Understanding Personality Improves Communication and Productivity

In my recent NACACS presentation, I received a lot of questions about the differences in personalities in the workplace. Some of the participants had gone through Myers-Briggs, DiSC, StrengthsFinder, or some other type of assessment. However, many of them had not had any training regarding personality preferences. There are a variety of personality assessments that can help people learn how to get along at work. Therefore, it may be challenging to determine which assessment to use. I believe that there are some important things to learn from many of these tools. Toni Rothpletz and I wrote It’s Not You It’s Your Personality to summarize the important aspects of each of the major personality assessments and help employees thrive at work.

Many guests on my Take the Lead Radio Show are experts in different aspects of helping employers improve communication. That is really what these assessments are meant to improve. We need to communicate more effectively; we can do that through improved understanding of each other’s preferences. Whether it is the introvert learning how to get a word in edgewise with an extravert, or a dominant personality learning to listen better, it is all about communicating effectively. In the 1970s, two separate research teams came up with what we now call The Big Five Factors of Personality, based on research that came out in the early 1930s. Societies have endeavored to determine the best ways to communicate. It is a challenge that will continue because there are so many unique personality traits.

What may help is to develop empathy, which is a big component of emotional intelligence. I studied the importance of empathy on interpersonal relationships as part of my doctoral dissertation. Empathy, mood self-regulation, self-presentation, along with practical intelligence was a big factor related to work success. Employees who demonstrate empathy understand other’s feelings when making decisions that might impact them. Companies that focus on developing these important skills can have more productive and engaged employees. It behooves employers to proactively encourage effective communication, due to the $550 billion a year productivity loss due to unhappy employees. They can begin by helping employees understand personality preferences. People are more accepting of personalities that are different from their own if they understand why people display certain behaviors. Once they understand different personality traits, they can develop empathy and other key emotional intelligence traits to help them be more successful, cooperative, and productive workers.

Related Articles:

• Soft Skills: Critical to Employee Success
• First IQ, Then EQ: Leaders Must Now Have CQ
• What Leaders Need to Know About Engagement
• Managing Millennials Requires Understanding Their Values
• The Cost of Engagement and How to Improve It
• How to Develop Soft Skills Not Learned at Work or School
• Forbes: Generational Issues in the Workplace: Millennials vs. Boomers
• Determining Personality Type for Team-Building
• One Key Word Impacts Intelligence, Engagement, Sales, Soft Skills, Gamification, and Millennials

Improving Employee Engagement

Employers struggle with a variety of motivation and emotion-based issues with employees. How to attract, engage, and inspire top talent to create winning teams is one of the most requested keynotes.  This is usually combined with some form of addressing generational differences, communication, culture, leadership, teamwork, and personality conflict.  Engagement has been broken down into three parts by Gallup including engaged (13%), not engaged (63%), and actively disengaged (60%).

With such a large percentage of workers in the category of not engaged, it brings attention to the costs involved with ambivalence.  If workers are not engaged, they do not put forth any extra effort, they are less innovative, less effective at customer service, less loyal, more likely to job hop, and are less productive.  Ambivalent workers are there to get a paycheck, but they are not likely to volunteer for much more.  They may be harder to spot because they are not necessarily unhappy, but they do not feel connected to the organization and therefore, are less concerned about customers, profitability, and safety.  They are more likely to leave, resulting in costly turnover expenses.

Consider the costs associated with engagement:

• The U.S. economy loses $250 billion a year to turnover; there is a loss of $30.5 billion just for Millennials
• Cost of a disengaged employee averages $3400 per $10,000 in salary
• Engaged companies have a 6% higher net profit margin and grow profits three times faster
• Managers spend up to 40% of their day dealing with conflict and engagement-related issues
• Companies with low engagement scores have 32.7% less operating income

For a complete list of costs involved in engagement, check out 2016 Employee Engagement/Retention Statistics.  There are ways to improve employee engagement. These include:

• Make engagement a priority
• Read the SRHM and Deloitte studies for an in-depth understanding of engagement
• Recognize the importance of understanding emotional aspects of employee behavior
• Determine levels of engagement to get a baseline
• Meet with employees and teams to open a dialogue and develop trust
• Have engaged employees mentor those who are not engaged
• Determine if employees are in jobs that match their preferences and skills
• Examine feedback, respect, and recognition employees receive – the number one driver of engagement is recognition
• Link compensation to engagement

Engagement may vary based on generations and length of service to the company.  As Millennials become the largest group in the workplace, it behooves leaders to learn more about how to attract and retain this group.  They do not require long, detailed-recognition, but frequent notifications that they are doing well and are on track may be very important to their emotional commitment.

