I have been fortunate enough to supervise hundreds of individuals in their daily work over the last fifteen years.  This has afforded me the opportunity to learn from many mistakes including underestimating the power and the potential of the Yellow personality type.  The reality—if the Yellow finds joy in their work, they can and often will be stars!

To understand why the Yellow personality is often underestimated and even misunderstood, we’ll take a brief look at the Red, Blue and White under a critical but common work condition—stress caused by heavy and challenging workloads.

The Red: This personality will put her nose to the grindstone; many a brow has been furrowed and never a smile has been cracked by the Red in this situation.  Everything becomes “act now, ask questions later.”  This personality often expects everyone else to close their mouths and move their hands and anyone not doing so must simply be irresponsible.

The Blue: This personality gets very serious and the worry begins to pile up quickly.  The Blue will often do a “deep-dive” into all that can, might, and (in their mind) will go wrong.  Anyone who doesn’t sympathize with them “just doesn’t care” —according to the Blue.  Then the Blue will probably begin to plan how to dig himself out of the hole he perceives himself to be in.  This planning process can be intense and exhaustive.

The White: The White will commonly react one of two ways.  The first way, if they are not in charge of things, is that they will retreat into their own space and put on some headphones and close a door.  The second, if they are in charge of things, is that they will in a very calm, collected and focused way analyze the circumstances and take swift and simple action to remove or mitigate the offending stressors, usually without too much discussion or explanation unless someone asks “why?”.

These are commonly what the Red, Blue and White do, and expect from others.  Clearly the Yellow is the odd duck out.  The other colors all get serious and focused but the Yellow goes the other direction.  Their instincts tell them to first lighten things up, help those around them relax – it’s much more enjoyable to deal with a heavy work load when you’re relaxed and laughing while you’re working.   They want to get creative with solutions, or make work a game because that’s a fun way to approach challenges.   So, on the surface, the Yellow appears to be “wasting time” (says Red), that he or she “just doesn’t care” (says Blue) or is an “unfocused distraction” (says White).   The result: the Yellow is often misunderstood, underestimated and disregarded.

Now let’s learn how to leverage the natural strengths of the Yellow in challenging work times.

The first thing we must do is value the way they do things.  We must accept that just because they’re smiling and laughing, it doesn’t mean they aren’t working hard – in fact, they are usually working at their peaks when they are smiling and laughing.

The next thing we can do is to leverage them in the right situations:

• Give them freedom within boundaries for best results.
• Seek their input when “outside the box” problem solving is required.  They are creative thinkers and relish an opportunity to ignore standard protocol.  It’s like a puzzle to them!
• Utilize their natural gifts at livening up a crowd—make them the emcee of an event, give them the responsibility of leading a companywide meeting, put them in charge of social and community out-reach.
• Give them the reins when a flashy, high-impact, high-energy business presentation is needed.
• Insert them into a team that doesn’t have a yellow. Without a Yellow, things get serious fast and just get more serious from there.
• They are amazing at sales if they believe in the product.  They’ll bring energy and positivity to the selling cycle.
• If you have a Yellow leader that has already proven him/herself, they are the most natural at implementing change.  Change is difficult for many (think Blue, White, Red if they disagree) and the Yellow will most easily communicate the positives of change and their enthusiasm is infectious.
• The Yellow can be very effective at delivering important announcements, especially if she is allowed to write the announcement herself.  They are very genuine people and audiences can feel and respond positively to that.
• Pay attention, you never know what a Yellow will find fun or joyful.  When they do find it, they will become stars. (I know a Yellow who is a secondary white that loves filing papers!!)

The last thing we must do is recognize and appreciate their impact and their value.  They experience life through their emotions. When they sense our appreciation, it becomes a joyful experience for them which leads them to want to repeat their performance.  Think of joy as fun and it all makes sense.

So it comes down to this: 1) Value their way, 2) leverage them in the right situation, 3) and appreciate their contribution.

Let me leave you with a story of a close friend that was underestimated. He worked in a sales-driven company and he hit a glass ceiling.  He was passed over for promotion several times.  The feedback he got was that he was good at the job, got great results and people liked him, but he just wasn’t serious enough. No surprise, he eventually left after feeling under appreciated. He became a realtor and in one year’s time became the second leading sales person in all of America for single-family homes in his company that has thousands of realtors across the country. Over 60 homes in less than 12 months sold!!  He loves house hunting, he finds joy in helping others, and he sees the potential in every home.   His broker valued his style, leveraged his personality and appreciated his accomplishments. CC

Derek Pangelinan (core Red, with a Blue secondary) specializes in Talent and Leadership Development and Leadership Training for Fred Meyer Stores, a division of The Kroger  Co.  Fred Meyer was just voted as the #4 Top Large Work Place in Oregon (The Oregonian Newspaper).  His wife and two boys are all Yellow.