TAIS Test vs. TAIS Theory

Theory of Attentional and Personal Style vs. Test of
Attentional and Interpersonal Style (TAIS)

Robert M. Nideffer, Ph.D.

Numerous investigators have emphasized how important it is for both researchers and applied practitioners in the field of performance psychology to have a sound theoretical base that guides their work (Moran, 1996; Abernethy, 1993; Druckman & Swets, 1988). This is especially true in the cognitive area where Moran maintains that “research on concentration in athletes has been conducted largely in a theoretical vacuum (pg. 235).” The reason often given for the failure to of investigators to have a theoretical bases for their hypotheses is the belief that there is an absence of well developed theories to study cognitive skills like attention, concentration, and information processing in sport (Masters & Lambert, 1989; Boutcher, 1992). I would like to argue that there is a very well developed theoretical framework for examining the relationship between cognitive processes, emotional arousal, and performance. A theory that explains far more about those psychological factors that lead to “choking” on the one hand, and entering the “zone” or “flow” state on the other, than any other theory in psychology. A theory that leads to testable, performance relevant, predictions. That theory, is the Theory of Attentional and Interpersonal Style and was first introduced in 1976 (Nideffer, 1976a). If the theory is indeed better than other performance relevant theories, then why aren’t researchers and practitioners using it, and/or even aware of it? I believe there are three reasons. The first reason has to do with the fact that the theory has not been communicated as clearly as it should have been. Different parts or theoretical constructs have been presented in different articles. Second, the theory has been changing with constructs being clarified and new constructs added in response to on going research. The third reason, and perhaps the most important one is that both researchers and practitioners have failed to separate the theory of attentional and interpersonal style from the test of attentional and interpersonal style. This can be seen most clearing in the following quotes from Moran (1996).

“At first glance, the theory of attention developed by Nideffer (1976a; 1976b) appears to be one of the most comprehensive cognitive models in contemporary sport psychology. In particular, it seems to account for many attentional phenomena (e.g., individual differences in concentration skills) in an elegant, parsimonious and plausible manner.” Moran – Pg. 142
The above quote begins a section on measuring attentional processes in athletes, in Moran’s book on The Psychology of Concentration in Sport Performers. Moran moves from that introduction to a review of research that was designed to assess the validity of The Test of Attentional and Interpersonal Style (TAIS) and draws the following conclusion. Note that the conclusion talks about the validity of the theory, not the inventory.

For more information on TAIS theory and the TAIS inventory, please contact us atinfo@winningmind.com

TAIS Test vs. TAIS Theory

Theory of Attentional and Personal Style vs. Test of
Attentional and Interpersonal Style (TAIS)

Robert M. Nideffer, Ph.D.

Numerous investigators have emphasized how important it is for both researchers and applied practitioners in the field of performance psychology to have a sound theoretical base that guides their work (Moran, 1996; Abernethy, 1993; Druckman & Swets, 1988). This is especially true in the cognitive area where Moran maintains that “research on concentration in athletes has been conducted largely in a theoretical vacuum (pg. 235).” The reason often given for the failure to of investigators to have a theoretical bases for their hypotheses is the belief that there is an absence of well developed theories to study cognitive skills like attention, concentration, and information processing in sport (Masters & Lambert, 1989; Boutcher, 1992). I would like to argue that there is a very well developed theoretical framework for examining the relationship between cognitive processes, emotional arousal, and performance. A theory that explains far more about those psychological factors that lead to “choking” on the one hand, and entering the “zone” or “flow” state on the other, than any other theory in psychology. A theory that leads to testable, performance relevant, predictions. That theory, is the Theory of Attentional and Interpersonal Style and was first introduced in 1976 (Nideffer, 1976a). If the theory is indeed better than other performance relevant theories, then why aren’t researchers and practitioners using it, and/or even aware of it? I believe there are three reasons. The first reason has to do with the fact that the theory has not been communicated as clearly as it should have been. Different parts or theoretical constructs have been presented in different articles. Second, the theory has been changing with constructs being clarified and new constructs added in response to on going research. The third reason, and perhaps the most important one is that both researchers and practitioners have failed to separate the theory of attentional and interpersonal style from the test of attentional and interpersonal style. This can be seen most clearing in the following quotes from Moran (1996).

“At first glance, the theory of attention developed by Nideffer (1976a; 1976b) appears to be one of the most comprehensive cognitive models in contemporary sport psychology. In particular, it seems to account for many attentional phenomena (e.g., individual differences in concentration skills) in an elegant, parsimonious and plausible manner.” Moran – Pg. 142
The above quote begins a section on measuring attentional processes in athletes, in Moran’s book on The Psychology of Concentration in Sport Performers. Moran moves from that introduction to a review of research that was designed to assess the validity of The Test of Attentional and Interpersonal Style (TAIS) and draws the following conclusion. Note that the conclusion talks about the validity of the theory, not the inventory.

For more information on TAIS theory and the TAIS inventory, please contact us atinfo@winningmind.com

TAIS Application in Corporate Settings

Leadership Development and Performance Coaching

Winning Mind Leadership Programs prioritize focus, confidence, commitment and adaptability in high-pressure settings. Our systematic assessment of individual and team attentional and interpersonal characteristics help identify developmental targets. Winning Mind Performance Coaching provides the insight and support necessary to take performance to the next level.

Building High Performance Teams

Team members who know themselves and understand one another have a much better chance of achieving collective success. Successful teams need the right people in the right places and must have the requisite trust and commitment in place in order to get the job done well. Winning Mind Team Programs typically include a comprehensive organizational review, in-depth individual profiling, feedback and team performance program sessions.

Identifying, Selecting and Retaining Effective Performers

Winning Mind helps organizations improve selection, hiring and succession-planning efforts. TAIS results, operational job descriptions, interview information, and performance data are brought together to create a comprehensive picture of “position:job fit.” Mission Profiling™ is a breakthrough process by which optimal, job-specific, performance profiles are generated and then used as benchmarks for comparison. Armed with this information, organizations can make better personnel decisions and take the necessary steps to retain and advance high-performers.

Reality-Based Training

The Winning Mind model for performance under pressure is ideally suited to experiential learning settings. Organizations looking to enhance existing experiential programs or design customized reality-based training should inquire about integration options.

Many powerful training metaphors can be applied to enable senior managers to reach their full potential and re-evaluate their responsibilities for creating rewarding, high performance corporate cultures. One excellent example of this is the “Redline” Program. Designed jointly by Winning Mind and Williams Gerard Productions, the program invites senior executives to convene at a world-class Skip Barber Racing School for first-hand experience with competitive driving techniques in Formula racecars. Throughout the program, driving becomes a metaphor for moving one’s self and one’s company forward. Current habits often must be “unlearned” and replaced by strategies to increase speed without sacrificing quality results. Winning Mind professionals participate in the program by guiding discussions and evaluating TAIS inventories prior to the driving exercises. The data serves as a basis for predicting how the executives will perform on the track and, hence, how they might typically respond to the pressures of fast-paced, competitive business environments.

For more information about TAIS application in corporate settings, please contact us at info@winningmind.com

Interview: TAIS with CIOs

Building high-performance teams: An Interview with Marc Sagal of Winning Mind, LLC

by Mary Ann Fitzharris

Takeaway: Until you’ve taken a good, hard look at the psychological makeup of your staff, you probably won’t be able to maximize the different skills they bring to the table. At least that’s what Marc Sagal thinks, and he’s got some good experience in this area.

Do you need help developing highly productive IT teams? Enter Marc Sagal, who likes to leverage his vast experience in sports and psychology to create successful corporate teams. Sagal believes his skill as a former professional soccer player and coach helps in his job as Managing Partner of Winning Mind, LLC (www.thewinningmind.com). Winning Mind provides consulting services and assessment tools for individuals, companies, and teams to help them perform more effectively under pressure.

