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a 15 minute Movie on the RBA
 (This
movie is a narrated PowerPoint® demonstration. It uses Windows® Media
Player for viewing. The media files are large so a high speed connection is
recommended.)
Description
of the Role Behavior Analysis®
By Pamela
Cole
Part of the
DiSC® Behavioral Management System™ is a companion instrument to the PPS, the
Role Behavior Analysis®, which covers an additional application area. The Role
Behavior Analysis® provides specific DiSC® behavioral statements for defining,
describing and discussing expectations for role-based behavior. The Role
Behavior Analysis® uses the DiSC® System to collect and process perceptions of
the behavioral expectations of `how' a job, position, or role needs to be
fulfilled to achieve maximum effectiveness. These perceptions are based on the
role, not the person in the role. The Role Behavior Analysis® focuses on
`how' the role needs to be fulfilled regardless of who is in the role.
The DiSC® System is used to bridge the gap between the "how"
and "what" of role expectations. Position descriptions or job
descriptions tend to focus on the `what' of a job, defining tasks, duties, or
responsibilities. Individuals may be able to define clearly "what"
should be done in a position, yet be unclear on "how" those activities
or tasks should be done. The Role Behavior Analysis provides a specific set of
DiSC® statements to clarify and define role expectations, or "how"
the job needs to be done, eliminating the confusion that comes from using
general or unclear statements to describe role expectations.
Confusing personalities with professions
Many people confuse role-based
behavior with an individual's "personality" or natural behavioral
style. This can be observed in comments like "all accountants must be
S's" or "we need a high D for this job." Both of these statements
demonstrate confusing role-based behavior with a person's behavioral style. It
is unlikely that all people who study accounting and become accountants are high
S's. While many accounting positions may require considerable S role behavior,
not all accounting positions will require it. Some accounting positions may be
characterized by more D, I or C role behavior depending on the other role
functions. For example, an accounting position that involved making and
communicating tough credit approval decisions may involve more D role behaviors
such as "move forcefully even though others may be offended" or
"take higher risks based on potential payoffs". Or, the role may
include some standard accounting functions as well as some interaction with
people, such as financial counseling or tax and investment advising. This type
of accounting position may require more Influencing role-based behaviors such as
"resolve conflict through initiating and facilitating discussion" or
"influence people through positive verbalization."
Why use both the PPS and the
RBA?
Frequently Human Resource
practitioners are asked to provide training and development interventions for
improving performance. Naturally, the Personal Profile is seen as an essential
part of the performance improvement process; however, the Role Behavior Analysis
may be the necessary and often missing component in meeting, training and
development needs. By using the Personal Profile exclusively, practitioners may
be using the wrong tool for the task and get a result like using a hammer when
they should be using a wrench.
The success of the training
and development intervention is not measured by changes in the PPS but by
observing changes in the person's ability to produce the behaviors required by
the role. Therefore, using the PPS as a pre and post training "test"
is inappropriate because we should not be trying to change who the person
is but how the person behaves. Changes in the PPS scores and graphs would
tell us about changes the person has made in how they see themselves as a person
rather than changes in behavior required by the role. Or, the changes may
simply tell us that we have taught the person that they need to give us
different answers in the "test" because the first set of answers was
unacceptable.
Ethical considerations
In addition to the practical aspects of using the right tool for the right
task to get the right results, there is also an ethical and philosophical issue
involved. If we attempt to change who someone is we are violating the
integrity of the person because we have implied that they are "not
okay" as they are and need to be changed as a person to be
acceptable. Communicating that
someone is "not okay" as a person and needs to be changed or fixed has
a negative effect on self-esteem and does not demonstrate a respect for
differences. However, if rather than
changing people, our approach is to provide both clarification of the behaviors
required for a role and the coaching necessary to develop those behaviors, while
validating the dignity and integrity of who the person is as a unique
individual, then we not only improve performance but contribute to creating a
climate of respect and empowerment which will result in sustainable performance
improvement.
What is a role?
