Benchmarks

Benchmarks is a 360° degree assessment that enables leaders to:

1. Learn how others perceive their strengths and development needs;
2. Learn how they compare to similar leaders in other organizations;
3. Focus on skills and perspectives critical to being effective and successful;
4. Design a plan that links needs to specific development experiences.

Benchmarks assesses 16 skills and perspectives that Center for Creative Leadership (www.ccl.org) researchers identified as being critical to successful management. They are:

Meeting Job Challenges

• Resourcefulness
• Doing Whatever it Takes
• Being a Quick Study
• Decisiveness

Respecting Self and Others

• Building and Mending Relationships
• Compassion and Sensitivity
• Straightforwardness and Composure
• Balance between Personal Life and Work
• Self-Awareness
• Putting People at Ease
• Difference Matter
• Career Management

Leading People

• Leading Employees
• Confronting Problem Employees
• Participative Management
• Change Management

In addition, Benchmarks helps you identify five potential flaws that may stall or derail a promising career:

• Problems with Interpersonal Relationships
• Difficulty Building and Leading a Team
• Difficulty Changing or Adapting
• Failure to Meet Business Objectives
• Too Narrow Functional Orientation

Benefits of Benchmarks 360° Assessment

• Comprehensive in-depth feedback which reveals strengths, areas to improve and information you may be unaware of;
• Allows individual an opportunity to seriously examine (and potentially change) behavior that hinders future leadership effectiveness;
• Easy to understand;
• In depth development learning guide to develop an effective strategy for change;
• Valid and reliable (based on decades of research with thousands of managers and top executives around the world).

Personalized feedback with an NHPCO Leadership Coach who is certified to interpret the instrument will help you understand the feedback and identify developmental goals to enhance your leadership effectiveness.

For more information about this or other Leadership Assessments, contact education@nhpco.org.

Career Effectiveness Profile (CEP)

This 105 item self-assessment survey measures your perception of your performance on 16 behavioral competencies. In addition, the survey collects information on five dimensions of effective career management. The survey will be scored when meeting with an NPHCO Leadership Coach.

Benefits of CEP

• Generates thinking that opens up possibilities for your on-going career effectiveness
• Helps you gain insight into your career performance
• Helps you gain insight about your career goals
• Identifies your relative areas of strengths and developmental areas in managing your career
• Can also be completed by another person about you to give feedback and identify differences between your self-assessment and that of another person who knows you well
• Assists you in developing a plan to target developmental opportunities while leveraging your areas of strength.

The Career Effectiveness Profile (CEP) assesses four areas: Career Assessment, Self Assessment, Professional Growth and Career Effectiveness and incorporates sixteen competencies.

Each area is composed of four competencies. They are:

Career Assessment

• Understands past forces and influences that shapes career
• Identifying and appreciating one’s own career values
• Identifying desired organizational values
• Adapting to change and taking responsibility for personal choices

Self-Assessment

• Understanding and appreciating personal strengths and abilities
• Understanding how one is perceived by others
• Identifying and creating a personally satisfying and productive work environment
• Realistically assessing career appropriateness to performance feedback

Professional Growth

• Taking an enabling approach to self and others
• Updating professional behavior within a career field
• Gathering and applying information related to careers
• Creating mutually beneficial relationships

Career Effectiveness

• Understanding industry changes and their impact on career effectiveness
• Understanding future options and opportunities
• Taking advantage of support systems
• Balancing personal, social and professional aspects of one’s life

In addition, there are five dimensions of career effectiveness that are measured. 

These are:

• Value question: What exactly do I do to add value to the organization’s profitability?
• Versatility question: In what ways can I apply my value to various jobs, tasks, opportunities that exist in the world of work?
• Visibility question: How visible is my value to those in the organization as well as others in my profession?
• Vision question: Is my vision of a career future clear, understandable and achievable?

For more information about this or other Leadership Assessments, contact education@nhpco.org.

