Marvin OnumonuDerbyshire-based Q Branch Consulting founders, Matt Clutterham (pictured, left) and Jenny Jarvis (pictured, right), said they are using dominance, influence, steadiness and compliance (DISC) personality profiling to help businesses improve staff retention after it helped save their own relationship.
Q Branch Consulting works with clients including charities, businesses and public sector organisations on brand and people transformation.
The DISC system is based on a questionnaire that generates a personality profile, identifying if someone is dominant, influential, steady or compliant.
The company has now added DISC profiling to its services, responding to recent research which found UK workers were quitting their jobs at record rates.
Jarvis said: “I use DISC profiling for all my clients as it lets me know how they like to be communicated with.
“A ‘C’ type personality, for example, needs lots of detail in order to feel happy, while a ‘D’ type will appreciate a very direct style of communication.
“People who are ‘I’ type personalities are sociable and influential while someone who is an ‘S’ likes clear boundaries and doesn’t appreciate working in a non-harmonious environment.”
Jarvis added: “DISC profiling is a fantastic tool for companies and we have seen our clients able to keep staff through offering leaders a greater understanding of what makes their employees ‘tick’.
“No business can work without establishing good relationships and that’s why we believe that DISC profiling is a great way for companies to ensure they keep their best talent on board.
“I’m happy to share that Matt and I used DISC profiling ourselves after a communications issue early on in our own relationship – it helped us see that we simply had different personalities and our misunderstanding had arisen through us looking at an issue in very different ways, not that we were incompatible.”
Research from Personio, which surveyed employees and employers across Europe, found nearly half of the continent’s workforce planned to look for a new job in the next 12 months.
Jarvis said using DISC profiling will help companies keep staff by increasing understanding, rather than relying on pay rises or extra holidays.
She said: “DISC profiling is powerful but can also be used in the wrong way. We have heard of staff who have undergone DISC profiling and are subject to negative questioning when it comes to a job interview.
“We advocate sensitive use of the system to help leaders forge good relationships with staff rather than create negativity.
“Leaders need to undergo DISC profiling themselves in order to understand how they operate – it really helps people appreciate why they act in certain ways and why, perhaps, their relationships haven’t necessarily gone well in the past.”
