Scenario
You know the scenario: you think John’s a good laugh, always chatty and enjoys banter. He is full of ideas and is enthusiastic about following them up but he often gets carried away and is a bit disorganised. You prioritise taking action and getting results. Iola is quiet and gets on with her work but she can be slow to make decisions yet be quick to criticise if anyone falls beneath her high standards.
John’s disorganisation and Iola’s slow decision-making stresses you at times but your drive to get results coupled with your tendency to snap at them especially when under pressure causes equal stress to John and Iola.
The above scenario shows how people with differing behavioural styles, and therefore different ways of working, can stress one another and, eventually, make one another mad at work. The misunderstanding comes from a lack of appreciation that people with different behavioural styles have different drivers and needs. If we can understand one another’s different drivers and needs, then we can mutually accommodate one another by better overall understanding and communication.
The conflicts
DiSC® (see below) identifies 4 pairs of contrary behavioural styles: unfeeling v empathetic, assertive v non-assertive, self-starter v support (needs affirmation), reserved v enthusiastic. Let’s look at those in turn.
Unfeeling v empathetic. When we talk of a person as unfeeling, we do not mean they have no feelings at all but that their feelings have a lower priority than with empathetic people. In compensation they place a higher priority on logic and challenge and don’t mind upsetting people if they think they are saying or doing the right (or logical) thing. This is at odds with empathetic people who are emotionally driven. They prioritise people’s feelings and consensus and are usually reluctant to upset people deliberately. Hence the conflict.
Assertive v non-assertive. The conflict between assertive and non-assertive may seem obvious: the assertive will always intimidate the non-assertive, right? Actually, in a business team, the non-assertive are equally capable of upsetting the assertive. How is that possible? Assertive doesn’t necessarily mean aggressive but in the course of normal interactions including team meetings, the assertive will naturally speak up and the non-assertive will equally naturally not speak up. This intimidates the assertive because the valuable expertise and experience of the non-assertive team members is lost to the team. In a worst-case scenario, this can progress to the point where the non-assertive never speak up or may even withdraw co-operation. This is a veritable loss-loss situation.
Self-starter v support. DiSC also tells us that some of your people are self-starters and results oriented while their opposites require support and affirmation. (I have not personally seen this referred to in any discussion about WFH (working from home) but it is my view that people requiring support need more careful management if WFH or otherwise working remotely. This is not in the scope of this blog but it will be in a future blog soon). There is nothing more to add about this conflict: self-starters get on with the job while those needing support need more management attention.
Reserved v enthusiastic. There’s no way to put this tactfully but reserved, quiet people tend to be private individuals who are often introverted. It can be hard for them to cope with extroverted and loud (enthusiastic) individuals. Indeed, faced with such people they may well retreat into their shells, if they can. Extroverted individuals may well find their introverted colleagues difficult to engage with and even boring. This difference in behavioural styles can create a barrier to mutual misunderstanding.
DiSC Behavioural Model
DiSC can help you bridge these behavioural conflicts. It tells your people that their behavioural styles comprise varying degrees of the elements Dominance, influence, Steadiness and Conscientiousness, but that 1 or more of those elements will be more prominent than the others in any one person. DiSC also tells your people the impact of their behavioural style on their colleagues and the impact of their colleagues’ behavioural styles upon them.
Your people will undertake a short online questionnaire and receive their behavioural profile reports. They will learn the effect of their style on their colleagues and the effect of their colleagues’ behavioural styles upon them.
While our reports are comprehensive and written in an easy-to-read English, we recommend workshop debrief and coaching following-up to ensure permanent learning and change of behaviour.
Further Reading
This is one of a series of blogs posted on https://discprofiles.uk and LinkedIn. Next blog next week.
Conclusion
Different natural behavioural styles can lead to conflicts in the workplace through a misunderstanding of different drivers and needs. These clashes can be greatly minimised or even eliminated by using a tool like DiSC to understand colleagues’ and one’s own behavioural styles.