DISC

DISC is a self-assessment which identifies your preferred behavior patterns and tendencies within 4 dimensions:

• Dominance - measures how you tend to overcome daily challenges;
• Influence - how you tend to persuade and influence others to change;
• Steadiness - how you work within your current environment;
• Conscientiousness - how you respond to fear and your desire for accuracy and quality details.

Benefits of DISC

DISC is the language of “how we act,” or our behavior. People with similar styles tend to exhibit specific types of behavior common to that style. While each of us naturally tends to have one particular, prevalent behavior style, all people exhibit all four behavioral factors in varying degrees of intensity. Recognizing and understanding how these factors work together can become an invaluable tool in your daily life and help you create an environment that will ensure your success. For example:

Dominance Behavioral Style

This person’s tendencies include (partial list):         

• Getting immediate results
• Causing action
• Accepting challenges
• Solving problems

This person desires an environment that includes:

• Prestige and challenge
• A wide scope of operations
• Power and authority
• Direct answers

Influence Behavioral Style

This person’s tendencies include (partial list):

• Creating a motivational environment
• Being articulate
• Making a favorable impression
• Participating in a group

This person desires an environment that includes:

• Public recognition of ability
• Freedom of expression
• Freedom from control and detail
• Coaching and counseling

Steadiness Behavioral Style

This person’s tendencies (partial list):

• Performing in a consistent, predictable manner
• Demonstrating patience
• Creating a stable, harmonious work environment
• Being a good listener

This person desires an environment that includes:

• Maintenance of the status quo unless given reasons for change
• Predictable routines
• Standard operating procedures
• Minimal conflict

Conscientiousness Behavioral Style

This person’s tendencies include (partial list):

• Thinking analytically, weighing pros and cons
• Adhering to key directives and standards
• Using subtle or indirect approaches to conflict
• Being diplomatic with people

This person desires an environment that includes:

• Clearly defined performance expectations
• Values on quality and accuracy
• Opportunities to demonstrate expertise
• Control over those factors that affect his/her performance

Example of Effective Use of DISC Assessment

An executive director with a strong DISC Conscientious style was very good at adhering to standards and was great at details, but was having difficulty confronting one of her managers. Her strengths included thinking analytically, being diplomatic with people and having consistent accomplishments. Through the DISC Assessment and analysis/discussion, she realized the need to develop more in the Dominance style area. She learned ways to address issues directly, be more decisive and manage conflict effectively. She also realized when she was “overdoing” her style and was able to make effective changes. The DISC helped her communicate and more effectively motivate her management team members with an understanding of each of their styles.

The DISC is also very effective when working with a team; individuals can understand their styles in relationship to others.

An NHPCO Leadership coach will help you  interpret the results of the DISC, so that you  can better understand yourself, recognize and appreciate others’ styles and thereby enable you to adapt your style to be a more effective leader.

For more information about this or other Leadership Assessments, contact education@nhpco.org.

Myers-Briggs Type Inventory

The Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) has become one of the most widely used personality assessment tools with both individuals and groups. The Indicator is nonjudgmental and allows people to gain an understanding of their preferences, particularly with respect to energy source, communication, decision making, lifestyle/work patterns and conflict management. Over 50 years of research and development have demonstrated the reliability and validity of the MBTI. The MBTI produces 16 different personality types (preferences), each with its own characteristics and strengths. 

Knowing your preferences can help you better understand your unique way of experiencing and expressing your type. All aspects of your personality type influence how you communicate (especially as part of a team), how you make decisions, manage change and manage conflict. The first type acknowledges an individual’s preference for extraversion (E) or introversion (I) and indicates whether the individual is energized by others or prefers to process ideas and concepts internally. The second type considers how the individual takes in data or information, either through the concrete method of sensing(S) or the abstract method of intuition (I). The third preference indicates how information is used by the individual in making decisions. The objective method is referred to as the thinking (T) function and the value method is referred to feeling (F). Finally, the judging(J)/perceiving(P) types indicate how an individual organizes and operates in the outside world.