According to Webster, the term
role comes from the French word rôle meaning literally "from a roll
containing an actor's part". The contemporary definition includes "a
part, or character, that an actor plays in a performance, a function or office
assumed by someone" as well as "a socially expected behavior pattern
usually determined by an individual's status in a particular society". The
use of the term 'role' in the Role Behavior Analysis is very close to all three
Webster definitions. The Role Behavior Analysis is used to define and 'script'
how the part should be played by the person in the role. The process of using
the RBA clarifies how the role needs to be played to meet the goals of the
'script' and the needs of the 'audience'. Additionally, the clear definition of
role expectations provided by the use of the RBA helps in "casting the
part" and in "coaching the actor".
How is a role different than a
job or position?
Typically, jobs or positions
are defined by the "what" of the position— the tasks, duties,
accountabilities, responsibilities or objectives of the position. Defining a
role focuses more closely on the "how" of the role or the description
of the behavior that is desired in completing the "what" of the
position. The differentiation of the two terms is essential for a number of
reasons. One reason is that there may be significant differences in how a role
is to be fulfilled from one organization to another even though the position
title and job description are essentially the
sam
e in both organizations. Or, the roles may be
different from department to department even within the
sam
e organization based on different needs and
behavioral expectations.
For example, two organizations may have very similar job descriptions for
the position of salesperson, yet have very different behavioral expectations, or
'scripts', for how that role needs to be 'played'. The differences in role
behavior expectations may have to do with the type of product, the type of
customers or how the company would like to be perceived in the marketplace. One
company may want to be seen as the "hard-charging, results-oriented
people" while another may want to be seen as "the friendly, helpful
partner".
The job description, or the 'what', may be very similar in both companies,
yet the 'how' is quite different. Also,
a job or position may involve several different roles based on the number of
needs met by that job. For example, the position of Manager of Accounting may
involve multiple roles. One role might involve managing the activities of
others, a technical/analytical function might comprise another role, and
consultative support to other departments as yet another role. In addition, the
job may include a role as a member of a management team, as well as another role
as a member of a cross-functional quality team. Each team role may require
different team member behavior based on the needs of the team.
How many roles comprise
a position or job?
One of the challenges that
people in a complex, rapidly changing environment face is the need to fulfill
many roles in their work and social life. Each role may have a different set of
expectations, not only in “what we do, but also, in “how” we do it.
Behavioral expectations can change considerably from one role to another.
Behavior that may be very successful in one role may be disastrous in another
role. For example, if we take the behavior that is very successful in our job
and attempt to use it at home, we may not be effective at all. Or, if we use the
behavior that is effective in the role of a parent with small children with our
peers at work, we may experience conflict. Using behavior that is effective when
managing others may not work well when used in the role of a member on a peer
work group or team.
The number of roles differs from position to position; however, the
general trend seems to be an increase in the number of roles within each
position as work becomes more complex and collaborative. Also, as the rate of
change increases, redefining roles frequently is essential because while the
formal position title may not have changed, the behavioral expectations for the
role may have changed significantly. Changes in market conditions or customer
populations (internal and external), downsizing, flattening of the organization
and corporate culture change, all may contribute to a change in how the role
needs to be performed behaviorally.
How does shifting roles
affect performance?
If an individual is unaware of the differences in behavior required for
each of the roles he needs to perform, he is less likely to shift to the
appropriate behavior when necessary. What
tends to happen most often is that either the person uses the behavior which is
most natural for him in all the roles, or he uses the behavior perceived to be
required for the primary role in all roles. In either case, the behavior
used is not likely to be the behavior most effective for meeting the behavioral
expectations of the role. The gap between the expected behavior and the actual
behavior is likely to result in less than adequate performance. Conscious
awareness and understanding of the different behaviors required by each role can
be used to increase effectiveness. By selecting and performing the behaviors
required by the role, the person is able to do both 'what' is required and
perform it 'how' it is required.
What is role-based
behavior?
Role-based behavior is the behavior required to perform a specific role
within a specific position/job/function, defined within a specific
organizational culture. The cultural framework of the social unit (company,
family, nationality, community, agency, etc.) contributes to the behavioral
expectations of the role by defining what the norms for behavior in that culture
are. In other words, the culture defines how "people like us" behave
when performing a specific role. As cultures change, expectations for how roles
are performed also changes. This is particularly relevant as companies go
through mergers, acquisitions and become increasingly global. It is relevant
also as expectations for social roles (spouse, parent, partner, etc.) change
with changing social conditions.
