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Emotional Intelligence

Read Your Emails The Right Way

Eighteen months back probably none of us would be able to predict that our communication with other people will soon be completely based only on emails and video calls. When that became our reality it became challenging to recognize what do people behind the screen to somewhere far away in their homes think when they write an email. Most experts agree that 70 to 93 percent of all communication is nonverbal, so it’s no wonder we get confused when nonverbal communication is taken out of the equation.

However, there are ways to improve your email communication with others. To be more exact, there are tells that will help you recognize what kind of personality is writing an email and how can you respond to make the email exchange smoother.

Source: https: giphy.com

If you receive an email that holds no additional information besides the one that is the theme of the conversation, you can be pretty sure you are talking to a high D personality. D’s are direct and they talk and write straight to the point. They are all about getting results so to communicate effectively with them you need to be professional, direct and short to the point. Just answer the question that they asked and they will be more than happy. You can act the same as they do, just like in this example of their response:
You: Did you get the proposal?
High D: Yes. Will be in touch.


Contrary to a very to-the-point D personality, a high I will be sending you emails with a lot of exclamation points and often emojis. Reading their email means also feeling their energy through the words as it will be full of positivity and optimism.
You: Did you get the proposal?
High I: Yes, thanks! 😊 I’m excited to read it and see what you have to offer!


The most difficult style to recognize through an email is the high S personality style since they are reserved by nature. However, S’s are also people-oriented and will make you feel good about what you sent through compliments and expressing positive feelings. This is the style from which you can also expect an apologetic tone of an email if they feel as if they are not responding to you fast enough. However, generally speaking, the tone of their email will mostly depend on the tone of an email that they receive.
You: Did you get the proposal?
High S: Sorry I didn’t get back to you. I’ve been quite busy. Thanks for sending it. I will look at it soon.


If you keep receiving highly detailed emails from your supervisor, you can be sure you are exchanging emails with a high C. They are detail-oriented because they want you to know exactly what are they trying to say. Their effort to be clear will go so far that they will probably reorganize and edit every email before sending it out to be sure that they will get it right. Also, when they respond to questions you can expect sentences like: “I provided this spreadsheet so you could see our group’s responses and questions.” This is their way of making sure that everything is clear and their thoughts are organized and helpful to you.
You: Did you get the proposal?
High C: Yes. I am looking over the document on Thursday morning. You should hear back from me by 1 pm EST on that day.

Source: giphy.com

Once you analyze emails that you are receiving in your Inbox and figure what kind of personality is on the other side of the screen, it will become much easier for you to communicate. This will also make your communication more effective, and that will leave you with more time to do the things that you love.

The last question to answer is: do you know which style is sitting on your side of the screen? This is the most important question because the first step to improve communication is to have self-awareness. Finding out which style you are in will help you understand yourself and others. Find that out right HERE.          

Four Powerful Interview Questions You Must Know

Regardless of which side of the table you are sitting at in an interview process, you can expect some standard question, such as:

  • Tell me a little bit about yourself.
  • What are your three biggest strengths and how do you bring those to the workplace?
  • Where do you see yourself five years from now?

Even though the interview process has changed through the years, these questions remain a part of it. However, interviewers are adding more and more emotional intelligence pieces into the interview equation. To help you prepare for an interview, I have listed four powerful questions that must be asked if you want to find a good fit for the job role. Equally, if you are looking for a new job, these are questions you can anticipate and prepare to answer as more and more employers are using them.

1. Tell me about someone with whom you work on a regular basis that you find difficult to get along with. What have you done to build a stronger relationship and what was the result?

This will take out a personal response to conflict since they need to describe someone they are not getting along with. This will depend on their personality type according to the DISC method (you can find out more about the way each style responds to conflict HERE).
To build a stronger relationship with someone a person needs to have self-awareness. Lacking it will leave them with no skillset to draw from to make a not-so-perfect relationship better on a daily basis. It is also good to notice that in terms of the results of trying to fix the relationship, anything is possible. That includes a person leaving the company just because of one colleague or boss they find difficult to get along with. If I had a nickel for every time on my speaking engagements I have heard: “People leave managers, not companies” …


2. Tell me about a time when you rejected one of your team members ideas or opinions about a project.

This is a question that is more for outgoing styles because they typically don’t hesitate when they have something to say. If you are talking to a D personality style, you can expect that they said whatever was on their mind, since they just let those kinds of things out. I personality style typically share quite a bit and get their energy from being around people, so they also don’t have an issue with speaking their mind.
However, S and C personality styles don’t like to share their thoughts and feelings, especially in public since they are the reserved kind. What you can expect from them even in the future in situations like this is to stand on the sidelines and take notes, and then react privately. In an anonymous email if possible.


