to shop for because the high C can be meticulous and critical about quality and appropriateness of a gift. Last year, Clara, a high C, was dismayed when her friends in the office gave her an expensive planner from Franklin-Covey – they thought it would be a big hit because she is so organized, but she felt insulted that they thought she needed someone else’s system to stay on top of things. This year they did better, giving her a subscription to Consumer Reports so she can always have the data to make the most informed purchase decisions.

Here are a few more just-in-fun gift ideas -

The gift they want:

• High D – NASCAR fantasy camp driving lesson, air horn, watch with built-in stopwatch
• High I – Tickets to the Oprah show, karaoke machine, a huge holiday party
• High S – Grandpa’s pocket watch, a family holiday dinner, savings bond
• High C – Gaggia Classic Espresso Machine, statistical graphing calculator, US Chess Federation standard chess set

The gift they need, but don’t want:

• High D – meditation retreat, biofeedback machine, chamomile tea
• High I – time management system, accountability coach, Social Media blocking software
• High S – home organizer session, procrastination-busters class, Toastmasters membership
• High C – empathy training, improv class, mud-wrestling tournament entry

As always with the World According to DISC series, we like to keep it light while sharing some instructive, yet one-dimensional attributes of DISC behavior. In reality people are multi-dimensional and are influenced by a range of motivators and attitudes in addition to having a mix of behavioral styles.

Whatever your DISC style we at Data Dome wish you and yours a very happy holiday season!

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Our intrepid office reporter cornered a few colleagues with classically high DISC profiles and asked, “Wow, we sure are busy these days aren’t we?”

The person with a high D DISC profile said: “You said it! I’ve got some big goals to reach before the end of the year, now give me a hand and sort these files for me.”

The high I said: “I know! Can you believe it? I mean everyone I talk to says they are swamped. You’re swamped, I’m swamped, we’re all swamped! So what do you have on your plate? Hey Jerry, hey Margaret, come here we’re discussing how busy everyone is these days…”

The high S said: “Um, I guess so, can I go back to work now?”

The high C said: “Who authorized this interview? We’re working on a very tight schedule here. Have you seen the project plan? We can’t have unapproved interruptions like this. We have procedures for a reason you know.”

“Are you taking any time off before the end of the year?”

The high D: “Ski vacation in Aspen – this year I’m going to conquer the expert slopes.”

The high I DISC profile said: “We’re going on a cruise – I just love meeting all the people and getting to know them all week.”

The high S: “Visiting my parents for a week like I did last year.”

The high C: “I’m taking the Series 7 Financial Certification exam.”

“How do you unwind?”

Our DISC profiles responded:

The high D: “Coaching my kid’s basketball team.”

The high I: “Meeting friends for coffee.”

The high S: “Reading a book in my favorite chair at home.”

The high C: “Organizing my receipts. ”

“What do you like best about your job?”

The high D: “Always another mountain to climb.”

The high I: “I work with some fascinating people.”

The high S: “I’m very loyal to my boss, I’ve worked for her for twenty years.”

The high C: “Refining our processes for higher quality.”

“Is there a question you would like to ask me?”

The high D: “Are we almost done here? I’ve got calls to make.”

The high I: “How did you become the office reporter? Do you meet a lot of people? Everyone must think you’re fascinating. I wonder if people would find me fascinating if I had your job? By the way, you are great at this! How long have you been reporting? Do you love it?…”

The high S: “I’ve never been interviewed before.”

The high C: “What makes you think you have the authority to come in here and disrupt my schedule?”

We like to use these World According to DISC examples to give you a flavor of how people with strong one-sided DISC profiles might act in familiar situations. However, it is important to remember that unlike the characters our reporter encountered here, real people aren’t one-dimensional and it is rare for someone to max-out in just one DISC category without also being strong in at least one other. It is the knowledge of a person’s total blend of motivators, behaviors and attitude that really makes the difference in understanding how they will work with others.

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