A Dominatrix

Eighteen months ago, a colleague asked that I participate in a DiSC evaluation with him. This DiSC review was focused on personality traits and preferences in work situations. Anyone can have a predilection towards one of the behaviors being analyzed; Dominance, Influence, Steadiness, and Conscientiousness; or can be more balanced in their personality styles. As someone who is fascinated with the human psyche and who formerly worked in HR, I believe that our personality traits directly affects how we communicate, behave, and respond in situations. Last week, my manager requested that I participate in this analysis so we could work on our management team's communication and strategy styles.

When I took this evaluation eighteen months ago, my numbers and behaviors were quite different than they were last week. Conscientiousness

2012	Score	2013	Score
Conscientiousness	19	Dominance	21
Influence	17	Conscientiousness	15
Dominance	16	Influence	15
Steadiness	5	Steadiness	6

Why the change? New responsibilities led to a change in my behavior on the job. Most won't believe it, but I can supress my dominant behavior when it's not needed. But if I'm the one held responsible in the end for an outcome, then that trait becomes prevelant. The discussion concerning the different traits and how they interact and communicate was fascinating to me.

A great way to explain these behaviors is:
Influence creates ideas but struggles with acting on those ideas yet are always open to dialog.
Steadiness weighs the options and after a lengthy consideration can make a final decision but does not like to openly admit their ideas/ decisions.
Conscientiousness are the one who like being given a goal and left to work independently on it.
Dominance makes quick decisions, acts on the ideas, questions status quo, and are very results driven.

This description also explains why I'm dominant in my personal life as well. If I care about the outcome then I'm invested 100%. What I find humorous is no one was shocked that my dominance trait was so high. Funny, considering it was not as high more than a year ago. Though I have no plans to start wearing leather and carrying a whip, I accept that people in my professional and personal life think of me as dominant personality. We'll see if this helps improve certain dynamics in my life.