Leading Beyond Personality Tests:

Why Leadership by Design Is the Future of Sustainable Performance

For decades, corporate leadership programs have leaned on personality frameworks & behavioral tools like DISC, StrengthsFinder, and the Big Five (OCEAN) to improve communication, build teams, and increase performance. Don't get us wrong, we have used some of them and these tools absolutely have merit, they’re accessible, research-backed, provide a snapshot in time view and a language for self-awareness.

But they’re also missing something big... they don’t tell you HOW to work or lead WITHOUT burning out.

As corporate executives and leaders with a combined 40+ years of experience managing teams, departments, and enterprise-level change, we followed A LOT of different suggested or mandated playbooks. We knew how to build strategy, develop high performers, and scale results. But we also learned, through personal trial (& error), that simply knowing behavioral assessment types weren’t enough to keep our teams (or ourselves) from fatigue, disengagement, and quiet quitting. We needed to know HOW our teams, including us, best work. We wish we knew our own Leadership Design earlier in our careers (& life).

Leadership x Design: A Blueprint for Personalized Leadership

Leadership x Design is not a personality test. It doesn’t measure historical behavior or situational snapshots, it reveals how you are meant to function. It gives you a personal operating manual based on your unique design, showing you how to:

• Make decisions without second-guessing yourself

• Manage your energy (and your team’s) to avoid burnout

• Lead in a way that feels natural to you 

Unlike behavioral tools that are based only on a snapshot in time, like Big Five, that rely on self-assessment (which can change based on mood, role, or stress levels), Leadership Design is static, you can't fake it, because your leadership design style is a blueprint unique to you that doesn’t change.

The Hidden Cost of Misalignment

Burnout isn’t always loud. Sometimes it looks like perfectionism. Sometimes it’s disengagement masked as "quiet quitting." And often, it’s leaders overcompensating to meet expectations that were never aligned with their strengths.

That’s why we created an ROI Tracker to evaluate the risk to you and your business. While burnout feels personal, it creates a much larger and detrimental organizational risk. Our ROI tracker is a guidance tool that quantifies the business impact of both your team's misalignment & disengagement, revealing the cost of disengaged teams, decision fatigue, and leadership burnout in real dollars that impact you and your business.

The Bottom Line

When leaders operate in alignment with their Leadership Design, they:

• Reduce decision fatigue

• Communicate more clearly and confidently

• Reclaim energy and focus

• Lead teams that are more productive, engaged, resilient, and innovative

Leadership Design doesn’t replace the Big Five, it enhances it and it goes deeper. It turns insight into action and potential into sustainable performance.

If you’re tired of surface-level self-awareness and are ready to lead from alignment, let’s talk. We offer a 1:1 consultation to see your risk in real time and real dollars. We can determine if a team-based session is right for you to decode your energetic leadership blueprint & show you exactly what misalignment is costing your organization.

We show leaders EXACTLY what burnout & misalignment are costing their business, in dollars, not darts by blending 40+ years of combined corporate leadership with cutting-edge Leadership Design and a custom ROI Tracker.

Want to see your team’s risk profile? DM "ROI" on LinkedIn or email [email protected] to request a sample report.

Want to decode your own leadership style? DM "Leadership Blueprint" and we will send you a no-fluff intro.

Leadership isn’t just about what you do... It’s about how you are. And when that’s aligned, everything changes.