Wouldn’t life be boring if we were all the same? We’d never learn anything new and would end up having the same conversations again and again. Yawn!
Thank goodness we are all different.
That said, our differences can be a double-edged sword. Although they make us unique, they may also mean we struggle to understand why others act the way they do. And that’s why learning to appreciate how other people think and behave is so important.
Personality profiling is an easy way to identify other people’s communication style.
You might have heard about personality profiling or even had your personality profiled in the past. But what value does it bring to business? And is it the kind of thing that can help your business grow?
What is personality profiling?
Personality profiling is a type of psychometric testing and a great way to identify someone’s personality traits, preferences, and behaviours. There are a range of companies providing tools with the main 3 being Myers Briggs Type Indicator, Insights, and the approach I teach my clients, DISC.
How does personality profiling work?
For each Personality profiling tool, you complete a short questionnaire that goes on to calculate how much you exhibit various traits. Although easy to complete, the questionnaires are the result of psychological theories and research and provide a highly detailed report on your behaviour, styles, and psychological makeup. These can be scarily insightful – as one client said, when faced with her profiling results, “It’s like they’ve known me forever!”
Why personality profiling matters
Personality profiling can be a lot of fun. After all, who doesn’t like to know more about themselves? However, it is powerful and a valuable tool for helping individuals and businesses communicate better and work more effectively. Here are some of the most common applications.
- Increasing self-awareness for personal and professional development: Personality profiling helps build self-awareness by revealing our strengths, weaknesses, goal-setting preferences, communication style, fears and the areas we may find challenging. This in turn helps us identify development areas and goals for personal and professional growth.
- Effective recruitment: Personality profiling is often used in recruitment processes to assess applicants’ traits against job requirements. As well as helping employers find the most suitable individuals for a role, it supports employee job satisfaction and retention by placing people in roles that align best with their natural tendencies.
- Identify training requirements: Personality profiling such as DISC can help by highlighting the traits that make fantastic salespeople. There’s a specific sales profile tool that highlights the desired traits in a sales role and illustrates a person’s tendency for each. As well as identifying naturally strong salespeople, you can use it to help improve your team’s sales skills and place employees in the best roles for their abilities – for example, an account management role vs. a new business.
- Building deeper relationships: Have you ever noticed that there are certain personalities that you click or clash with? Personality profiling allows us to identify the traits of others and appreciate how to get on with these people. By understanding different communication styles, we can adapt our interactions to suit their preferences. This in turn helps strengthen relationships in various areas of our lives, including partnerships, friendships, work colleagues, and family.
- Improved communication: With a good understanding of different personality types, something as simple as a phone call can help you gauge how best to communicate with a new contact. Some people prefer a social catch-up before discussing business, while others prefer minimal social interaction. Similarly, when responding to emails, you can consider the length and tone of emails you receive and mirror your responses to the recipient’s style to improve relationships and results.
- Building better leaders: The DISC leadership profile can help strengthen someone’s skills as a leader. This provides valuable insights into someone’s behavioural tendencies, which in turn helps them understand their strengths and areas for growth. By understanding our dominant style, we can adapt our leadership approach, communicate effectively, build stronger relationships, and positively impact our team’s performance.
- Conflict resolution in the workplace: Conflicts and differences within teams are very common. However, by using personality profiling to better understand ourselves, we can develop action plans to overcome challenges and improve team dynamics.
About DISC
As shown earlier, there are a range of personality profiling tools available. I have chosen to work with DISC because of how easy it is to understand and action. It categorises people into four main personality types, each associated with a colour. That said, we all have an element of each of these in us and it is the combination and level of each which defines our unique profile.
- Dominance, associated with red
- Influence, associated with yellow
- Steadiness, associated with green
- Conscientiousness, associated with blue.
DISC focuses on behavioural styles and helps us understand our communication preferences and work dynamics. As well as how easy it is to use, the colours align with marketing and branding psychology, which suits my colourful personality.
Vive la difference!
Personality profiling is a highly valuable tool that works on many levels – both personally and professionally. I love the way it helps us embrace the things that make us different while enabling people to connect positively.
Curious to understand more about personality profiling and how it could help you and your business? Get in touch and I’ll be happy to help.
