Delta Associates has developed a comprehensive strategy for using assessments to enhance the effectiveness of individuals, teams and entire organizations. Please contact us (512 -498-9780 or
jspeer@delta-associates.com) or click through the tabs in this section for more information.
Using MBTI and Other Key Assessments for Individual and Team High Performance
The right assessment data skillfully interpreted can advance a person’s career by years in a few months. It can make a floundering team focused and effective in a matter of weeks. It can transform a high performing team into an organizational force of nature.
Replacing Subjectivity with Data
Why is this? It’s because assessments replace subjective judgments with the clarity of data. For instance, a person can describe a strength you have or a behavior that will sink your career–but your instinctive reaction may be to deny, negate, or simply not understand that feedback because it appears subjective. Yet when you complete the right assessments and receive the proper interpretation, it is as if you realized for the first time that you had been pouring ketchup over your shirt each time you led a business meeting or that you saw a talent you never recognized in yourself.
Yet often assessments don’t have this “ah-ha” effect. Your organization may even have tried them with minimal or negligible results. Assessments all too often are poorly presented and inadequately interpreted. So while participants may find them interesting and even enjoyable, they are quickly forgotten or improperly applied.
The Video Replays of Organizations
Assessments are to a high performing organization what a video replay is to a professional sports team. They are the primary tool that will take the team to the championship. As with video replay, an organization will not receive value from an assessment unless it is interpreted effectively. Delta Associates takes assessments from being an entertaining “event” to becoming an integral part of your culture and tools. There are many popular assessments available today–some very strong and some highly questionable. Delta Associates uses assessments that provide a full picture of individual and organizational performance. We choose only assessments that meet the highest standards of statistical validity. As a result, these assessments elicit the “ah-ha” response: “Now I understand what is going on with me and the world around me and I have a tool I can use for the rest of my life.” We use assessments, in other words, that make a lasting impact and deliver lasting value.
For the person who is determined to grow as a professional, a single assessment is like having a compass with one arrow pointing in one direction. Delta Associates has developed a complete methodology around a set of assessments that provides professionals with all the coordinates necessary to chart a career.
The following are assessments that we use to strengthen performance and diagnose organizational issues:
Myers-Briggs Type Indicator(RT). The MBTI(RT) is the most well-known personality assessment in the world. There are many good personality assessments, but none that are as effective in helping a person understand– often for the first time–the way they communicate, make decisions, react under stress and best organize their life.
The FIRO-B. This assessment is fundamental to understanding how our often mixed signals make it impossible for people “read” us and for us to lead them. We want them to keep us informed of everything, yet we tell them little or nothing. We want a huge amount of control over others on the one hand, or little or no responsibility on the other. We expect people to be friendly, yet we withhold friendship, and a host of other interpersonal limiters. FIRO-B tells us unique things about ourselves and is the best measurement available of emotional intelligence.
CPI 260. This assessment is one of the few that creates a “scorecard” of how an executive compares to a database of 5,600 successful managers, senior managers and executives in North America and Europe.
The Birkman One of the most comprehensive assessments in the world, the Birkman enables you to see the disconnects between your usual behavior in the workplace, what you truly need in order to function most effectively and what you do under stress that may be counter-productive. It enables you to understand your natural leadership style and how to modify it for greater effectiveness.
The 360-degree Assessment. This assessment has become standard in organizations that want to be high performing. The assessment is web-based and extremely user friendly. It is customized to the organization and industry. It gives the participant clear feedback from bosses, peers, direct reports. We can customize the 360 to include other groups inside the organization or external constituencies such as customers or board members. It is one of the most effective assessments available for executive development.