3. Describe a time when someone treated you unfairly. What did you do?

Unfairness is a common thing that appears in society these days and people often feel that they are treated unfairly. If a High D feels that they are treated unfairly they will be very tactical and not allow personal feelings to get into a conversation. On the other hand, you can expect a High I to be emotional and talk to the person who made them feel a certain way to get to the bottom of the situation.
On the other side of the spectrum, a high S will internalize the situation and not do anything publicly. They will wait and maybe talk to a supervisor, but for the most part, they will just hold their emotions inside. So, if you want to know how a High S is feeling, you must talk to them privately and one-on-one. Lastly, a high C will be very calm and calculated and know the time and the place to say that they are feeling unfair. Most probably they will approach the person that makes them feel that way and talk to them openly.  


4. How do you know we will be a culture fit for you? What traits you have that match those of current employees? What is different about you or what skill set you have that can better our company in the process of attaining our goals?

Personality style that will put culture in the first place is definitely a high S. These people want to feel as if they are a part of something bigger than themselves and/or a part of a family. Unlike them, D and S personality styles can work independently and don’t require much interaction with other people daily, so they won’t be concerned about the culture, but rather about achieving their own goals.
Talking about traits that match those of current employees will require a bit of research. This is where C personality styles will thrive since they love a ton of research, especially from a standpoint of employee satisfaction. D personality styles will look for potential award winners among the employees because they want to be a part of that kind of culture. Unlike them, I personality styles look for fun in the culture of a company and question will they enjoy being in it daily. Looking for a more family atmosphere and a way to individually contribute to the higher good is something you can expect from a high S. But don’t expect them or a high C to talk much about what are they bringing to the table. They have written it down in a CV and they don’t like to talk much more about their achievements. However, a D personality style will be super happy to tell you about the things they do well so even from that standpoint you can figure out who is what personality style.

Why are these questions important?

When we are interviewing people, we need to anticipate these responses so that we can recognize the personality style of a person we are talking to and tailor the rest of the questions. It is important to keep in mind what position are we interviewing the person for because otherwise, we won’t know how to use this information. What we want from a person is to gain the energy from a role they will be working on, not lose it. Because that can help them overcome the challenges that they have to deal with daily within that role. If you do your benchmarking properly, the person you are interviewing will feel as if the job role was made for them. That will make them feel fulfilled by the role and they will do their best and be super successful.

Using DISC in the workplace can do wonders for your company, as it has for these people HERE. Understand your people and unlock their true potential by joining one of my courses HERE.

How To Anticipate Your Response To Conflict?

I recently found myself in a fast-food drive-through and witnessed a perfect example of a person being triggered by an everyday situation where each personality style would have a completely different reaction.

What happened is: I was in a line to get my ordered food when a driver of a minivan started to go around me outside of all the lanes and tried to pull ahead of me. As a High S personality style, I bumped the horn ever so lightly, trying to figure out what was going on and what is the lady behind the wheel trying to do before she hits my car. What I got as a response was the “finger”!

How to respond to the “bird flip”?

A large number of insults followed the bird flip. This time, it was coming from the passenger on the side seat. 

I decided to let them go ahead of me, but another bird flip from a driver followed that! And they didn’t even look at me once. Obviously, the person was triggered by something, and the question is: what would YOU do in this situation?

How your personality style determins your reaction

Suppose you have a high D personality style. What would make you a direct person who speaks what’s on your mind. Your reaction would probably be shouting and not allowing the person to push in front of me. High D’s might be aggressive and not have a lot of filters when in a conflict situation.

A High I who is outgoing and people-oriented might see how close they can get to the other car without damaging it and make the whole situation a bit playful. They would not do anything manipulative and try to get a positive outcome.

High S personality style as a caring person and all about supporting others would, at the moment the person started to push in front of them, let them try to help them get whatever it is they need faster. Even after the bird flip, a High S would still be welcoming and warm because they are very empathetic and understanding, so they will respond calmly.

And lastly, a high C will wonder why the driver chose to get in front of all the people and think about how the driver’s behavior is inefficient. They will probably let them in at the end but will have so many questions in their head at the same time.

You can only control yourself

We all have a unique way of responding to situations when things stress us out. It’s crucial to have self-awareness about how we will react to prevent ourselves from being triggered in those moments. Otherwise, we let everyone else influence our own emotions and our attitudes. Remember: the only thing we can control is our attitude and actions in this world. If we let someone steal that from us, then the question is where we are as a society. And we become very reactionary instead of proactive in terms of how we approach the world.

To keep control of our attitudes and reactions, it is important to get to know ourselves as much as possible. Finding out your personality style is so helpful in that so I invite you to check out the Store and find out for yourself.

Why Does My Partner Ignore Me?

Large number of people feel the need for a great amount of attention from their partners when they are in love. And it’s not that difficult to feel as if you are being ignored. But things are not always (or almost never) the way they seem to be.

The whole population of humans belongs to one of the four personality types: D, I, S or C. And each human being is a unique mix of the four. That also means that we all communicate differently and to understand why you are “being ignored” you need to understand how different personality styles look at life, work, relationships, and everything that comes in between.