Leaders should recognize that the way people work must be evaluated. The days of 8 to 5, no flexibility, and yearly performance reviews are no longer the norm.  People require frequent recognition and feedback.  Leaders who schedule time for feedback will be the ones who reap the rewards. Now that 40% of global workers are remote, it is important to find new ways to connect and to empower people to work virtually.  The successful leaders will begin by hiring the best people, monitor their outcomes, and continue to provide feedback, respect, recognition, and support.

Related Articles:

• Soft Skills: Critical to Employee Success
• First IQ, Then EQ: Leaders Must Now Have CQ
• What Leaders Need to Know About Engagement
• Managing Millennials Requires Understanding Their Values
• The Cost of Engagement and How to Improve It
• How to Develop Soft Skills Not Learned at Work or School
• Forbes: Generational Issues in the Workplace: Millennials vs. Boomers
• Determining Personality Type for Team-Building
• One Key Word Impacts Intelligence, Engagement, Sales, Soft Skills, Gamification, and Millennials

Managing Millennials Requires Understanding Their Values

Millennials are one of the most misunderstood generations, which has led to frustration in the workplace.  With so many generations working together, it is not unusual that there would be some conflict. The biggest issues have revolved around the clash between Boomers and Millennials.  With varying views on political and leadership issues, as well as differences in the frequency at which they embrace technology, conflict management has become a top concern for many leaders.  Part of learning to manage this unique generation includes understanding and embracing their values.

The Forbes Mentor Week presentation, “The Future of the Workplace” focused on what will happen when Boomers finally retire, and Millennials take the wheel.  This presentation addressed some myths and facts about Millennials.  In addition to the information provided there, here are a few more Millennials statistics that may be surprising:

• Millennials are now the largest living generation
• Millennials make up more than 25% of the U.S. workforce
• Nearly half of business to business researchers are Millennials
• Millennials are among the strongest advocates of business
• Millennials’ top issue that concerns them in business is education (including skills and training)
• Millennials’ loyalty to employers remains low with many anticipating leaving jobs within 2-5 years
• Although they embrace technology, 40% believe it poses a threat to their employment

Millennials want to experience engagement at work.  For this group, engagement requires that they have a sense of belonging.  To meet this need, leaders must clearly share their vision, to obtain their cooperation.  Millennials must feel valued; therefore, it is critical that leaders show them respect and reward them for their efforts.  In research by Zemke, Rains, and Filipczak, the authors found that Millennials had nine more frequent requests. These included:

• Help us learn
• Believe in us
• Tune on to our technology
• Connect us
• Let us make it our own
• Tell us how we’re doing
• Be approachable
• Plug into our parents
• Be someone we can believe in

Part of being successfully in meeting their requests is to provide timely and detailed feedback.  Millennials like to receive feedback more frequently than past generations.  They like to meet privately and learn about their performance immediately after, with concrete observations.  They do not mind hearing they need to improve, but they will want to have specifics on how to accomplish that.  To ensure proper training occurs, managers should vary the way in which they present information. Millennials are avid learners and like to get their information through technology.  Allowing for workplace flexibility may be critical to Millennials staying with their employer.  Flexible working conditions are linked to improved productivity and engagement in this group.  By offering flexibility, employers have found that it has encouraged their sense of accountability.   By demonstrating to Millennials that leaders appreciate their values, they will have a better opportunity to lead this group in a way that meets their unique needs, leading to improved engagement and productivity.

Please click on the following link to take a Generational Engagement Survey.

About the Author:

Dr. Diane Hamilton is a speaker, educator, and the co-author of It’s Not You, It’s Your Personality and award-winning speaker at DrDianeHamilton.com.  She is a former Editor in Chief at an online education site and has written for several sites including Investopedia.  Dr. Hamilton has spoken for top companies including Forbes about topics including leadership, engagement, emotional intelligence, and generational conflict.  If you would like to learn more about these issues, you can sign up here: Contact.

