[Samantha Benson]

Marcia’s exploring voices are strong and dominant. This may indicate that she focuses on the needs of others and understanding these in depth, which would align with her previous experience as a nurse and her work in palliative care. Strong exploring voices may suggest compassion and empathy, a strong interest in others and a desire to really understand their needs in order to help, without putting herself front and centre. This would have helped her be effective in her previous roles. In her current role, use of inquire, diagnose and probe can also be helpful in bringing people on board with change. She moves from exploring voices to positioning voices, and the fact that she has a strong understanding of how people think and feel before articulating or advising may also be effective in building trust. Her direct voice very rarely makes an appearance, and overall, her controlling voices are less evident, which is likely to have pros and cons.
On the flip side, under pressure Marcia’s exploring voices veer towards interrogating, intruding and over analysing. It may be that her previous roles make her comfortable to ask certain questions than people may find intrusive, and when she senses resistance she becomes pushy and overbearing. There is sometimes a fine line between advising and patronising, and it appears that under pressure Marcia can come across as patronising. I wonder if this happens when she feels that people don’t fully understand her positive intent, or when she is feeling less confident. In her new role, Marcia may need to dial up her challenge, evaluate and direct voices to bring about change and make decisions, even if these come less naturally to her.
In a conversation with Marcia I would expect her to be self-reflective, although as her tendency is to use exploring voices, she may find it challenging to be more at the receiving end. I’d be curious to explore her insights when looking at her profile. Does she recognise herself? Has anything surprised her? How are her strong voices and her previous experience positively impacting her new role? What may be hindering her? What does it mean in her new role to avoid or underuse Evaluate and Direct? I would also be curious about her own self awareness when it comes to how she uses exploring voices under pressure. I’d expect the conversation to explore her new role in some depth and look at how she is managing the transition. A lack of confidence may be contributing to the way she is using some voices under pressure.
In terms of voices that she needs to develop in her new role, in order to champion a new system and bring about change, she will need to become more comfortable evaluating and directing, and challenging when necessary. We could explore whether there are any situations in or out of work where she uses these voices more, and look at situations and scenarios where she can begin to experiment with these voices.

[Samantha Benson]

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[Samantha Benson]

Patronise
I may ‘over challenge’ and go on the attack, but at the same time switch off from listening to what the person is saying
Instinctive reaction
It prevents the interaction from having a positive outcome – chances are that neither of us are really listening to each other