How You Learn, Negotiate, Delegate and React to Stress

The way you prefer to learn, negotiate, delegate tasks to others and react to conflict are hidden within your psychology's DNA. This personality assessment provides the key to unlock the way your brain works.

Your personality profile, as measured by the world's most accurate and reliable psychometric assessment, the Core Values Index™, is made up of a particular ratio of four personality types called core value energies. Each of these core value energies has a particular preference and psychological default that governs how you learn, negotiate, delegate and react to conflict and stress.

Take the CVI to get your scores for how much of each of the four core value energies make up your personality's DNA. Then review the sections below to learn how those energies influence the way you prefer to operate in your daily life.

Learning

Builders learn by doing.

Since Builders are all about power and energy, they love getting things done. They prefer to focus on the destination rather than the journey (and getting there quickly), and this greatly affects their learning style.

Builders learn through a hands-on and action-oriented process, unafraid of trial and error. Reading manuals or sitting through long-winded lectures is tedious and tiring to them. Give them something they can get their hands on right away and they'll enthusiastically dive right in. Despite their relative lack of patience, they can enjoy the process as long as it is engaging and filled with challenges.

Merchants learn by talking and listening.

The interaction between people is the mechanism by which Merchants learn most effectively. They thrive on personal connections and this feeds their optimal learning style. Reading manuals, especially in isolation, will try a Merchant's patience almost as fast as it will that of a Builder. Instead, they do best with lots of activity, especially with others.

Merchants form and expand their learning by expressing their thoughts and ideas with other people. Merchants also enjoy learning through storytelling; raw facts and data will bore them.

Innovators learn by observing, making assessments, and solving problems.

Because the lifeblood of an Innovator's existence is to solve problems, this heavily influences their optimal learning style. Innovators are somewhat methodical in their learning approach, preferring to sit quietly and study a problem. An Innovator's biggest fear is being foolish, so they strive to understand a problem thoroughly.

The second aspect of an Innovator's learning style is to brainstorm with others to interactively and thoroughly understand the topic. Like Merchants, they gain value by teaching others and by doing so they can further refine their thinking.

Bankers learn by meticulously gathering data and information.

What makes Bankers thrive is the gathering and sharing of knowledge. This is reflected in their optimal learning style: they gather and analyze facts. Another driver for the Banker is to ensure any actions they take are appropriate, precise, and correct the first time. Trial and error, like a Builder might prefer, is a counterproductive and even anxiety-inducing approach for the Banker.

Because Bankers crave accuracy, their biggest fear is appearing ignorant. They take this thirst for knowledge into their learning style with calm yet methodical tenacity.

Negotiation

Builders are all about power. They want to win, and everyone else must be the loser. They are blunt and forceful. They don't care about the other side's feelings or how they are seen by others. They are uncompromising.

Merchants are the ones that want the win/win outcome so that everyone will be happy. Most Merchants are worried about the other side covering costs, such as when buying a car, so they will concern themselves with the other side's situation. Merchants are the most likely to find compromise. Merchants with secondary Builder energy make great negotiators because they seek compromise but are willing to call "bull$h*t" when they detect they are being lied to or mislead.

Because Merchants are the most intuitive and adept at non-verbal communication, they are able to detect when someone is lying more accurately than any other core value energy.

Innovators negotiate in a complex way. They treat it as an elaborate puzzle to be solved. They seek to understand the intricacies and nuances of both sides of the negotiation but won't necessarily excel at finding the best compromise.

Bankers are the worst negotiators. They want to lay it all out, more of a presentation of the facts, with the assumption you'll come to a just conclusion. They are also the least able to pick up on subtle clues that they are being misled or manipulated.

Delegation

Builders simply want to get things done so they are quick to delegate. It's all about the outcome. Good now is better than perfect tomorrow, and they don't care about building consensus. To the Builder, it's all about the destination and having a pleasant journey is toward the bottom of their list of priorities.

Merchants are natural team-builders so delegating and cooperating is in the very fiber of their being.

Merchants are more likely to get everyone pulling together toward a common goal than any other of the four core value energies. They make great cheerleaders and can delegate the group toward their shared destination in a way that makes everyone enjoy the journey.

Innovators want to be the greatest source of wisdom in the room, so there can be a sense of competition, almost ego, with other Innovators to see whose idea wins out. In the end, though, their altruism motivates them to select the best idea even if it's not their own.

Bankers, the aloof and judgmental members of the group, don't find cooperation or delegation to be in their nature. They aren't opposed to it, but it's certainly not their first instinct. As long as the other people do things by the book and don't improvise, they're okay with it.

Bankers don't like to improvise and don't do well in situations where flexibility is required. They find it stressful. Because of this, they won't expect others to be flexible, either.

Stress!

The opposite of one's source of joy is the source of their greatest stress. Everyone reacts to conflict and stress based on their psychometric hardwiring.

Builders

Builders are all about power and getting things done. If your CVI profile has Builder energy in the primary position, what will make you feel stressed or conflicted the fastest? The opposite of what makes you feel energized and the most alive — feeling powerful — is to feel powerless.

When someone with primary Builder energy within their CVI profile feels powerless, their default response to conflict is to intimidate. Intimidation is your automatic way of regaining your power and eliminating that feeling of powerlessness.

Merchants

Merchants want to feel connected to the group. Their joy is found in getting everyone to work together toward a common goal, to get things moving. Merchants are great at motivating everyone to get things started. This gives them the sense that they are the strongest presence of community love in the room.

If your primary core value energy is Merchant, what will make you feel stressed and conflicted the quickest? Being made to feel unloved or unworthy of love. As soon as the Merchant feels unloved, unworthy of love, or shunned from the group, their default conflict resolution strategy is to manipulate.

Nobody can manipulate others on an emotional level more effectively than a Merchant when in their conflict resolution mode.

Merchants will say things to get others pulling behind them in a concerted counter-effort against the person they think has wronged them. Because Merchants have the strongest level of intuitiveness among all four core value energies, that gives them the super power of cutting others down with the greatest effectiveness.

Innovators

Those with Innovator as their primary core value energy love nothing more than solving problems. Being the greatest source of wisdom in the group thrills them to the deepest part of their being. What is the opposite of being wise?

An Innovator will instantly go into their conflict resolution strategy of interrogation the moment they are made to feel foolish or unwise. If you make an Innovator feel as if their contribution is unwanted or unwise, they will start asking leading questions in an effort to make you realize that you are the unwise one.

Bankers

If you are a person with Banker as your primary core value energy, you will know that being the source of knowledge and information, justly given to those who deserve to receive it, is where you are the happiest. It is a source of pride for you to be the definitive source of data and knowledge on a given subject.

As we've pointed out with the other three core value energies, the opposite of one's source of joy is the source of their greatest stress. In the case of Bankers, the opposite of knowledge and information is ignorance. If you make a Banker feel as if they are ignorant or don't know the answer to something (or at least know where to look it up), their conflict resolution strategy is to aloofly judge you.

Core Values Index™ and CVI™ are trademarks of Taylor Protocols, Inc.