Related Articles:

• Soft Skills: Critical to Employee Success
• The Cost of Engagement and How to Improve It
• What Can We Learn from Billionaire Ken Fisher About Introverts and Extraverts
• Forbes: Generational Issues in the Workplace: Millennials vs. Boomers
• Determining Personality Type for Team-Building

The Cost of Low Engagement and How to Improve It

Many people misunderstand the meaning of engagement. It is important to note that engagement does not mean satisfaction. Engagement refers to an emotional commitment to an organization and its goals.  Engagement, generational conflict, emotional intelligence, and other communication issues are some of the most requested speech topics by organizations. This is not surprising because 60-80% of all difficulties in organizations stem from relationship-based issues.  Numerous studies have demonstrated a correlation between engagement and performance.  Leaders with high levels of engagement also were more transformational, had higher levels of interpersonal skills, and had a better sense of well-being.

It behooves companies to improve engagement for a multitude of reasons, including retention issues.  Gallup found that the cost of disengagement was estimated at $550 billion annually in the U.S. With all the chatter about how often employees, especially Millennials, job-hop, it is important to consider why.  Studies indicate multiple reasons.  Talent Solutions found that 42% of job switchers stated they might have remained with their companies had they had better opportunities, benefits, recognition, and rewards.

To appreciate the importance of engagement, leaders must consider who lacks engagement and why.  Organizations may be able to not only improve turnover with improved engagement, but they may also be more profitable.  Organizations have shown a 6% higher net profit margin if their companies have high levels of engagement.  It can be helpful to look at some startling statistics provided by SHRM, Gallup, and other top researchers.

• 87% of employees are not engaged at work
• Engaged companies have a 6% higher net profit margin
• Managers spend up to 40% of their day dealing with conflict
• Women are 35% engaged; men are 29% Engaged
• 29% of Millennials are engaged at Work
• Millennials change jobs more than three times that of non-Millennials
• Engaged Millennials are 64% less likely to switch jobs
• 59% of Millennials, 44% of Gen Xers and 41% of Baby Boomers say opportunities to learn and grow are extremely important to them when applying for a Job

To create improved engagement, employers should focus on communication, growth, development, recognition appreciation, trust, and confidence. Since engagement is an emotion-based issue, it could be critical to create a baseline measurement of employees’ emotional intelligence.  Emotional-based assessments like the EQ-i may be useful.  Leaders must share the results with their employees to develop action plans to improve any personal issues employees may have.  Once personal emotional issues have been addressed, leaders should recognize their responsibilities to improve. Leaders need to get into the rhythm of communicating, showing concern for employee growth, recognizing achievements, and instilling trust by doing what they promise.  By improving emotional-based issues like engagement, managers can use that 40% of their day with productive issues rather than dealing with conflict.

Please click on this link: to take a Generational Engagement Survey.

About the Author:

Dr. Diane Hamilton is a speaker, educator, and the co-author of It’s Not You, It’s Your Personality, and award-winning speaker at DrDianeHamilton.com.  She is a former Editor in Chief at an online education site and has written for several sites including Investopedia.  Dr. Hamilton has spoken for top companies including Forbes about topics including leadership, engagement, emotional intelligence, and generational conflict.  If you would like to learn more about these issues, you can sign up here: Contact.

Related Articles:

• Soft Skills: Critical to Employee Success
• It’s Not You, It’s Your Personality: Understanding Post-Boomer Generations
• What Can We Learn from Billionaire Ken Fisher About Introverts and Extraverts
• Forbes: Generational Issues in the Workplace: Millennials vs. Boomers
• Determining Personality Type for Team-Building

Soft Skills: Critical to Employee Success

Attend any leadership conference, and someone likely will bring up startling statistics regarding how employees and leaders lack something they refer to as soft skills. This term is used to describe many qualities that include interpersonal skills, emotional intelligence, and other personality-based issues. The problem that many organizations have experienced is that people are hired for their hard skills, or in other words, for what they know (knowledge). Then later, are often fired for their lack of soft skills, or what they do (behaviors). If employers recognize the importance of soft skills, they can avoid costly hiring and training mistakes, improve turnover, and boost productivity.

