Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: Foreign.
[00:00:05] Speaker B: Welcome, everyone, to Moraine Park Technical College's Talent Talk Podcast. I'm Kelly Karpinski, a business development manager in the Economic and Workforce Development Division of mptc.
Today my guest is Dan Paulo, a leadership instructor in ewd. Dan is here to talk about a variety of assessments we deliver at MPTC that help individuals better understand themselves and the people they work with. Welcome, Dan, and thank you for joining us.
[00:00:33] Speaker A: Thanks for the opportunity.
[00:00:35] Speaker B: I provided just now a very generic description of what we'll be talking about today, but let's get into specifics.
Through Economic and Workforce Development, or ewd, we provide assessments that give insight into communication, personality, leadership.
What are those assessments and what specific insights do each of them provide?
[00:01:00] Speaker A: Well, there's actually four we're going to talk about today.
The first one, and there's some similarities across them, but they all kind of have their specific role. So the first one is our DISC certification, and that one is really a personality assessment. And it looks at four different parts of someone's personality. And I can't go into all of them, but we'll. Or we'd be here forever.
First one is dominant. Right. So it breaks a lot of these all, break them down into four areas. One is dominant, one is influential, one is that steady person, and then one is more compliant. So if you think of those words. Right.
And this is again, a self assessment that you take and then we bring everybody in a room. A couple things you can do is just deal with this individually or you can get team results and graph the types of personalities on your team. And that also comes with an emotional intelligence piece, too, that you can add on so you can overlap those two. Someone's personality and then how that affects how they handle their emotions. So it's a real powerful assessment. I'll get into a little bit later about how to choose one maybe for each situation.
[00:02:16] Speaker B: Great.
[00:02:17] Speaker A: The next one I want to talk about is Strength Finder. And this is. This is a real personalized approach. It looks at what your strengths are. It breaks down your five top strengths, and then it gives you kind of another spectrum of. There's a total of 34.
So just some examples of that would be. You could be. One of your strengths would be a learner.
Right. One of your strengths could be a believer, meaning that you're really.
You look real deeply into situations. Right. Learner. I think that makes sense. It's somebody who likes to learn. Right?
[00:02:50] Speaker B: Correct.
[00:02:50] Speaker A: So you get your five strengths and you break it down. It gives you a lot of ways to use that and how to use those to improve a team. The real premise is there is we're always trying to fix our weaknesses.
And this is a return on investment on working on your strengths and using them to the fullest.
The last one that we're really just starting to offer more, excuse me, is the true colors assessment. And again, this breaks it down into four different types. Breaks it down into four colors.
And with each color, there's a certain set of traits that go with your personality. So gold is one. Gold tends to be that rule follower very looks for. It needs a lot of structure.
We have an orange personality that tends to be very outgoing, very spontaneous. You probably figured out I'm fairly orange.
Then we have a blue personality that tends to be more empathetic. They tend to be those people that create consensus among a group and they're very feeling heavy. And then last, and that one is the green.
And the green tends to be problem solvers. They're looking for digging deep. They love research. They look for the question why is big?
And then the last One is the 360 assessment. And this is really powerful for someone who wants to grow in their leadership role.
Basically what you do is you send out a survey to those who supervise you, those of you, your peers, and then those that you supervise.
And you get feedback from all levels of that part of your leadership role. Can be very enlightening.
It's what you need to hear versus many times what you want to hear.
[00:04:39] Speaker B: And it's. Except for the manager. It's anonymous as well, correct? Yes.
[00:04:43] Speaker A: Yep.
It's very anonymous. And you give it out to more than one of each.
[00:04:48] Speaker B: Right.
[00:04:49] Speaker A: So you can't pinpoint it.
[00:04:51] Speaker B: Right.
[00:04:51] Speaker A: Bi level.
Done it myself. And it's just very enlightening.
[00:04:56] Speaker B: Yes. And humbling in some respects.
[00:04:59] Speaker A: And humbling as well. Yeah. I use some of the tools. A lot of the tools I learned. I could give you example after example, but sometimes we think we're, you know, people are understanding us. And then there's times where, like I live very comfortably in the gray area, you know, very spontaneous. And then some of the people I supervised, that wasn't so good for them. They wanted. They were more goals. Right. As we discussed.
