Discipline: Creating Structure That Builds Trust

Jim Collison:
[0:00] Welcome to Season 4 of The CliftonStrengths Podcast, where we'll dive deep into how CliftonStrengths themes build powerful partnerships and help teams thrive. I'm Jim Collison, Gallup's CliftonStrengths Community Manager.

Jillian White:
[0:10] And I'm Jillian White, Gallup's Subject Matter Expert on Culture and Leadership and our Lead Subject Matter Expert for CliftonStrengths.

Jim Collison:
[0:16] Today's theme is Discipline. We'll explore what this theme brings, what it needs, and how it fosters collaboration. Jillian, welcome!

Jillian White:
[0:24] Thank you, Jim. I look forward to bringing some structure to how we talk about Discipline today.

Jim Collison:
[0:29] Love that. Let's back up a little bit. Let's talk about Discipline. Can you give us a quick refresher on what this looks like?

Jillian White:
[0:35] Yeah. Just a reminder, anyone who has high Discipline as a strength, at the heart of this strength is someone who enjoys routine and who enjoys structure. They bring order to the world around them. They like finding efficiencies. It's an Executing strength, so it gets energy from doing it. Oftentimes makes the plan, it sticks to the plan, and it follows through. The image that I like to think of with high Discipline is, if I were to peek at someone's completely organized calendar, and I look, and they've got everything mapped out, and they know what they're doing when, what their routines are for the week, and then they follow through on that. So that Discipline, that self-control that even shows up in having a plan and sticking with the plan. That's a good picture of Discipline.

Jim Collison:
[1:18] That image that you just put out reminds me, we're in Gallup Learning Series week coming up next week, and so a lot of preparations. I spent a lot of time this week. I sat down and took my wife, Sarah, out to dinner the other night, and she has Discipline very high. And what do you think we did during dinner? She pulled out her calendar —

Jillian White:
[1:36] Do some planning during dinner.

Jim Collison:
[1:36] All of the events. That was a, that was a date for her, right, with Discipline, of, Tell me everything. I want to get this, I want to get this nailed down. I see that every day. She has super high Discipline. Jillian, from the consulting work that you do, can, can you share an example of maybe where you've seen this in action?

Jillian White:
[1:55] Yeah. And, you know, I mean, Jim, just going back to what you just shared with your date night with Sarah, I do always go back to, How do you see strengths in action? It is usually where people default in their free time. And it's oftentimes where they light up, right?

Jillian White:
[2:09] High Discipline is going to light up getting to pull out that calendar and have the plan and work it. That's actually enjoyable and exciting for them. Thinking about some real business scenarios for this, I told Jim it was, it was a really busy week for me just workwise. And I was actually, earlier this week, in Phoenix with a team. We have a large client we work with — about a $20 billion company — that had a CFO transition. And I got to look at, I spent about 3 hours with this team on their transition and walking through the strengths of each person with a new CFO coming in, and looking at how this team should work together and what they should think about for how they were leading everyone around them. And what was really interesting is the team itself had very high Arranger, Strategic, a lot of very, I'll say, agile strengths. And as we went individual by individual around that team, there were several people who brought high Discipline.

Jillian White:
[3:01] And so it's always fun in those conversations to ask that leadership team, "Hey, how do you see this person contributing to the team?" And what was really neat to hear is all of these high agile strengths said, "We need you," right? "You are the person who helps bring some efficiency to our team. You have a plan. We can rely on you. You bring stability. You increase trust. When we know you say you're going to do something, and you have a plan around it, we know you're going to follow through on that." So it was really fun to hear how valuable, once again, in a strengths-based organization or a strengths-based team, we actually value our differences, because we need those people who bring something that might be different than what the rest of us have. And it was, it was really neat to hear the value of that Discipline, bringing stability, trust and an ability to come up with a plan as a part of that team.

Jim Collison:
[3:52] Yeah. And even as we think of those 4 Needs of Followers, you were saying — Trust, Stability, Compassion and Hope.

Jillian White:
[3:57] Oh, yeah.

Jim Collison:
[3:57] And you think, oh, compassion wouldn't be satisfied with Discipline, but it absolutely can be, as you were saying: I do what I say, right? And that's very comforting. That's very compassionate to someone, especially when you've promised something that they need, right?

Jillian White:
[4:12] Yeah. I think that's a great exercise for all of these strengths is to go back and say, you know, every single one of them, it's the "how" you meet the needs of followers. I know you had a whole season dedicated to that as a part of the Strengths Podcast, but, you know, I think of something like Discipline, it's obviously bringing stability and trust, right? You can see those natural connections. But to your point, it can bring hope, because it's helping you see the path forward. It can bring compassion, because it's caring about having a plan. And so it's neat to see how it can fulfill all of those.

Jim Collison:
[4:43] Right. Bringing that reliability, that brings that stability, that compassion and hope. I love that. I love talking through that. We have a new section in Gallup Access available to every, every one, a community section in your Strengths Dashboard, where we talk about and have information there about what each theme brings and what it needs. Let's do a little exercise now, where we think about, What does Discipline bring?

