The work. The leadership consulting work. It all begins with the assessment from Organizational Analysis and Design (OAD).

Over the few years I have been involved with OAD, I have come to think of myself as an analyst. I can see the person in the OAD results report. And I can see OAD trait definitions in people I meet. Especially leaders who might become clients.

Now, while I have learned to identify different types of leaders naturally, I keep that “educated guess” to myself. I do use that knowledge, of course. One especially helpful trait I can pick up very quickly now is “impatience.” Every impatient person has a tell.

Of course, I am an OAD-trained analyst and use the assessment process in any kind of formal engagement, particularly in leadership training and team workshops. Here’s how it works.

The assessment takes only a few minutes to complete, yet it is highly accurate. The process eliminates social desirability distortions, like you’d see in a direct question or even a well-structured employee survey. OAD is also built to the standards of leading international psychological institutions and rating agencies. Shorthand for “you can trust the data.”

The assessment itself is simply a list of 110 adjectives. Participants go through the list twice to complete the process. Each time is an identical experience with just two different sets of instructions:

• Select all the words that describe yourself.
• Select all the words that describe how you must behave at work.

This simple approach yields extraordinary insights. Some that can last a lifetime.

The Results:

Let’s start with the OAD Leadership Style Matrix. This is an overly simplistic – but incredibly useful – rubric to help leaders and their teams to have a general grounding of their results.

The Leadership Style Matrix is a 2×2 four-quadrant matrix with these characteristics.

Here are words that describe each end of the spectrum:

| Generalist | Independent, Comfortable with Ambiguity, Flexible, Venturesome, Effective at Delegation, Assertive | | Specialist | Structured, Prefers Clarity, Skilled, Accurate, Cautious, Hands-On, Compliant | | Socially Oriented| Open, Persuasive, Amiable, Outgoing, Social, Optimistic, Quick to Trust | | Technically Oriented | Analytical, Straightforward, Direct, Reserved, Technical, Skeptical, Slower to Trust |

While some people are at the edges of these definitions, many people’s traits contain a mix. Literally like a snowflake, each similar but different in their own way.

The matrix is read by combining Substance with a Communication style.

And to bring it home, each quadrant has multiple versions of Trait Names.

The OAD assessment results are shared on an infographic table containing 7 “constructs.” These constructs are organized into two groups: Relative Traits and Trait Modifiers.

Relative Traits include these characteristics and serve to define the person’s personality traits:

• Assertiveness
• Extroversion
• Patience
• Detail Orientation.

They are called relative traits because the analysis is more concerned with where the traits are “relative” to each other. And they define how the traits are plotted on the Leadership Style Matrix.

Trait Modifiers tell us insights into how a person acts and includes these lenses:

• Versatility Level (VL). This 60-point scale provides insight into a person’s natural behavioral adaptability.
• Emotional Control (EC). This 10-point scale helps provide insight into a person’s decision-making process. We shorthand it into Heart vs. Head. Someone with a lower score tends to make their decisions based on empathy and feeling, while a higher score reflects a more logic-minded approach.
• Creativity (CR). Also a 10-point scale, CR helps us understand how a person might tackle a problem or project. A lower score indicates the desire to “read the manual” and study the solution. A higher score reflects more comfort with solving it on your own.

Now, putting this all together allows the OAD Analyst to really help the participant understand themselves in a richer, action-oriented manner.

The Last Topic:

Remember that the assessment process includes 2 sets of identical adjectives. The first tells us about the person. The second is a snapshot of how they feel they must behave at work. We call the second report “Perceived Job Behaviors.”

Comparing the two reports is where the magic and the breakthroughs happen. And it is where the consulting work begins, often in the form of team workshops designed to align team dynamics with these insights.

When we talk next, I’ll show you how that works.