Over my career, I have worked with school leaders on a variety of school change initiatives, and increasingly I find that my most powerful go-to tool is the Brain Profile Dashboard created by Six Seconds. I use it because it gives school leaders a baseline for understanding the collection of brain profiles, brain talents, and EQ outcomes for the leaders on their team. In one page, you can see an EQ score for the team, the ranked brain talents of the team, and get a sense of how the group prefers to process information, make decisions, and invest their energies. In the outcomes section, you can see where the team is “in the green” even in times of stress, and where yellow and red outcome areas highlight areas of vulnerability that need to be addressed.
Focus on Team Outcomes
If we look at the performance area of the dashboard report, we can see that one of the 8 success outcome areas is in the green. This team can expect to leverage its collective emotional intelligence to successfully motivate and involve others in school directives, such as carrying out new guidelines for health and safety protocols, student assessment systems, or school culture initiatives.
On the other hand, at the bottom of the scale health and balance display the lowest scores for this team. They show as the low end of functional. In times of stress these aspects of wellbeing will likely become real challenge ares for the leadership team. As a coach I work to help teams see these gaps for themselves and develop action plans for how to move forward to achieve their goals.
Tuning into Team Brain Talents to Shift Outcomes
In the Brain Profile Dashboard, we can see the brain talents, or most readily available capabilities of the team, ranked in order from top to bottom. Commitment, problem-solving, and proactivity are the most powerful talents for this group of school leaders. These talents may or may not be in current use for the group given the context of the team, but they are capabilities within reach to help the team get the results they desire.
This leadership team is comprised of individuals who are able to leverage the talent of commitment to stay focused on what is most important. There is a tenacity in this leadership team that can be activated to maintain energy and attention on an important initiative at hand or problem that most be solved. This talent is part of a cluster of capabilities that help teams take action, build energy, and drive results. In fact, the other two talents in this group are problem-solving and proactivity, the other top talents of this team.
