What:
I
remember my first counseling session as a Second Lieutenant. It was my first in
the Army and the first with my Battalion Commander. The purpose of the
counseling was to receive my first evaluation report. My commander asked me a
simple question, “What are your strengths?” I stumbled around the questions and
answered, “I’m a hard worker, I’m smart, I work well with others, etc.” After I
answered we sat silently for a minute, then I was dismissed. This was the
abrupt end to the counseling.
The truth was that
I didn’t really know my strengths. Nor, did I feel like my commander was
interested in helping me find them as apparent by the quick end to the
conversation. This is a common problem. As a leader and follower, I found that
leaders do not spend enough time counseling their followers and followers wind
up feeling neglected.
I’ve had the awesome opportunity to
take a break from the Army and attend graduate school. I’ve also had the
opportunity to take many different personality tests and team dynamic tests in
my small groups and leadership classes. Below is an inventory of these tests
(This is a non-inclusive list):
|
Application:
|
Online Test, Self-test and observer questionnaires
|
|
Results:
|
Measures the Five Practices of Exemplary Leadership
|
|
Cost:
|
~$40.00
|
|
Uses:
|
360 inventory
|
|
Application:
|
Online Test
|
|
Results:
|
Dominance, Influence, Steadiness, Conscientiousness
|
|
Cost:
|
Free
|
|
Uses:
|
Increases self-knowledge, Conflict Management, Motivations, Stressors,
Problem Solving, facilitates better team work and Group interaction
|
|
Application:
|
Online Test
|
|
Results:
|
Four dichotomies extraversion-introversion, sensing-intuition,
thinking-feeling, judging-perception
|
|
Cost:
|
Free
|
|
Uses:
|
Personality type, how personality type fits into the ‘team’
|
|
Application:
|
Online Test
|
|
Results:
|
Measures individual capacity of self-perception, self-expression,
interpersonal composite, decision making, and stress management on a scoreable
scale.
|
|
Cost:
|
$66.00
|
|
Uses:
|
Individual self-knowledge and actualization
|
|
Application:
|
Online Test and book
|
|
Results:
|
Identifies top five strengths in the categories of executing,
influencing, relationship building, and strategic thinking.
|
|
Cost:
|
$24.00
|
|
Uses:
|
Individual self-knowledge and actualization, team strengths.
|
|
Application:
|
Online Test
|
|
Results:
|
How to deal with conflicts and group dynamics
|
|
Cost:
|
$15.00
|
|
Uses:
|
Team dynamics
|
So what:
I am always looking
for different ways to counsel my subordinates and develop my teams. The Army
uses the Multi-Source Assessment and Feeback 360 (MSAF 360)
tool to help leaders develop their self-awareness. The limitation with this
tool is that only the Soldier sees the result (which is as it was designed).
The problem is that Soldiers do not have to use this information for any
purpose in team development or professional counseling. I want to develop a
system for myself to use the tools listed above to develop my own counseling
and team building plans. I propose the following:
Now What:
It’s important to
note that this list is non-inclusive. Each leader must define his or her own
style. Each of these tests has different purposes and applications. I want to
use them to build my team, identify strengths and weaknesses, organize for
efficiency, and help my subordinates develop their self-awareness and
actualization.
These are great
tools for my leader “toolbox”. I will continue to refine this system and test
it with my teams. I will face the challenge of using the right tools at the
right time and bring each team member on board with this idea. However, I think
that in the future my teams will find the results useful and will hopefully
understand each other and the team dynamics better.
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