Jillian White:
[5:06] Yeah. And I always feel like I've already been saying these things in the examples. So just to summarize it, if I'm working with somebody who has high Discipline, what are they bringing to our partnership? They are bringing order and structure. They will be that person who thinks about all the details of what we need to do and the flow and the milestones as a part of that. So that order and structure is a part of what they bring to the partnership. As a result of that, I find they bring efficiency, because they're thinking about how to create routines and systems that, OK, if we put this in place, it's going to help us be efficient and get to what we need to complete. So they may say, "What's the goal?" And then they go, "All right, what's the routines, the structures, the things we need to do?" They're able to break down the steps to get to that goal.

Jillian White:
[5:54] As a result, they have a lot of high self-control. They have that ability to say, "Here's the plan," and follow through. So that does bring that stability and that trust when I'm partnering with somebody to say, Hey, I know that they're, they're going to say this is the plan, and then they're going to do it. They've got that ability to have that high sense of self-discipline in their approach to partnership.

Jim Collison:
[6:13] Yeah, I love, you brought, that, when you said "precision and detail orientation," we've, we have a word we, Sarah uses "fiddly." She says, "I do the fiddly things," the small details, stuff that require, you said, precision. And I don't know if we, we often bring that word precision in when we think about Discipline. That may be a new, at least for me, a new thought in that, that real detail orientation, but in small, precise parts. And so "fiddly" is our word for it. You can insert that or use that if you like. She just says, "I do the fiddly stuff." When we think about what it needs, I think there's some great opportunities in this one. What does it need? What does Discipline need?

Jillian White:
[6:53] Yeah. If I'm partnering with somebody who has high Discipline, what do they need? They need opportunities to plan in advance. They're going to feel a lot better when they've got that freedom to say, "OK, here's where we're going to go as a team." And they get to come up with that plan of how to get there. They like to plan. They like to follow through on that plan. They need opportunities to do that. I will also say they need an organized environment around them. Remember, oftentimes people, what they value is what they oftentimes want from others. They value order and structure. I had to giggle, because even when I was at this meeting, and you looked around at the people who had high Discipline, their space around them was just, like, you look at the desk of somebody who has high Discipline. I remember helping a friend move who had high Discipline, and she had boxes completely organized for that move. And so, what do they need from us? They're actually going to do better when we have some order, structure and an organized environment that we're creating around them.

Jim Collison:
[7:51] I love that. In the new CliftonStrengths Top 5 Report, we've added a section called Theme Dynamics. It's really where we take a look at two themes together. Lots of folks love to do this, lots of great things to talk about. In that, we look — and here in the podcast, we're looking at a theme that is most commonly paired with Discipline. No surprises here, but what is that?

Jillian White:
[8:11] I feel like you can already hear it in some of the lean of Discipline. The theme that's most likely to show up inside of someone who has high Discipline is also Responsibility. So you can imagine that Discipline I think of is almost an internal drive for efficiency. And that's why it looks for those routines and structures. Responsibility is a desire to follow through and to fulfill commitment to others. So there's almost like an internal drive with Discipline and an external drive to fulfill those commitments with Responsibility. So you put those two things together, and you've got that internal efficiency that helps to fulfill on commitments to others, that external orientation. So I think it's what really makes somebody a powerful partner you know you can trust and that's going to do what they say they're going to do.

Jim Collison:
[8:59] Yeah. There's great stability, right, in that. And the, these are available for you. These theme pairs are available for you, customized to you — so your Top 5 all put together. I'd encourage you to go out and look at that. We also want to spend some time, because Theme Dynamics can work in the context of teams as well, partnerships and collaborations. So give us some clues, as we think about Discipline blending with other themes on teams.

Jillian White:
[9:23] You know, I always like to think, you know, who's that fun partner for them to work with that catalyzes their strengths? And then who's that complementary partner? So when you think about the catalyst partner, what does Discipline value? It values efficiency. Another strength I oftentimes see show up around Discipline might be Consistency, because it also values efficiency, but it's creating infrastructures to help people feel a sense of fairness. So put those two things together, and there can be this common love of creating structure, right? And so I think those could have a lot of fun working together. I also think about what Discipline values. It puts a plan in place to help get things done. So just working with other people who have strong Executing themes — we talked about how it pairs with Responsibility — maybe having a partner with strong Responsibility would be really fulfilling, because it's going to help you work the plan.

Jillian White:
[10:13] Now, on the flip side of this, those complementary partners, I oftentimes think, Where is a potential watch-out spot for high Discipline? High Discipline works the plan, right? It's not necessarily known for being incredibly flexible unless it has other strengths around it that help it with that. So if you have high Discipline, who might you want to partner with? You might want to partner with somebody who actually enjoys flexibility and brings that. That might be Arranger, Adaptability, Strategic — some of those strengths that think in a bit more of an agile, flexible way.

