[Tom Kenward]

What do you hypothesise from Yvette’s triangle?
All voices appear to be potentially underused, although we need to understand context to be sure. This may be to do with Yvette’s confidence, her judgement of whether her views are welcome in this context and so on. It may be that she intentionally – through sensitivity and skill – chooses only to use any voice when she believes it will be worthwhile.

What does Yvette’s comparative track tell you about her tendencies under pressure?
Most drop away under pressure, particularly evaluate, challenge and direct. The only one that appears to rise much under pressure is advocate, but even then only into the mid range. Three others also rise, but only from very low to low: inquire, diagnose and articulate. This may be entirely appropriate for the situations Yvette finds herself in and dependent on what constitutes pressure for her.

What are your hypotheses and lines of enquiry to explore Yvette’s profile?
The group may want to hear more from Yvette under normal circumstances, in terms of her view (advocate) but also every other voice as well. We need to understand how effective Yvette views her present choices as, and whether something different might be more effective.

[Tom Kenward]

Advocate
I’d like to offer my view and position, which is this..

Articulate
So if I summarise the different positions I’ve heard amongst the group, without getting into my own opinion for now, they seem to be as follows.

Diagnose
The dynamics of the situation seem to include a number of factors that are giving rise to…

Direct
To be absolutely clear, given my responsibilities in this role, i need the following to be done next.

Challenge
I’d like to offer a challenge to the direction of thinking here as i think we are missing important perspectives.

Advise
Would you be open to my advice or suggestions? I’d be happy to offer some ideas.

Evaluate
Considering the pros and cons of what we’ve heard, I think overall the situation is..

Probe
I think we need to dig into this more deeply. Would you mind if I ask some more questions? What specifically? When? How did that come about?

Inquire
I’d like to open up a wider conversation here that brings more of our collective understanding to bear. What are people’s perspectives on where we find ourselves? How can we move things forward together here?

[Tom Kenward]

Q1. What catches your attention about the shape of Jack’s profile?
Jack appears strongest across most of the Positioning and Controlling voices and much less so Exploring.
Q2. What impressions do you find yourself forming about Jack from his profile?
As per the American stereotype, it gives the impression that Jack may be happy to have an opinion and lead from the front.
Q3. Which aspects of the context do you think might be important in this case?
An American working in Asia, but familiar with the region – hopefully sensitive to cultural differences to U.S.? Short term consultancy – they may in part want Jack to be advising, challening, directing etc – acknoweldge value of this.
Q4. What issues might you be looking to explore with Jack?
South East Asia can require precision in Positioning so he may need to dial up Articulate.
The SE Asia cultures tend to be quite deferential, so if there is a need to dig a little deeper and understand what else is going on, Jack may have to work pretty hard, against his strong preferences, to spend more time in the Exploring voices of Inquire and Diagnose.

n.b. i’m a bit confused as to why Direct is last on the Track when Articulate, Inquire and Diagnose appear to be lesser known in the Triangle?