About the FIRO-B™: Team Development – Role Preferences, Part I

When working with others, most of us tend to behave consistently.  As other team members get used to our style, it starts to become a role they expect from us.  This role is determined partly by our own desires and from the group’s desires and experiences.  The role you are most likely to take in a group can be determined by your highest Expressed Need.  This time we'll look those with Inclusion as the highest score.

The role most often associated with Inclusion is Clarifier.  Typical behavior includes finding ways to make everyone participate in discussions, speaking to everyone in the group (and not just a few people), bringing together ideas from many sources, and summarizing or explaining the discussion.

Some advantages of this role include increasing the group's collaboration, making sure the work is evenly distributed, adding new viewpoints to discussions, and helping the group evaluate where it stands.  Potential disadvantages include trying for fairness at all costs, seeing commonalities where none exists, putting people under pressure to contribute, and attempting to keep a team together that no longer serves a purpose and needs to disband.

As with most scores on the FIRO-B, you are more likely to fit the above pattern the higher your score on this scale is.  You might do the above less frequently, or only when others do not take this role.  Likewise, if your highest Total Need is in the same category, you are more likely to take on this role.