[00:05:28] Speaker B: Sure, sure.
So a way, a way to help you grow personally and professionally.
[00:05:34] Speaker A: Yeah. If you combine StrengthsFinder and that360 assessment, it's really powerful because, you know, you see what your strengths are and how to use those to match some of those things you found out within your 360.
[00:05:52] Speaker B: So we just touched on a Little bit of, kind of foreshadowed how these can be used for personal and professional development. So we don't necessarily have to go one by one, but kind of overall, how can these help us?
[00:06:09] Speaker A: Well, well, I think there's really, you know, number one is just going through these certifications. I mean there's. Other than the 360, it's a group certification. You're normally in a group of peers or so just hearing those within that one when you're doing the training is very, very powerful.
And then once you, you know some of these, there's follow up and other sessions. But then you see the power of it when you meet with them again.
And it's really good for conflict resolution because people learn their personalities.
It's great for just communication skills. I mean, it hits the spectrum. Each one of these, again, don't need to go into all of them, but they have their own kind of flavor.
[00:06:55] Speaker B: Sure.
[00:06:56] Speaker A: So it's just growth, growth in individuals and growth in your teams.
[00:07:00] Speaker B: Right. And as I understand, I've been part of some of these too, within a group. And it's. You probably understand others as well a little bit maybe like, oh, that's why they say that, or do it that way or oh, now I know I have to adapt for them. Just like your direct reports who were.
[00:07:26] Speaker A: Right, who were gold. Yeah, I have a great example of that. I was doing the disc certification with a group from a local, local business and they had one young man who was fairly new and he really kind of fit that compliant mode.
And then there was another individual who was in charge of maintenance and he really had a dominant role.
So the new employee was fairly compliant. Literally had other people go ask him questions or if something broke, he wouldn't even go ask them himself.
There was one guy in the group so that would go ask him. So having those two people in the room and understanding like how the one who was more dominant was affecting the one who was more compliant, it just opened up that avenue of discussion.
[00:08:17] Speaker B: Sure.
[00:08:18] Speaker A: So when I met with them again a month later, there was great improvement.
[00:08:22] Speaker B: Oh, that's wonderful.
[00:08:23] Speaker A: And humorous. Right? Go talk to them now. Right?
[00:08:25] Speaker B: Yeah.
Don't be afraid.
[00:08:27] Speaker A: Short term, long term, I would say. Yeah.
[00:08:30] Speaker B: Okay, good to know.
How about.
So that's the individuals. How about for a business?
What can the business get out of it if they do these?
[00:08:46] Speaker A: I think it's a huge culture piece to improve the culture of your organization. Because number one, I always tell people they're investing. This is an investment in you As a leader. Right. So the reason you're here is that the company is trying to improve culture, improve effectiveness from a business standpoint. Right. A good culture is good for your return on investment. So investing in these trainings, short term, long term, has a huge effect on how your teams communicate. I could give you example, example of different, you know, parts of an organization that through this have been able to improve certain, certain parts of their systems. Right. So if you find someone who's like in for example, True Colors, who's a real green, that tends to dig deeper.
[00:09:42] Speaker B: Right.
[00:09:42] Speaker A: And they're with that more orange person who's always coming up with ideas. Right. So it helps focus an organization because you could be one of those leaders that just picks and chooses and gets real excited. But then you have that other individual that can really take and dig a bit deeper.
[00:10:00] Speaker B: Sure.
[00:10:01] Speaker A: So I would say efficiencies across multiple areas, especially when you're working cross functional those efficiencies of communication, looking for ways to increase productivity.
I mean, right now we live in a very competitive environment. Right?
[00:10:21] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:10:22] Speaker A: So employee productivity.
And again, we live. A lot of the companies I work with have high turnover and research shows that if you can bring someone in and meet some of these needs, you know you're going to keep that employee.
[00:10:38] Speaker B: Right.
[00:10:39] Speaker A: So retention is huge.
[00:10:41] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:10:43] Speaker A: Like I said, a lot of the groups I work with, that's a huge issue.
