A person completes a personality assessment. He or she then receives individual feedback on his or her personality profile. If the assessment is worth its salt, the person probably agreed with much of the interpretation and was challenged or surprised by the rest. For the feedback that resonated with him or her, the likely response was, “Yep, I knew that about myself. Now I have a test that validates it.” For the surprising feedback, the likely response was, “Interesting. I didn’t know I was being perceived in that way.” Now what? What does this person do with that information? The way I see it, the person now has an excuse for that behavior or an opportunity to improve it.

Purely for academic purposes, let’s say that I scored low on the Prudence scale from the Hogan Personality Inventory. This means that people tend to perceive me as someone who is flexible and open to change but also someone who is not always detail-oriented and can be impulsive at times. What do I do with that information? One approach would be to use it as an excuse or a crutch. When I overlook a detail and it affects the outcome of a project, I can simply say, “Yep, that’s my low Prudence coming out!” and laugh it off. People will come to expect that Kevin is not a details guy and may expect me to focus on bigger picture issues instead. However, what will also happen is that people may begin to not trust in my ability to deliver a high-quality, well-proofed work product, and I will miss out on opportunities for challenge or advancement. This would ultimately affect my career success.

Continuing with this hypothetical example, a second approach to using this information about my lack of conscientiousness (not to be read as conscience) is as an opportunity. If I am serious about having a successful career, I should use the results of my personality assessment to leverage my strengths and develop my shortcomings. If I am working on a project with a tight timeline and I notice my natural propensity to cut corners or fudge over details starting to rear its head, I can seize the opportunity to take extra care and create the highest quality product I can. By intentionally changing my behaviors to do what may not come naturally and what others would not expect me to, I am effecting change on my reputation, which will ultimately have an effect on my success.

All of this being said, the irony is that the choice between Excuse Avenue and Opportunity Road is largely based on personality. People who are naturally open to feedback and change and driven to be successful are those who are more likely to take a right on Opportunity Road, while those who are resistant to feedback and change and not particularly motivated will take a left on Excuse Avenue (which runs parallel to Easy Street). The good news is that the same high-quality personality assessment will identify the likely path the person is to take. From that assessment, we can identify those individuals who may need a bit more help steering toward Opportunity Road if we are serious about investing in their success.

At the end of the day, there is always a choice. We can ultimately decide whether we want to be who we are now with all of our warts, caveats, and excuses, or if we want to be the more successful versions of ourselves with fewer warts and more opportunities…however you define that success.

You may not have realized, but March happens to be a very eventful month. Some noteworthy festivities this month include Mardi Gras (8th), St. Patrick’s Day (17th), Spring Break, Easter (some years), and the vernal equinox or first day of Spring (20th). Some lesser known, albeit random, contenders for March dates are: If Pets Had Thumbs Day (3rd), Multiple Personality Day (5th), Ear Muff Day (13th), Extraterrestrial Abduction Day (20th), and finally a holiday that seems to capture the theme of this blog, National Make up your own Holiday Day (26th).

Today March 15^th, or the Ides of March, denotes the first day of the Roman New Year and first day of spring (also Roman). Historically, the Ides of March is also associated with the stabbing and subsequent overthrow of Julius Caesar in 44 B.C.E. If you remember back to your high school English course, or visit Wikipedia, you may recall that Caesar was stabbed to death in the Roman Senate in a coup d'tat led by Brutus.

It is not a far stretch to correlate this story to a modern corporate organization. While there may not be physical acts of violence in the boardroom, the rules and players remain the same; specifically, Chairman is to Caesar as the C-Suite is to the Senate. Corporate culture in many Fortune 500 companies mirror this ruthless style and are defined by such mentality as “kill or be killed”; therefore, it is no surprise that organizational failure is driven at the top by self-interested leaders.

As a manager, or leader at any level in the business world, it is crucial to understand how specific individuals in your organization will compete in the corporate game. To this end, Hogan assessments can describe an individual’s day-to-day behavior (HPI), stress-induced derailers (HDS), and core motivators (MVPI). This comprehensive profile of an individual’s personality characteristics relate to business potential, organizational effectiveness, and the ultimate ability to predict job performance.

So the next time you are curious when an employee stumbles in the office late on March 9^th or 18^th, you can look to their Hogan assessment results to determine, with a high degree of certainty, whether or not they celebrated excessively (i.e. Hedonism, Mischievous, Tradition, Sociability). Unfortunately, for characters like Julius Caesar, there is no specific scale that captures propensity to overthrow as would have proven beneficial 2,054 years ago today. However, there are numerous scales that indicate if and how a person will make it to the top and that information can be just as invaluable.

June 4th, 2010 marked the passing of basketball coaching legend John Wooden. As many people are aware, Wooden was known as the “Wizard of Westwood” for his unmatched success as coach of the UCLA men’s basketball team, leading them to a record 88 consecutive victories and 10 national championships among other accomplishments. What is less widely publicized is the strategy that Wooden designed and deployed in order to recruit, assess, select, develop, and mentor his players into successful individuals on and off the court. This aspect of the coach’s legend interestingly establishes him as not only an innovator in the sport of basketball, but also a pioneer in the realm of talent management.