Sagal is a graduate of Colorado College and San Diego State University, where he received a master’s in sports psychology. He was a professional athlete, and he holds the highest-level coaching license from the United States Soccer Federation. His training in psychology and his experience as an athlete and coach give him a unique understanding of performance problems facing businesses today. Sagal has coordinated programs for technology companies like SBI.Razorfish, Organic, and Linden Lab. His book, Assessment in Sport Psychology, co-authored with Robert Nideffer, CEO of Enhanced Performance Systems, includes a model that is also used in business assessment.

TR: Do you use Winning Mind’s methodology to work with IT teams?

Sagal: Yes, we do. We work in a variety of different arenas, but recently we’ve been well received in the IT area, because IT folks are really feeling an incredible amount of pressure. Our specialty is helping folks perform when they’re under stress and when things are moving very rapidly.

TR: In order to help them you have to assess them first, is that right?

Sagal: Yes. We usually start with an assessment tool that we’ve developed called TAIS. It stands for The Attentional and Interpersonal Style inventory, and it was developed about 25 years ago by Robert Nideffer. He was working with U.S. Olympic teams, looking at ways to measure concentration and the kinds of critical interpersonal skills that people need to perform when they are under pressure. Although it was developed in the sports world, what we found over the last twenty years is that it has great application in business and military environments, particularly those environments where people are operating under high stress and where the results of mistakes are seen more rapidly.

TR: How do you use it in sports?

Sagal: When we are working with an athlete or team, we will have them complete the assessment. That enables us to get at what we call the “building blocks of performance.” So we can see the pattern of the scores and get a handle on what we believe the critical issues are going to be for that particular athlete. We do that by looking at the profile and comparing what we see as that person’s particular strengths and weaknesses, and then evaluating the performance situation. For example, the characteristics of a successful pitcher in baseball may be very different than for a successful catcher. And we want to see if there is a good match between how that individual has scored and what the demands of the performance situation are. So we’re looking for a fit.

TR: How do you translate this into business?

Sagal: Well, believe it or not, the same set of skills that are important for an athlete are equally important for someone operating in the business environment. The same theory applies, the same principles apply. What we’ve done is translated what the effective skill set is from the athletic world to the business world. So we don’t really have to measure anything differently. All we have to do is apply what we measure and compare that to a different set of optimal skills.

TR: Can you give an example?

Sagal: A pitcher in baseball needs to be extremely focused, doesn’t have to think too much, and basically has to hit a target. You don’t necessarily want that person, from a concentration perspective, to be doing a lot of analyzing or big-picture thinking. In a way, there are some IT professionals that are parallel to the pitcher in what they are asked to do. For instance, if they have to write code or just be one member of a team, you want them focused on the end result of a particular product. Their job really isn’t to analyze, assess, or see the big picture. So their skill set matches may actually be similar. They will need a similar type of concentration as the pitcher I’ve described. This is an oversimplification, but [it works as an] example here.

TR: How about IT managers who may be a lot more like coaches?

Sagal: They have to be able to see the big picture. They have to be interpersonally a little bit more sensitive [as] to how to put a good team together, what the big picture is, and where the organization is trying to go. So that type of concentration skill, the ability to analyze and plan, see the big picture, and multitask, would be a skill set that you might find in a coach and also what you might find in a good IT manager.

TR: How about a CIO who wants to put together good teams for several projects? How would they figure out, using your system, which people go on which teams?

Sagal: It’s certainly one of the things that we have been asked to do before. The first thing that has to happen is that we have to have a handle on the nature of those projects and what the teams are going to need to be made up of in terms of their different skill sets. We can get a handle on that by talking to the CIO, who [might tell us]:

  • Project team A is going to be doing this.
  • I have to have someone who is directing that team as a manager.
  • I have to have a number of individual contributors who are very focused on very specific aspects of the project.

Perhaps even more detail than that, there may be a function of the team that is more creative in nature. So if we can identify the different components of the team, we can then go in and create what we call a mission profile for each of those different parts of the job.

TR: After you identify the needed skill sets, what do you do?

Sagal: We will test the individuals and match what the results of their tests are to what we think are the optimal kinds of characteristics that the members of the team are going to need. We give that information to the CIO, who may [have] to make the decision to put those teams together.

TR: When you say skill sets, are you talking about whether they can program in C++?

Sagal: No, I should clarify that. We’re talking much more about the psychological skill sets.

TR: Can you give some examples?

Sagal: We spend a lot of time evaluating a person’s ability to concentrate, which we can measure in different ways. One would be the ability to see the big picture, to analyze, put all of the pieces together. Another would be the ability to execute, to be far-sighted, and to see projects from A all the way to Z. Another aspect we call “external awareness,” which is the ability to be sensitive to your environment, to be politically savvy, to be able to read a customer, or be sensitive to how other people are reacting to what you’re saying.

We’re also assessing more familiar interpersonal and psychological characteristics, such as interpersonal style, extroversion, introversion, need for control, self-confidence, and the ability to multitask, which is obviously important in the IT world. We also look at how positive or critical you are, how you give feedback to folks, if you are intellectually expressive, or if you sit on ideas that would have been useful to contribute. That’s a short list of the 20 individual characteristics that we’re looking at.

Some of the corporate work that Winning Mind has done includes:

  • Putting together teams with varying skill sets
  • Implementing team-building exercises and innovation programs
  • Identifying employees with professional development needs
  • Providing conflict resolution between departments that have differing psychological types
  • Helping to decide in a merger who should stay and who should go by identifying high-potential individuals
  • Assessing who can work in a high-pressure environment
  • Helping a company move from a conservative culture to a dynamic, innovative one
  • Identifying who would make good team members for a virtual team, one that is geographically separated

TR: Aren’t some of these skills contradictory?

Sagal: Yes. What we’ve found out through our research is that nobody can do it all. Everybody has strengths and weaknesses in those attentional areas. So if we can find a good match between what’s required in the situation and what their psychological skill set is, then we’ve got somebody who’s likely to be effective, because part of our theory is that under pressure you go to your strongest attentional style.

TR: Can a CIO use this test to find the right manager to promote?

Sagal: That’s something that we’re asked to do all of the time. In fact, that’s probably the biggest problem that we see with the high-tech companies. There’s a huge demand for IT managers and leaders, and most of the time those people are being promoted because they were successful as an individual contributor. The psychological skill set to be a good leader or manager isn’t the same as it is to be a good engineer. So what we can do through our instrument and the interviewing and consulting that we do is identify the kinds of engineers, for instance, who have enough qualities that will allow them to make the transition successfully.

TR: If a CIO was thinking about becoming a CEO or pursuing some sort of change like that, might he or she use this assessment to determine whether or not the skills are there?

Sagal: Yeah, absolutely. That’s a great point. The same principle applies, and I think this depends on the role that the CIO is playing in the organization. I think there will be times when a lot of the same qualities will apply for the CEO as for the CIO. But I think there will also be instances where the CIO is much more focused on technology issues and maybe isn’t as focused as the CEO needs to be on much bigger-picture, strategic, company-wide issues. So there may be challenges there, but the kinds of things that we’re looking at will be useful to the CIO [who wants to make] that type of transition.

TR: What is it that makes you come to work everyday? What do you like best about this kind of work?

Sagal: I think that I am in a position to do a great number of different things. My background is in philosophy, psychology, coaching, and professional sports. I’ve always needed to have my finger in a number of different pies, and here I’m in charge of an organization with a great product, and I get a chance to grow this company, manage the resources, and also have a hand in the actual consulting and coaching responsibilities. I get to do a lot of very interesting things, and I work with a lot of companies that are on the cutting edge of what they do, so there’s a learning component to my job that keeps me excited.

This article was originally printed in TechRepublic magazine.

For more information on using TAIS in your business, please contact us atinfo@winningmind.com

Developing High Performance Managers using TAIS

Developing High-Performance Managers

The Problem:

In high-pressure environments, success is more a matter of finely tuned psychological skills than of well developed technical skills. Both are important, but technical ability alone will never cut it. Psychological skills typically develop with time and experience (often defined as maturity).

