What is DISC Training: Activities for Each Personality

Each person is a unique mix of different characteristics and traits. These individual mixes guide how we behave, make decisions, and even how we communicate and interact with others. Taking advantage of personality frameworks such as DISC and utilizing DISC personality style training is an excellent way to further develop your understanding of yourself and others.

What is DISC training?

DISC training allows people to understand their colleagues better, work more efficiently, resolve conflict, and communicate better with one another. Learning the personalities of yourself and others will be better equip you to handle any communicative situation. Through various DISC training activities, users can discover their communication styles, how to approach different personalities in different scenarios, and more. DISC is a valuable tool that can be extremely useful for personal use, teams, leadership, sales, and recruiting and hiring practices.

What is the difference between DISC assessment and training?

When you take the DISC training test and discover your DISC profile or have a candidate or client take it, you can gain valuable insights into the inner workings of yourself and others. The DISC personality assessment will ask you a series of questions, which you will answer based on how strongly you relate to each trait. Your answers will determine your personality type and where you fall on the DISC model. There are four main personality types and 16 sub-groups to provide a more detailed and accurate result.

Once someone's DISC style has been determined, you can use DISC training to implement the appropriate communication tactics and tips. DISC training is also valuable for helping people better understand their results and putting them into action. The DISC assessment and DISC model is much more than just a personality test--it allows people to discover how to interact with one another effectively and better understand themselves and others. DISC training is instrumental in the implementation of DISC findings for team building and more effective teams.

4 DISC training activities and how to use them

DISC training activities can help teams better understand how DISC works and improve their team culture and soft skills. Because each person's learning style may differ, using these activities to supplement the resources and information from the DISC personality test and DISC training is beneficial. While there are many culture-building activities  to choose from, here are a few DISC for teams ones to get you started:

Group activity 1: Self-awareness exercise

The first step in communicating effectively with others is understanding your communication styles and tendencies. Teach your team how to read their DISC reports--there is no right or wrong way to do this. You may wish to print out informational packets for each team member or share them digitally to follow along.  Go through each section, or pick out the most relevant ones to discuss. Have team members highlight areas that resonate with them most to revisit later or circle sections that they feel aren't entirely accurate. Have an open discussion at the end to ensure that everyone understands their reports and behavioral styles and how they differ or are similar to one another.  

Group activity 2: Identifying others' DISC type exercise

Once participants have a solid understanding of their DISC type, it is essential to give them the tools to identify the personalities of others. A broad overview of each personality type, including main traits and characteristics, communication styles, and outward expressions, will help your team better understand the personalities of their colleagues or peers. It may also be helpful to include real-life examples of each type. For example, Bill Gates has a solid C-type personality, whereas Ellen Degeneres has a strong I-type personality.

Once you have gone over all of the styles, provide or read aloud a short paragraph describing a make-believe person and their characteristics. Ideas include public figures, movie or book characters, or just a completely made-up person by you.  Have team members try to identify the personality type of the person you are describing. Ask which traits lead them to their decisions.

Group activity 3: DISC style pantomime exercise

After team members have familiarized themselves with the different personality styles, it's time to have fun with it! Write the four main personality types--D, I, S, and C--on pieces of paper, and put them into a bucket. Have each team member draw a paper from the bucket, then go around the room and have each person act out whichever type they pulled. Other participants will then guess which personality type was written on their paper. Examples:

D-types: Standing tall, puffed out chest, hands placed on hips, giving orders to others

I-types: Taking a bow, moving enthusiastically, waving to others, talking on the phone

S-type: Kind smile, nodding in agreement, calm motions or gestures, waving others over

C-type: Typing at a desk, avoiding eye contact, pretending to check something off a list

Group activity 4: Applying DISC to everyday scenarios exercise

This exercise will help participants further learn everything DISC-related while giving them real-life examples to learn from. Divide team members up by DISC style, and choose a scenario. Email communication works well because email is a common form of communication that they most likely use daily. Have each group discuss each of the following categories, and record their answers:

1. How often do they check their email

2. What type of messages are they likely to respond to (formal v.s. casual, short and sweet, humorous and personable, detailed and well-thought-out, etc.)

3. What type of messages are they likely to delay responding to or ignore altogether

4. Would they rather have a video or phone call rather than an email

After the activity, have each group share their answers and see how they align with their respected personality type's predicted email preferences.

Benefits of using DISC personality training

Improved self-awareness

Referring to exercise 1, learning about your personality type, characteristics, motivations, and behaviors can help you better understand your communication and working styles and preferences. You will also learn about your strengths and weaknesses, which can help you be more productive and happy. This increase in awareness can help you thrive in both your personal and professional life.

Increased empathy

Understanding others and how to have effective communication with them ensure that both parties are getting the most out of every interaction. When speaking to others, it is important to talk in the way they need, rather than the way you want. With DISC training, you will no longer be flying blind in your daily interactions--you'll understand how to approach different situations in a way that will resonate and align with others.

More personalized interactions

With empathy and understanding in your back pocket, you'll be able to tailor your approach to fit the person you are communicating with. Pitching an idea to a C-type personality will differ significantly from an I-type personality, as will different forms of correspondence and other communicative scenarios.  Being able to identify those styles within your colleagues or clients will help guide success in each interaction.

Better team communication

And, of course, when your team uses what they've learned from DISC leadership training in their everyday interactions, there will be quite an improvement in communication. Team members will learn how to best work with one another, communicate effectively, and resolve conflicts. DISC training programs will introduce mindfulness while providing team members with the tools to take action in various communicative situations.

DISC learning styles: talent development and retention

DISC management training will help leaders address the different learning styles of their employees, resulting in improvement to current training programs and better talent retention. Each individual on a team has their unique personality and preferences; using DISC workshops and training to better understand human behaviors will help create a healthier and more efficient work environment for everyone. Learn more about the benefits of employee training and development, and how to implement better practices by clicking here!

DISC Training: Key Takeaways

The bottom line is that when people feel understood, they tend to respond better in any situation. Taking care to practice empathy and using tools such as DISC to better understand your employees, colleagues, or clients will result in an overall increase in success, efficiency, happiness, and teamwork.

Did you know that Crystal offers DISC training to quickly get you up-to-speed on using DISC in your company’s hiring process, sales cycle, and training and development programs?

Get started with Crystal today!