As a result of this
confusion between role-based behavior and natural style, when people first begin
looking at what a role actually requires, they may not have a clear perception.
This may result in a RBA response in which all four role-based appear to be
about equal. While this may be an accurate description of the behaviors required
to be effective in that role, it may also indicate a lack of skill in defining
role-based behavior or a lack of clarity in expectations due to role confusion
or conflicting expectations.
Creating a Consensus RBA
The most effective way to clarify behavioral expectations of a specific
role is to have several people familiar with the role participate in a consensus
discussion of the role behavioral expectations. This discussion is conducted by
having each person individually rank-order each group of statements on the RBA
response form. Then the group discusses their individual responses and comes to
consensus on the ranking of each group. As each group of behavioral statements
is discussed, each person has to present the rationale for their selection. In
this part of the process people frequently discover areas where they had clearly
different information about the role or clearly different expectations about
"how" the role needs to be performed behaviorally (This discussion is
modeled in the DMS video). This
frequently comes as a surprise because they had thought they were dealing with a
clearly defined position description. And, they probably were.
The problem is that position descriptions define the "what" of a
role, defining tasks, duties and responsibilities. However, seldom does the
position description describe "how" the "what" should be
performed, which results in a hidden source of conflict. The reason that the
source of this conflict remains hidden is that people lack a process or system
for discussing role-based behavioral expectations. As a result of this lack of
tools and lack of experience, most people initially are not very skilled at
defining role-based behavior. However, by using the RBA process, people very
quickly develop skills in defining the behavioral expectations for a specific
role, including negotiating consensus decisions.
The language of the Role Behavior Analysis response form has been
carefully selected to accurately reflect specific DISC correlates of role-based
behavior. Each phrase is designed to be used as it occurs, with little or no
editorial freedom. People frequently unknowingly distort the meaning of the
phrases when summarizing or re-stating the phrase. For example, the first phrase
on the RBA Comparison Grid says "take unprecedented risks" which
someone might restate as "Yes, we want people to take unprecedented risks
in this role after they have had a chance to gather information and think about
it for a while." This restatement changes the intent of the original
statement from a D behavior to either an S or C behavior. Remaining close to a
word-for-word use of the statement ensures an accurate DISC description of the
role.
When the role expectations have been defined by a consensus process, the
DISC-language RBA can be used for performance management in the areas of
selection, career development, training, coaching and performance counseling.
For each of these performance management activities, the RBA profile for a
specific role can be compared to the individual's natural behavioral style as
determined by the Personal Profile System. The Comparison of the RBA and PPS
result in description of three categories of person-role performance `matching'.
The first category of performance matching is called `good fit'. These are
the behaviors where the role requires about the
sam
e amount of the behavior as the person has
naturally occurring (scores within 20%). The next category is called
`stretches'. These are the behaviors that the role requires more of than is
naturally occurring in the person's behavioral style (greater than 20%
difference). The third category is `overuses'. These are the behaviors that the
person has more of naturally occurring than the role requires (greater than
20%), which means he/she may overuse these behaviors and may need to re-direct
his/her naturally occurring behaviors to those behaviors required by the role.
For example, some one may have a
naturally high D profile which would mean they would have a natural tendency to
use behaviors such as “speculate on untested ideas" and "move
forcefully even though others may be offended." However, the role may
require considerably less of those behaviors so the person would need to
re-direct his/her natural tendency to use these behaviors, using instead those
behaviors required by the role that may represent a `stretch'. The RBA/PPS
Comparison Grid can be used to identify those behaviors requiring additional
training, coaching or mentoring.
To
learn more about processes that use the RBA and PPSS Individual Reports and
Comparison Reports, click
here to download for the full article by Pamela Cole.
Contact us for more information or continue browsing
through our web site to learn more.
DiSC®,
Personal Profile System™, Personal Profile System™ for Windows™, Role
Behavior Analysis™, DiSC® Management Strategies, and DiSC® Sales Strategies
are all registered trademarks of Inscape Publishing, Inc.
DiSC® Behavioral Management System™ is a trademark of Resource Development
Systems, LLC.
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