Putting young and relatively inexperienced performers into high-pressure management roles requires them to perform without the benefit of experience and self-knowledge.

How do you speed up the learning/maturity curve?

The Model:

1. Profile success in a performance environment.
2. Increase self-awareness about performance strengths and weaknesses within that environment.
3. Place in challenging, “stretch” experiences/assignments.
4. Provide on-going coaching, support, and performance debriefing.

Winning Mind speeds up the development/learning process by profiling what it takes to be successful in any high performance environment and benchmarking individual strengths & weaknesses against that profile. We show managers how to play to strengths and improve their ability to:

— Perform more effectively in situations that take them beyond their comfort zone;
— Decrease mistakes made in high pressure situations; and
— Recognize and develop the areas where they need additional management/leadership skills.

Managers are given advanced warning (awareness) about the types of situations that will prove problematic and coached about how to handle them. The same information (plus coaching advice) is presented to internal trainers/mentors, who then apply it to the development process and in performance debriefings with managers.

— Coaches know which developmental targets to emphasize.
— They are given a “heads-up” about what mistakes to look for.
— They receive intervention suggestions to use with each candidate.

The Winning Mind Advantage

— We target the critical factors related to success in high-pressure performance environments.
— We design customized profiles for the specific components of success for each organization.
— We have years of experience working with top performers and coaches in the most highly competitive operating environments in the world.

An Example:

A comfort or willingness to step up and take control of situations or people is a success factor in virtually every management/leadership environment. Winning Mind profiles just how much of this factor is required for success in a particular environment and under what conditions.

New managers are then benchmarked against that profile with several possible outcomes:

1. Manager X has the right stuff for success in your environment. She benefits from understanding and gaining awareness about the types of situations that demand more or less of this trait. She goes into his work knowing that this is a strength and how to play to it.

2. Manager X is not comfortable stepping up and taking control when necessary. His style is more laid-back and hands-off. This information (insight) becomes a target area for development. Training is provided to advance requisite management skill. The manager then goes into work on the lookout for situations where this vulnerability is most probable and is now ready to respond accordingly.

3. Manager X shows a vulnerability because he has too much of a good thing. He is likely to take control in virtually every situation, even when not appropriate. He benefits from the awareness that this strength is likely to become a weakness and is provided with coaching that makes him more likely to step back and turn control over to others. He goes into work recognizing the relevant “danger signs,” understanding that he must guard against this tendency to over-control and micromanage.

For more information about developing high performance managers using TAIS, please contact us at info@winningmind.com

World Champions and Olympic Medal Winners

Building A Psychological Profile of Olympic Medalists and World Champions

Robert M. Nideffer, Ph.D., Jeffrey Bond, Alberto Cei, and Umberto Manili

Kevin Curran a first time finalist at Wimbledon a few years ago was being interviewed by a television commentator. The commentator asked Curran why it had taken someone with his talent, so many years to reach the final of a grand slam. He also wanted to know if this was the “break through” that would lead to greater things in the future. In a very honest and open way Curran responded by saying “No, it wasn’t a break through.” He went on to say that he had a lot of talent and once in a while would hold things together enough to make a final and/or win a tournament, but he didn’t have the kind of drive and dedication that consistent winners have.

Those of us who have worked with world class athletes would intuitively agree with Curran’s assessment of those champions who are consistent winners. There is something different about them and it isn’t their physical talent. In fact, we often feel it’s the opposite, consistent winners have a mental toughness that in many athletes seems to compensate for a relative lack of physical talent.

In spite of Kevin Curran’s comments and our intuition there has been little hard evidence to show that there are indeed important psychological differences between world class athletes who win once, and those that win repeatedly. There are probably several reasons for this. First, we may have been measuring the wrong things. Second, there may not be enough variability in the athletes scores when we are looking at elite level performers. Finally, it is difficult to get a large enough number of subjects to obtain reliable results.

Purpose

The purpose of the present study was to determine the extent to which those concentration and interpersonal skills measured by The Attentional and Interpersonal Style (TAIS) Inventory, could differentiate between world champion athletes based on the number of medals or world championships they had won (Nideffer, 1976).

Subjects

We searched a TAIS data base of approximately 10,000 elite level athletes, and were able to identify 239 individuals who had won at least one Olympic Medal or world championship. These two hundred and thirty nine athletes were competing in 23 different sports. There were 171 males and 68 females. Combined, these individuals had won 113 Olympic Gold Medals, 44 Olympic Silver Medals, 73 Olympic Bronze Medals and 170 World Championships.

For purposes of this study, the subjects were divided into two groups. A multiple medal winners group (N=87) with a mean age of 26.5, that consisted of 69 males and 18 females. A single medal winners group (N=152) with mean age of 23.5, consisting of 102 males and 50 females.

TAIS

The Attentional and Interpersonal Style (TAIS) inventory is a 144 item questionnaire that measures eighteen different, performance relevant characteristics. A table listing the attentional and interpersonal characteristics measured by TAIS is appended to this paper. For the past fifteen years, TAIS has been administered to elite level athletes at Olympic training centers around the world. The purpose for administering the inventory at these centers, is use it to educate athletes about their concentration strengths and weaknesses. Information from the inventory is then used by the athletes, coaches, and sport psychologists, to develop athlete specific performance enhancement programs. This fact is important, because it minimizes defensiveness on the part of athletes and encourages very open and honest responses to the inventory.

Data Analyses

Subjects score on the various TAIS scales were converted to percentiles comparing them to a much broader population of elite athletes (Individuals who had competed at state, national, and/or international levels). The characteristics of this group of elite athletes have been described elsewhere (Nideffer, et. al., 2000).

Subject’s scores on TAIS scales were clustered into five groups, those measuring: 1) Concentration Skills; 2) Concentration Errors; 3) Impulsivity and speed of decision making; 4) Leadership; 5) People Orientation, and; 6) Communication Style. Analysis of variance procedures were then used to make comparisons between the two groups on the different scale clusters.

The first analysis was a 2 (groups) by 3 (concentration skills) analysis of variance. Results of this analysis are presented in Table 1, and in Figure 1.

Table 1

Effect df F p-level
Groups (Single vs. Multiple) 1,237 .0460 .8300
Concentration Skills 2,474 8.4300 .0002
Groups x Concentration 2,474 7.3000 .0007

Figure 1

A Newman Keuls analysis of the main effect for concentration skills revealed that for these athletes, the ability to focus concentration is significantly more developed than either environmental awareness (p=.0001) or analytical ability (p=.003). The groups by concentration skills interaction shows that multiple winners are more focused than they are aware (p=.00006), or analytical (p=.00006), and more focused than single medal winners (p=01). For single medal winners there were no significant differences between the three types of concentration. Interestingly, single medal winners were significantly more analytical than multiple medal winners (p=.05).

The second analysis was a 2 (groups) by 3 (concentration errors) analysis of variance. Results of this analysis are presented in Table 2, and in Figure 2.

Table 2

Effect df F p-level
Groups (Single vs. Multiple) 1,237 .0390 .8426
Concentration Errors 2,474 5.9900 .0020
Groups x Errors 2,474 7.6100 .0005

Figure 2

A Newman Kuels analysis of the main effect for errors revealed that these athletes were significantly more likely to make mistakes because they were overly focused and under-inclusive than they were because they became externally distracted (p=.03) or internally overloaded (p=.001). The groups by errors interaction shown in Figure 2, suggests this finding is due largely to the scores of the multiple medal winners.

An analysis of the groups by errors interaction revealed that there were no differences in terms of the types of errors that single medal winners would make. When compared to multiple medal winners, single medal winners were much more likely to make errors due to over analyzing and becoming overloaded (p=.02). Multiple medal winners on the other hand were much more likely than single medal winners to make errors because they became excessively narrow or under-inclusive in their focus (p=.03).