While you might be an outgoing person who loves company, your partner might be on a completely opposite side of the DISC graph and naturally, be quieter and enjoy concentrating on his or her work assignments. If your boyfriend comes to mind right away, regardless of where he stands on a DISC graph, it is important to remember boyfriends don’t intentionally ignore you (most of the time).

A person that belongs to a D personality style is hyper focused on getting things done and is mostly about execution. This means that if a D has a big project at work, nothing will exist outside of it. They are not trying to ignore you, but they are focused on getting whatever it is done. Unfortunately for you, if you are in a relationship with a High D, they will have a list of tasks that need to be done that’s 32 miles long and they won’t be able to sleep until they are done with it. So, remember: they are not ignoring you because they don’t love you; they are just in the zone.  

A partner that is an I personality style is not trying to ignore you, but he has an incredibly short attention span. I am an I and I can confirm that we get into situations where we are all over the place. One of the examples is that we’ll pick up a phone after it buzzes, end up on social media and completely forget why we even picked it up in the first place. The reason behind this is that we suffer from shiny object syndrome and we can get involved in an activity in a blink of an eye. Forgive us, we don’t mean to be the way we are, and we certainly do love you.

If your partner is a S personality style, then he has a big problem with prioritization. He is not ignoring you because he wants to, but because he easily becomes overwhelmed. People who are high S get analysis paralysis and get worried that they might make someone angry if they don’t do something, so they don’t know who or what to prioritize.

A partner that is a C personality style is a very structured and very process-driven individual. This type of person will build in time in their day to check their phone. If you miss that window, there are high chances you will feel ignored. They see a phone as a tool and nothing else. Similar to D’s, C personality types have an extremely long list of tasks they need to finish, but they need to do it in a specific order. So once the phone or talk time comes up in a schedule, they will talk to you. They are not trying to ignore you, but it is just not the right time.

The most important thing we all need to understand is that everything starts with self-awareness. Each of us is a unique blend of four personality styles, so we all have our expectations. What happens when you understand what your personality style is and where does your partner fit in, it will literally change your whole life. The way you act as a couple will change from its core, and you will also see a tremendous change in your behavior at work or around your friends.

DISC Assessment will transform the way you communicate and give you understanding of yourself and others. This also means that it will make you understand how to adapt your behavior around other people. That alone will open doors you never even knew existed when it comes to communicating and networking with other people.

You can find out more about each personality style by checking posts in the sidebar on the right and take that first step toward change by going to the Store and taking the DISC Assessment. 

Why Is Communication Regarded as Difficult and Complex

Each person on this planet gives and receives information in completely unique way. The reason for it is that we all have a specific lens that we look through and that lens determines how we see life. Harsh truth is this: until you learn how to expand that lens, you won’t be able to communicate with people as effectively as you could, and your relationships are going to suffer as a result.

The key to good communication is to understand what drives people to do what they do and say what they say, and why do people communicate verbally in a way they do?

Communication style of every person depends on their personality style.

High D personality style will communicate very directly, and they are going to say things in a very few words. These people like to move fast and talk fast so you can expect them to give you a short answer to a question and answer exactly what you asked and nothing more or less Also, a high D personality type is going to interrupt you if you start to tell a tale and talk a lot. Remember: they are not trying to be mean, but their brain is just full of questions and news ideas and they must say what is on their mind as soon as it comes there.

If a person from your environment likes to talk with their hands, they are probably a high I personality style. These people are very emotional and excited about everything. They have high energy and want to express themselves any way they can. That means you can expect a lot of emojis in their text messages and emails. Also, they suffer from shiny object syndrome, so they get distracted very easily and extremely fast. Remember that they are not trying to annoy you, they are just wired that way and they need you to snap them out of excitement and pull their focus back about the conversation.

Your co-worker or a friend who doesn’t say much and does so softly when they do is probably a high S personality style. This behavior comes from their lack of willingness to rock the boat or to create conflict. These people are afraid that they will offend someone if they speak their mind and you can expect them to give up on their wishes to please others.

Being cautious in communication is also the biggest trait of a high C personality style. You can recognize them through their monotone tone of voice and lack of emotions. Their expression is never too low nor too high. But don’t get fooled; high C’s are buzzing in the background. Their mind is full of questions and that’s why they communicate the way they do because they need to process all the information carefully to say the right thing, at the right time, and to the right people.

Did you recognize yourself in any of these descriptions? Take notice that without self and social awareness, we can not communicate effectively.

The starting point is to understand yourself and your personality style. That will help you know how and why you communicate and how you can communicate with other personality styles.

You can find out more about different personality styles on my YouTube channel or on my Podcast, and if you want to take that first step towards better communication today: check the DISC assessment in the Store.

Concise Adult Version

This 6-page report provides essential feedback with an accurate measurement of your personality blend. Your report will include the following:

  • Words that describe you
  • Your strengths
  • Keys to Excellence
  • Your value on a team
  • Your DISC personality graphs