Avoid conflicts : Are you Internal or External pattern like 40% of population? – by Cécile Lammer

Avoid conflicts: Are you more Internal or External pattern?

Are you aware that we find our motivation from different sources? There are two main sources of motivation depending on individuals: Internal pattern and external pattern. Understanding the motivation pattern of others around you or your team will increase their effectiveness. Your employees will feel involved, accepted and understood.

The book “Words that change minds: the 14 Patterns for Mastering the Language of Influence” by Charvet Shelle Rose explains those 2 patterns. It helps you to identify them thanks to questions, sentence structure and body language.

Based on Charvet Shelle Rose’s book there are 3 profiles:

• Mainly internal: 40%
• Equally internal and external 20%
• Mainly External: 40%

How to identify an internal pattern?

Mostly internal pattern finds their motivation within themselves. The quality of their work is decided based on their own vision and they have difficulty receiving or accepting other’s opinions. In this case, if they feel they did a good job but receive external negative feedback they will question the opinion of the person giving the feedback.

This personality can be hard to manage. It is hard for them to accept external requests. Even though they would gather external information to forge their opinion they will judge it based on their internal standard. Managers holding this pattern won’t usually give a lot of feedback.

How to identify an external pattern?

External pattern holder enjoys receiving feedback and others’ opinion. This helps them to remain motivated. Without external feedback, they may not be able to know if they are doing well or not. Information is seen as an order and they most likely will follow it. They would rather want someone to decide for them, this simplifies their decision as they may not be able to take one on their own. External mode people may need outside encouragement or feedback to start or finish an activity. They gather standards from outside sources and do not hold standards within themselves. Quote from Charvet Shelle Rose:

“At work, if there is a long absence of any external feedback or reaction to their work, they may experience something akin to sensory deprivation”

One of the highlighted questions from the book to help identify the pattern of a person is: “How do you know that you have done a good job?

Based on Charvet Shelle Rose, internal and external patterns have distinctive reactions to the question. Both are based on their body language and the structure of their sentence.

It is interesting to see how internal pattern reacts:

• The structure of the sentence is using “I know”
• They evaluate their own performance based on their own standards or criteria.
• They develop a high resistance when someone tells them what to do or wants to decide for them.
• Any form of outside instruction is taken as information.

Their body language is usually sitting upright, pointing to self, may pause before answering judgement from someone else while they evaluate it, and minimal gestures and facial expressions for their culture.

Concerning the External pattern:

They believe others or external sources of information decide or judge them. They need to compare their work to an external norm or stand. They usually would lean forward, and watch for a response, their facial expressions indicate they want to know from others if they did well.

The information above is based on the book “Words that change minds: the 14 Patterns for Mastering the Language of Influence” by Charvet Shelle Rose.

This book gives a lot of insight into how to interact with others and understand their reactions without taking them personally. If two people have different patterns they may not understand each other. They may feel the other part is too or not enough in “action” which may cause misunderstanding. Moreover, two people with the same pattern may enter into conflict easily. Knowing how to engage and understand where people are coming from and adapting an approach creates a positive dynamic among a group. Especially both patterns have a lot to bring to each other.

Moreover, the internal and external patterns are usually combined with other patterns explained in the book. There’s a variety of personalities which leads to a variety of ways to interact with others in order to get the best results and avoid conflicts. This book is highly recommended, it brings a lot of insights and may help you to clarify some situations you are stuck in. Keep in mind that a person’s pattern can change depending on the situations they face.

Ceicia publishes one article per month, related to different subjects. Stay tuned.

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