One of the greatest gifts you could give yourself is to seek, find, and apply truth in your life. This is the path to becoming a healthy person. Aligning yourself with the truth permits a better person to eventually emerge from within. If you happen to agree then you will love the Johari Window. Years ago two gentlemen came up with this little creature.. The Johari Window helps you to categorize conscious and subconscious areas of your life. The window works much like a grid. It goes from the obvious and more conscious areas of your life to the less obvious areas that your may not be aware of.
The below are the main quadrants of johari window:
Open: Adjectives that are selected by both the participant and his or her peers are placed into the Open quadrant. This quadrant represents traits of the subjects that both they and their peers are aware of.
Hidden: Adjectives selected only by subjects, but not by any of their peers, are placed into the Hidden quadrant, representing information about them their peers are unaware of. It is then up to the subject to disclose this information or not.
Blind Spot: Adjectives that are not selected by subjects but only by their peers are placed into the Blind Spot quadrant. These represent information that the subject is not aware of, but others are, and they can decide whether and how to inform the individual about these "blind spots".
Unknown: Adjectives that were not selected by either subjects or their peers remain in the Unknown quadrant, representing the participant's behaviors or motives that were not recognized by anyone participating. This may be because they do not apply or because there is collective ignorance of the existence of these traits.
The Johari Window is a tool that can also help you understand where your employees fit on a "very closed" to "very open" scale.
The window and its degree will vary like the established team members will have larger open areas than new team members. New team members start with smaller open areas because little knowledge about the new team member has yet been shared. The size of the Open Area can be expanded horizontally into the blind space, by seeking and actively listening to feedback from other group members.
The questions that can help you evaluate yourself are as follows:
If a friend of mine had a “personality conflict” with a mutual acquaintance of ours and I thought it was important for them to get along, I would:
A. Tell my friend that I felt s/he was partially responsible for any problems with this other person and try to let him/her know how the person was being affected by him/her.
B. Not get involved because I wouldn’t be able to continue to get along with both of them once I had entered into their conflict in any way.
2. If one of my friends and I had a heated argument in the past and I realized that s/he was ill at ease around me from that time on, I would:
A. Just let the whole thing drop to avoid making things worse by discussing it.
B. Bring up his/her behavior and ask how s/he felt the argument had affected our relationship.
3. If a friend began to avoid me and act in an aloof and withdrawn manner, I would:
A. Tell him/her about his/her behavior and suggest that s/he tell me what was on his/her mind.
B. Follow his/her lead & keep our contact brief & aloof since that seems to be what s/he wants.
4. If two of my friends and I were talking and one of them slipped and brought up a personal problem of mine that involved the other friend, of which s/he was not yet aware, I would:
A. Change the subject and signal my friend to do the same.
B. Briefly explain what the other friend was talking about and suggest that we go into it later.
5. If a friend of mine were to tell me that, in his/her opinion, I was doing things that made me less effective than I might be in social situations, I would:
A. Ask him/her to describe what s/he has observed and suggest changes I might make.
B. Resent his/her criticism and let him/her know why I behave the way I do.
6. If one of my friends aspired to an office in our organization for which I felt s/he was unqualified, and if s/he had been tentatively assigned to that position by the leader of our group, I would:
A. Not mention any misgivings to either my friend or the leader of our group and let them handle it in their own way.
B. Tell my friend and the group leader of my misgivings and leave the final decision to them.
7. If I felt that one of my friends was being unfair to me and his/her other friends, but none of the other friends had mentioned anything about it, I would:
A. Ask the other friends how they perceive the situation to see if they felt s/he was being unfair.
B. Not ask the others how they perceive our friend, but wait for them to bring it up with me.
8. If I were preoccupied with some personal matters and a friend told me that I had become irritated with him/her and others and that I was jumping on him/her for unimportant things, I would:
A. Tell him/her I was preoccupied and would probably be on edge for a while.
B. Listen to his/her complaints but not explain myself to him/her.
9. If I had heard some friends discussing an ugly rumor about a friend of mine which I knew could hurt him/her and s/he asked me what I knew about it, if anything, I would:
A. Say I didn’t know anything and tell him/her our friends wouldn’t believe ugly rumors anyway.
B. Tell him/her exactly what I had heard, when I had heard it, and from whom I had heard it.
10. If a friend pointed out that I had a personality conflict with another friend with whom it was important for me to get along, I would:
A. Consider his/her comments out of line and tell him/her I didn’t want to discuss the matter.
B. Talk about it openly with him/her to find out how my behavior was being affected by this.
Evaluate yourself and take the most out of it, try and make yourself capable and open to communications so that you emerge as the best of everyone.