an abstract photo of a curved building with a blue sky in the background

Whenever we work with a leader - which is something we have been doing since 2000 - there is a huge penny which drops somewhere along the journey; and it is simply this: the process we take you through with Birkman.me doesn't just help you understand yourself; it helps you understand everyone else, as well.

And that is for a very simple reason. Unlike tools which started with some theoretical hypothesis - for example, "all leaders are Type A people who would have been the big boss back in cave man days" - the Birkman tool we use started with an initial patient 12 years of Doctoral Research. Roger Birkman interviewed hundreds and hundreds of couples about how they saw themselves, and how their spouse saw them; all of it designed to answer the question: "why do people going through the same experience see it in such different, but apparently predictable ways?"

Sometimes, what you learn about yourself will be almost overwhelming at first: "oh my goodness, that's why I always..." But once the personal insight starts to normalise for you (and we say that for a good reason; the insights will keep coming for years; but you will get used to it!), you will find yourself asking questions about the people around you. "I wonder why in such and such a situation, I see x but they seem to see y...?"

Now of course, you may well decide to get Birkman for your whole team - something we have also been doing since 2000 - but even without that, your own results include the framework within which everyone on the planet operates. You will be equipped to understand (for example) that "I need time to be by myself and getting on with making my own contribution - but some of my colleagues probably feel cast adrift without a social context like the team, all of the time."

Once you have that understanding it impacts the way you think about leadership. It is impossible to think, for example, that "my way or the highway" is a credible approach to leadership, once you have seen the range of human possibility - and you will recognise it for what it is - a defensive strategy to try to make the world conform to what you need (and the best of luck with that!)

This expanded understanding becomes your leadership superpower. Instead of trying to shut down those who lie beyond a certain boundary, you now can actively , and with confidence, seek insight from those you least resemble or who have perspectives that are wildly different from you own.