Tools for people managent
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Understanding Conflict Management
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Thomas Kilmann Conflict Mode Instrument [TKI]
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Understanding Personality Types
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DISC test​
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Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI)​​
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Responsibility Assignment
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RACI Chart​
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Setting of Ground Rules
These tools aims to help you get through the initial stages of the 5 stages of group development
Experiences from Project CASA
​We used the TKI, MBTI and setting of Ground Rules for our people management. We then formed our roles and resposibilities mainly through personality.
From our individual TKI results, we are able figure out our conflict management techniques. This allows us to better understand each other and know how we should react when there are conflicts not only within the team, but also from external stakeholders for the project
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Rishi, the group leader, have always come up with a win-win solution for the team when discussing with Green Nudge about the content that needs to be in the toolkit.
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Personally, I feel that the TKI was not really significant in improving the team's dynamic for this project as we are close friends and we know each other really well. Throughout the whole project, we constantly reminded each other to voice out each other's opinion before moving on to the next topic. The strong friendship is able to make the group dynamic better which eventually led to us having little to no conflict. All in all, I would say that TKI was not very significant in this project.
Find out your conflict management style here (unfortunately this is not free)
*ask your social pyschology lecturer for this assessment*
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Rishi - INFJ, Carissa - ISFP,
Suzi - ENTP, Jerilyn - ENFJ,
Yue Tong - ISFP and Me - ENFJ.
Sharing your MBTI results with each other allows your group to understand each other's working style, strengths and weaknesses. It is better to have a variety in a group setting as each MBTI result will have a blindside. From the characteristics of each personality it is going to easier for the group to assign roles and responsibilities.
For instance, who chose Rishi to be our leader based on his personality. He is an INFJ which is also know as an advocate. Advocates have pretty tall demands when it comes to a satisfying work environment. Rishi is very strict with the quality work, he always make sure to clear up any doubts before moving on to the next task. He is someone who is very decisive which makes the whole project flow smoother without us having second thoughts. However, one weakness about him is that he have very strong opinions and will fight tirelessly for an idea even if it is bad. This is where me or Jerilyn will come in. As ENFJ, we are reliable and tolerant. We will layout the Pros and Cons of the idea and try our best to convince Rishi while trying to prevent a conflict.
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All in all, I feel that the MBTI is one of the better tool to identify your group members and also
their roles and responsibilities. However, I is not completely accurate as our personalities can change overtime and it will be good if you retake the assessment frequently.
What are you waiting for? Take your MBTI assessment here
Setting of ground rules or basic standard operational procedure. The 6 ground rules for Project CASA ensure a level of self-discipline within one and other. Coming together to discuss the ground rules ensure allows everyone of us to know what is expected from one another.
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Looking back at the ground rules that we had set, it was really helpful.
Looking our for one another. These few words are so simple yet significant enough to help improve the team dynamic throughout the whole project. For example, it is very common for us to help each other out after we have done our own part. I am the risk manager of the group, better known as the devil's advocate. Our first draft submitted to Green Nudge came back with a lot of feedback that many changes are to be done. Being the devil's advocate, when a draft came back like that it just made me question if I was actually doing my job. That really affected me a lot because I know that I have led my team down. However, Suzi, Rishi, Jerilyn, Carissa and Yue Tong were constantly reminding me that it was all part of the learning process and not to be disheartened about it. The second draft that we submitted was so much better and it just feels good to see that we are making progress. I am grateful for them for looking out for me and constantly motivating me to do better.
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This tool is highly recommended by me! Sit down together as a team and come up with simple ground rules to follow throughout the whole project.
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The RACI Chart is a really useful tool to help assign responsibilites to different members of the group. This chart can also be used for Task Management. Personally, I feel that this is very useful for projects that are doing workshops, campaigns and big events. Since Project CASA is only focusing on creating a toolkit, we did not feel the need to have a RACI chart.
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RACI Chart as it allows us to split up our work in a clear and neat table format. It shows who we can find when we need help and also who to be accountable when things go wrong. However, when using this chart, we should all be clear and limit the number of work load that should be accountable or responsible to one person if not quality of work will be affected.
RACI Chart prevents social loafing which is good to have when the group is big.
Here is a good example on how to create a RACI Chart
Now that you have better understanding on the types of tools we used for people management, lets now move on to the next component of project management. Task Management