Some workplaces take advantage of the growing number of assessments that allow employees to learn more about themselves.

Profiling tools can be great for self-awareness. And self-awareness is the foundation of emotional intelligence.

However, I get people telling me they have used such assessments – and that it didn’t help them much. This can lead to money lost for the organisation, time lost in doing all the surveys, and lost opportunities for growth for individuals and organisations.

Here are eight ways to get more out of your profiling exercise:

1. Get Them Interpreted With Accuracy

• Get someone trained to interpret the results to debrief you personally whenever possible. Nothing beats a personal and in-depth session. Have a follow up session to track progress on any actions the staff wants to take.

• Where personal debriefs are not feasible for all, arrange them at least for those in leadership.

• For staff who don’t get individual debriefs, organize an interactive group session to enable the facilitators to explain how to interpret the tool and enable the group to practise and ask questions.

• Discuss that each person’s profile has positives and a shadow side.

• Some universals are needed. Your profile may show you may heavy on the cognitive side and not have much emotional intelligence. However, emotional intelligence is important in cultivating positive relationships. This is important if you want to build a positive work culture. We cannot just say, Oh, that’s not you so don’t worry about it.

 2. Strengthen Teamwork By Enabling Understanding 

• Reduce conflict potential by enabling staff to appreciate each other’s contribution to the organisation, and that we are all made different and increase understanding of each other.

3. Use The Tool As Part Of A Larger Programme Or Conversation

• See the tool as just that. Embed it as part of a broader programme where related concepts are introduced to staff.
• Include the language of the tool in daily work life.

4. Use The Data In Practical Ways 

• Use the data from profiling to help practical decisions like delegation, learning, and development choices for staff, composing groups focused on specific tasks.

5. Use It To Inform Learning Journeys

• Invite people to learn and grow by learning about each other’s profiles. Perhaps they may want to develop a quality that a colleague has and the profiling exercise may have made this clear. So they could observe this person for that quality and learn from them.

• Staff may also be invited to design their learning journey (whether it’s through formal courses or otherwise) based on their profiling results. One of the tools I use, the R2 Strengths Profiler, shows the energising strengths of employees which they are not using much. Supporting them to use these traits may bring faster dividends to the organisation and individual than working on a weakness which is very entrenched.

• Yet weaknesses may sometimes be a hole in the ship – it can sink us either in terms of work performance, relationships at work or at home, or our well-being. So paying attention to which weakness we may need to grow in would also help.

6. Use For Coaching

• If there are external coaches, they could be informed of tools the staff have been exposed to so they can take it into consideration.

• Leaders may also coach their staff, keeping their profiles in mind.

7. Use For Recruitment Or Onboarding 

To get someone speaking the shared language you have in your team, get them to take the profiling survey when they come in. The award-winning Drake P3 has a job-candidate matching service where you create a profile of the ideal candidate for the job (in terms of certain dimensions of personality) and then you can match that with your candidates profile.

8. Connect With Other Tools 

• If the organisation has used other assessments, where possible, discuss links between the ideas behind the new tool and the older one, as well how people’s results may be enriched by this new tool. Pinpoint and give attention to contradictions that need to be discussed. Tools are a great starting point for meaningful dialogue  and action. They are not the end-point. Don’t let them gather dust on your shelf!

 Visit the JoyWorks page to find out more about Vadivu’s work.