Most leaders do not think graduates have the soft skills that businesses require for success, and 75% of newly hired executives have difficulty with these core competencies. Soft skills are critical for interpersonal relationships and communication. One important reason to develop these skills is that most employees do not quit because of companies; they quit because of leaders. Stress from working with leaders who have poor soft skills costs American companies $360 billion a year.

Some of the most problematic areas for employees and leaders include difficulty with listening, communication, team-building, listening, negotiating, problem-solving, decision-making, time management, motivation, and emotional intelligence, which includes interpersonal skills. The Millennial generation often gets bad press for having less-than-stellar soft skills including lack of patience. The use of too much technology may cause a breakdown in interpersonal relationships. Instead of interacting before meetings, many individuals embrace their cell phones. This lack of interaction has led to issues with listening and poor two-way communication.

The good news is that individuals can improve their soft skills. Authors like Daniel Goleman have found that emotional intelligence, which includes things like interpersonal skills and empathy, can be developed. Having a baseline measurement of emotional intelligence levels may be an important part of monitoring improvements. Seeking a mentor may be helpful as well; it is important that employees and leaders are open to feedback. It is important for individuals to consider ways to overcome their personal weaknesses and threats. Identifying the problem is only the beginning; having a plan to improve with measurable goals may be critical.

Employers face a financial burden if employees do not have proper soft-skill development. With the increase on reliance on technology, some basic interpersonal relationship skills may not have developed well. Employers can help employees and leaders develop these important skills through training programs and education. The first step is to realize there is a problem; only then can individuals set measurable goals to improve.

To receive updates regarding interpersonal skills, emotional intelligence, engagement, and tips for working on generational conflict, please feel free to sign up for: Updates

Related Articles and Videos:

• What Can We Learn from Billionaire Ken Fisher About Introverts and Extraverts
• Forbes: Generational Issues in the Workplace: Millennials vs. Boomers
• Determining Personality Type for Team-Building
• It’s Not You, It’s Your Personality: Understanding Post-Boomer Generations

Stop the Madness with Top Classroom Management Techniques

I have worked with educators in schools and universities across the United States since 2006.  My experience includes teaching, speaking, mentoring, training, program review, and curriculum design.  My goal is to help educators succeed and make a difference in the lives of students.  As a successful educator, coach, national trainer, and speaker, I promise to motivate and inspire educators through my on-site school training and district keynotes.  I share practical, proven strategies for immediate use in classrooms. This information will help educators feel self-value and proud of their chosen profession as they witness what proven techniques can do to help them succeed.  Please contact me today to find out how I can make a difference for you and your students.  For more information about hiring me for business consulting, speaking, and other training, please click on this link:  https://www.smore.com/ruh68-stop-the-madness

 

Millennial Student Entitlement Issues

The word Millennials is used to describe adults born between the years of 1980 and 2000.  They are also known as Generation Y.  Jean Twenge, author of Generation Me explained Millennials tend to be more self-focused and may expect to receive a lot of recognition. Sixty Minutes aired an interesting story titled The Millennials are Coming.  In this show, they explained how this younger generation expects good things and expects them with little effort. I have noticed that this sense of entitlement has carried into the online classroom setting.

Most of my students are very respectful. They follow directions.  They ask questions with the proper tone.  However, there are a few that are more demanding.  Although I have not formally studied the age group of the students who demonstrate issues with entitlement, I have noticed that my older Baby Boomer students seem to demonstrate more respect.

Some students become frustrated with expectations as they enter higher level programs.  Some of my students have managed to get through their undergraduate program with poor writing skills.  If I make comments about things that they need to work on for future assignments, some of them become upset or angry.  It is as if they expect to receive an A with very little effort.  They may make comments that express their indignation that I would even suggest that they might write “a lot” as two words, or indent a paragraph per APA guidelines.  I might even receive a note from them about how other professors did not mark down for certain things.

I do not take that many points off for writing or APA-related issues. I teach business-related courses and should not have to make grammar or structure my main focus.  What is interesting to me is that their anger does not seem to be about the score received as much as the fact that I have pointed out something they have done incorrectly.

Many students tell me that professors do not insert comments on their assignments. Perhaps that is why some of them react the way they do.  However, it seems to me that a graduate-level student should write at a graduate level.

