Building high-performing teams with work personality insights

Ever looked at those dream teams that just seem to click, where everyone’s strengths complement each other perfectly, and wondered how they got it so right? Here’s some good news—it’s not random magic; it’s science. By leveraging Work Personality insights, you can build teams that aren’t just functional but exceptional, with a natural flow that drives your organisation’s success.

This blog pulls everything together. We’ll explore how understanding team dynamics, crafting the right interview questions, and implementing a scoring key contribute to creating cohesive, aligned teams. And, with tools like Compono Hire and Compono Engage, you’ll have everything you need to make this approach seamless and effective.

Why work personality is the backbone of high-performing teams

To start, think of Work Personality as your team’s DNA. It’s the traits, strengths, and behavioural patterns that define how each individual operates—and when you bring all those unique elements together, you’ve got a team dynamic.

But here’s the rub. Without understanding these dynamics, you risk creating mismatches that lead to friction, miscommunication, or even high employee turnover. That’s why mapping out Work Personalities isn’t just a box-ticking exercise. It’s a strategic move to:

• Build a team that collaborates effortlessly.
• Identify gaps that new hires can fill.
• Improve engagement and retention.
• Create alignment, where every individual is pulling in the same direction.

Now, the real magic happens when you combine this insight with targeted strategies throughout your hiring process. Here’s how.

Step 1: Understanding team dynamics

The first step? Know your current team inside out. Before you even start thinking about hiring, step back and assess the dynamics you already have in place.

Ask yourself questions like:

• What are our core strengths as a team?
• Where do we struggle to perform or collaborate?
• Are we missing any key personality types or traits?

This is where a tool like Compono Engage can transform the process. It offers deep-dive insights into your team’s Work Personality profile, highlighting everything from behavioural trends to potential blind spots. For instance, maybe you discover your team is overloaded with visionaries but missing detail-focused planners to bring big ideas to life. Or perhaps collaboration is a strong point, but decision-making feels sluggish.

Armed with this data, you’ll have a roadmap to guide your hiring efforts, focusing on traits that complement, rather than replicate, your team’s current setup.

Mental visualisation tip:

Imagine your team as a jigsaw puzzle. You already have plenty of corner pieces, but you’re missing the centre. Work Personality insights help you identify that missing piece and ensure it fits perfectly with the rest.

Step 2: Crafting targeted interview questions

When you know what your team needs, the next step is filtering for candidates who fit the bill. And here’s the kicker—conventional interview questions just won’t cut it. Those “What are your strengths?” prompts might look great on paper, but they don’t really give you a detailed glimpse into how someone operates within a team.

This is where Work Personality shines. By tailoring your questions around specific personality traits and behaviours, you can uncover insights that go beyond the CV. The trick is to make questions situational and open-ended, digging into the candidate’s real-world problem-solving and interactions with others.

Here are a few examples:

• For collaboration: “Tell me about a time you had to work with someone whose approach differed from yours. How did you manage the situation?”
• For adaptability: “Describe a project where unexpected challenges came up. How did you change your strategy to handle them?”
• For leadership (even in non-leadership roles): “Can you share an example of when you took initiative on a task? What did you learn from the experience?”

These types of questions go beyond “can they do the job?” to explore “how will they do the job?” and “how will they fit with the team?” It’s about finding the puzzle piece with the right edges—not another piece just because it looks nice.

If you’re struggling to tie these questions together, Compono Hire offers tailored alignment insights to guide direction of questions to align with your team's needs, making it simple to nail the interview phase.

Step 3: Using a scoring key for objectivity

We all have biases—whether we like to admit it or not. And in hiring, those biases can make it tricky to evaluate candidates objectively. That’s where scoring keys save the day.

A scoring key gives you a structured framework for evaluating candidates based on the traits and behaviours your team actually needs. Instead of going with your gut feeling (which is notoriously unreliable), you assign scores to specific categories during the interview. For example:

• Collaboration = 4 (Exceeds expectations)
• Adaptability = 3 (Meets expectations)
• Leadership = 2 (Below average)

To make this even more valuable, weight the traits by importance. If collaboration is critical for the role, give it more weight than a category like leadership. The result is a clear, unbiased ranking for each candidate—allowing you to make decisions with confidence rather than guesswork.

And the good news? This process isn’t half as daunting as it sounds, especially with Compono’s tools. With scientifically grounded assessments and scoring templates, you can set up a system that works like clockwork, ensuring every step is consistent and informed.

Bringing it all together

By combining these three steps—understanding your team, crafting insightful interview questions, and creating a fair scoring key—you’ve got a recipe for hiring with purpose. Instead of just filling vacancies, you’re building teams that thrive, aligning every new hire with your overarching goals and culture.

Here’s what this looks like in action:

• You identify a team gap in strategic planning skills and adaptability via Compono Engage.
• You target these traits during interviews, asking situational questions to explore compatibility.
• You evaluate candidates with a scoring key, prioritising alignment with both the role and your existing team dynamic.

One hire might not seem like much, but when every member of your team is selected with this intentionality, the results can be transformational. It’s not just a team—it’s a high-performing powerhouse.

Why partner with Compono?

Making smarter hiring decisions doesn’t have to be a hefty mountain to climb. Compono’s platforms, Hire and Engage, do the heavy lifting for you. From measuring Work Personality insights to offering pre-built scoring frameworks, these tools ensure you're armed with the data you need at every step.

With Compono, you can:

• Reduce hiring risks by selecting candidates scientifically aligned with team dynamics.
• Build cohesive, engaged teams with meaningful data at your fingertips.
• Focus on strategy, rather than getting bogged down in hiring admin.

If you’re ready to transform the way you hire and manage your teams, make the first step—and start building with intent.

Your next step to smarter hiring

Great teams don’t just happen—they’re built with care. Whether you’re tackling high turnover, scaling up, or just want to make hiring less stressful, Work Personality insights can make all the difference.

Want to learn more about how Compono can help? Explore the tools available to empower your hiring and boost your team’s performance.

Your dream team is closer than you think.

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