At Laurence Rumming Assessments we are Certified Career Development Practitioners and Susan is a certified Life Coach. Sometimes there are community resources available to an individual at no cost to help with the changes and we will always suggest these resources first if they are available.

If your journey has become derailed, give us a call for a free consultaion.

For Laurence Rumming Assessments it has been a good year working with, and connecting to, some amazing people. Susan and I would like to take this opportunity to wish everyone a very Merry Christmas and a happy, healthy New Year!

The Myers-Briggs Type Indicator Step II assessment is a powerful and effective tool when used for the purpose of exploring interaction between people. Once participants understand the basics of personality type the Myers-Briggs offers methods to estimate a client’s “type mode” based on behavioural and language cues. The salesperson can then match the approach to the customer’s type mode.

Whether you are selling Mercedes or widgets, the relationship your sales team builds with the customers determines your bottom line at the end of the year. If you would like to learn more about how the Myers-Briggs can help your sales staff, contact us for a free consultation.

This conference focused on the abilities that people bring to the workplace rather than their disabilities. We, as a society, tend to have pre-conceived ideas of how someone with challenges might perform in the workplace.

Some of the myths we entertain in our minds are;

• They will not be able to perform the job
• They will be absent more than the other employees
• The accommodations will be expensive
• They will impact safety
• They will require more supervision

NONE of these are true! Visit www.usbin.org for more on workplace diversity.

What other myths do you entertain in your mind regarding employees in the workplace?

• They only come to work for the money
• They are not interested in the goals you have set for yourself and your business?
• Hiring an immigrant would require too much of your time
• They are too old and will take too much sick time
• They are young and don’t want to work
• They are not competent because they are not certified
• They are overqualified and will leave at the first opportunity

Although these may be true for some people, for the most part they are myths. You may be missing out on the best employees for your organization. If you need assistance with your hiring or want to find out more about diversity in the workplace, contact us to set up an appointment.

Many employers bring in facilitators for workshops and never follow through with the program material. The cost to the employer is considerable if they are going to treat it as “Flavour-of-the-Month”. There is the cost of the facilitator, materials, wages, lost production time, perhaps a facility and lunch, and possibly revenue because of employees being absent from their jobs. In addition, if there is no follow-through demonstrating importance by the employer, the employees will not see the value in the training and treat it accordingly.

If an employee attends a training course at the expense of the business;

• Ask them what they gained from the training and how they see it being applied in the organization.
• Make an opportunity for them to share the learning with those who did not/could not attend.

If you, as an employer, bring in staff training;

• Work with the facilitator to ensure there is a ‘commitment to action’ in place for follow-through showing;
 What they will commit to
 Timeline
 How they will determine achievement

Training, well done, is the greatest tool for retention of employees. Poorly done or not done, it is the number one reason why employees leave their employment. Invest in your employees, but invest wisely. Don’t turn an asset into a liability!

Secondly and perhaps more stressful for us was the fact that we had no idea where we were staying the first night. Add to this getting stuck in a 2 hour traffic jam with the dash light telling us we were nearly out of fuel and no gas station in sight, finding out that there was no accommodation for 120 kilometres, and the dynamics in the vehicle start to get very interesting!

This scenario is experienced at home, at work, at school, and in the community everyday…people interacting with people! People placed together in situations not necessarily of their choosing; people with differing personality types. Some who experience the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator think that by choosing teams or people to interact with or have a relationship with, by compatible personality type, everything will be better.

This is not reality, and compatibility is not between types, it is in the understanding of the type differences so that we can communicate effectively with all types as life does not select matching personalities in our daily living!

Fifty-two hundred kilometres later, we arrived back home, still friends, filled with the amazing experiences and sights of the journey. We had our challenges and worked through them as we communicated openly and agreed on what we needed from each other to be comfortable travelling together and, as a result, had lots of laughs and a wonderful time! It is all about understanding type differences.

1. Hire for the future. Many times a company or organization will hire for the moment as they suddenly have an opening created by someone leaving. Hiring a new employee that fits with your business plan and where you intend to be in the future is important. It can save time and money in future recruitment. Whenever you have an opening it is an opportunity to revisit your business plan.

