Behavior assessments help employers ID the best fit

When hiring new employees, Karen Best has a secret weapon – the DISC assessment.

“Different positions need different strengths,” said the CEO of The Best Team with Keller Williams Realty.

The DISC behavior assessment – which centers on the four behavioral traits of dominance, influence, steadiness and compliance – is used by companies large and small to identify an employee’s communication style.

“If I can understand what makes them tick, we can learn how to interact with each other better and we can get things done,” said Best, who also is mayor of Branson. “If I’m hiring someone for in-depth contract work, I want a high C, someone whose nature it is to pay attention to details.”

The real estate agent is among a growing majority of business leaders using personality assessments in the workplace.

Tests such as the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator have been around since the 1920s. While the tests only identify tendencies, not hard facts, knowing employees’ preferences can change and often improve workflow.

“Say the boss likes a clean, orderly office environment, but one employee works best in a bit of desk chaos,” said Stephen Eiffert, an MBTI-certified assessor and instructor at Missouri State University’s Management Development Institute. “The boss can make that person clean their desk, but if they know their Myers-Briggs type, they will know that employee would be less productive.

“People work best in their own style. If you can identify that, you can reach maximum efficiency.”

Don’t pigeonhole
DISC won’t reveal what a person will do, but rather how they go about doing it.

“DISC helps you understand yourself and knowing what you bring to the table can be a powerful thing,” said Beverly Baker, a certified extended DISC trainer and co-owner of consultant Trustpoint LLC.

Similar to a person’s blood type, Baker says you are what you are. While distinct communication styles may fit better into certain roles, Baker said the test is in no way meant to pigeonhole or limit an employee.

“The way we communicate is inherent,” she said, adding it wouldn’t be fair to penalize a perspective employee for having O negative blood because it’s something they can’t change. “Knowing your natural style doesn’t fit in a certain role means you know what you have to work on. It means a boss knows where they need to coach you.”

MDI’s Eiffert knows the tests can be a double-edged sword, giving rise to the false notion of a “natural fit.”

“The organizations most successful in employee retention and customer service tend to be more sophisticated in predicting traits and compensating for those traits,” said the 25-year consultant.

When Panera Bread Co.’s first-ever franchisee, Traditional Bakery Inc., got its start in Springfield, co-owner Jim Magers came to Eiffert to help set an HR structure in place. Adapting a hiring model used by Walt Disney Co. (NYSE: DIS), Eiffert cast people into the bakery’s roles, rather than hire them to predetermined positions, using a twist on the Myers-Briggs system.

“Using that knowledge to predict personality, we cast outgoing people into the roles at the front counter,” he said, adding just because a person didn’t like eye contact, didn’t make them a bad employee. “It just means they would be better cast in a different role. They may be more precise, so they would be tremendous at measurements if cast as a baker.”

Eiffert said knowing MBTI data can give employers flexibility within their workforce and employees the confidence to do their best within their natural roles.

It takes all types
While each test type can be boiled down into four basic traits, the characteristics can be combined in multiple ways.

Myers-Briggs – which analyzes one’s sensing, intuition, feeling and thinking – can be combined to form 16 personality preference types. The test determines extraversion vs. introversion, sensing vs. intuition, thinking vs. feeling and judging vs. perceiving.

The sensing and judging traits are most common, in roughly 38 percent of the population, Eiffert said. Business leaders tend to be S/Js, but it takes all types to make a company tick.

“Take entrepreneurs for example, they are not S/Js. They usually rebel against the administrator-type S/J,” he said. “So they start their own company with relaxed rules and increased creativity. That business takes off and that entrepreneur needs someone to manage (human resources) and get payroll out. They hire S/Js. It’s a cycle.”

Eiffert said when a person is consistent with who they are, they do their best work and the company benefits. For real estate agent Best, the testing practice is working.

“I’ve seen a difference in the staff, not only in how I interact with them, but also how they interact with each other,” said Best. “When you know your weakness, you can fix it and success is all about overcoming weakness.”