Last week, I talked about ‘what got you here won’t get you there.’ So, if you’ve been one of those top performers only having to worry about showing up to hit your targets week in and week out, and then all of a sudden, you’re now a leader and responsible for a team, you need to make a shift up because now you’re not only responsible for yourself, you’re responsible for others.
When working with leaders, business owners, teams, and entrepreneurs there’s an assessment I like to use called the DISC. D is dominant, I is influencing, S is steady, and C is compliant. Now there’s a statistic in the United States of America, on what percentages of people fall in these different categories. As we look at this; 39% of people in the US are high I’s, influencing, 27% are high S’s, steady, 23% are C’s, compliant, and only 12% are D’s, dominant.
Now, why is this important? It’s important to understand that because most leaders in organizations are high D’s. They’re dominant, they make things happen. They’re always out front. They like challenges, they want to lead. Now the challenge with a D is they could be a little bit aggressive; they could be a little bit too quick on the draw. Understanding that high I’s need to be influenced and inspired. They’re not very good at dotting the i’s and crossing the t’s. High S’s are steady, they don’t necessarily like going outside their comfort zone. They don’t like confrontation and they need to be led. High C’s are very analytical. They overanalyze everything and they sometimes take too long to make a decision as everything has to be just right. Finally, your high D’s, boom, they just get in the mix and make things happen.
Now here’s a little bit of controversy where there could be a little miscommunication. High D’s are those top performers who have been individually making things happen, now they’re in charge of teams. Understand that depending on the demographics of your team, if they are not in sales, the vast majority of them are going to be I’s, S’s, and C’s. Why is this important to be familiar with? Because as a D being the leader, they most likely relate to others, ‘come on, it’s your job, to just figure it out and get it done’. That’s the fast-paced behavior of the D. A high S doesn’t figure it out and get it done. They’re afraid to go outside their comfort zone. They don’t want to be wrong; they need to be led. High I’s will not just get it done because they don’t execute and they need to be inspired. High C’s definitely don’t want to make a mistake because everything has to be just right as they have to be articulated and have to be given time.
Now if you’re a high D fast-paced leader and you don’t know these statistics. You’ve been a striver and go-getter all your life and you haven’t been coached in how to be a leader and understand the different behaviors and how to communicate accordingly. You are coming in and blowing 88% of the people out of the box because you are telling them to do it one way quickly. Get it done, figure it out, make it happen. And yet those 88% in their behavior are not designed to just figure it out, get it done, and make it happen quickly.
What’s a leader to do? You bring in someone like me to administer these types of behavioral assessments and educate everybody, including you, on how to understand not only their own behavior but everyone else’s so everyone can communicate better. Because most remember the golden rule, ‘treat others like you would like to be treated.’ That doesn’t work. The platinum rule is, ‘treat others the way they want to be treated.’ And when everyone understands those dynamics and how to communicate correctly, everybody wins. With that, you’ll have a lot less drama in an organization, and efficiency, productivity, and results will be on the rise.
COACH MICHAEL DILL is an Award-Winning Certified Business Coach, global speaker, and published author. He is a proud Action Coach Franchise partner as well as the President of Power & Ice Wealth Creation a strategic leadership company that works with business owners, leaders, teams, and entrepreneurs to both develop a systematized and structured organization while accelerating their mindset, efficiencies, and effectiveness to grow both personally and professionally to achieve extraordinary results. He brings more than 40 years of business and entrepreneurial experience in his leadership, team training, and mentoring practice. Businesscoachmichaeldill.com