Learn the Type D Personality based on DISC
Adam Stamm
Type D Personality — Competitive and in Control
Someone with a type D personality loves to take the reins of control to get things done and achieve their goals.
DISC is a simple but powerful assessment that can quickly identify a person’s dominant personality type. Beyond just assigning someone a personality type, DISC helps people understand how their dominant personality types shape their goals and fears, as well as their communication styles. The ultimate goal is to help people learn more about themselves and others.
In a previous blog, we wrote all about Type C individuals, and in this blog post, we’ll be talking about the Type D personality — Dominant. Stay tuned for more blog posts about the other two personality styles. If you’re new to DISC, start here to learn about all 12 DISC personality types.
Read on to learn more about the type D personality!
What Drives a Type D Personality?
Spelling out a list of personality traits can only contribute so much to self-awareness and understanding of others. To truly understand someone, it’s important to learn their values — from this understanding, we can discover what their motivations and fears.
People with a type D personality are driven by their need for results. This need is psychological and it is a driver for other behaviors that are commonly associated with the D Personality Type. Here are behaviors that are often associated with this personality:
- Fast-paced
- Blunt
- Task-focused
- Controlling
- Skeptical
- Challenging
Type D people love to feel like they’re achieving their goals, and as a result, they tend to be highly competitive and they won’t back down from a challenge. They might take on authority believing their way is better than what’s currently in place. Their skepticism is a vehicle for ensuring that outside ideas will help them accomplish their goals and tasks.
With an eye toward the finish line, the type D personality prefers to think about the bottom-line results rather than the small details needed to achieve the end goal. This leads them to look outside the box and think about the bigger picture.
D Personality Type Strengths
People with a type D personality are quick to act and get to the bottom of any problem. Like other Personality Types, they have many valuable strengths for teams and organizations.
Problem solvers
There is no problem too great for a type D personality, and they love to dive head-first into a problem. Because of their natural tendency towards leadership, a type D person works best when alone to tease out the solution to a problem, only turning to the team later to delegate the execution of that solution. When working on something, the type D personality can easily tune out all distractions, only to emerge when they feel they’ve figured it out.
Striving for the best
People with Type D personalities are highly competitive because they want the best for themselves and those around them. They value measurable results and hold everyone to a high standard. Someone with a Type D personality is able to shape the environment around them in order to overcome anything that gets in the way of winning. Because of this, someone with a type D personality may often initiate changes in their life in the hopes of always doing better.
Big-picture thinkers
The type D personality has no problem seeing the forest for the trees — they’ve built the forest in their mind, and it’s up to someone else to draw the individual trees. They process information conceptually, thinking from most general to specific. They tend to use their left brain, sparking creative ideas for change.
D Personality Type and Areas for Growth
Everyone has areas of personal growth, and the type D personality is no exception. These individuals can improve by learning patience and productive coping mechanisms.
Impatience for others
Because Type D personality wants to control the environment around them, they can get easily impatient and frustrated at those around them that don’t “get with the program.” With a keen eye toward the bottom line, they can lack empathy for those whom they view as inadequate.
Venting under pressure
When faced with pressure, people with a type D personality style can vent their frustrations outward to others. They respond to any tense situation with a fight response that can be off-putting and intimidating to others. What is simply a stress relieving practice for the type D personality can easily be misunderstood by others as anger.
D Personality Type: Communication style
People with D Personality Type can have a tendency to dominate a conversation. They usually engage in communication that has one direction — they talk and expect others to listen.
It’s important to note that someone with this personality type can quickly present opinions and guesses as facts due to their confidence and generalizing tendencies. The type D personality values blunt, fast-paced communication.
When communicating with the type D personality, provide concise and big-picture data.
Show them potential for new opportunities or ways to “win”, and compliment their accomplishments. Let them take the lead where appropriate and work together to agree on what success looks like.
Do you have a D Personality Type?
Are you confident, competitive, and find yourself taking the reigns when working in groups? Then you may be a type D personality. Take the DISC free personality assessment to determine if you’re a type D or a different personality type.