Based on the reaction I get from the younger students, I often wonder if some professors “let things go” in order to keep the peace.  I have spoken to other professors who perform peer-reviews and deal with conflict resolution.  They have told me that students will complain about many little things.  If students complain, professors must respond, and then that creates more of a hassle for them.

The squeaky wheel may get the grease. If professors do not want to tell students the truth, for fear of reprimand, they may just let things slide.  My concern is that younger students’ entitlement issues have made them complain too easily and kept them from developing important skills.

Related Articles:

• Sheldon Cooper is in an EQ Stupor
• Jumping Through Hoops to Please Millennials
• Is the Millennial Generation the Best Generation Ever?
• Millennials Embrace Online Education
• Millennials Unique Expectations

 

Changing the Way Students Perform Online Research

Google and other search engines have changed the way people locate information.  The problem is that online students think of Google as a proper tool to use to perform research for assignments.  Google Scholar may provide access to some scholarly research.  However, most online schools prefer that students use the school’s library search feature.  It is important that students consider the reliability of the type of content that is available on traditional websites.

Pew reported that the majority of students are not able to recognize bias in online content.  This has become frustrating for professors because these skills should be taught in first-year college courses.  Turnitin’s white paper titled What’s Wrong with Wikipedia, reported that in over 37 million papers submitted by students, there were 156 million matches to content found from the Internet.  This means that students use sites like Google Books, May Clinic, Yahoo Answers, Wikipedia, etc.  These are unacceptable sources to use for college-level courses.

According to Turnitin’s research, the following problems exist with student’s research behavior:

• Problem: Students value immediacy over quality – Students use sites like Wikipedia to find quick answers.  Wikipedia may offer some valuable resources at the bottom of their site to support the content. Solution:  These sources are usually available through the school’s library search feature.  Schools’ search engines are quite easy to use. They access some of the best material available for free.  Students can easily mark a box for peer-reviewed studies.  This will ensure that their research contains quality information.
• Problem:  Students often use cheat sites – Students may find sites that offer to write their papers for a fee.  Most of these papers are captured within Turnitin’s plagiarism detecting software. Therefore when students buy the paper and submit as their own, the software will detect it as plagiarized.  Solution:  The time it takes to find and buy a paper on the Internet could have been used to simply write an original paper.  Nothing is gained from submitted plagiarized work.  Students risk getting expelled.  Most assignments are not that long or difficult.  The point of writing them is to gain knowledge.  Students who attend school just to obtain a piece of paper will not be prepared for the working world.  They will spend money on a degree that will not help them if they have not learned the information.
• Problem:  Research is not synonymous with search – Students may put a lot of faith in the information found on the Internet.  Just because a site allows people to ask and answer questions, does not mean that the answers are correct. Searching for answers on the Internet does not mean that the answers are based on actual research.  Solution:  Using peer-reviewed sources that are available through the school’s library ensures that the information in the article has been reviewed by the author’s peers.  These studies are actual research.

There are times when assignments allow for students to use websites like Apple.com, or other corporate or news sites.  If this is allowed by the instructor, students must be able to recognize if the site is highly regarded. An example might be The New York Times.  If students are in doubt, they should direct questions to their instructor for guidance.

Related Articles:

• Worst Sources for Citing
• What is Google Scholar?
• Mastering Citations and References
• APA and Writing Help Page
• Turnitin Helps Students Receive Meaningful Feedback
• How to Ace Discussion Questions

Online Student Safety and Behavioral Issues

The online classroom may make it easier for students with personality problems or even mental health issues to go undetected.  It may provide a false sense of security for some students who make friends with other students who may appear to be well.  However, in any online situation, it is wise to look for some behavioral signals that may indicate some problems.

I have had students who ignore netiquette, aka rules of proper behavior in the online classroom. I have had a few students who concerned me to the point that I believed, for safety reasons, I had to report them.  Although I have not had this happen often, it can be frightening for innocent students who get bullied or are provoked by these behaviorally-challenged students.

I recently had a student send me a note that she felt uncomfortable by certain wording that another student used in class.  She asked me to ask the student to refrain from using what she considered profanity.  Although this “profanity” may have seemed very mild to some of the other students, it bothered her.  It is important for students to realize that everyone may not be comfortable with certain words.

