Drawing up a psychological portrait of a criminal in the footsteps at the crime scene – thanks to foreign TV shows, most people know exactly this about profiling. However, profilers also investigate economic crimes and help improve the atmosphere in the team. We have spoken to these experts.
Have you ever heard of profiling? No wonder: this direction appeared in Russia not so long ago, at the end of 2010. Before that, it was possible to speak separately about psychology, personality typology, lie detection, biology of human behavior as components of the future direction.
The word itself was borrowed from the special services of Israeli airports: it was there that they first began to use a complex for assessing and predicting human behavior in order to determine whether a particular passenger poses a threat to others.
The task of the profiler is to quickly determine the type of personality of a person, to identify his strengths and weaknesses
However, modern profiling – including those used in Russia – is much wider. It helps to assess the condition of any person, draw up his character portrait, and also give a reliable assessment of what the person says.
We met with the leaders of the first profiling research center Alexander Milovanov and Svetlana Grunina.
IF SOMETHING GOES WRONG
According to Alexander Milovanov, one of the most popular requests today is to assess and change the psychological climate in the team. “Most often, the head of the company or the owner of the business understands that because of one or more employees, the situation in the entire department or department is “lame”.
For example, an employee (often a leader) is prone to pessimism and suppresses his colleagues and subordinates, or spreads gossip, arranges provocations. And often he or she does it unconsciously: these are character traits that a person himself may not even be aware of.
The specialist can tell the management to which department it is worth transferring the employee so that he “opens up” as much as possible
The task of a specialist in this case is to quickly determine the type of person’s personality, identify his strengths and weaknesses in order to “smooth the corners”, help the employee start working more efficiently.
Sometimes, on the basis of the analysis, it turns out that a person is simply “not in his place” and is busy with “not his own business”. In this case, the profiler can tell the management to which department or to which position the employee should be transferred so that he “opens up” as much as possible, and the company receives the maximum benefit.
So, for example, in the course of communication, specialists find out that the head of the sales department with depressive-sad character traits, who demotivated his subordinates, is extremely pedantic, scrupulous and attentive to numbers, loves to write reports. As a result, he is transferred to the financial department, and in his place they take a person who knows how to charge and maintain the team spirit of the “salespeople”.
Often profilers are invited to investigate economic crimes and incidents within companies.
It happens that the problems lie in the behavior of the owner himself. Work in this case is slower and harder: often a person is not ready to admit his mistakes. And in this case, realizing that there will be no positive dynamics, profilers may refuse to work.
Other common reasons for refusal, according to Svetlana Grunina, are that the client refuses to provide enough information to conduct a study or initially puts forward impossible conditions: dictates what exactly he wants to see in the report.
INVESTIGATION LEAD
Profilers are often called in to investigate economic crimes and incidents within companies.
“It turned out that in the regional offices of a large Russian company there are “kickback” schemes,” says Svetlana Grunina. – The head of the logistics department fell under suspicion. The company invited a polygraph examiner from outside. He conducted a polygraph test and gave a conclusion: the head was involved, he knew about what was happening and took the money.
But still, something kept the owners from making a final decision. They turned to us, and we found out that this leader is a certain type of person, with a great thirst for recognition, with a desire to be accepted in society. In the regions, this was intuitively guessed, they gave him a truly royal reception, and he did not delve into what was happening at all. Accordingly, his actions are qualified as negligence, and this is a completely different article.
Profilers are also invited when you need to make a choice between several applicants for a position
If the company’s security officers do not have enough information about who could have committed, for example, theft, profilers can first draw up a character portrait, describe what kind of person could do this, what characteristics and qualities he must have for this.
Profilers are also invited when it is necessary to make a difficult choice between several candidates for a promotion or to approve an applicant for a responsible position.
“The owner wanted to invite a very talented and experienced financier to the company,” says Svetlana. – However, in his past there was one serious “but”: several fraud cases were opened against him. All charges were dropped, but this could not but alert the security service. We were invited to take a look.
They need to quickly “read” the interlocutor: his posture, gestures, mimicry, how and what he says
We met with a man of high intelligence, a brilliant communicator, and in doing so, we quickly realized that he was extremely risk-addicted. At the same time, appreciating his own intellect, he did not put his life and health at risk: he did not jump with a parachute, did not go in for other extreme sports. He received adrenaline in a different way: he participated in illegal schemes.
We gave the owner feedback: yes, he is a strong specialist, but working with him can be fraught with unpleasant consequences.”
A separate area is bank profiling: what type of personality are people who most often do not repay loans, and how to talk to a person so that he repays a loan.
LET ME TEACH
It is tempting to learn how to quickly determine the type of personality of a colleague, partner or client, not to hang a pre-prepared label, but to see a set of qualities and characteristics, which means it is tempting to start communicating differently.
Most students come to profiling courses, which are taught not only by expert profilers, but also by psychophysiologists, behavioral biologists, graphologists, guided by professional interests. Among the students are psychologists, polygraph examiners, HR specialists. All of them need to quickly “read” the interlocutor: his posture, gestures, mimicry, how and what he says.
Of course, there are written tests for this, but studies show that even verified questionnaires give 40% false information. And this is not surprising: we all tend to give socially expected answers, we strive to look better.
Each person is strong in his character and at the same time limited. This is the most important truth
The profiler reads even what a person would prefer to hide, and the probability of a “hit” is at least 90%. In addition, a person understands why his relationship with others did not really stick.
“A woman manager came to us for one of the first courses,” says Svetlana. She showed only two emotions: anger and disgust. Gradually, in the classroom, she began to smile, and one day she came and said: you changed my life! I may not be investigating at work, but my relationship with the team has changed, I have ceased to experience stress. Improved relationships with colleagues.
“It is important to understand that there are no bad types of people,” emphasizes Alexander Milovanov. – As the psychotherapist and psychiatrist Mark Burno said, each person is strong in his character and at the same time limited. This is the most important truth.”