DiSC & Leadership - Why Leadership Isn't One Face to All

The 8 Dimensions of Leadership

by Jeffrey Sugerman, Mark Scullard and Emma Wilhelm

To be an effective leader you need to know your strengths—but that’s only part of the story. You also need a broad perspective on all the behaviors needed to be an effective leader. This book provides both.

Using the third-generation DiSC® online personality assessment — one of the most scientifically validated tools available — The 8 Dimensions of Leadership helps you identify your primary leadership dimension.

Whether you are a Pioneering, Energizing, Affirming, Inclusive, Humble, Deliberate, Resolute, or Commanding leader, the authors help you understand the psychological drivers, motivations, and “blind spots” characteristic of your style.

But no single style will take you all the way.

A Humble leader may have a hard time making tough decisions. A Commanding leader may run roughshod over potential allies. The authors detail the lessons all leaders can learn from each style, enabling you to craft a multidimensional approach to becoming the leader you aspire to be.

Click here to learn more

The Amazement of EPIC!

If you’re a DiSC user, are you also an EPIC user? Just want you to know the amazing range of possibilities….

EPIC – in this case it means Electronic Profile Information Center – and it’s the perfect place to completely manage the generation and distribution of your profiles – and not just DiSC!

If you have an EPIC account, are you using it to its fullest? If you don’t have an EPIC account, look at what you can do – all of these profiles and reports can be run through EPIC

• Everything DiSC®363 for Leaders Report
• Everything DiSC®363 for Leaders Coaching Supplemental Report
• Everything DiSC® Workplace Profile
• Everything DiSC® Management Profile
• Everything DiSC® Sales Profile
• Everything DiSC® Comparison Reports
• Everything DiSC® Group Report
• Everything DiSC® Facilitator Report
• DiSC® Classic 2.0
• DiSC® Classic 2.0 PLUS
• DiSC® Facilitator Report
• DiSC® Group Culture Report
• Discovering Diversity Profile
• Discovering Diversity Group Report
• Time Mastery Profile
• Time Mastery Facilitator Report
• Personal Listening Profile
• Personal Listening Profile Facilitator Report
• Work Expectations Profile
• Work Expectations Profile Team Report
• Team Dimensions Profile
• Team Dimensions Profile Group Report
• Coping and Stress Profile

Visit our EPIC webpage and learn more about each item listed.

Here are some additional “can-do’s” with EPIC:


1. Everything DiSC Comparison Reports - Follow-up reports that can be created for any two participants to illustrate their similarities and differences. Available with ED Application Library Only and they are FREE!!! This extends the benefits of DiSC training and learning by using the Comparison Reports – these free reports are available for anyone who has completed an Everything DiSC Application Library (AL) for Mangers, Sales, Workplace or 363™ for Leaders.

I have to say: these are amazing reports – they create the basis for one-on-one conversations between two people to resolve differences, work through any differences or misunderstandings they may have had and set the stage for a much improved relationship. What a terrific addition to your training session.

2. Run DiSC Group Culture Reports – this will customize your training session to a “t”. Designed to help you explore the DiSC styles — or culture — of a group. Once you know the culture — its characteristics, advantages, and drawbacks — you’re better prepared to open meaningful discussions with group members in a group setting or one-on-one. Uses data from DiSC Classic 2.0 or an Everything DiSC AL Profile (Workplace, Management, Sales) on EPIC.

3. Improve your facilitation with the DiSC Facilitator Report – this lets you build customized group reports using data from DiSC Classic 2.0 or an Everything DiSC AL Profile (Workplace, Management, Sales) on EPIC. The report includes an illustration of the group's distribution of DiSC styles, the group's Classical Pattern distribution, and detailed information on how each individual's DiSC style may affect the DiSC culture within the group or organization.

4. Have you tried the Everything DiSC Application Library (AL) Profiles and facilitation materials? This newer version of DiSC is 300% more customizable than DISC Classic and the profiles use the circular model rather than the graph you may be more familiar with. The graph version remains highly reliable and useable, though the circular model can give your training sessions greater depth for each individual. AND…when someone responds to one profile in the Everything DiSC AL series, they don’t have to respond a second time – here’s an example: team member A responds to the ED Workplace Profile. When you want to complete an ED Management Profile on team member A, just run it – no need for team member A respond a second time – how easy is that???

5. Have you organized your sub accounts into folders and sub-folders? This will make creating comparison reports and batch report generation so much easier.


6. Make batch generation easy on yourself: The Batch Report Generation functions in EPIC allow you to generate a group of reports in a single process. Now you may also use batch report generation to create multiple Everything DiSC Comparison Reports at once, rather than one report at a time!

How DiSC Can Benefit a Leader/Manager

We talked about how DiSC and an understanding of behavioral styles and individual priorities can help reduce conflict, improve sales and teamwork. So how does it help you as the manager or leader of others?

