Finding The Right DiSC® Facilitator Can Unlock Your Team’s Full Potential
For any manager, improving teamwork and collaboration is a top priority. One powerful yet often overlooked approach is to work with a certified DiSC® facilitator to leverage the Everything DiSC® profile family!
This family of DiSC® (Dominance, Influence, Steadiness, Conscientiousness) personality profiling tools provides insights into behavioral styles and tendencies. Partnering with a skilled DiSC® facilitator enables individuals and teams to understand better each member’s unique disc communication style, strengths, blind spots, and needs. This understanding fosters improved dynamics that translate to tangible benefits like reduced conflict, enhanced engagement, and optimized productivity.
In this comprehensive post, I’ll share extensive advice on finding the right facilitator, detail what to expect during DiSC® training, and provide tips to maximize the value of your experience. By investing in a qualified provider and fully leveraging the process, DiSC® can transform team relationships and performance.
Why DiSC® Training Matters
Before diving into facilitator selection and optimizing your DiSC® engagement, it’s helpful to understand why this training is so impactful.
DiSC® equips individuals and teams with a common framework and language to decipher behaviors. Suddenly, those confusing or frustrating interactions make sense because of the gained clarity around what motivates and stresses others.
With this insight, communication instantly improves. People adapt to collaborate more effectively with colleagues of varying behavioral tendencies. Workplace discussions become more productive and positive.
Leaders learn to support better, motivate, and develop team members through the DiSC® lens. They can modify their approach to connect with different styles. Coaching and feedback conversations become tailored and meaningful.
In short, DiSC® transforms hidden disconnects that drain productivity into powerful connections that fuel performance.
However, to fully realize these benefits requires finding the right facilitator and optimizing the training experience.
Selecting a Properly Credentialed DiSC® Facilitator
The first step in choosing the appropriate DiSC® facilitator is to verify the following best practices:
- Verify DiSC® certification is achieved from reputable organizations like Everything DiSC® or TrainSMART. If using PXT Select or Five Behaviors, ensure that the proper credentials are held. Credentials ensure you get expertise.
- Request references and reviews to evaluate a facilitator’s abilities and style. Past client feedback offers invaluable insights.
- Seek industry-specific experience. Facilitators immersed in your field provide better context and relevance.
- Consider logistical factors like location, group size, and virtual or in-person delivery. Align logistics to your needs and preferences.
- Align philosophies. Ensure the facilitator’s approach matches your organization’s culture and values.
- Define post-training support. Will the facilitator offer follow-up reinforcement and coaching? Confirm availability.
- Taking time upfront to thoroughly assess facilitator qualifications, references, industry experience, logistics, values, and ongoing support ensures you find the optimal partner for your needs and culture.
Outlining Your DISC Objectives
Once you’ve identified partner options, clarify your goals and ideal participant outcomes. Share these objectives with prospective facilitators to determine the best fit. Be as specific as possible, for example:
- Improve collaboration and communication between our sales and engineering teams
- Equip leaders with strategies for adapting their styles to motivate direct reports effectively
- Resolve lingering team conflicts through a better understanding of behavioral drivers
- Accelerate onboarding by quickly helping new hires appreciate team dynamics
- Well-defined goals allow facilitators to customize their approach, frame the training appropriately, and establish success metrics. Both parties should agree on focus areas, expected outcomes, and what meaningful progress looks like.
Understanding the Typical DiSC® Training Process
Once you’ve selected your provider, what should you expect during the actual DiSC® process?
While each facilitator is unique, training generally follows this framework:
- Participants complete DiSC® assessments independently to identify behavioral tendencies. Facilitators help interpret and discuss results one-on-one.
- Group debriefs explain the overarching DiSC® styles and how behavioral preferences manifest day-to-day in the workplace through communication, work style, motivation, blind spots, etc.
- Breakout discussions and targeted activities dive deeper into the practical application of DiSC®. Sessions are tailored to focus areas like leadership, teamwork, sales, or communication.
- Participants receive actionable takeaways and strategies to immediately apply DiSC® insights back on the job for greater effectiveness. Facilitators share additional resources to reinforce adoption.
- Follow-up reinforcement check-ins are scheduled to answer questions, provide coaching, and sustain momentum.
While each facilitator applies this framework differently, understanding the overall flow allows you to align expectations, reinforce learning, and maximize participation.
Tips to Get the Most from DiSC® Training
Follow these guidelines to ensure your DiSC® engagement is rewarding and impactful:
- Secure leadership buy-in. Manager participation demonstrates the importance of this initiative. Their modeling of learning also profoundly shapes team adoption.
- Tailor topics to real work scenarios. Tying training directly to everyday responsibilities and challenges makes the content relatable and practical.
- Encourage full participation. Greater involvement leads to deeper insights. Employees should feel comfortable being vulnerable and sharing challenges.
- Revisit key takeaways often. Continuous reinforcement is critical for converting insights into habits. Consider regular pulse checks.
- Use your facilitator as an ongoing resource. Even after training concludes, many will provide follow-up coaching and advice. Tap into it.
- Track progress over time—survey participants before and after to gauge communication, teamwork, leadership growth, and productivity improvements.
- Investing entirely in the DiSC® experience through preparation, immersive participation, follow-through, and tracking results is integral for business impact.
Realizing Long-Term Benefits from DISC
While excellent training gets results, interpersonal growth is often gradual. Patience and reinforcement sustain progress.
Some visible benefits, like reduced conflict and improved collaboration, may emerge quickly. However, leadership development, culture shifts, and optimization of group strategy can take more time.
Be intentional about regularly circulating key frameworks and vocabulary from the DISC training, even informally. Look for opportunities to acknowledge and praise positive behavioral changes.
Finally, consider re-assessing team members and conducting refresher sessions. People and organizations evolve, so revisiting DISC insights can accelerate continued improvement.
The right DiSC® facilitator who uses the Everything DiSC® Profile Family becomes a valued organizational and team development partner. They can unlock a team’s full potential through their expertise and thoughtful training approach.
Start Enhancing Your Team Dynamics Today
While this was a lengthy post, I hope it provided a comprehensive overview of how working with a properly credentialed facilitator can transform your organization.
Finding the right provider and investing entirely in the experience allows the profile to be used to build understanding, strengthen communication, improve leadership, and boost productivity.
If you’re interested in getting started, I’d be happy to discuss your organizational needs and team objectives to gauge whether DISC could be valuable. Fill out the form to discuss your goals, and together, we can determine if this is the right next step.