Brittany Shaw – HR Consultant, Certified Insights Practitioner
March 2026
One thing I’ve learned working with teams and leaders over the years: you can have the best strategy in the world, the most talented team, the most well-funded initiative… and it will still fall flat if you don’t understand the people inside of it.
It’s a simple observation, but it explains a lot.
I started out as a teacher. And the thing about teaching that never leaves you is this: before you can reach someone, you have to understand them. You HAVE to know how they receive information, what motivates them, where they shut down, and what makes them come alive. I carried that belief out of the classroom and into boardrooms, workshop spaces, and conference rooms, and it has never once steered me wrong.
Self-awareness has quietly become one of the hottest topics in organizational development right now, and we are not mad about it. People are tired of showing up to workplaces that don’t see them. Leaders are tired of guessing.
Teams are tired of the friction that nobody seems to have a name for. Assessments give it a name. Better than that, they tell the story.
I’ve seen countless “a-ha” moments in these sessions. In one case, two managers looked almost identical in their profiles, but their tension came down to decision style: one wired for caution, the other for speed. The moment we named it, understanding took over.
And that is exactly what lights me up about this work. It is not just about collecting data. It is about finding the thread in that data and using it to tell a story that actually changes something. A story that helps a leader understand why their team keeps hitting the same wall. A story that helps a new hire see where they belong. A story that turns a struggling team dynamic into something that finally makes sense.
That is the work. And it is having a serious moment!
01. You cannot build what you don’t understand.
Whether it’s a new hire, a re-org, a team in conflict, or a leader who keeps missing the mark… the root cause is almost always a gap in self-awareness or interpersonal understanding. Assessments give you a shared language. They give you a data-informed map of how people think, communicate, and make decisions.
My personal go-to is Insights Discovery (yes, I am absolutely a Colour Wheel girl), but the tool matters less than the commitment to actually using the data. We also work with Myers-Briggs, Predictive Index, CliftonStrengthsFinder, The 6 Types of Working Genius, Thomas-Kilmann Conflict Mode Instrument, Fierce Conversations, BIRDS, Strong Interest Inventory… and we can build custom assessments, depending on what your team actually needs. There is no shortage of ways in.
02. The new workforce is demanding it.
We are in an era where employees want to be seen, developed, and challenged in ways that are specific to them. Cookie-cutter development plans don’t cut it anymore.
People want to know: what am I good at, why do I work the way I do, and where do I fit in? Assessments answer those questions in a way that feels credible rather than performative.
Learning and development is shifting fast. The organizations leading the charge aren’t doing one-size-fits-all training and calling it a day. They are building custom ecosystems rooted in team data. I have been running workshops on this across Atlantic Canada for years now, and the energy in the room when people finally see themselves clearly on paper? Huge! That ripples. Into morale, into culture, into how people treat each other on a Tuesday afternoon when nobody is watching.
If your L&D strategy doesn’t include this kind of foundation, it’s time to catch up.
03. The ROI shows up everywhere.
Getting leadership buy-in for this kind of work can be the hardest part. Once people actually see the value of good assessment data, though, everything starts to fall into place.
With the right insights in hand, you can apply them to almost everything: hiring decisions, onboarding, team communication, change management rollouts, conflict resolution, leadership development, and succession planning. The foundation you build with this kind of research pays dividends across every project it touches.
I’ve watched teams go from dysfunction to genuine collaboration just by slowing down long enough to understand how people are wired. Sometimes it’s as simple as realizing the “difficult” person on the team isn’t difficult at all… they just process the world differently.
That’s not magic OR guesswork. It’s process + insight + your people. That’s a story worth telling!
04. AI only makes this stronger.
Assessment data has always told a powerful story. AI just helps us read that data faster, surface patterns quicker, and ask better questions during the debrief. It’s part of how I work now, and it has only expanded what is possible.
The bottom line
The organizations that are thriving right now are not just working harder. They are working with greater self-awareness, greater interpersonal intelligence, and greater intentionality in how their people fit together.
That starts with a solid foundation for assessment. And it starts with being willing to let the data tell you something true.
I open every single workshop and training session with exactly that question. Be open! Be willing! Because the data can only do its job if you let it.
If you’re curious about what this could look like for your team or organization, let’s talk. The conversation alone is usually worth it.
What assessment has made the biggest difference for you or your team? brittany@teamjmc.ca
JMC HR Consulting is a Moncton-based firm supporting organizations across Atlantic Canada and beyond with practical, strategic HR solutions. Our work focuses on helping organizations build strong, effective teams through executive recruitment, compensation alignment, workforce planning, organizational structure, leadership support, and employee and team assessments.
We work closely with municipalities, co-operatives, Indigenous organizations, non-profits, and private sector employers to navigate complex workforce challenges and support long-term organizational success.
Learn more about our work at www.teamjmc.ca.
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