This is the first in a series of posts about the DISC behavioral model. It’s a crucial part of how Hip Socket helps clients. We hope this gives current clients more insight and future clients a peek behind the curtain.
Cranky customers now crankier?
Did the pandemic permanently change your customers?
Science says “yes.”
A recent psychology study used quantitative analysis and machine learning to review millions of results of the field’s “Big Five” personality assessment.
It found that the pandemic has indeed “altered human personality.” We are less conscientious and more neurotic since the pandemic started.
It also found we were at our best when it seemed like the world was ending … but now that it’s not, we are less agreeable and less open.
The study has yet to be peer-reviewed, and there is surely more to the story.
But you don’t need a psychology degree or any experience with AI to see that society has changed.
You just need to work in service industries.
When forced to abandon our preferred ways, we are sapped of energy–and seem to turn into different people.
Cranky customers (and sometimes cranky employees!) are bringing many employees to the breaking point. This is part of the reason so many have quit their jobs. And I can tell you that, among my clients, there are many employees still thinking about it. Perhaps you are too.
The good news: You also don’t need a psychology degree to get some relief. There is an ancient, simple model that can help you in every single customer interaction.
You apply it by asking two multiple-choice questions.
I’ll introduce the questions in a future post. For now, know that those questions spring from this simple truth:
Humans evaluate and interact with the world in four basic ways. Each of us find some of those ways more comfortable than others.
And when forced to abandon our preferred ways, we are sapped of energy–and seem to turn into different people.
Overclocking your computer
Have you ever seen someone overclock a computer?
I lived on a dorm floor with a bunch of computer science majors. They are going to laugh as I simplify what they do, but here goes:
A new program–say, a game that renders lots of video on the fly–requires a computer that can do more computing.
If a computer can’t handle this program, my friends could force its processor to operate more quickly. More quickly than the computers were designed to go–in many cases, voiding the warranty.
To do this additional processing, overclockers put radiators around their computers and use water cooling. They might even make use of coolant such as liquid nitrogen or dry ice.
Why? To cool down a hot processor–from all the extra electricity needed for the additional processing.
If overclocked computers don’t compensate for the heat generated by their power needs, they can ruin components or shorten the lifespan of the machine.
Our bodies are designed with computers as well. The prefrontal cortex is far more complex and powerful than a machine computer. But they both run on electricity.
To complete the analogy:
When circumstances cause our prefrontal cortexes to evaluate and interact with the world in uncomfortable ways, we literally use more energy.
A client recently told me that this is what it feels like to speak a foreign language. I’ve seen people lose the use of a limb and have to do extra processing to come up with new ways of doing things they’ve always done.
We speak of “muscle memory,” “second nature,” “comfortable,” “natural.” All are expressing the same concept. I don’t have to do much computing to act in ways that come naturally to me.
But depending on your style, you can get exhausted when you have to be around a lot of people–or spend time on analysis and details. You can get exhausted if you have to take charge–or if you have to adapt to others.
Exhausted people don’t act like themselves. They might even appear to have the opposite personality.
Over the next few weeks, I’ll tease out a fuller explanation of how this all works.
For now, have some empathy for that customer in front of you: You may be dealing with an overclocked computer.