The third analysis was a 2 (groups) by 2 (impulsivity and speed of decisions) analysis of variance. Results of this analysis are presented in Table 3, and in Figure 2.

Table 3

Effect df F p-level
Groups (Single vs. Multiple) 1,237 .5760 .4480
Concentration Errors 2,237 6.0100 .0100
Groups x Errors 1,237 4.7400 .0300

Figure 3

Impulsiveness in this analysis is measured by the behavior control scale on TAIS. The higher an individual scores on the behavior control scale, the more likely he or she is to behave in an impulsive way, and/or to lose control over anger. As you can see, both groups score much lower on this scale than the “average” elite level athlete.

Cautiousness in this analysis is measured by the obsessiveness scale on TAIS which is really a measure of speed of decision making. The higher an individual scores on the cautiousness or speed of decision making scale, the more he or she is concerned about avoiding mistakes. Hence, the more likely the person is to emphasize accuracy over speed when making decisions and/or performing.

The main effect for groups indicated that these athletes were more cautious and careful than they were impulsive (p=.01). A Newman Kuels analysis of the groups by decision making interaction indicated that multiple medal winners were more cautious and more concerned about avoiding mistakes than single medal winners (p=.005).

The fourth analysis was a 2 (groups) by 3 (leadership) analysis of variance. Results of this analysis are presented in Table 4.

Table 4

Effect df F p-level
Groups (Single vs. Multiple) 1,237 .0010 .9670
Leadership (CON, SES, P/O) 2,474 2.8800 .0500
Groups x Leadership 2,474 .2280 .2280

The three TAIS scales that make up the leadership group include the scales measuring need for control (CON), self-confidence/self-esteem (SES), and competitiveness (P/O). There were no significant differences between the two groups on any of these measures. A Newman Kuels analysis of the main effect for leadership revealed that these athletes scored significantly higher (p=.01) on the competitiveness scale (65%), than they did on the control scale (60%). The difference between scores on the control scale and scores on the self-esteem scale (63%) approached, but did not reach significance (p=.09).

The fifth analysis was a 2 (groups) by 2 (people orientation) analysis of variance. Results of this analysis are presented in Table 5, and Figure 4.

Table 5

Effect df F p-level
Groups (Single vs. Multiple) 1,237 .9430 .33200
People Orientation (EXT, INT) 1,237 15.8800 .00008
Groups x People 1,237 5.8600 .01000

Figure 4

The main effect for people orientation revealed that these athletes were significantly more introverted than extroverted (p=.00008). A Newman Kuels analysis of the groups by people orientation interaction revealed that multiple medal winners were more introverted than they were extroverted (p=.00004), and less extroverted than single medal winners (p=.02).

The sixth and final analysis was a 2 (groups) by 3 (communication styles) analysis of variance. Results of this analysis are presented in Table 6.

Table 6

Effect df F p-level
Groups (Single vs. Multiple) 1,237 .0240 .8750
Communication Style 2,474 2.3600 .0900
Groups x Communication Style 2,474 .7740 .4610

Communication style in this analysis is measure by three scales. These include the intellectual expressiveness scale (IEX), the scale measuring expression of anger and criticism (NAE), and the scale measuring the expression of support and affection (PAE). As you can see from Table 6, neither the main effects nor the interaction reached significance. In comparison to the elite level normative population, the average scores on the communication style scales for the 239 athletes in this study were 56% on IEX, 49% on NAE, and 54% on PAE.

Discussion

Results of this study provide strong support for the belief that there are significant psychological differences between those Olympic medalists and world champions who are consistent winners, and those who win only once. We feel strongly that the entire pattern of results shows both the skill sets champions need, and highlights the sacrifices they have to make to be consistent winners.

Looking first at the results of the attentional analysis, as we would have expected multiple medal winners were more highly focused that single medal winners. Their attention to detail and willingness to engage in the same behaviors again and again (NAR), combined with their concern about avoiding errors and perfecting their skills (OBS) undoubted contribute to their repeated success and to their ability to perform under highly competitive conditions.

Looking at the types of mistakes these two groups make we can see that there is a “down side” to being as focused and dedicated as multiple medal winners are. When they make mistakes it’s because they become too focused, failing to make adjustments (RED). It is important to note that higher scores on the under-inclusion (RED scale will occur when an athlete recognizes that his or her personal commitment to sport is causing poor performance in other areas (e.g., the failure to respond to the needs of a significant other). It may be that some of the elevation we are seeing in this scale is a reflection of the social and interpersonal sacrifices that world class athletes have to make. This would be consistent with some of the other findings.

Nideffer et. al. (2000), reported that introversion increased and extroversion decreased with increasing age for elite level athletes. That finding suggested that continuing success at an elite level requires athletes to spend more time alone, and/or to limit their social activities. Dan O’Brian, the Olympic gold medalist in the decathlon made the following statement at the 1999 meeting of the Association for the Advancement of Applied Sport Psychology (AAASP) in Banff: “I no longer have friends who aren’t as committed to my training as I am and/or who don’t believe I will win the gold medal again.” The finding that multiple medal winners are more introverted and less extroverted than single medal winners adds additional evidence to the need for athletes to be willing to make significant sacrifices to be successful.

The fact that multiple medal winners make fewer mistakes than single medal winners because of over analyzing, or over thinking is important. It’s conceivable that their ability to focus helps them shut off some of the analysis that goes on for others. It’s also conceivable that they are simply less analytical, and therefore less likely to become overloaded by their own thoughts. This interpretation would be consistent with the fact that multiple medal winners scored significantly lower on the TAIS scale measuring analytical thinking (BIT), than single medal winners.

In summary, our results indicate that there is such a thing as a world champions profile. When we compare world champions, both single and multiple medal winners (and especially multiple medal winners) to other elite level athletes and to the general population. They are much more capable of narrowing their focus of concentration to attend to details and to develop and perfect their skills and abilities. They are less likely to make mistakes of all types, but are especially those mistakes due to external and/or internal distractions.

World champions are more willing to take responsibility and assume a leadership role (CON), more confident (SES), and more physically competitive (P/O). Elite athletes as a group, when compared to the general population tend to be somewhat more extroverted and slightly less introverted. The higher the level of performance of the elite athlete, however, the smaller these differences become. When world champions are compared to other elite athletes, they tend to be more introverted and less extroverted.

From a developmental perspective, these findings are important. There are a great many extremely talented athletes who have difficulty staying focused, either because they are overly analytical, or because they are too socially oriented, failing to make some of the sacrifices necessary to fully capitalize on their physical talents. It is conceivable that the early identification of potential problems could be used to help athletes either develop their own skills, and/or to organize their competitive environments so that they help them stay focused and committed.

For more information on using TAIS in your business, please contact us atinfo@winningmind.com

Measuring the Building Blocks of Performance

Measuring the Building Blocks of Performance

Robert M. Nideffer, Ph.D.

Once an individual has developed the knowledge base and technical skills required to be successful in a highly competitive job or sport, what is it that determines success or failure? The answer is simple, it’s the ability to stay focused, to concentrate on task relevant cues. Nothing is more basic to performance, or more critical to success, than the ability to concentrate. The Attentional and Interpersonal Style (TAIS) inventory is a tool that measures basic concentration skills.

To be successful, people need to be able to shift their focus of concentration along two intersecting dimensions, width, and direction. When they can make those shifts in response to the changing demands of performance situations, they can “do it all.” Figure 1 shows the four basic concentration styles people need to be able to shift between.

A broad external focus of concentration is the style used for awareness and sensitivity to surroundings. A master of the martial arts needs this focus to be ready to respond to an attack from any direction. A good salesperson uses this focus to be sensitive to a customers reactions.

A broad internal focus of concentration is used to strategize and to creatively problem solve. A coach uses it to make adjustments in a game, a manager uses it to develop strategic goals and objectives for his division or for the company.