Jillian White:
[10:46] You might also want to partner with somebody who helps you think outside the box, right? Discipline has the plan, works the plan. Think about people like those that have Ideation and can just go, "Hey, let's have a completely different way of looking at this." And then finally, I think Discipline tends to think of task first on its own. It tends to lean toward that high execution orientation. So partnering with some other people that have some strong relational talents — Relator, Empathy, Harmony, Includer; any of those Relationship Building strengths —are going to help you think about the person on the other side of your plan and bring those two things together in a powerful way, leading people around your plan.

Jim Collison:
[11:26] I love the way you've developed this section of the podcast, because I think, well, as we think about, these are team sessions when you're getting together with the Team Grid, and you can steal this and say, Hey, how do we, how do we use this as a catalyst? And how do we use these in complementing partnerships, right? I mean, I think these are two really easy questions that, for some teams, could take hours.

Jillian White:
[11:48] And I will just say, I mean, I will say typically, that catalyst partner is a lot easier, right? And typically, that complementary partner is a little harder to partner, but a strong team actually needs the complementary partnerships. Because all of a sudden — take that team that I was talking about earlier, you know, very agile. But what's their danger? That they keep creating new systems. They need some efficiency that someone like a Discipline is going to bring. Might not feel good to everybody else at first, but it is a gift to the team to have that well-roundedness.

Jim Collison:
[12:18] Love that. As we think about wrapping up our time here, we have some tips for leaders and teams, as well as individuals. Let's talk about leaders first. How can leaders recognize and harness Discipline with their teams and organizations?

Jillian White:
[12:28] If you're a leader, look for people on your team who are really organized. They bring the structure. They've got a plan. Those are your people with high Discipline. If you're leading someone like that, remember to leverage their ability to bring that structure. So I think a good question might be, "Hey, the person with high Discipline, how would you organize this?" Put them in places to use their love of structure and organization to use it for the good of the team or for the good of what you're trying to accomplish as a team. I like to think a fun way to consider positioning somebody who has high Discipline, think of them as your efficiency consultant. They're your person whom you go to and you say, "Where do we need to have some structure that's going to help us be more efficient?"

Jim Collison:
[13:14] We, I wish I could go back in time and restructure this question. As we've been talking today, I would ask this.

Jillian White:
[13:20] We can do whatever we want, Jim. We can restructure it for next time.

Jim Collison:
[13:23] We've been saying, "What should teams know about someone working with their strengths?" And I'd actually change it to, "How would you onboard someone to a team that has this theme?"

Jillian White:
[13:32] Oh, that's a great question.

Jim Collison:
[13:34] I think that's so, let's ruminate on that. But talk about that. How do you think you'd do that?

Jillian White:
[13:39] Well, I always think, you know, this is something that coaches oftentimes have to think through: Who's on the other side of this coaching experience? I think it's no different when you're working with somebody who's coming onto a team, and you say, Who's on the other side of this partnership or who's on the other side of coming into this team? What do they need and what's going to feel good to them? We know Discipline values structure. So for example, if I am onboarding somebody who's high Discipline on a team, they're going to feel a lot better about their onboarding experience if I lay out what the plan is. Here's your 30-day plan. Here's your 60-day plan. Here's your 90-day plan. If I'm meeting one on one with somebody who has high Discipline, they're going to feel better if I send an agenda for that meeting, because they know what the plan is. They appreciate organization. They appreciate structure. They appreciate a plan. So come with it. That will honor that high Discipline in that person and actually help them feel more welcome and like they can thrive, because they know what the plan is.

Jim Collison:
[14:38] Final thoughts on Discipline, keeping partnerships in mind?

Jillian White:
[14:42] Yeah, I just always encourage people in this section, if you have that strength that's very strong, think about how you use it to help other people around you. So remember what I said — you can be a bit of that efficiency consultant with that high Discipline. Use that in your partnerships. Use that to say, What are we working on together? And what thoughts can I bring? What plans can I bring that help us be more efficient in how we're working and how we get to that outcome? Be the person who says, "I'll be the one who comes up with our plan to get to it." That's going to feel good, and it's going to be a great contribution to your partners.

Jim Collison:
[15:15] Jillian, thanks for spending time with me today and bringing these insights. Appreciate it.

Jillian White:
[15:20] You bet.

Jim Collison:
[15:20] For that, we'll remind everyone to take full advantage of all the resources we do have available inside of Gallup Access. Head out to my.gallup.com. Log in, go to the Resources tab, upper left, and then just choose "Resources," and then put in "Discipline." All the resources that we have for you — podcasts, written content, articles, those kinds of things — available for you. Let the learning continue, and love to have you do that as well. You can also head out to, we've got a lot of information out at gallup.com/cliftonstrengths — I know, super original, but gallup.com/cliftonstrengths. If you're joining us live, stay around for a little bit of a midshow. If you're listening on the podcast, chances are we have another one of these available for you. Just click Next. With that, we'll say, Goodbye, everybody.