One simple tool that will revolutionise your work

Picture this… the board room is full at Company X. The entire team is having their monthly meeting.

Things are starting to get a little heated – John has been presenting the latest sales figures for his team, and he is getting frustrated. Kim (who works in the finance team) is asking for more detail, and questioning the accuracy of the data that John is presenting. John feels as if he is being personally attacked and is starting to shut down in his communication. Kim is getting more and more frustrated because she has a genuine concern that the information has been pulled from the wrong spreadsheet and is out by about $10,000. From John’s perspective, this is nothing – he is trying to celebrate his team and share their enthusiasm in passing their sales target of $1.2million for the quarter. The $10,000 doesn’t matter to him because they passed their target by more than this, so why is it important?

Sound familiar? John and Kim are failing miserably at seeing each other’s perspective.

Now instead, imagine this:

John is sharing the figures for his sales team. He is pumped. They passed their target for the quarter, and he wants to celebrate and share the joy with the rest of the company. Kim can see that the data isn’t 100% accurate, and is out by about $10,000. However – she knows that for John and his team, this victory is a big deal. And she knows that while this inaccuracy matters a great deal to her, there isn’t a huge material impact and it can be addressed at a later time. John – knowing himself that he usually jumps the gun a bit and data isn’t his #1 priority - does mention in his presentation that he isn’t sure his figures are 100% correct, but he is sure that they passed their target. He mentions in the meeting that he would like to sit down with Kim afterwards to get the more accurate data.

Kim feels that her need for accuracy is acknowledged.
John feels that his need for enthusiasm and optimism is met.

Same players. Different outcome. So how do you get from scenario A to scenario B?

DiSC.

What is DiSC?

In scenario B, Company X had carried out DiSC assessments on their team. They followed the assessment with workshops around what each DiSC style meant, what they valued, how they worked together as a team, and how they could manage their own personalities while acknowledging and meeting the needs of their team mates. What has been even better is that John’s sales team have been able to adapt their sales approaches based on what they think is important to their client. For example, when they have a client who has tendencies of a ‘C’ – Conscientious - who value accuracy (like Kim!) they adjust their sales proposal to match this and to meet their information needs. This has sped up the buying process! And Kim has amended the way she presents her finance reports each month. She now knows that her boss Chris is a ‘D’ – dominance - who values efficiency, results and action. Kim can now move through the finance reports quicker, pausing only on material matters, and doesn’t get into too much detail on the variance to budget of $324.56c in the stationery expenses.

At Sudburys we’ve been using DiSC with a number of our clients for years and recently took the exciting step to become an Authorized DiSC Partner. We see huge benefit in the insight that DiSC brings to management teams, managers, overall internal relationships, and the impact that this insight can also have externally and on sales results.

To find out more about how DiSC could help your business, contact Nikita Tomlinson today.