AzaLearning provides six core assessments. Each is based on research, classroom/coaching experience, and extensive piloting and revision. All draw on three principles:
- Lead from where you stand. A clear picture of our values and preferences gives us information about what we are likely to see and what we are likely to miss. As Walter Lippmann said, “We don’t see first and define, we define and then we see.” This also gives us the opportunity to see others’ differences as complementary rather than threatening.
- Data should contribute to change. AzaLearning assessments provide a baseline for learning focused on impact. All accompanying materials move toward using the information from the assessment to improve interaction and communication.
- We need a common framework. The results provide a language we can use to frame a continuing, useful dialogue. These assessments provide a perspective about how we approach problems and decision making that helps us to be more inclusive and flexible.
Communication Style: My Impact on Others is a self-contained instrument that measures our tendency to be product-, process-, or people-focused as well as the advantages, deficits, and impact of each preference, especially when working collaboratively on a project.
The Solution Preference Inventory: Helping Us Move from Confrontation to Collaboration through the Use of Interest-Based Problem Solving provides two data fields: How we see conflict managed in our workplace and how we would prefer to manage conflict in our workplace. It clearly differentiates among the five styles of workplace conflict management (Position, Avoiding, Rights, Smoothing, and Interest) and provides a foundation to better manage differences.
The Multi-Source Feedback Instrument (MSFI) is a 360° assessment focused on behavior. It measures how others perceive our impact in four behavioral sets: Use of Self Skills, Partnering Skills, Team Skills, and Organizational Skills. It can serve equally well as a benchmark for an LDP or during a training program as a level three evaluation.
The Team Function Survey establishes a starting point for improving team/group operation based on the ranking of behaviors when the group is working collectively, as in a project meeting. The ranking of these behaviors serves as a baseline for desired change.
The Values Scale is the small assessment with a huge impact. It creates a safe starting point for talking about individual values — how we define them and how they manifest in the workplace. All the values in the assessment are positive, so the conversation does not focus on who’s right or wrong, but on how these values appear behaviorally for each of us.
How I Spend My Energy provides a clear graph showing how you currently spend expend your energy and how you would prefer to. Time Management is much less important in our work lives than energy management—how much time a task takes has less impact than how much energy it takes. A day is always 24 hours, but we get worn down by expending energy on tasks that don’t align with our values and vision. This assessment provides a starting point for individual development or coaching/mentoring to better use our personal resources.
Mac Bogert, president of AzaLearning, developed these assessments over twenty years of working with hundreds of clients. In addition to original assessments, Mac is also certified in the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator®, FIRO-B®, La Monica Empathy Profile®, Thomas-Kilmann Conflict Mode Instrument®, Parker Team Player Survey®. He is also an administrator for Ntrinsx®.