DISC behavioral style influences how individuals navigate change, but beyond DISC, there are five deeper personality styles that also have an influence. These dimensions help explain why two people with the same DISC profile can respond very differently to the same change initiative and why understanding people at this level makes leaders significantly more effective.
Research using the International Personality Item Pool identified five personality scales with direct links to attitudes toward change. Together with DISC, these scales create a richer picture of how individuals process change across the three stages of evolution: Acknowledge, Acclimate, and Accept.
Picture two team members who share the same High D style. Both push for fast decisions and resist long discussions, so you might expect them to respond to organizational change in the same way. But when a merger reshuffles their reporting lines, one treats the change as a puzzle and starts mapping new relationships within a week while the other spends that same week venting to colleagues and stalling on decisions that used to take him minutes.
While DISC predicts how each person communicates under pressure, it cannot predict how someone will respond to change. To understand that, let’s examine the five personality scales.
The Five Personality Scales
- Locus of Control (LOC) — The degree to which someone believes they control their circumstances, described on a scale of internal to external. People with an internal LOC tend to view change more favorably, seeing themselves as capable of influencing outcomes. Those with an external LOC often feel that change is happening to them, increasing the likelihood of a victim mindset. On a change initiative, the former asks what they can influence and the latter waits to be told what to do.
- Neuroticism (NEO) — A person’s level of emotional reactivity and sensitivity to stress. High neuroticism may present as perfectionism, irritability, or anxiety during change. Low neuroticism enables calmer, more measured responses. A high NEO individual may respond with dread to an email they interpreted as harsh, while a low NEO scorer might read the same email and move on.
- Coping (COP) — The emotional and behavioral strategies someone uses to manage stress. Strong copers regulate their emotions during change; those with weaker coping skills may let their reactions become counterproductive. A strong coper can take a bad meeting in stride, while a weak coper will carry that meeting into the next three days.
- Tolerance for Ambiguity (TFA) — Comfort with the unknown. Organizational change creates significant ambiguity. High TFA enables flexibility while low TFA can result in paralysis or intense anxiety when information is incomplete. High TFA leaders can draft a plan with half the facts and start moving, while low TFA leaders are likely to wait for every detail before they take a single step.
- Self-Efficacy (SE) — Belief in one’s ability to succeed in a new situation. Self-efficacy encompasses the ABCs of change: Affective (emotions), Cognitive (beliefs), and Behavioral (actions). Someone low in self-efficacy doubts they can pull the task off, while someone high in self-efficacy with the exact same skill level approaches the task with confidence.
The ABCs of change: Affective thoughts and emotions about the change inform beliefs, which then shape actions. While you may not control your initial reaction (thoughts and emotions), you can always choose your behavior.
These five personality scales run through every stage of evolution (acknowledge, acclimate, accept), from the first moment someone hears about a change to the point the new pattern sticks.
Locus of control shapes how someone acknowledges the change. Internal LOC is more likely to treat the news as information to act on, while external LOC will treat it as something being done to them, which shapes the person’s attitude toward the change.
Neuroticism shapes the intensity of every stage: higher levels of neuroticism raise the emotional charge at acknowledgement, add friction throughout acclimation, and can keep reopening old anxiety even after someone reaches acceptance. Conversely, lower neuroticism will ease someone’s emotional experience throughout all three stages.
Coping skills govern the acclimation phase, which is where new behavior is tested under pressure. Strong copers absorb the stress of trial and error, while weak copers may burn out and retreat to old patterns.
Tolerance for ambiguity is similar, where high TFA individuals better tolerate the in-between period, while low TFA individuals need high levels of communication throughout the acclimation phase.
Self-efficacy influences how easily someone reaches acceptance. Someone can move through the acknowledge and acclimate phases and still slide back, doubting they can succeed in the new state for the long term.
What This Means for Leaders
Leaders who understand these five dimensions can tailor their support more precisely for team members who struggle to adapt. Someone with low tolerance for ambiguity benefits enormously from clearly defined roles and expectations. Someone with high neuroticism may need more frequent check-ins and reassurance. Someone with low self-efficacy needs to feel recognized for their progress.
For a team member with low LOC, give one element of the change they can control, like a schedule, a workspace layout, or a single process step. For someone high in neuroticism, check in twice as often during the first weeks of a change, and keep each conversation specific instead of open-ended to eliminate room for anxieties to run wild.
Someone with weak coping skills is likely to react emotionally. Give them space to process, and if their behavior becomes a problem, name the behavior directly, then pair it with a concrete alternative, like a five-minute walk before answering a frustrating email, or a habit of asking a manager for help instead of brooding silently.
Someone with low tolerance for ambiguity needs structure before anything else. That might take the form of a written role description, a list of what changes and what stays the same, and a specific date for the next update.
Someone with low self-efficacy responds best to evidence of their own value. Generic praise is likely to slide right off, so instead highlight a specific moment of success or a hard situation this person handled well.
Together, DISC and the five personality scales give a much clearer picture of how someone responds to change. As a leader, you’re ability to identify these traits in your team members allows you to help them navigate the phases of change by helping you determine you when to give structure, when to give space, and when to give proof instead of encouragement.
If you take the time to build your understanding of your team members before implementing change, you can better prepare your team and your change management strategy so you can spend less time managing reactions and more time moving people forward.
| Key Insight: The five personality scales (locus of control, neuroticism, coping, tolerance for ambiguity, and self-efficacy) work in combination with DISC style to shape how each person experiences and navigates change. Understanding both levels gives leaders a powerful advantage. |
Cooper Consulting Group · CooperConsultingGroup.com · Inspiring learning and leadership development so leaders and teams can be their best.™