In the Wall Street Journal article When Social Skills are a Warning, the author explained that it may be important to look for social skills that may indicate a warning of behavioral issues. Instructors and fellow students might be able to detect some early signs that are symptoms of problems like social indifference, lack of empathy, and inappropriate behavior.  Some students do not recognize when to “back off” in discussions.  In the article, the author explained how our brains are set up differently. “Some networks act as emotional brakes and others as the gas.  Everyone has a different balance of these networks, which contributes to our personalities, emotions and behaviors.”

When students notice something that makes them feel uncomfortable, they should report it to their professor or counselor.  Many students are harmless and just do not realize how they may come across to others.  The problem is that there have been incidents that make the news that scare people.  These past tragedies may help to make people more aware of the importance of recognizing behavior.

Just because there is a computer screen between students, does not mean there is no danger.  Some students connect in online chat rooms.  Sometimes they exchange email and telephone numbers.  Just because a student is in an online college classroom, it does not ensure that this person is harmless.  In online, just as in traditional courses, there will be some students who have behavioral problems.  It is important that students do not let their guard down too far due to a possible incorrect assumption that all students must be normal.  I do not want to squelch the college connection experience. It is just important to remember that people may have issues whether they are in a traditional or online location.  Students should be just as vigilant about their safety in an online class as they would be in any other situation.

Related Articles:

• Generation of Haters Behind Social Media Anonymity
• Are Online Classes Primarily for Introverts?
• Students Quit or Bully to Receive an A
• Worst Experiences in Online Education

Hiring Graduates Based on Personality Skills

HR professionals within organizations have given personality assessments to potential employees for many years. I was asked to take a personality assessment for a pharmaceutical sales job in 1987.  The changes I have noticed since that time include the type and frequency of personality tests given.  What also may be trending is the fact that leaders of schools have become more interested in personality assessments. In the Wall Street Journal article Business Schools Know How You Think, but How Do You Feel, author Melissa Korn explained, “Prospective MBA students need to shine by showing emotional traits like empathy, motivation, resilience, and dozens of others.”  Schools may be interested in these traits because organizations value these traits.  Korn also explained, “Measuring EQ-or emotional intelligence quotient-is the latest attempt by business schools to identify future stars.”

I find this trend to be particularly interesting because I teach business, I am a qualified Myers Briggs instructor, a certified EQ-i instructor, and I wrote my dissertation on the relationship between emotional intelligence and sales performance.  I have also witnessed that online schools have placed more importance on personality assessments. Many of my first-year students must take a Jung-like personality test.  Many of my undergraduate and graduate business students have to assess their EQ.

I think it is important for these personality preference and emotional intelligence issues to be addressed in online courses.  Some of the things that may hurt a graduate’s chance of obtaining is job include having poor self-assessment skills, poor interpersonal skills, and a lack of concern for how they are perceived by others.

When I was in pharmaceutical sales, they rated us each year on our concern for impact.  It was such an important part of what they believed made us successful in the field, that there were consequences to poor judgment and rude behavior.  In the book, It’s Not You It’s Your Personality, there is a chapter regarding concern for impact, as well as one for Myers Briggs MBTI, Emotional Intelligence, DISC, and many other personality assessments that may help young adults in the workplace. One of the universities for which I teach requires students to read this book in a foresight course.

It is important for online students to learn about these assessments because employers use them.  Some personality traits stay with us throughout our lives.  The MBTI is an example of an assessment that determines preferences that may not change.  This assessment may be helpful to students who are not sure about career paths.  Other assessments like the EQ-i determine emotional intelligence levels.  The good news about emotional intelligence is that it may be improved. Marcia Hughes has written several books about how to improve EQ in the workplace.  The savvy online students will work on developing their EQ and understanding personality preferences before they graduate.  By being proactive, students may have a better chance of being successful in a career that matches their personality preferences.

Related Articles:

• Jobs and Education Choices Based on Myers Briggs
• The Emotionally Intelligent Online Student
• Schools Focusing on Career Path
• MBTI and VARK Importance to Learning
• More Education Required for Employment
• Degree Programs Based on MBTI
• It’s Not You It’s Your Personality
• How to Get a Job Based on Understanding Introverts and Extraverts