DiSC…

• Provides managers with an “Instruction Manual” for their team members
• Enables you to change your approach to get the most of team members
• Gives managers a language that creates meaningful conversations
• Saves a good team member by allowing the manager to understand what motivates them and then providing the team member meaningful work
• Helps leaders identify the needs of those they lead
• Teaches a manager to create an environment where people can be successful
• Gives a window into what type of recognition is desired by the team member
• Gives insight on how to have a more effective conversation with your team members
• Gives managers the language for corrective/ adjustment conversations
• Helps managers conduct effective, meaningful and useful performance appraisals because you can speak behaviorally
• Allows managers to match the goals and objectives of the organization with many goals of team members
• Helps the manager understand how others view them

Wouldn't you appreciate the usefulness of these insights?
Learn more about DiSC and the range of profiles here

DiSC and Working with Teams

I’ve described so far how DiSC and a knowledge of your own preferred behavioral style and priorities can improved your relationships with others. And, of course, learning about yourself and behavioral styles leads to understanding where others are coming from in the workplace.
OK – this stuff works everywhere - at home, in community venues, in just about any situation you can envision yourself. It even works for premarital counseling!

A recent post itemized how understanding styles can reduce conflict, even improve sales performance. But today, I want to address working in teams.

Leaders, managers, individuals all end up working in or with teams sooner or later. Even virtually we work with teams and teamwork can be one of the hardest things some of us do! Some of us are just not cut out for teamwork – we fly better by ourselves and even prefer it. But….sooner or later…there’s teamwork involved and we’d better be able to play in that arena.

If DiSC is so cool at helping us learn about ourselves and others, how DOES it help with teamwork? DiSC..

• Opens people up to a cognitive diversity and can create powerful teams by leveraging the different approaches
• Helps you realize that all styles are valuable and that everyone can make a contribution
• Allows you to understand different strengths as complimentary strengths
• Shows the value, perspectives and strengths an individual brings to a team
• Is a tremendous tool for a team leader to understand the make-up of a team
• Allows the leader to call on the right strengths at the right time from the right person
• Shows that there are different ways to approach the same team goals
• Provides a method to assign tasks – base the tasks on strengths OR on the strengths that need to be developed

All in all, DiSC and understanding your own and others’ behavioral styles goes a long way to making us all more productive.

Everything DiSC Sales Customer Interaction Maps

It just got easier to access Everything DiSC Sales Customer Interaction Maps on EPIC!

We’ve simplified the process for accessing Everything DiSC Sales Customer Interaction Maps. Now, you have two options for giving participants access to Customer Interaction Maps. You can either add map access when you’re assigning an access code, or you can add map access after sending an access code by using the Edit Existing Reports function. Once you’ve activated this follow-up feature, the participant will have unlimited, free Customer Interaction Maps whenever they need them.

Here’s how it works. When you’re in the Assign Access Code step for an Everything DiSC Sales profile, you’ll be able to choose whether you’d like to include Follow-Up Activities – you’ll see an option to include Everything DiSC Sales Customer Interaction Maps. When the feature is active, the assign access code email tells the participant that they have access to a follow-up site after completing the Everything DiSC Sales profile. They can access the Customer Interaction Maps as soon as their profile is complete, or they can return to their original assign access code email, click the link, and seamlessly access unlimited Customer Interaction Maps.

Go to EPIC account today to see for yourself how easy the process is!

Check out Everything DiSC Sales Profile

DiSC and Improved Sales Performance

Recently I described how the DiSC Profile can reduce conflict in organizations or between individuals by creating a greater understanding of priorities and differences.

The DiSC Profile can do the same thing for those of you in the sales field by creating a better understanding and actually STRENGHTING your sales results!

What if you had a tool that could strengthen your sales output by:
• Understanding behavioral differences so you can speak the buyer’s language and increase sales
• Giving you more confidence in understanding your own strengths as a salesperson
• Gaining insights into the approach you will use for that customer
• Giving you a clearer focus on the sales tasks
• Helping you understand the customer’s motivation which in turn helps them be a hero
• Shortening the sales cycle
• Helping close specific clients by tailoring approach to match the customer’s style
• Realizing you can’t sell the same way to all your customers
• Helping to understand the personal needs of the prospect
• Learning to “dial-up” different styles to meet the customer’s style
• Making the relationship more comfortable
• Slowing the process down for some that would rather not move more quickly
• Deepening trust. “I can understand that you get me vs. schmoozing me.”
• Helping you understand how the client hears
• Establishing rapport
• Preparing for a customer meeting

Click here to read about the Everything DiSC Sales Profile and look for the sample profile on this page – read it through and discover for yourself the value of a resources that can make a difference in your approach to sales and in your sales results!


Give DiSC a try - you owe it to yourself!

Reducing Conflict

Think about this: DiSC can help you (and your organization) reduce conflict situations all by understanding yourself and others better. Imagine:

• Understand other people and really get in sync with them
• Gain an appreciation and value another person’s contribution
• Provide an opportunity for self-awareness and allow us to realize that our behavior may be part of the conflict
• Give us common ground and the ability to create a win-win situation
• Reduce stress and anxiety because people are able to get their needs met
• Allow people to focus on getting work done
• Open communication and give people a new language to speak in
• Realize that different people react to conflict in different ways
• Clear-up misunderstandings
• Allow people to truly talk to each other
• Reduce the they vs. me mentality
• Help take the emotion out of the conflict
• Provides a discussion point in behaviors and environment
• Help see the situation from the other person’s perspective
• Help resolve the conflict by being aware of one’s own behavioral preferences and another’s style
• Learn that you can work through conflict without an underlying tension
• Allow individuals to offer opinions and contributions without letting emotions overshadow the information
• DiSC allows you to focus on the behavior that is causing the problem vs. attacking the person

A better workplace and improved relationships all around!