A narrow internal focus of concentration is used to create a logical set of systems and/or procedures. A diver uses this style of concentration to mentally rehearse his performance. Mangers use it to create a set of rules or steps that lead to the accomplishment of a production goal or corporate objective.

A narrow external focus of concentration is used to execute, to get the job done. This is the type of concentration used to catch or hit a ball in sport. It’s the kind of concentration a production line worker uses to drill a hole, or a writer uses to type a letter.

TAIS Measures A Person’s Concentration Preferences

Although everyone is capable of developing the four different styles of concentration shown in Figure 1, people’s scores on TAIS indicate we each have preferred or more highly developed focus. Typically, these preferred styles of attending are associated with both our genetic makeup and our educational and occupational backgrounds. Most CEO’s for example, are strategic or “big picture” thinkers. Scores on TAIS indicate that for CEO’s and other top level executives, it’s a broad internal focus of concentration that is most highly developed. In contrast, it is the ability to narrow one’s focus to a single task or goal that is more developed in engineers and other highly skilled technically oriented individuals, including most world record.

Having a dominant or preferred style does not mean you can’t shift your focus. Under conditions of optimal emotional arousal, most people perform effectively, and have no problems shifting between the four different styles of concentration when required to do so. When emotional arousal drops too low or goes to high, however, individuals fail to make adjustments in their focus of concentration, becoming dominated by their preferred style, and performance errors occur. Figure 2 shows the different types of concentration errors people make.

TAIS Allows Us to Predict A Person’s Concentration Errors

When arousal levels drop too low, people’s minds begin to wander. Those who are dominated by a broad-external focus of concentration become distracted by things going on in their environment. Those dominated by a broad-internal focus of concentration have a tendency to become overloaded and distracted by their own thoughts.

The sales person who’s strength is his external awareness, but isn’t really into the sale, pays more attention to people walking by than to the client, and because of that loses the sale. The master of the martial arts relaxes to much and allows himself to becomes distracted by one of his opponents losing his awareness of the attackers. The coach or manager known for his strategic skills and abilities over analyzes and becomes too creative in his thinking. Instead of providing a clear set of instructions for others to follow, he overloads them with information and paralyzes them.

If the mistakes individuals make when they become a little too relaxed occur within an important situation, those mistakes cause an immediate increase in the individual’s level of emotional arousal. That increase in arousal causes biochemical changes which narrow the focus of concentration. Narrowing is a natural part of the bodies “fight or flight” response. The individual uses the narrow focus to immediately assess the situation to determine how much damage has been done.

Whether a person will recover and re-focus on the task, depends upon his level of self-confidence following the assessment. When confident, arousal settles into the optimal range. The person is able to mentally let the mistake go and re-focus concentration on accomplishing the task. When confidence is lacking, however, arousal levels increase even more and the person begins to develop feelings of anger and frustration, or of anxiety and doubt.

TAIS scores allow us to predict who is more likely to become bored and distracted by things going on in the environment, and who is more likely to become distracted and over loaded by their own thoughts. TAIS scores also allow us to predict who will lose control over feelings of frustration and anger and who will lose control over feelings of anxiety and self-doubt.

TAIS Allows Us To Predict Performance Under Pressure

Whether or not a person will react to mistakes by becoming frustrated and angry or by becoming worried and anxious depends on how they score on TAIS scales measuring the need for control, competitiveness, level of self-esteem, and speed of decision making. Individuals who have higher levels of self-esteem, are more competitive, have a greater desire to be in control, and make decisions more quickly than the average person react to mistakes with anger and frustration. Their focus of concentration narrows and they begin to try and force the issue. Whether they can use the anger successfully depends in large part on the situation. Often, they cannot.

The tennis player shown in Figure 2 tightens up and tries to hit the serve harder than she is capable of. She ducks her head, rushes her swing and hits the ball into the net. A salesperson becomes too intense and is perceived as too aggressive by the client, pushing too hard, and not listening. The narrow external focus keeps both the tennis player and the salesperson from monitoring their own behavior and from making the adjustments they need to make to be successful.

Individuals who make decisions more slowly, and are below average in competitiveness, the need for control, and level of self-esteem, react to pressure and mistakes with worry and self-doubt. When their concentration narrows it becomes focused internally, on negative thoughts and feelings. The diver shown in Figure 2 begins thinking about possible mistakes instead of systematically rehearsing performance. Managers with this pattern of scores on TAIS start to worry about mistakes or about how they are being perceived by others. An internal focus keeps them from being aware of critical things going on around them and interferes with timely decisions.

Whether the emotional reaction is one of anger and frustration, or one of worry and doubt, the narrowing of attention, and the break down in shifting from an external focus to an internal one, or vice versa, results in decisions being made with only half of the relevant data being considered. Just how destructive that breakdown in concentration will be depends upon the complexity of the task (how much information is missed), and on how important the situation is. Was it match point at Wimbledon or just a recreational tennis match? Did the manager’s worry keep him from hearing the same old complaint he’s already heard a dozen times, or did it keep him from reacting quickly enough to a major problem on a production line?

TAIS Allows Us To Anticipate Problem Areas

Scores on TAIS scales can also be used to identify the performance conditions most likely to lead to success or failure for a person.

How high or low a person scores on any of the attentional and interpersonal building blocks measured by TAIS provides an indication of the individual’s level of comfort and confidence, as well as their behavioral flexibility, in performance situations requiring the behavior.

A manager with a very high need for control, for example, will find it difficult to give up control and to effectively delegate when he is under pressure. It is more stressful to give up control than it is to try and do everyone else’s job. Contrast this with the behavior of a manager who scores much lower on the TAIS scale measuring need for control.

A low scoring manager will be stressed when pressure forces him to become more authoritative and less democratic in his management style. Under these conditions he is likely to fail because he doesn’t confront issues quickly enough and fails to provide needed structure.

This same logic applies to the other interpersonal characteristics measured by TAIS. People who make decisions quickly are stressed when they have to wait. People who are introverted are more likely to become stressed when they have to initiate contact with others. Individuals who are highly verbal are stressed in situations where they have to remain silent.

All TAIS Scales Are Directly Related to Performance

What makes TAIS so useful is the fact that the concentration skills and interpersonal abilities the inventory measures have an obvious and very direct link to virtually all performance situations. It is this, combined with the fact preferred concentration and interpersonal styles become very trait like under pressure, that makes TAIS a valuable tool when working with individuals who must perform at very high levels and those who must perform under a lot of pressure.

The fact that each of the characteristics measured by TAIS has some relevance to almost every performance situation makes it possible to develop mission or performance specific profiles. These profiles can be created statistically by testing a group of high performers within a particular area and then using their means scores to graph a profile. The profiles can also be created by identifying “exemplar” performers or models, and using their scores on TAIS as a metric. Finally, mission profiles can be developed conceptually, by using the input of experts to behaviorally define the performance requirements in terms of scores on TAIS.

Mission or Job Specific TAIS Profiles

The ability to create mission or job specific profiles is critical because the concentration skills and interpersonal abilities required by different jobs can’t be adequately captured by comparing an individual’s scores on TAIS to those of some normative population. The keys to success for two individuals with the same job title, even within the same organization, can be dramatically different. The organizational climate, the behaviors and attitudes of subordinates, peers, and superiors all help to determine the concentration and interpersonal skills required for success in a given job. A normative group, who’s job is similar to that of an applicant, may provide a general template that can be used as a starting point for developing a mission or job specific profile, but that’s all it does.

Obviously, the development of job or mission specific profiles requires considerable knowledge about the organization and about the people that the person being considered, will interact with. When organizations make good selection decisions, it is because the people making those decisions are able to use the knowledge they have about others in the organization, in addition to the knowledge they have about the individual, to help them in the decision making process. In effect, they create mission or job specific profiles in their head. TAIS, more than any other instrument can help make this process more objective, and more reliable.

TAIS differs from other instruments in two distinct ways. 1) The characteristics measured have direct relevance to performance and are much more easily translated into job specific behaviors. 2) There is a broad enough range of performance relevant characteristics measured to allow for subtle but critical differentiations between mission or job profiles.

