Kolbe Assessment to the Rescue: Do-er Diversity, Part Two
Before you read how the Kolbe Assessment could save poor Richard from sinking his ship, read It Takes All Kinds: Do-er Diversity, Part One.
An urban nonprofit organization hosts quarterly academic lectures that are popular events in the community. Richard, a self-described visionary, was recently brought on board as VP of Community and Cultural Programs to steer the organization toward increased donor dollars and national esteem. He is eager to transform the established lecture series into a first-class, intellectual star-studded, standing room only event.
Richard immediately put Jillian in charge of producing his vision for the expanded, spectacular lecture series because she had proven herself a committed curator of the quarterly lecture series for five years running and had endless ideas about future topics and speakers that would put the organization in the limelight. Her ability to think outside the box impressed him - he saw himself in her.
What Richard didn’t know is that while Jillian loves academic lectures, (she is stimulated by the interplay of broad, creative ideas), organizing them makes her miserable. The myriad of tedious details involved in organizing a lecture overwhelm and drain her, so for the past five years she has discreetly delegated those endless tasks to the interns with less than stellar results: invitations were late, speakers arrived without hotel reservations, invoices were lost, and people cried… including Jillian. When Richard proudly told her that he was promoting her to a director position where she would have sole custody of organizing the new, elaborate, monthly lecture series, her heart sank. Jillian started circulating her resume the next day.
“Being unaware of do-er diversity styles is a sure-fire way to sink your ship.”
Since Richard wanted to keep his good-guy reputation intact, he knew not to burden Jillian with the task of coming up with all of the lecture topic ideas and possible speakers by herself. So, he enlisted Jackson to partner with her. An excellent idea, he thought, since Jackson’s all-star performance in deftly managing the calendars, correspondence, budget, travel agendas, contracts, weekly events, and materials for 75 people in his department was well-known.
Richard congratulated himself on his bold moves. He could almost taste the praise and adulation that would soon be his.
During the next two months Jillian and Jackson gave it their all. Jillian had enough lecture topic ideas to last the next 50 years – the possibilities flowed like water. Jackson struck out on ideas and secretly checked airfares for future speakers on his cell phone while nagging Jillian about the burgeoning lecture series budget. Jillian and Jackson both left planning meetings drained, dejected, and disillusioned. Jackson also began to pass around his resume.
Two months in and the new lecture series hasn’t yet left dry dock much less set sail for the stars. Richard’s department is imploding, and he’s about to lose two valuable employees.
Poor Richard is unaware of his team’s do-er diversity styles. SOS!
Kolbe Assessment to the Rescue!
The Kolbe A Index is a 36-question online assessment tool that reveals the four different action modes that reveals how people naturally go about doing things. The tool offers instant results with a detailed explanation of each instinct-driven, do-er (conative) style. Thirty-five years of research has proven that when groups of people with the right mix of do-er styles work together, the combined energy produces synergy. Teams organized along these lines can perform at higher levels than the same group of people functioning independently.
If Richard assessed his team, he would know that Jillian is an idea-rich Quick Start, like himself, and Jackson is an organization-guru Follow Thru. By making Jillian the Rapid-Fire Idea Chief and Jackson the Director of Planning and Development, and then adding a detail-minded Fact Finder and an action-driven Implementer to the team, Richard would have aboard his ship the right mix of do-er diverse people necessary for realizing his vision of first-class, intellectual, star-studded, standing room only events.
Don’t be a Richard. Make the Kolbe assessment part of your do-er diversity strategy to avoid sinking your ship.