Judging a Book by its Cover

Guess what? We do judge a book by its cover. It is our natural first instinct and its imbedded deep within our basic, reptilian brain. It’s that “Fight or Flight” mechanism that allowed our ancient ancestors to survive the world they lived in. Our more modern day selves though, have been taught not to judge a book by its cover, but to get to know what’s inside, to learn about who a person is, what their beliefs are, before passing judgement. In fact, we are encouraged not to pass judgement at all but to accept a person as they are and learn to co-exist.

However, often the reality is that in stressful situations our reptilian brain kicks in and all the blood rushes to our extremities, preparing us to either run or fight. The brain – the centre of thought and reason is left unable to figure out what is happening and all hell can break loose. But there is good news: we can train ourselves to deal with this; we can train our brain muscle to react differently. This is the basis for Social Intelligence.

Of the three elements of Social Intelligence (Behavior Style, Emotional Intelligence & Mindset), our Behavioral Style is the easiest for us to learn and to assess. We may not be able to determine others’ Emotional Intelligence or identify their Mindset, but we can observe if they’re animated, rushed or sulking. People tend to make judgements on how to interact with each other based on these observations. We are judged by our cover. Understanding how and why is the first step to improving communications and reducing conflict.

In Tracom’s SOCIAL STYLE™ model, behaviour is broken down into four basic groups or “Styles”, each of the four Styles displays positive and negative characteristics when working with others. Years of research has shown that people of any STYLE can be successful in any profession. Understanding Style allows us to identify the preferences of others and modify our own behavior to enhance communication and make others more comfortable. This is known as Versatility, and it is strongly linked to personal, career and business success.

SOCIAL STYLE™ is the world’s leading Behavioral Style model. It has been used by thousands of organizations to improve leadership performance and sales results.

TRACOM’s SOCIAL STYLE Profile measures SOCIAL STYLE and Versatility, allowing you to take steps to improve your relationships and performance. Taking these steps is especially important for increasing leadership performance, developing coaching skills, increasing sales, building relationships, working in teams and enhancing communications.

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