Using TAIS to develop job specific profiles forces those who are hiring, to behaviorally define the characteristics they believe are critical to success. When individual’s profiles don’t match the ideal, it leads to very specific, and testable predictions, about the kinds of problems that are likely to occur. Using other sources of information (e.g., the interview process and past history) to examine the accuracy of those predictions greatly enhances the likelihood of hiring the right person.

Comparing an individual’s TAIS profile to the mission profile also leads to an identification of those specific behaviors that need to be modified and/or developed to enhance performance and/or to raise it to acceptable levels. It is this that makes TAIS such a valuable tool for training and for performance enhancement.

Summary and Conclusions

There are certain concentration skills and interpersonal characteristics that are important contributors to performance in almost every situation. A convenient way to think of these characteristics is as the “building blocks of performance.” The Attentional and Interpersonal Style (TAIS) inventory, measures these building blocks of performance.

As a result of biological factors, genetics, and learning experiences, some of the building blocks measured by TAIS become more highly developed or trait like than others. Each of us develops a slightly different pattern of scores. Those characteristics in us, that are more highly developed, become more trait like when our emotional arousal level gets outside the optimal range. With increasing arousal, we lose our ability to adapt our some of our trait like behaviors to changes in the performance situation. We become controlled by our dominant characteristics.

There is no perfect, or ideal pattern of scores on TAIS. What ever the pattern of scores, that pattern will contribute to success in some situations, and lead to failure in others. The challenge we all face is to:

Select performance arenas that play to our strengths or dominant patterns.

Enhance performance by gaining greater control over emotions and our focus of concentration to keep our more dominant building blocks from controlling us. That is what Attention Control Training (ACT) is all about.

Team build, by establishing relationships with people we trust, people who have characteristics that are complimentary to our own.

TAIS, more than any other inventory available today, provides the information needed for selection, performance enhancement, and for team building, in situations where people must perform at extremely high levels, and/or when individuals are under a great deal of pressure to perform.

For more information on using TAIS in your business, please contact us atinfo@winningmind.com

Executive Selection and Screening using TAIS

3 Factors Define Success on the Job

Success or failure on the job is determined by three factors:

1.Skills and Abilities

2.Motivation and Desire

3.Goodness of Fit Between Job Demands and Employee Psychological Characteristics

Most employee selection programs focus on required skills and motivation (and do a good job evaluating these factors). However, many job failures cannot be traced back to skill deficits or problems with motivation. More often than not, employees fail because their psychological strengths and weaknesses are not well matched to the demands of the performance environment.

Additionally, the highly competitive nature of today’s business environment places increased emphasis on an employee’s ability to perform effectively under pressure. How well someone holds it together under pressure is entirely a function of psychological factors.

TAIS Measures “The Right Stuff”

The Attentional & Interpersonal Style (TAIS) Inventory accurately assesses the psychological components critical to effective performance. The origins of TAIS are in the world of competitive athletics, and for over 30 years, TAIS has been used to determine who has the psychological “Right Stuff” to compete at the elite level of sports. TAIS reliably measures whether or not a person can stay focused and keep their emotions under control, which are the core elements of performing well under high-pressure conditions.

Mission Profiling Assesses Goodness of Fit

Winning Mind has helped pioneer a process of benchmarking employee strengths and weaknesses against the performance demands of the job. This Mission Profiling technology begins with the development of a comprehensive profile of the unique demands of a particular job. Winning Mind has the expertise and data necessary to build a profile that accurately reflects the critical success factors in any performance environment. Our years of experience working with elite performers in business, sports, and the military means we know what it takes to succeed under pressure.

Mission Profiling adds tremendous value to the hiring process by providing an indication of a candidate’s ability to:

•Deal with the pressures of the job

•Work well with a specific team

•Perform up to potential

•React effectively to the current management style

•Adjust to the organizational culture

For more information on using TAIS for executive selection, please contact us atinfo@winningmind.com

Interview: TAIS with CIOs

Building high-performance teams: An Interview with Marc Sagal of Winning Mind, LLC

by Mary Ann Fitzharris

Takeaway: Until you’ve taken a good, hard look at the psychological makeup of your staff, you probably won’t be able to maximize the different skills they bring to the table. At least that’s what Marc Sagal thinks, and he’s got some good experience in this area.

Do you need help developing highly productive IT teams? Enter Marc Sagal, who likes to leverage his vast experience in sports and psychology to create successful corporate teams. Sagal believes his skill as a former professional soccer player and coach helps in his job as Managing Partner of Winning Mind, LLC (www.thewinningmind.com). Winning Mind provides consulting services and assessment tools for individuals, companies, and teams to help them perform more effectively under pressure.

Sagal is a graduate of Colorado College and San Diego State University, where he received a master’s in sports psychology. He was a professional athlete, and he holds the highest-level coaching license from the United States Soccer Federation. His training in psychology and his experience as an athlete and coach give him a unique understanding of performance problems facing businesses today. Sagal has coordinated programs for technology companies like SBI.Razorfish, Organic, and Linden Lab. His book, Assessment in Sport Psychology, co-authored with Robert Nideffer, CEO of Enhanced Performance Systems, includes a model that is also used in business assessment.

TR: Do you use Winning Mind’s methodology to work with IT teams?

Sagal: Yes, we do. We work in a variety of different arenas, but recently we’ve been well received in the IT area, because IT folks are really feeling an incredible amount of pressure. Our specialty is helping folks perform when they’re under stress and when things are moving very rapidly.

TR: In order to help them you have to assess them first, is that right?

Sagal: Yes. We usually start with an assessment tool that we’ve developed called TAIS. It stands for The Attentional and Interpersonal Style inventory, and it was developed about 25 years ago by Robert Nideffer. He was working with U.S. Olympic teams, looking at ways to measure concentration and the kinds of critical interpersonal skills that people need to perform when they are under pressure. Although it was developed in the sports world, what we found over the last twenty years is that it has great application in business and military environments, particularly those environments where people are operating under high stress and where the results of mistakes are seen more rapidly.

TR: How do you use it in sports?

Sagal: When we are working with an athlete or team, we will have them complete the assessment. That enables us to get at what we call the “building blocks of performance.” So we can see the pattern of the scores and get a handle on what we believe the critical issues are going to be for that particular athlete. We do that by looking at the profile and comparing what we see as that person’s particular strengths and weaknesses, and then evaluating the performance situation. For example, the characteristics of a successful pitcher in baseball may be very different than for a successful catcher. And we want to see if there is a good match between how that individual has scored and what the demands of the performance situation are. So we’re looking for a fit.

TR: How do you translate this into business?

Sagal: Well, believe it or not, the same set of skills that are important for an athlete are equally important for someone operating in the business environment. The same theory applies, the same principles apply. What we’ve done is translated what the effective skill set is from the athletic world to the business world. So we don’t really have to measure anything differently. All we have to do is apply what we measure and compare that to a different set of optimal skills.

TR: Can you give an example?

Sagal: A pitcher in baseball needs to be extremely focused, doesn’t have to think too much, and basically has to hit a target. You don’t necessarily want that person, from a concentration perspective, to be doing a lot of analyzing or big-picture thinking. In a way, there are some IT professionals that are parallel to the pitcher in what they are asked to do. For instance, if they have to write code or just be one member of a team, you want them focused on the end result of a particular product. Their job really isn’t to analyze, assess, or see the big picture. So their skill set matches may actually be similar. They will need a similar type of concentration as the pitcher I’ve described. This is an oversimplification, but [it works as an] example here.

TR: How about IT managers who may be a lot more like coaches?

Sagal: They have to be able to see the big picture. They have to be interpersonally a little bit more sensitive [as] to how to put a good team together, what the big picture is, and where the organization is trying to go. So that type of concentration skill, the ability to analyze and plan, see the big picture, and multitask, would be a skill set that you might find in a coach and also what you might find in a good IT manager.

