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JGR100: Finding Your Leadership Purpose

Week 5

WHAT IS PERSONALITY?

Remember, your personality is the combination of distinct qualities or strengths that form your unique character. For example, you might be assertive and reliable or patient and optimistic or even creative and sensitive. Understanding personality can help us understand and, for the most part, predict behavior. The strengths that make up your personality offer clues into how you will react or behave in different situations. For instance, a more introverted person might feel uncomfortable speaking up in a large meeting, and a more assertive person might be off-putting to a coworker that tends to avoid confrontation. Personality varies from person to person, even when we share some of the same strengths! But understanding your personality (and strengths) is an essential step to discovering your purpose and to finding a career where you can excel!

HOW CAN I UNDERSTAND MY PERSONALITY?

This week you will be taking the DiSC assessment. The DiSC assessment is a simple questionnaire that measures your behavior for 4 main personality styles

The are:

D - Dominance i - Influence S - Steadiness C - Conscientiousness

This may sound obvious, but most of us are not simply one personality or another. We have strengths from different personalities - the trick is seeing what that balance looks like. To find out, the DiSC assessment measures our behaviors in different situations to identify our strengths and help predict successful performance.

Knowing your personality style can help you identify why you prefer working under certain conditions, why there are some people you have a harder time connecting with, why there are some people you absolutely LOVE working with, and most importantly, how you can use your results on the DiSC assessment to find positions and roles that are aligned with your own skills. Understanding your personality and seeking a career that plays to your strengths will lead to greater job satisfaction and increased productivity.

Each of the four personality styles has general qualities or strengths associated with them. Let’s take a look.

D: DOMINANCED personalities are driven and focused - real go-getters. They are quick to make decisions and can seem aggressive at times because of their assertiveness. They are very adventurous and confident and like to take charge!

i: INFLUENCEi personalities are optimistic and influential. Their enthusiasm is contagious, and they are great at motivating others to get involved. People who are i's are risk-takers and visionaries; they love new ideas, are creative, and enjoy change.

S: STEADINESSS personalities are relationship-oriented. They are concerned about the well-being of others and like to keep harmony. That means they often avoid conflict and also dislike change. An S's loyalty and reliability can make them a great asset to a team!

C: CONSCIENTIOUSNESSC personalities are very detail-oriented. They love to follow the rules and want to please others. C personalities can be sensitive and reserved. They are perfectionists and enjoy delivering results!

Your DiSC results will indicate your own unique blend of the above styles. The highest of your four styles is called your primary style. The next highest is your secondary style. Most people have a least one secondary style.

NOTE: If you have any questions about how to interpret your results, reach out to your instructor.

HOW DOES YOUR PERSONALITY AFFECT YOUR CAREER?

Your personality has a huge impact on the way you interact with others in your career. Let’s say you’re a fashion blogger who gets energized by communicating with all of your followers. If that’s the case, it might be hard for you to spend 80% of your time working with budgets and numbers. If you understand your personality and strengths, you will know how to improve your career or find one that is more suited to you.

Your DiSC results can provide you with a personality mirror - a way to see your true self, confirm the things you already know, and show you some things you weren't able to see before. It may also help you see patterns in your past. You may realize that you've had difficulty in jobs with the same types of bosses or when similar challenges emerge. Understanding your results (and your strengths) will help you create a picture of your best self. In other words, you will understand the situations, people, and roles that allow you to perform best. Then, when you look at your professional past, you will be able to identify WHY you have (or have not) been successful.

Once you have a picture of your best self, you can harness your personality's power! Think of the things you enjoy about your current career. Are there aspects of your career that you'd like to be doing more of or that you prefer doing? If your current career isn't allowing you to use your natural strengths, then you can make changes in the way you work to find a way to use those strengths (taking on a mentor or asking to lead a special project, for instance). If you cannot mold your job into one that will allow you to use your strengths, then you can pursue a new career path that will better fit your personality and strengths in the future.

One of Coach’s secrets to success is his ability to align particular personality styles with jobs that require those specific strengths. (You’ll learn more about this in the second course of the Joe Gibbs Performance Management Program, JGR510 Building Your Team.) In this week’s Strayer Talk you heard from Craig Greene, the former pediatric cardiologist, now VP, at Joe Gibbs Racing. When Coach Gibbs recruited him, Craig had a hard time seeing how the strengths and personality that made him a successful doctor would work in the very different role of Vice President for Business Operations. But, the incredible thing about personality strengths is how they can translate across different jobs and industries! Craig's strengths of motivating others and caring about their well-being made him excel in both roles.

Coach Gibbs has done a great job at creating an environment where people’s personality styles allow them to thrive. You can learn how to do this with your own personality style as well! Once you understand your strengths and personality, you can take control of your career. To get started, check out the table below. Under each personality style is a list of occupations that are best-suited to someone with that personality style. First, read through the lists, then compare your DiSC results to the occupations that relate to your personality style(s). You might be surprised by what you see!

DiSC: CAREER MATCHES

Now, let’s take a look at how someone might use their DiSC assessment results and this chart of DiSC career matches to explore a career change.

Meet Dylan.

Dylan works as at a local copy center. He's worked there since high school and is now the day-time manager, but he doesn't feel satisfied with his job. He doesn't enjoy managing the staff and often feels unsure when he needs to lead the team in a new direction. Dylan's favorite part of his current job is interacting with customers. The same customers have been coming to him for years because they enjoy his enthusiasm. Dylan also volunteers for his neighborhood's youth theater summer program and finds that his creativity and excitement make him a great leader to the teens he works with. Dylan had just taken his DiSC assessment, and his DiSC results show that his primary personality style is an i and his secondary style is a D.

Dylan has always been outgoing and popular. Even though he sometimes feels unsure about how to lead his staff, he finds that people naturally want to follow him because of his energy and charm. After reflecting on the type of environment where he believes he performs the best and the importance he places on his volunteer work, Dylan looks at the list of careers that relate to i's and realizes that he has always been drawn to performing arts.

Dylan decides to meet with the director of the summer theater program to get a better picture of what the field is like. The director mentions they are looking to expand the program year-round and will be hiring full-time staff. During these interviews, Dylan learns about the possible challenges that he may face like motivating teenagers, developing trust with the students, and creating a fun environment that serves the community. Dylan believes he can handle these challenges with his i strengths of encouragement, motivation, and humor. He also recognizes that he has some D strengths like being able to hit the ground running and staying optimistic. So Dylan decides to apply to work for the youth theatre program year-round. Working with the teenagers on their performance skills would allow him to exercise his strengths as an influencer, without the daily-pressure of managing a staff and dealing with business operations. This career change would also allow Dylan to concentrate more on his creative strengths.

Your DiSC results can help you in different ways. They can help you better understand how your personality helps (or hinders) your current job and responsibilities, why you feel so satisfied (or not) with your current job, and even how to explore new career opportunities. Of course, choosing or changing a career requires more than just a personality assessment. It also involves understanding your interests, your values, and your purpose. But understanding your personality could be the beginning of finding a better fit for your career.

Now that you have your DiSC results you can start thinking about how you want to use what you've learned to make changes to your current career or start exploring new career opportunities. Remember, utilizing your strengths in your career will make you more productive and successful as you pursue your leadership purpose.

In the coming weeks, you will use all of the knowledge you’ve gained to create a game plan for success!