2. Conduct Behavioural Interviews. This is essential to ensure you hire someone who not only fits the educational requirements but has the necessary experience and matches the ‘culture’ of the organization. If appropriate, use assessments and tasks as tools in selecting an new employee.

3. Provide Letter of Employment. It is important to have a new employee read and sign a letter of employment that states the expectations are for the position plus the salary/wage and any benefits. Most importantly it will state the probation period and how they will be evaluated during that period.

4. Have a Succession Plan. I don’t mean the ‘accountant version’ of how you pass on the family business. I mean the ‘human resources version’, which ensures you have a business to pass on. Having employees in place to run the business successfully should you be unable due to sickness or an accident is crucial. You may even want to take a holiday sometime!

5. Have a Position Description and Evaluation Process. You cannot evaluate an employee without a position description that outlines the main duties and responsibilities. The evaluation process is crucial as it sets out mutual goals to challenge the employee and increase their value to the organization and to themselves. The number one reason employees leave a job is a lack of training and development.

For more information please contact us at lrassess@telus.net

Some may have noticed that I have been absent from blogging for a while. I had a health issue out of the blue which undermined my sense of stability to the point where I had too much on my plate.

My reaction as an ISFJ was to pull back and have some pessimism about the future. As a sensing person I tend to be in the present and not dwell too much on the future but this became extreme and the future almost did not exist. I withdrew and the circle of people in my life with whom I confided became even smaller. I became obsessed thinking about problems that, at this point, did not exist. Lastly I shut down on all but essential work as it is very important for me to do it well or don’t do it and my confidence was waning.

I am fortunate to be surrounded by loving people who support me and, with the health issues fading, am now able to resume my wonderful full life and the excitement of bringing performance enhancing workshops to organizations.

When health impacts us we feel vulnerable and the Introverts go into deep research mode to find out as much as they can (data) while the Extraverts seek knowledge by talking it out with those who may have the information. The Thinkers will almost appear matter-of-fact and not always bring forward the support that the Feeling types would like at the time.

In our lives there will always be stressors, whether at work or in our home lives. By understanding Myers-Briggs personality types we can identify when we are ‘in the grip’ or stressed and have tools to remedy much of the effects of it. It is also useful knowledge when offering support to someone else in a stressful situation. If you are interested in learning more about Myers-Briggs Type Indicator and how it can be of benefit to you or your organization, please contact us.

There are many parallels in the teams we create in our lives. When we all communicate well with each other we are more productive and the stress is much lower. In a recent study by Psychometrics 69% of HR professionals indicated that employee engagement is a problem. Disengaged employees have a large impact on organizations. Contrary to what some may believe, disengaged employees do not quit their jobs or fail to show up for work, they stay on the job damaging both productivity and relationships.

Offering the Myers-Briggs to employees will benefit not only your organization but their personal life as well. Positive interaction in the workplace benefits in increased productivity and improved communications amongst the employees. When employees are engaged in the organization and ‘flying’ in the same direction it shows in their performance and commitment.

Both of these workshops were excellent and had really good facilitators. What was interesting to me was that many of the principles used in these courses are parallel to those learned when one does the Myers-Briggs® Assessment and has it debriefed. What was more evident was the ability of the facilitators to ‘read’ the participants and deliver information in a manner which suited them. If they saw it wasn’t hitting home they would come at it from a different perspective. Knowledge of type as it influences learning style is extremely valuable in communication. The facilitators may have had training in personality types or may have gained their style through experience. Whichever way, they used the knowledge well!

For both of the workshops, communication was key to the topic. If you communicated poorly, you would obtain a much different result than if you communicated well. This is the same in anything that we do, whether at home or at work. Our communications with our spouses, friends and families as well as our co-workers and contacts on the job are all influenced by personality type. The more knowledge we have in this area, the better equipped we are to head off potential miscommunication and the resulting consequences.

Taking the Myers-Briggs® Type Indicator is a personal choice and cannot be mandated so not everyone you know is going to take it. Even if only you have had the assessment it will be beneficial to your relationships with others. In any organization, whether it is a church group, a service club, a task force or senior management team, all benefit from knowing how to effectively communicate with their peers.