How Can DISC Help Improve Relationships?

Written by: Jess Goodman

Last year, Allison introduced us to DiSC in her article, “What’s your DiSC Style?”  Understanding DiSC styles can help anyone improve relationships both at work and home. Check out how!

  1. Improve communication: Understanding someone’s DiSC style can help improve interpersonal communication. For example, I know my boss is a ‘D’ style. He likes to make the most of his time and he uses stats to set and track goals. When I am working on professional development with him, I know to get started right away and use stats and ratios to make new goals. 
  2. Become a better advocate for yourself: DiSC allows you to better understand your own communication needs. This understanding helps you learn more about yourself and what style of communication best suits you. Not only do you understand how to effectively communicate with others, but you gain a new understanding of how you want others to communicate with you.
  3. Building a stronger team: When utilizing DiSC, you are able to build a stronger team using individuals’ strengths. Learning a team member’s DiSC style provides you with valuable information on how to succeed together. For example, I know some members of my team are strong at building relationships with clients, while others’ strengths lie in data and statistics. Each is equally invaluable, but in their own ways. Through DiSC, we can identify those strengths and capitalize on them.
  4. Reduce conflict: DiSC gives us the opportunity to avoid conflict within interpersonal communication because we can better understand those around us. When we learn our team member’s styles, we learn more about how they operate in different environments. For example, some DiSC styles are more direct and task-oriented, which could cause a misinterpretation of their behavior by someone who is more personable and tends to need more relationship building. If I have prior knowledge of another person’s personality, I would be able to avoid potential conflict by anticipating what to expect my interactions with them to be like.

What ways will YOU use DiSC to improve your relationships?