3 Reasons Why The Big Five is Important in Remote Work
Not everyone likes personality tests in the workplace. They can be narrow-minded or enforce useless stereotypes. But I have to say, I think they have their value and even more so in remote work.
It’s pretty well-accepted now that diversity helps teams. Differing viewpoints and experiences lead to better products, less bias, and better processes. But while some differences are superficial and easily selected for or against during a hiring process, such as skin color or different education types, the diversity of how people’s minds work is usually not something we select for in our hiring. While you might think of some traits, say extroversion, being aligned with certain roles, like sales, many people have experiences of very successful, very introverted salespeople who followed a different path that worked best for them in connecting with and ultimately selling to clients. Their teams were better off for having seen someone approach sales differently. And it’s true for all roles and functions.
At the management level, this is even more crucial. When a group of people is deciding the strategic plan for a company, it’s critical to have different ways of perceiving the world. Pessimism and optimism are obvious examples. You don’t want a room full of only one or the other. You need both to create harmony. Pessimists are necessary to point out issues that need to be addressed. And optimists are essential to keep the enthusiasm for a plan going.
As an armchair psychologist/marketing consultant, I recently had the pleasure of working with a management team that skewed very much towards the spontaneous and stable, if you’re using the Big Five personality trait rubric. I watched as they lost the one teammate who was more neurotic and conscientious. In this situation, the team’s ideas became far more optimistic. The world was their oyster.
In some ways, this is an exciting group to be a part of. But, without neuroticism and conscientiousness, you often lose the necessary “nitpicking” and planning that take good ideas towards excellent execution. I happened to be in the office with this team and saw these personality traits manifest in various ways, giving me a clear picture of who was contributing what. Had I not been in the office, it would’ve taken me far longer to piece together the differing personality traits of my colleagues. In the office, you get a more comprehensive picture of how people approach tasks. You can form a more complete picture by overhearing them on the phone, seeing how they arrange their day, or even getting a glimpse into their personal life.
By contrast, another team I worked with was fully remote. The mental models we could create of each other’s personalities were far less robust given that we’d never met in person, and I think this led to some misunderstandings and even resentment. But the CEO had the very bright idea of doing a Myers-Briggs assessment. So what did I learn from doing Myers-Briggs with a remote-only team?
It’s a language toolkit- The Big Personality Test, What Color is Your Parachute, Myers-Briggs, they all give the team a lexicon to share and work with. Everyone on the team has the right words to describe their personality and work style. Being able to name, accept, and even celebrate these differences makes diverse groups great.
It provides helpful color - In an office, this color comes from seeing them in different moments, moods, and environments. Without that quantity and quality of context, we need to lean on other tools to color in our colleagues' edges. The exercise we did was hugely helpful in providing further depth to my understanding of this team, who I only know through Zoom. Otherwise, traits like introversion can be mistaken for disinterest on a phone call, or neuroticism may be seen only as a negative when in fact, it can be so valuable in a teammate. (to a degree, of course!
It’s comfortable - Some of the most effective team bonding activities can also seem far too intimate for some people. These personality tests are much lower risk and far more widely accepted. They make it easier for people to divulge more of their personalities.
Seeing these two teams in parallel made me realize how important it is to flesh out the personalities of your remote colleagues so that you practice #digitalempathy. Understanding your colleague gives you a better idea of the context in which they approach decision-making and task execution, ultimately allowing you to work more effectively and harmoniously together.
Some links this week.
A fun podcast I did with The Workplace Communication Expert
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