TR: How about a CIO who wants to put together good teams for several projects? How would they figure out, using your system, which people go on which teams?

Sagal: It’s certainly one of the things that we have been asked to do before. The first thing that has to happen is that we have to have a handle on the nature of those projects and what the teams are going to need to be made up of in terms of their different skill sets. We can get a handle on that by talking to the CIO, who [might tell us]:

  • Project team A is going to be doing this.
  • I have to have someone who is directing that team as a manager.
  • I have to have a number of individual contributors who are very focused on very specific aspects of the project.

Perhaps even more detail than that, there may be a function of the team that is more creative in nature. So if we can identify the different components of the team, we can then go in and create what we call a mission profile for each of those different parts of the job.

TR: After you identify the needed skill sets, what do you do?

Sagal: We will test the individuals and match what the results of their tests are to what we think are the optimal kinds of characteristics that the members of the team are going to need. We give that information to the CIO, who may [have] to make the decision to put those teams together.

TR: When you say skill sets, are you talking about whether they can program in C++?

Sagal: No, I should clarify that. We’re talking much more about the psychological skill sets.

TR: Can you give some examples?

Sagal: We spend a lot of time evaluating a person’s ability to concentrate, which we can measure in different ways. One would be the ability to see the big picture, to analyze, put all of the pieces together. Another would be the ability to execute, to be far-sighted, and to see projects from A all the way to Z. Another aspect we call “external awareness,” which is the ability to be sensitive to your environment, to be politically savvy, to be able to read a customer, or be sensitive to how other people are reacting to what you’re saying.

We’re also assessing more familiar interpersonal and psychological characteristics, such as interpersonal style, extroversion, introversion, need for control, self-confidence, and the ability to multitask, which is obviously important in the IT world. We also look at how positive or critical you are, how you give feedback to folks, if you are intellectually expressive, or if you sit on ideas that would have been useful to contribute. That’s a short list of the 20 individual characteristics that we’re looking at.

Some of the corporate work that Winning Mind has done includes:

  • Putting together teams with varying skill sets
  • Implementing team-building exercises and innovation programs
  • Identifying employees with professional development needs
  • Providing conflict resolution between departments that have differing psychological types
  • Helping to decide in a merger who should stay and who should go by identifying high-potential individuals
  • Assessing who can work in a high-pressure environment
  • Helping a company move from a conservative culture to a dynamic, innovative one
  • Identifying who would make good team members for a virtual team, one that is geographically separated

TR: Aren’t some of these skills contradictory?

Sagal: Yes. What we’ve found out through our research is that nobody can do it all. Everybody has strengths and weaknesses in those attentional areas. So if we can find a good match between what’s required in the situation and what their psychological skill set is, then we’ve got somebody who’s likely to be effective, because part of our theory is that under pressure you go to your strongest attentional style.

TR: Can a CIO use this test to find the right manager to promote?

Sagal: That’s something that we’re asked to do all of the time. In fact, that’s probably the biggest problem that we see with the high-tech companies. There’s a huge demand for IT managers and leaders, and most of the time those people are being promoted because they were successful as an individual contributor. The psychological skill set to be a good leader or manager isn’t the same as it is to be a good engineer. So what we can do through our instrument and the interviewing and consulting that we do is identify the kinds of engineers, for instance, who have enough qualities that will allow them to make the transition successfully.

TR: If a CIO was thinking about becoming a CEO or pursuing some sort of change like that, might he or she use this assessment to determine whether or not the skills are there?

Sagal: Yeah, absolutely. That’s a great point. The same principle applies, and I think this depends on the role that the CIO is playing in the organization. I think there will be times when a lot of the same qualities will apply for the CEO as for the CIO. But I think there will also be instances where the CIO is much more focused on technology issues and maybe isn’t as focused as the CEO needs to be on much bigger-picture, strategic, company-wide issues. So there may be challenges there, but the kinds of things that we’re looking at will be useful to the CIO [who wants to make] that type of transition.

TR: What is it that makes you come to work everyday? What do you like best about this kind of work?

Sagal: I think that I am in a position to do a great number of different things. My background is in philosophy, psychology, coaching, and professional sports. I’ve always needed to have my finger in a number of different pies, and here I’m in charge of an organization with a great product, and I get a chance to grow this company, manage the resources, and also have a hand in the actual consulting and coaching responsibilities. I get to do a lot of very interesting things, and I work with a lot of companies that are on the cutting edge of what they do, so there’s a learning component to my job that keeps me excited.

This article was originally printed in TechRepublic magazine.

For more information on using TAIS in your business, please contact us atinfo@winningmind.com

Measuring the Building Blocks of Performance

Measuring the Building Blocks of Performance

Robert M. Nideffer, Ph.D.

Once an individual has developed the knowledge base and technical skills required to be successful in a highly competitive job or sport, what is it that determines success or failure? The answer is simple, it’s the ability to stay focused, to concentrate on task relevant cues. Nothing is more basic to performance, or more critical to success, than the ability to concentrate. The Attentional and Interpersonal Style (TAIS) inventory is a tool that measures basic concentration skills.

To be successful, people need to be able to shift their focus of concentration along two intersecting dimensions, width, and direction. When they can make those shifts in response to the changing demands of performance situations, they can “do it all.” Figure 1 shows the four basic concentration styles people need to be able to shift between.

A broad external focus of concentration is the style used for awareness and sensitivity to surroundings. A master of the martial arts needs this focus to be ready to respond to an attack from any direction. A good salesperson uses this focus to be sensitive to a customers reactions.

A broad internal focus of concentration is used to strategize and to creatively problem solve. A coach uses it to make adjustments in a game, a manager uses it to develop strategic goals and objectives for his division or for the company.

A narrow internal focus of concentration is used to create a logical set of systems and/or procedures. A diver uses this style of concentration to mentally rehearse his performance. Mangers use it to create a set of rules or steps that lead to the accomplishment of a production goal or corporate objective.

A narrow external focus of concentration is used to execute, to get the job done. This is the type of concentration used to catch or hit a ball in sport. It’s the kind of concentration a production line worker uses to drill a hole, or a writer uses to type a letter.

TAIS Measures A Person’s Concentration Preferences

Although everyone is capable of developing the four different styles of concentration shown in Figure 1, people’s scores on TAIS indicate we each have preferred or more highly developed focus. Typically, these preferred styles of attending are associated with both our genetic makeup and our educational and occupational backgrounds. Most CEO’s for example, are strategic or “big picture” thinkers. Scores on TAIS indicate that for CEO’s and other top level executives, it’s a broad internal focus of concentration that is most highly developed. In contrast, it is the ability to narrow one’s focus to a single task or goal that is more developed in engineers and other highly skilled technically oriented individuals, including most world record.

Having a dominant or preferred style does not mean you can’t shift your focus. Under conditions of optimal emotional arousal, most people perform effectively, and have no problems shifting between the four different styles of concentration when required to do so. When emotional arousal drops too low or goes to high, however, individuals fail to make adjustments in their focus of concentration, becoming dominated by their preferred style, and performance errors occur. Figure 2 shows the different types of concentration errors people make.

TAIS Allows Us to Predict A Person’s Concentration Errors

When arousal levels drop too low, people’s minds begin to wander. Those who are dominated by a broad-external focus of concentration become distracted by things going on in their environment. Those dominated by a broad-internal focus of concentration have a tendency to become overloaded and distracted by their own thoughts.

The sales person who’s strength is his external awareness, but isn’t really into the sale, pays more attention to people walking by than to the client, and because of that loses the sale. The master of the martial arts relaxes to much and allows himself to becomes distracted by one of his opponents losing his awareness of the attackers. The coach or manager known for his strategic skills and abilities over analyzes and becomes too creative in his thinking. Instead of providing a clear set of instructions for others to follow, he overloads them with information and paralyzes them.

