Behavioral Styles

¶ … Coaching The information that Martha Borst provides regarding the assessment of personalities demonstrates how one can create alignment and agreement with others. Borst provides information about how the ways in which people view the world continue to be fundamentally different. If one does not understand these different personality types and the distinct ways that individuals approach the world and themselves, then it's going to continue to be entirely problematic for people to reach compromises or even just a general level of understanding.

Borst's assessment helps to prevent people from butting heads all the time by allowing them to lucidly see how different personality types get along, view the world and themselves. This just allows people to build better relationships as they are more empowered to understand where others are coming from.

Such a personality assessment can be crucial for couples as it means that when each part of a couple is able to understand the other along with themselves, they're more aware of the strengths and weaknesses that they bring to the equation. This means that if the male in the relationship is aware that he is the driver and has a tendency to listen poorly and to be bossy and proud, then he already knows what he needs to work on.

This empowers the male in the relationship to develop more self-awareness and to conduct himself with a higher level of vigilance so that the relationship doesn't become damaged by his pride or by his action-oriented, momentum-driving activities. It can also be helpful for each part in a relationship to know who they're dealing with when it comes to the other person.

For instance, if the Driver is aware that he is in a relationship with an ANLYZER he needs to know that he's in a relationship with someone who is far more sensitive than he is, along with someone who is a much better listener than he is. This allows each party of the relationship to develop a greater level of sensitivity to the other person.

The Driver needs to know that the person he is in a relationship with won't have skin as thick as his, and will be paying particularly close attention to his words. Dr. Tony Alessandra helps to expand on this by providing actual guideposts of DO's and DON'T's for specific personality types. For instance, if one is a D, then he provides advice about the importance of NOT butting in and participating in groups without having to be in command, and resisting the urge to give orders.

As one working in a field like couples counseling, this type of concrete advice can be truly useful, as it gives members of a couple actual changes to make so that their interaction runs smoother. Thus, a couples counselor needs to be aware of the distinct personality types of the couples he or she is treating so that such lucid advice can be given regarding the actions of one or both members of a couple.

Likewise with C-type people, they need to be taught to avoid criticism and to be taught more.