Leadership can be challenging, more so when the team members have vastly different and strong personalities. Leaders need to motivate their team members, build their morale, improve their work environment, provide guidance, and initiate action. Strong leadership traits are essential in guiding individuals towards the fulfillment of the set objectives and goals. These skills assist leaders in maximizing productivity and accomplishing strategic and project goals. Understanding employees' personality is essential in enhancing teamwork, motivating employees, minimizing turnover, appreciating diversity, and improving decision-making abilities.
The Value of Understanding Employee Personality
Leaders need to understand their employees' personalities to enable supervisors to motivate the workers appropriately. Although leaders can use monetary incentives to uplift their workers' spirits, such strategies may not last long (Klinger & Mallon, 2015). Therefore, leaders need to use better and long-term approaches to keep their employees happy and motivated. For example, workers may be unmotivated because of the task they are given, despite being given bonuses. Therefore, when a leader understands their employee's personality, they can quickly identify the demotivation source that may drive away human capital.
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Turnover minimization is another value of leaders understanding their employees' personalities. Knowing individuals' personalities helps in identifying the workers that have the potential to succeed in specific tasks. As a result, the supervisor will know which employee is fit to complete particular tasks. Consequently, the workers will be positioned in their areas of specialization, thus increasing the chances of excellent productivity (Youshan & Hassan, 2015). Happy workers are more productive and motivated, thus reducing the turnover rate.
Additionally, leaders can improve collaboration and reduce conflicts in their teams by understanding their workers' personalities. Employees' personalities clash can result in a conflict between the employees. When supervisors understand which employees' personality dimensions can work together, teamwork grouping can be more manageable. Although other factors cause disputes in the workplace, personality incompatibilities between colleagues can result in resentments, cold-shoulders, and conflicts (Klinger & Mallon, 2015. Hence, a leader can form excellent employee collaborations in their team by understanding their worker's personalities.
Understanding employees' personalities can help leaders prevent burnout. A leader should know which employee is susceptible to high nervous tension or unable to detach. Subsequently, a leader with such an understanding can reinforce the workers positively to enable them to perform at their usual standards (Youshan & Hassan, 2015). Some employees may have low concentration at their workplace for various reasons, including frustration and stress. Once the supervisor is aware of the workers' personalities, they can take the necessary actions to uplift such workers.
Knowing individuals' personalities can help a leader communicate effectively with their workforce. Sometimes a worker may not understand the supervisors' instruction, not because the supervisor has poor communication skills, but because of different understanding levels. A leader may give complicated instructions, while the worker needs an example of completing the task (Klinger & Mallon, 2015). Therefore, leaders at the workplace need to know the personality of their team members to ensure they approach them most effectively. Also, understanding employees' character helps leaders know their workers' needs.
Understanding the personality traits of the employees can help the supervisor appreciate diversity. Arguably, most individuals have different personalities, which makes them do things differently. Consequently, some workers bring diverse value to the work environment, making their supervisors appreciate an outrageously creative mind (Sackett & Walmsley, 2014). Such personalities help the team to generate numerous problem-solving ideas when they hit a roadblock.
Strategies to Overcome the Effects of Personality on Team Dynamics
Employees may be having different personality disorders, thus requiring different strategies to overcome the effects on team dynamics. Keeping the workers engaged in physical activities is one of the techniques a leader can use for some types of personality disorders. Physical activities may assist the worker suffering from certain personality disorders to regain control over their emotions (Livesley, 2017). Some of the activities that can help individuals stabilize themselves from various personalities include yoga, cycling, running, or boxing. However, a leader should first ensure that the strategy will work for a particular patient before applying it.
Although social isolation can sometimes be detrimental, it can be a good strategy for dealing with specific personality disorders. Leaders should be allowing employees with personality disorders to take occasional time breaks away from their colleagues. This strategy can help workers with such conditions recharge without other people's influence. For example, when the person is angry or unable to control their emotions, letting them reflect solo is an excellent remedy to help them readjust (Clarke et al., 2014). The leader should be sure that this strategy will work for a particular person before its application.
Additionally, leaders should allow workers who are suffering from personality disorders to take breaks from work. The job or the other workers might be the source of stress for the affected worker. Temporarily removing the person suffering from the disorder from a stressful environment can help them alleviate the feelings of aggression and anger (Clarke et al., 2014). The leaders can request a personality disorder patient to take about a two-hour break to enable them to readjust and stabilize.
