Saturday, January 17, 2009

Team Work and Handwriting

The most important component of success in today’s workplace is everyone working as a team and everyone sharing and communicating in a positive, forward-thinking manner.

I’ve found that one of the most dependable areas to perceive Team Work is in the strokes of Handwriting. It’s amazing how many times I’ve seen how people’s work team relationships work so well because they have common drives as reflected in their writing.

I’ve spoken to many groups whose ability to communicate and care/counsel others is paramount to the success of their team; it’s amazing how common characteristics thread through all the writings in the group resulting in all team members being on the ‘same page’ in their goals, their work ethic and their desire to help one another. Such a team would as a matter of course have gently forward-slanted writing that makes them natural counselors and people who love to give their time and help to others. Such a team would also be inclined to have ‘fluidity of mind’ in their writings where all or most of their t-bars join to the next letter and where they have many fluid figure-8 g’s and y’s in their script. Such fluidity would not only enhance their communication, but would help them be expert at troubleshooting difficult situations and shifting tough topics to ‘safe waters’ without the other person realizing they had done so.

Solidity within teams at work where communication and care are paramount can also be seen where the lines of writing of those on the team are steady, indicating their dependability, their reliability and their sincerity with others. In a team where rules and guidelines need to be adhered to, team members will likely have letters that join together, indicating their logical, sequential mind and their ability to effectively problem solve.

Where the positions predominant in the team are guideline-focused, team members who opt for the tried and true and for methods that work are usually the most comfortable. In handwriting this is seen where the person predominantly retraces the mid-portion of their letter h’s. Where there are break-away strokes in the mid-portion of this particular letter it indicates the person will occasionally take a ‘risk’; where this is combined with all the stroke tendencies in the paragraph immediately above, it suggests the person will take a ‘calculated’ risk as long as they’re sure that what they’re doing will work out well.

The next time you find yourself assessing a team at work, try having them write some of their goals and objectives as a team on blank paper and, especially if the team is geared toward caring and counseling, check their writings to see if all or most of the above stroke tendencies are present. The more the writings have in common with one another, the more your team will have a similar mind set, goals and focus.

Be sure to view my 5-minute “Power of the Pen” DVD on my Home Page at www.handwritinganalysistoronto.com

Friday, January 2, 2009

Handwriting: Regular or Inconsistent?

I’ve found that one of the most frequent characteristics an employer seeks of their candidates is consistency in work style and work production.

Some of the areas in handwriting where this is evident is in the consistent size of letters, the consistency of slant, consistent pressure and the ‘cadence’ or strokes that return to the baseline of the writing on a regular basis. The presence of this constellation of trait strokes indicates the level of stability, maturity and self-discipline of the candidate. This is the type of person who will have the staying power and reliability that most employers value so highly.

All too often a writing is seen where the size of letters fluctuate in size within a word or the slant will vary greatly from word to word or line to line. A candidate whose cursive or printed script has these characteristics is someone whose maturity has yet to be developed, someone who is less than disciplined and someone who might be careless in their work.

All too often I have seen candidates’ writing where there is frequent patching of letters, frequent flooding of ink within words and cross-outs of letters or words that seem almost angry. I have seen instances where candidates have this crossing-out of letters within their own name or the date. Such a writing is far from what could be termed ‘regular’.

Most people would agree that capitalizing the name of the company you are applying to would be usual, if not an understood or unconscious stroke of the pen. Believe it or not, I have in my possession a candidate’s writing where they on three occasions used lower case letters to write the company name. This, once again, is something I would definitely call irregular!

There are some who might immediately think: “What if the person is from another country and English is not their first language?” I have seen writings from people very new to North America that are by far more regular and consistent than people who were born and educated here.

A writing that is consistent and ‘regular’ is termed a writing with ‘good form level’. The opposite features mentioned above are red flags employers need to watch for!


Be sure to view my 5-minute “Power of the Pen” DVD on my Home Page at www.handwritinganalysistoronto.com