MBTI or DiSC? Three ways to learn interaction
MBTI and DiSC are well-known tools for understanding differences within a team. SGL Coach draws on a third method, Jan Petrus Hagberg's SGL: interaction, group growth and leadership. One important difference is how you learn and use the framework during your working day.
Profile first or situation first
MBTI begins with a questionnaire. The results are explored through feedback to find a best-fit type among sixteen types built on four preference pairs.
DiSC begins with an assessment of behavioural style: Dominance, influence, Steadiness and Conscientiousness.
Both give a team a shared language for differences, and their providers offer materials and learning platforms for applying the insights further.
SGL starts with a situation you face: a meeting that went wrong or a decision that has stalled. You do not need to complete a questionnaire.
| MBTI | DiSC | SGL Coach | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Starts with | Questionnaire and type | Assessment and behavioural style | A situation from your working day |
| You learn | Your type and other people’s preferences | Your style and how you work with other styles | To see what the conversation needs and try it |
| Learning takes place | Through feedback from a certified practitioner and development materials | In a workshop and on a learning platform | In everyday work, with an AI coach, short exercise videos and practitioner support |
Knowledge about yourself or skill in interaction
A profile gives you knowledge: your type or style and how other people may differ. Jan Petrus Hagberg’s model of knowledge and competence distinguishes what can be learned from what needs to be experienced. Interaction belongs to what needs to be experienced. It becomes a skill when you try it in a real conversation, reflect on what happened and try again.
That is why learning in SGL Coach takes place during the working day. You prepare for a conversation with an AI coach and reflect on it afterwards. Each topic has short exercise videos in which Jan Petrus demonstrates the exercise, and a task to carry out in your own work. Practitioners can support the team through features in the product.
The colours in SGL do not describe a type of person either. They describe four aspects of communication that everyone uses and moves between: facts, personal connection and ideas, feelings and values, and the intuitive. The question is what the conversation needs. An SGL colour therefore cannot be translated into a DiSC style or an MBTI type.
A profile can provide a starting point for further development. SGL Coach emphasises the skill you develop through practice. We have built SGL Coach this way because we believe interaction is best learned where it happens.
An example
A project team repeatedly postpones a decision. One person wants more documentation; another wants to try the proposal on a small scale. Both think the other is making collaboration difficult. This example is fictional.
An MBTI or DiSC profile may help explain different preferences and ways of working. The profile alone does not determine what the team needs to decide now. With SGL, you explore the situation itself: which facts are missing? What does each person imagine will happen? Which feelings and values are at stake? What needs to be clarified before you decide?
Use the profile you already have
If your team has used MBTI or DiSC, you can bring those insights with you. SGL Coach offers a way to learn interaction in the situations where it happens.
Arrange a demonstration of SGL Coach Team.
SGL is an independent framework, not derived from or endorsed by other profile or type tools. MBTI and Myers-Briggs Type Indicator are registered trademarks of The Myers & Briggs Foundation. Everything DiSC is a registered trademark of John Wiley & Sons.
Sources: The Myers-Briggs Company on MBTI, MBTI and the best-fit process and Everything DiSC’s learning platform.