So meeting their needs is really important. And finding out their strengths and how to use them, you know, how to utilize that person within the different areas of your organization.
[00:10:59] Speaker B: Sure, sure. For projects, teams, maybe cross functional teams.
[00:11:05] Speaker A: Right, right. And making sure you have the right fit. Many times you have a great, great employee, but you have them in an area that's not their strength.
[00:11:14] Speaker B: Right, sure.
[00:11:15] Speaker A: Or their personality doesn't match. So you have some areas where someone has to be very, you know, I don't want to say assertive, we'll just use that word. Right. In some areas where that doesn't work. But you get those two people together and it's just as good for your organization. So I would say culture, efficiencies and then return on investment for the money you spend, you know, for one of these certification trainings.
[00:11:46] Speaker B: Okay, wonderful.
So what should these organizations consider when they're choosing? So we, we have four, we do fairly regularly. So what should they be considering when they're looking at these?
[00:12:02] Speaker A: I would always start with what are your objectives and what are your goals? Right. So if your goal is conflict resolution or just, you know, working on communication Skills, the true colors one or the disc one would probably be the best at this point. I think the true colors matches that the best.
[00:12:21] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:12:23] Speaker A: So again matching it to your objectives. Work with our team also to come up with what fits best.
[00:12:31] Speaker B: Sure.
[00:12:31] Speaker A: I mean your team is very, very knowledgeable on which one works well.
So work with your contract specialist to really come out with what works best. And then they'll a lot of times communicate with me. We work together, but start with your objectives and your goals. If you're looking for leadership development within one individual, one of your leaders, of course that 360 is very powerful.
[00:12:58] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:12:58] Speaker A: And the strengths finder.
[00:12:59] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:13:00] Speaker A: So you know softer skills, you know, knowing their, where they fit their personality types. And then if you're really looking to build individual leaders, it's very one on one.
So these are one on one conversations, not like large group.
[00:13:17] Speaker B: Right. And we should say the 360, we require a couple hours for sure of coaching.
[00:13:26] Speaker A: Right.
[00:13:27] Speaker B: So that they can not only understand their results, but start working on a plan for a kind of a self improvement plan.
[00:13:36] Speaker A: Right.
[00:13:37] Speaker B: And I do know businesses that will have even further coaching. So right now we're working with a business where they did the 360 and then they're doing actually six months of coaching after.
Because they want these people to be future leaders.
[00:13:55] Speaker A: Right? Yeah, there's.
[00:13:56] Speaker B: They're just not there yet.
[00:13:58] Speaker A: Yeah, there's a huge coaching after the fact piece to that. And one of the things I guess I didn't touch on is that these organizations like the True Colors certification, you have to go through three days of original training just to become a certified.
To become a certified instructor, you have to take three days of training and then another day. So totally you take four days.
[00:14:21] Speaker B: Right.
[00:14:22] Speaker A: So this is, they feel strongly about their product and they want you to be trained when you go in. Same thing with the 360. It's. They don't just say here's your PowerPoint, you know, have at it. So.
[00:14:36] Speaker B: Right.
[00:14:37] Speaker A: They feel strongly about their product and their high quality products.
[00:14:41] Speaker B: Yes. So we and listeners, we have two instructors who are.
Two of our, both of our full time leadership instructors are certified in to be able to do these assessments. I think we might also have an adjunct who's certified in a couple of them as well. So we, we have staff who can help.
[00:15:05] Speaker A: Definitely.
[00:15:06] Speaker B: All right.
[00:15:07] Speaker A: And it's a passion of ours as ewd. I think it's really something we're proud to provide.
[00:15:12] Speaker B: Right, I agree, I agree. And we, we do recommend them often.
So if listeners, if you're interested in learning more or reaching out, just email trainingerainepark.edu. that's TrainingerRainparePark.edu.
dan, thank you so much for your time today and letting listeners know about these opportunities that are available to them.
[00:15:40] Speaker A: Thank you for letting me share my passion and knowledge about just a great topic.
[00:15:45] Speaker B: All right, wonderful. That that concludes today's podcast. Thank you all for listening and have a wonderful.
