Understanding and Investing in Your Discipline Talent

On this Theme Thursday Season 4 webcast, Jim Collison, Gallup's Director of Talent Sourcing, and Maika Leibbrandt, Senior Workplace Consultant, talk about Discipline.

People exceptionally talented in Discipline enjoy routine and structure. Their world is best described by the order they create. Individuals with Discipline are detail-oriented and architects of structure. They don't just follow the rules that are in front of them but they think in a way that creates rules. People with Discipline are quite planned, they're exact and exacting.

When Discipline is at its best, it brings order and stability to chaos or to mess, not just bringing order and stability where there already is some. Discipline is enhancing the current reality by sorting it into predictable order. It's thoughtfully moving through tasks in a way that maximizes effort. With this, there is an element of efficiency.

Get close to the measure of success on every team you're on. Ask where we are going, even if it seems no one else is asking this. You can be a safari guide for others by moving people from the current state to a desired state by incorporating a plan. A plan for someone like you is a vehicle, and your best tool you can offer. You know that a plan has a start, a middle, and an end and that's the best tool for you to make the best sense of chaos in your own life. Also think of a plan as an opportunity for you to raise your hand and offer your best to other people. Break big projects into manageable plans, you can break something complicated down into something trackable.

Ask for rules, metrics, and clear understanding of what the best outcome should be and ask for that in a way that isn't left up to interpretation. Ask for the black and white evidence of whether something is on track. Ask for overt permission or agreement to sort and organize. You can run into trouble if it feels like everyone is sorting and organizing.

Worry less about doing things differently for the sake of doing things creatively. You should pay attention to improvement and measure it, but don't throw your hat into the ring when it comes to creativity for creativity's sake. Your Discipline can be a benefit to other people if you can separate it from ownership. It can be a great tool to other people if you can use discipline in more of a leadership capacity. Help other people plan and let go of the ownership of the outcome.

Expect practical relationships with what is. It's about dealing with what's in front of you than a matter of what if. Understand the moving pieces that are in front of you instead of dreaming about what they can be. Expect a value of what is promised. Those with Discipline are always on the way to a goal, so shifting goals or priorities will need to be obvious and overt.

Recognize the safety or the order they've created for others. Recognize them with data and statistics to back up why you believe something is positive. Don't just say "that was great." Instead, talk about the effect of their work, their process, or their structure. Explain to them because of their approach, you achieved XYZ.

Stretch by asking for the most important goals they're facing, and then ask how you can stretch them in meaningful and achievable ways. Tap into their process for achieving goals to help them achieve their own. Ask them what they could do more efficiently, or even times of the day they are more disciplined than others.

Support those with discipline by offering metrics when you have them, and create them when you don't. There is always something you can rate, rank, or sort and that makes chaos more organized. It's a benefit to be a thought partner to this executing theme. Discipline is how do I move towards a goal, not just how do I think in a really clear manner. You can be be a great thinking partner by helping someone with Discipline get something they need done, done by thinking and talking it through.

If Discipline is one of your Dominant Themes, invest in it this week through the following challenge items:

• Develop your trusted set of routines for when flexibility or change is required. 3-step response system.
• Add "3 big priorities" to your calendar for each day.
• Name a time your Discipline created excellence for someone else.

If Discipline is not one of your dominant themes, invest in it this week through the following challenge items:

• Find an accountability partner (Relationship-Building): Who keeps you honest in pursuit of your goals? Host a goal-meeting date where you talk both about where you want to go and where you are currently going.
• Name a habit you've been meaning to acquire. Take one small step toward this habit every single day, at the same time of day, for 1 week.