What is Diversity Icebreaker
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    Diversity Icebreaker®




Diversity Icebreaker is a new tool used in seminar training.  It helps participants find out more about the variety of personal styles and preferences when people communicate and work together in a team or in a multicultural environment. The method was developed by the Norwegian consultancy organisation Human Factors in 1998 and has been used around the world since then. There was a growing interest in the last years and the questionnaire has been translated into 18 languages , including Bulgarian.

The key element of the method is a test which is easy to use and is a more positive alternative to Myers Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI), TMP and Belbin Team Roles. There are also a number of exercises (workbook) developed to introduce the key concepts in the questionnaire and to ensure that seminar participants create a shared understanding of the meaining and importance of these concepts and how they can be applied. Download the workbook in pdf format in Bulgarian / English.

Diversity Icebreaker questionnaire is used worldwide in team development, kick-off seminars, project training, management development programmess, change management processes, communication and diversity training. The tool creates a safe psychological climate to share ideas of differences between people, cultures and organisational units. Feedback from both participants and consultants is very positive.

Diversity Icebreaker is easy to use for consultants and trainers:
 - No certification seminar for consultants and trainers is needed;
 - people fill in the questionnaire in 10 minutes in the seminar;
 - when using the method the only cost is buying the questionnaire, no other fees or payments.
 
Aha Moments is the official representative of Diversity Icebreaker for Bulgaria. We organise seminars for consultants and trainers to help them get familiar with the tool and its application. Find out more about the questionnaire and how you can byu it.


Testimonials after using the Diversity Icebreaker tool

"And believe me, when you see the President of a major Chinese retailer laughing and immersing himself in the exercise, you know you have a winner. GOOD WORK."

"A tool that is easily applicable, and that does not focus on the requisition of having an academic degree to understand how to use it, and is easily available to most people."
 
"The constructs work, and the participants identify with them"

"It is fun to share with each other what we think of each other"
 
"One of the advantages of Diversity Icebreaker is that it is value neutral. The colours are not hierarchical..."

"Typically, after we have run the Diversity Icebreaker in a group, then everybody walks around and talks about blue, red and green, and that you are blue, and I am green and so on, in weeks after. It is really an eye-opener."

"We get to use the tool in such a way that we focus on the strengths in the group, one discovers the strengths of the others, because one gets a new language to talk about this."

"I believe the constructs work, people identify with them and use them later, I have heard 'It is a Blue way of doing it', 'Yes, here we need a Green process". I like to use Diversity Icebreaker relatively early to create a tribal language"

"It is a strategy to manage diversity" 

"Very fast there is a in-out group thinking. We in the green group, we are like this"

"Because we have a strong focus on multidimensionality, you have different strength that maybe will be salient in different contexts. You can switch and vary, and use your strengths."

"One views each other in a different way. How things are here with us and how we can contribute in making each other good"

"They (participants) give very good feedback on that they have acquired a way to discuss the organisation. A way that is different and useful"

"It makes some conflicts easier to understand. And along with understanding you accept the differences. For example, some can be frustrated by somebody being pedantic in a group. Or somebody being hasty - OK we have different preferences and it has different advantages and disadvantages in different settings and that can result in inbuilt conflicts. Then it is not so important anymore, so it is a way to manage conflicts. A part of the idea behind managing diversity is to prevent conflicts."

Diversity Icebreaker has been translated into the following langauges

English (US) 

English (UK)

Italian

Spanish

German

Dutch

French

Russian

Swedish

Danish

Finnish

Norwegian

Japanese

Chinese

Hebrew

Arabic

Bulgarian