Benefits of the MBTI

Example of Effective Use of MBTI

A strong ESTJ (Extroversion/Sensing/Thinking/Judging)   executive director was excellent in improving productivity and getting bottom-line results, but she was alienating some of her staff and board members. Completing both the MBTI and a 360° feedback instrument provided a strong wake-up call for her and gave her specific information on what her strengths and deficits were, but more importantly, gave her helpful information to improve her professional development. She learned cues to help her recognize when her strengths were overpowering was able to make corrections.  She learned to better balance task and relationship behaviors, which helped her retain and further her hospice career.

For more information about this or other Leadership Assessments, contact education@nhpco.org.

Leadership Report

Combination of the MBTI and FIRO B (Fundamental Interpersonal Relations Orientation-Behavior)

FIRO B helps people understand how their need for inclusion, control and affection can shape their interactions with others at work or in their personal lives. The FIRO-B assessment measures interpersonal needs :

• The need for Inclusion has to do with forming new relations and associating with people, and determines the extent of contact and prominence a person seeks
• The need for Control has to do with decision making, influence and persuasion between people, and determines the extent of power or dominance a person seeks
• The need for Affection has to do with emotional ties and warm connections between people, and determines the extent of closeness a person seeks

Benefits of the Leadership Report

Both the MBTI and FIRO-B are quite distinct, each providing a view from a different perspectives. Together, they complement each other and provide rich information to use in a personal, ongoing leadership development program.

  The Leadership Report provides a snapshot of your leadership style:

• How you lead in various contexts: interpersonal relationships, teams and organizational cultures
• Your strengths and possible challenges you might face in responding to change and stress
• How you can be a more “adaptable” leader, using leadership approaches that match the situation and people’s differing needs

For more information about this or other Leadership Assessments, contact education@nhpco.org.

Thomas-Kilman Conflict Mode Instrument

Conflict in life is inevitable. Whether in the workplace, home or social gatherings, conflict results from the inescapable fact that people have different goals, needs, desires, responsibilities, perception and ideas. Despite our best efforts to prevent it, we will undoubtedly find ourselves in disagreements with other people. Although conflict is inevitable, it is not necessarily bad as some kinds of conflict can be beneficial. Conflict that focuses on ideas rather than on the personalities and shortcomings of the people involved can result in creativity and productivity, teamwork and improved group relations. Conflict that focuses on people, on the other hand, can escalate rapidly and unpleasantly and have quite detrimental and far-reaching effects. The goal, then, is to manage conflict in such a way that its useful functions are realized while more negative aspects are minimized or avoided entirely.

Is your approach to conflict assertive or cooperative? The Thomas-Kilman Conflict Mode Instrument will help you better understand the way you typically respond to conflict (either competing, collaborating, compromising, avoiding or accommodating).  This assessment can also be useful with a team.

Benefits of Thomas-Kilman Conflict Mode Instrument

The Thomas-Kilman Conflict Mode Instrument will provide feedback on:

• What provokes an individual (Hot Buttons)
• How that individual perceives the way s/he typically responds to conflict
• How others view that individual as responding to conflict
• How the individual responds before, during and after conflict
• Which responses to conflict have the potential to harm one’s position in his/her particular organization

Example of Effective Use of the Thomas-Kilman Conflict Mode Instrument:

A director of nursing with a strong “Accommodating” style was excellent at “keeping the peace” with her staff. She was also known for the good will she created on behalf of the hospice program in her community. However, she was always forgoing her own personal needs in order for the needs of patients and other staff members to be met. In addition, she tended to “back down” in management meetings and not voice her opinions when contentious issues were being discussed. As a result of learning more about the strengths and obstacles associated with her dominant style, she started to consider ways she could combat burnout and become more assertive. The Kilmann alerted her to areas where she was underutilizing other conflict modes as well as over utilizing accommodation.

Completion of this instrument and discussion with an NHPCO Leadership Coach will help you plan how to manage conflict more successfully and learn to move beyond conflict and focus on achieving organizational goals and business objectives.

For more information about this or other Leadership Assessments, contact education@nhpco.org.