Depending on the type of personality disorder, keeping the patient busy can help them control their feelings. A leader who understands their employees' personalities can differentiate which patient requires a break from work and who needs to stay busy. Therefore, some personality disorders require something to distract the current emotions (Clarke et al., 2014). For example, some individuals suffering from the condition in question can hold an item to keep their hands occupied, thus letting their mind focus on the specific task at hand.
Leaders should advise their team members who have personality disorders to practice self-care. Mental and physical health are linked to each other intrinsically. As a result, being physically healthy can assist such workers in managing their personality disorders. Getting enough sleep, exercising, and having a healthy diet are some of the self-care items that can help personality disorder patients overcome (Newton-Howes, 2014). The patient can create a routine or a schedule that integrates time for things that are enjoyable for them.
The supervisors should advise the workers who have personality disorders to know their patterns. For example, the workers should check their history of losing their temper in the office, if they struggle with productivity, and if they tend to quit jobs after working for a short period. Although recognizing their workplace pattern will not solve the patient's problem, self-awareness will assist them in identifying the changes they need to make (Livesley, 2017). Also, with the therapist's assistance, the patients can identify strategies that prevent them from repeating the cycle.
Another strategy that can help individuals overcome personality disorders is finding the right job. For example, an avoidant personality disorder patient may feel overwhelmed while working in a crowded office. However, the same individual may be comfortable working in a smaller environment that has few trusted colleagues (Livesley, 2017).
The other employees should understand and accommodate their colleagues who have personality disorders. Interpersonal problems are common issues of personality disorder patients. For instance, persons with paranoid personality disorder distrust other individuals, including their partners, family members, and colleagues (Newton-Howes, 2014). As a result, they keep looking for clues to validate their fears that the people around them are out to get them. Therefore, all the team members should understand that their colleagues with personality disorder fight to form and maintain relationships.
Conclusion
Leadership can be a challenging task. Consequently, leaders need to have various leadership personalities to help the other team members to accomplish the project at hand successfully. Besides, supervisors should understand their employees' personalities to help them offer useful guidance and leadership. There are various values associated with the understanding of the workers' characters, including providing compelling employee motivation. Motivated employees are most likely to have increased productivity. Another importance of understanding staff's personalities is the high retention of the human workforce, minimizing recruitment costs. Additionally, leaders who understand their workers' characters enhance teamwork in their work environments and prevent burnout, thus improving efficiency and productivity. Different employees' personalities may have various effects on the team, including low productivity and conflict among employees.
A good leader should be able to develop strategies to overcome the effects caused by team dynamics. Depending on the type of personality disorder, the supervisor should ensure the individual suffering from the condition is engaged with physical activities if the exercises can help them regain control. Workers with personality disorders that occur due to job distress or colleagues should be allowed to take temporary breaks from work. Leaders should also advise their team members with the condition in question to practice self-care by having an adequate sleep, frequent exercises, and eating a healthy diet. Moreover, the employees with this disorder should know their patterns, helping them make the necessary changes. The patients should also find the right job to be comfortable with the working environment and colleagues.
References
Clarke, M., Jinks, M., Huband, N., & McMurran, M. (2014). Strategies for engaging people with personality disorder in treatment. Mental Health Practice, 17(8), 23-27. https://doi.org/10.7748/mhp2014.05.17.8.23.e894
Klinger, R., & Mallon, M. (2015). Personality and values at work. International Encyclopedia of the Social & Behavioral Sciences , 821-826. https://doi.org/10.1016/b978-0-08-097086-8.22039-4
Livesley, J. (2017). Foreword. Stepped Care for Borderline Personality Disorder , xi-xiv. https://doi.org/10.1016/b978-0-12-811421-6.00016-8
Newton-Howes, G. (2014). Other interventions and strategies in the management of personality disorder. Personality Disorder , 57-59. https://doi.org/10.1093/med/9780199688388.003.0012
Sackett, P. R., & Walmsley, P. T. (2014). Which personality attributes are most important in the workplace? Perspectives on Psychological Science , 9(5), 538-551. https://doi.org/10.1177/1745691614543972
Youshan, B., & Hassan, Z. (2015). The effect of employees' personality on organizational performance: Study on insurance company. International Journal of Accounting and Business Management, 4 (2), 187-196. https://doi.org/10.24924/ijabm/2015.04/v3.iss1/187.196
