Belbin Team Inventory

N. Zimmermann

People with different habits and roles form a functioning team. Meredith Belbin identifies eight different team personalities. One or probably several of the role descriptions will remind you of yourself. Needless to say that these descriptions only represent a tendency for a certain behavior at a specific time. They are not rigid but rather ‘snapshots’ of a way of behaving. It might be that in another team, at another moment you will behave completely different .

Social Roles
The Resource Investigator is communicative and enthusiastic, establishes contacts and mostly keeps a contingency plan in mind. However, he also quickly loses interest once the initial euphoric start of the project is over.	The Co-Ordinator brings together the different minds in the team. She is good at setting goals, assigning tasks and encouraging decisions. But this way she can also be manipulative and threatens to delegate too much work to other team members.	The Teamworker is cooperative, diplomatic, able to perceive the feelings of others, a good listener and keeps the team together. But during crises he is indecisive and struggles to make a decision.
Thinking Roles
The Plant introduces new and innovative ideas and is able to solve difficult problems. In doing so, she is often absentminded and overly concerned about effective communication.	The Specialist is focused and committed, provides expert knowledge and information, but may get lost in details.	The Monitor Evaluator is levelheaded, critical and thinks strategically – and she judges fairly because she considers every option. But she is seldom a source of inspiration or motivation.
Action Roles
The Shaper is good at working under pressure and has sufficient energy and courage to confront obstacles. But he is also provocative and capable of offending others’ feelings.	The Implementor gets her job done efficiently and in a disciplined manner. You can rely on her. She works according to the principle ‘walk the talk‘, but she is also quite inflexible at that und finds it hard to adopt new ideas.	The Completer works carefully and conscientiously, detects the smallest mistakes and is punctual. He tends to bother his head about everything and is incapable of delegating work.

References

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