Understanding Leadership in Your Workplace or Organization

This past May, I attended the LeaderShape Institute with Temple University, a six-day long leadership retreat. On the second day of the program, we talked about leadership styles and took the DiSC Classic Personality Test. This test helps you understand yourself and others by giving you a framework for understanding human behavior. DiSC stands for dominance, influence, steadiness, and conscientiousness. After completing the test, you find out the strength of these qualities are in your own personality. 

I found out that I am a “C,” which places an emphasis on work that ensures quality and accuracy. After taking the test and finding out which letter each of us represented, we found that our different strengths in our leadership styles, when combined, are beneficial, especially in your organization or workplace.  Whether you represent dominance, influence, steadiness, or conscientiousness all four of these qualities are needed:

Dominance (D) – This type of person likes getting immediate results, shaping the environment, making quick decisions, managing trouble, solving problems, and questioning the status quo. A person with a dominant personality needs others who use caution, weigh pros and cons, research facts, calculate risks, and recognize the needs of others.

Influence (i) – This type of person likes contacting people, being articulate, creating a motivating environment, generating enthusiasm, and entertaining people. An influencer needs others who respect sincerity, develop systematic approaches, take a logical approach, concentrate on the task, and seek facts.

Steadiness (S) – This type of person enjoys performing in a consistent, predictable manner, demonstrating patience, helping others, showing loyalty, being a good listener, and creating a stable, efficient work environment. A person with this personality needs others who react quickly to unexpected change, apply pressure on others, work well in an unpredictable environment, and are flexible in work procedures.

Conscientiousness (C) – This type of person likes being diplomatic with people, critically analyzing performance, concentrating on details, approaching situations systematically, and weighing pros and cons. This person needs others who delegate important tasks, encourage teamwork, use policies as guidelines, and make quick decisions.

Whichever letter you represent, you bring value to your workplace or organization. You may even have qualities from two or more DiSC areas. As you can see, you need others with different strengths and leadership styles to help make your workplace or organization the best it can be. What type of leader are you? 

This guest blog post was written by PRowl staff member Megan Healy.