If the mistakes individuals make when they become a little too relaxed occur within an important situation, those mistakes cause an immediate increase in the individual’s level of emotional arousal. That increase in arousal causes biochemical changes which narrow the focus of concentration. Narrowing is a natural part of the bodies “fight or flight” response. The individual uses the narrow focus to immediately assess the situation to determine how much damage has been done.

Whether a person will recover and re-focus on the task, depends upon his level of self-confidence following the assessment. When confident, arousal settles into the optimal range. The person is able to mentally let the mistake go and re-focus concentration on accomplishing the task. When confidence is lacking, however, arousal levels increase even more and the person begins to develop feelings of anger and frustration, or of anxiety and doubt.

TAIS scores allow us to predict who is more likely to become bored and distracted by things going on in the environment, and who is more likely to become distracted and over loaded by their own thoughts. TAIS scores also allow us to predict who will lose control over feelings of frustration and anger and who will lose control over feelings of anxiety and self-doubt.

TAIS Allows Us To Predict Performance Under Pressure

Whether or not a person will react to mistakes by becoming frustrated and angry or by becoming worried and anxious depends on how they score on TAIS scales measuring the need for control, competitiveness, level of self-esteem, and speed of decision making. Individuals who have higher levels of self-esteem, are more competitive, have a greater desire to be in control, and make decisions more quickly than the average person react to mistakes with anger and frustration. Their focus of concentration narrows and they begin to try and force the issue. Whether they can use the anger successfully depends in large part on the situation. Often, they cannot.

The tennis player shown in Figure 2 tightens up and tries to hit the serve harder than she is capable of. She ducks her head, rushes her swing and hits the ball into the net. A salesperson becomes too intense and is perceived as too aggressive by the client, pushing too hard, and not listening. The narrow external focus keeps both the tennis player and the salesperson from monitoring their own behavior and from making the adjustments they need to make to be successful.

Individuals who make decisions more slowly, and are below average in competitiveness, the need for control, and level of self-esteem, react to pressure and mistakes with worry and self-doubt. When their concentration narrows it becomes focused internally, on negative thoughts and feelings. The diver shown in Figure 2 begins thinking about possible mistakes instead of systematically rehearsing performance. Managers with this pattern of scores on TAIS start to worry about mistakes or about how they are being perceived by others. An internal focus keeps them from being aware of critical things going on around them and interferes with timely decisions.

Whether the emotional reaction is one of anger and frustration, or one of worry and doubt, the narrowing of attention, and the break down in shifting from an external focus to an internal one, or vice versa, results in decisions being made with only half of the relevant data being considered. Just how destructive that breakdown in concentration will be depends upon the complexity of the task (how much information is missed), and on how important the situation is. Was it match point at Wimbledon or just a recreational tennis match? Did the manager’s worry keep him from hearing the same old complaint he’s already heard a dozen times, or did it keep him from reacting quickly enough to a major problem on a production line?

TAIS Allows Us To Anticipate Problem Areas

Scores on TAIS scales can also be used to identify the performance conditions most likely to lead to success or failure for a person.

How high or low a person scores on any of the attentional and interpersonal building blocks measured by TAIS provides an indication of the individual’s level of comfort and confidence, as well as their behavioral flexibility, in performance situations requiring the behavior.

A manager with a very high need for control, for example, will find it difficult to give up control and to effectively delegate when he is under pressure. It is more stressful to give up control than it is to try and do everyone else’s job. Contrast this with the behavior of a manager who scores much lower on the TAIS scale measuring need for control.

A low scoring manager will be stressed when pressure forces him to become more authoritative and less democratic in his management style. Under these conditions he is likely to fail because he doesn’t confront issues quickly enough and fails to provide needed structure.

This same logic applies to the other interpersonal characteristics measured by TAIS. People who make decisions quickly are stressed when they have to wait. People who are introverted are more likely to become stressed when they have to initiate contact with others. Individuals who are highly verbal are stressed in situations where they have to remain silent.

All TAIS Scales Are Directly Related to Performance

What makes TAIS so useful is the fact that the concentration skills and interpersonal abilities the inventory measures have an obvious and very direct link to virtually all performance situations. It is this, combined with the fact preferred concentration and interpersonal styles become very trait like under pressure, that makes TAIS a valuable tool when working with individuals who must perform at very high levels and those who must perform under a lot of pressure.

The fact that each of the characteristics measured by TAIS has some relevance to almost every performance situation makes it possible to develop mission or performance specific profiles. These profiles can be created statistically by testing a group of high performers within a particular area and then using their means scores to graph a profile. The profiles can also be created by identifying “exemplar” performers or models, and using their scores on TAIS as a metric. Finally, mission profiles can be developed conceptually, by using the input of experts to behaviorally define the performance requirements in terms of scores on TAIS.

Mission or Job Specific TAIS Profiles

The ability to create mission or job specific profiles is critical because the concentration skills and interpersonal abilities required by different jobs can’t be adequately captured by comparing an individual’s scores on TAIS to those of some normative population. The keys to success for two individuals with the same job title, even within the same organization, can be dramatically different. The organizational climate, the behaviors and attitudes of subordinates, peers, and superiors all help to determine the concentration and interpersonal skills required for success in a given job. A normative group, who’s job is similar to that of an applicant, may provide a general template that can be used as a starting point for developing a mission or job specific profile, but that’s all it does.

Obviously, the development of job or mission specific profiles requires considerable knowledge about the organization and about the people that the person being considered, will interact with. When organizations make good selection decisions, it is because the people making those decisions are able to use the knowledge they have about others in the organization, in addition to the knowledge they have about the individual, to help them in the decision making process. In effect, they create mission or job specific profiles in their head. TAIS, more than any other instrument can help make this process more objective, and more reliable.

TAIS differs from other instruments in two distinct ways. 1) The characteristics measured have direct relevance to performance and are much more easily translated into job specific behaviors. 2) There is a broad enough range of performance relevant characteristics measured to allow for subtle but critical differentiations between mission or job profiles.

Using TAIS to develop job specific profiles forces those who are hiring, to behaviorally define the characteristics they believe are critical to success. When individual’s profiles don’t match the ideal, it leads to very specific, and testable predictions, about the kinds of problems that are likely to occur. Using other sources of information (e.g., the interview process and past history) to examine the accuracy of those predictions greatly enhances the likelihood of hiring the right person.

Comparing an individual’s TAIS profile to the mission profile also leads to an identification of those specific behaviors that need to be modified and/or developed to enhance performance and/or to raise it to acceptable levels. It is this that makes TAIS such a valuable tool for training and for performance enhancement.

Summary and Conclusions

There are certain concentration skills and interpersonal characteristics that are important contributors to performance in almost every situation. A convenient way to think of these characteristics is as the “building blocks of performance.” The Attentional and Interpersonal Style (TAIS) inventory, measures these building blocks of performance.

As a result of biological factors, genetics, and learning experiences, some of the building blocks measured by TAIS become more highly developed or trait like than others. Each of us develops a slightly different pattern of scores. Those characteristics in us, that are more highly developed, become more trait like when our emotional arousal level gets outside the optimal range. With increasing arousal, we lose our ability to adapt our some of our trait like behaviors to changes in the performance situation. We become controlled by our dominant characteristics.

There is no perfect, or ideal pattern of scores on TAIS. What ever the pattern of scores, that pattern will contribute to success in some situations, and lead to failure in others. The challenge we all face is to:

Select performance arenas that play to our strengths or dominant patterns.

Enhance performance by gaining greater control over emotions and our focus of concentration to keep our more dominant building blocks from controlling us. That is what Attention Control Training (ACT) is all about.

Team build, by establishing relationships with people we trust, people who have characteristics that are complimentary to our own.

TAIS, more than any other inventory available today, provides the information needed for selection, performance enhancement, and for team building, in situations where people must perform at extremely high levels, and/or when individuals are under a great deal of pressure to perform.

For more information on using TAIS in your business, please contact us atinfo@winningmind.com