The 12 Driving Forces assessment measures the hidden motivators that explain why people do what they do at work. Published by TTI Success Insights, it identifies six core workplace motivators — each split into a high and low pole — producing twelve distinct driving forces that shape engagement, decision-making, and performance. Where personality tools capture how someone behaves, this motivation assessment reveals the fuel behind the behavior. When you understand what drives your people, you stop guessing and start matching the right roles, incentives, and conversations to what actually motivates them.
12 Driving Forces is a research-backed motivation assessment based on Eduard Spranger’s 1928 research. It measures six core motivators — split into twelve high/low poles — to reveal why people act, decide, and engage the way they do. After delivering 4,000+ workshops and training 30,000+ leaders, we can say this with confidence: motivation is the variable most teams ignore and most leaders misunderstand. That ends here.
Key Takeaways
- The 12 Driving Forces assessment measures why people act — not how — making it the missing half of most team diagnostics.
- Six motivators (Knowledge, Utility, Surroundings, Market, Power, Method) each split into two poles, producing twelve driving forces.
- Motivation and behavior are different systems. DiSC tells you how someone shows up; 12 Driving Forces tells you what fuels them.
- TTI Success Insights has trained 100,000+ certified administrators globally — a research-backed, proven instrument.
- Pairing 12 Driving Forces + DiSC delivers a complete picture — behavior plus motivation — and transforms team alignment.
- Practical application starts when you stop treating motivation as abstract and start using data to match people to what drives them.
The Research Behind 12 Driving Forces
Every motivators assessment for teams worth using stands on evidence, not trends. The 12 Driving Forces TTI assessment traces back to German philosopher and psychologist Eduard Spranger, who published Types of Men in 1928. Spranger proposed that human behavior is driven by six fundamental value systems — not random preferences, but deep cognitive filters that shape how people prioritize, decide, and engage.
His work identified six core attitudes: Theoretical, Economic, Aesthetic, Social, Political, and Religious. Each person ranks these values in a personal hierarchy. That ranking drives everything from career choice to conflict style.
TTI Success Insights refined Spranger’s framework for the modern workplace. Decades of applied research validated the six motivators. They split each one into a high pole and low pole, producing twelve driving forces — a more nuanced, actionable model than the original six alone.
This isn’t pop psychology. It’s anchored in nearly a century of research, tested across industries, and prescribed by OD professionals who need reliable data. We’ve delivered over 4,000 workshops — and we’ve learned a few things about what actually sticks.
The 6 Motivators and 12 Driving Forces Explained
Each of the six motivators exists on a continuum. The high pole represents a strong drive toward that value. The low pole isn’t a weakness — it’s a different motivational orientation. Both poles are productive. The problem arises when you match the wrong motivator to the wrong role.
| Cluster | Motivator (High Pole) | Driving Force | Motivator (Low Pole) | Driving Force |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Intellectual | Knowledge | Passion for learning, discovery, and truth | Instinct | Relies on intuition and experience over formal research |
| Resourceful | Utility | Passion for practical return, efficiency, and ROI | Selfless | Driven by service and giving without expectation of return |
| Harmonious | Surroundings | Passion for beauty, environment, and aesthetic balance | Knack | Values function and utility over form and appearance |
| Objective | Market | Passion for competition, influence, and measurable results | Harmony | Prioritizes consensus, peace, and collective wellbeing |
| Commanding | Power | Passion for authority, control, and directing outcomes | Compassion | Driven by empathy, support, and lifting others up |
| Structured | Method | Passion for systems, order, and proven processes | Belief | Guided by personal values, faith, and purpose beyond structure |
Read this table carefully. Notice the pairs. Knowledge and Instinct aren’t opposites in the conflict sense — they’re two ends of the same motivational spectrum. A high-Knowledge team member wants research. A high-Instinct team member trusts gut feel. Both can be right. Both can clash.
When you see why the clash happens, you can facilitate the conversation. That’s what amotivators assessment for teams makes possible.
How the Assessment Works in Practice
The 12 Driving Forces assessment is straightforward to administer. Here’s the process:
- Online delivery. Participants receive a secure link and complete the assessment from any device.
- Time commitment. The assessment takes 20–30 minutes. No proctoring required.
- Question format. Respondents rank statements and choose between paired descriptors. The forced-choice format prevents social desirability bias — people can’t easily game the results.
- Scoring. TTI’s algorithm maps responses to the six continua and positions each person across the twelve driving forces.
- Results. A detailed report shows each motivator’s intensity, the primary and secondary driving forces, and narrative descriptions for interpretation.
- Debrief. This is where the real value lives. A certified facilitator — not a software dashboard — helps the individual and team make meaning from the data.
We’ve seen too many organizations administer assessments and skip the debrief. That’s like running blood work and never reviewing results with the physician. The data without the conversation is incomplete. We prescribe facilitated debriefs because they validate the findings and equip people to act on them.
For teams ready to go deeper, our workshops walk you through the full interpretive process — not just your profile, but how your driving forces interact with your teammates’.
Why Motivation Matters More Than Personality
Here’s the distinction that changes everything: personality describes how you behave. Motivation describes why.
DiSC tells you someone is fast-paced and direct. The 12 Driving Forces assessment tells you why they’re racing — because they’re driven by Market (competition and results) or because they’re driven by Utility (efficiency and return). Same behavior. Completely different fuel.
When you only measure how, you get surface alignment. People learn style names. They adjust tone. They flex — and that’s useful. But it doesn’t explain the burnout, the disengagement, or the quiet quitting that starts when someone’s core motivators go unmet.
What motivates employees is not a personality question — it’s a motivation question. Consider three scenarios:
- A high-Method person in a freewheeling startup may feel unmoored — not because the team lacks skill, but because their driving force for structure is starving.
- A high-Selfless person in a hyper-competitive sales culture may disengage — not because they can’t sell, but because the reward system contradicts their core values.
- A high-Knowledge person stuck in rigid SOPs may leave — not for more money, but for more learning.
Motivation is the predictor personality misses. Research from Gallup shows that teams with high engagement are 21% more productive and 22% more profitable (Gallup, 2023). Yet most organizations still measure behavior and hope motivation sorts itself out. It doesn’t.
When we served as Head of Learning Consulting at Pearson, we saw this pattern across business units. The teams that thrived weren’t the ones with the “right” personality mix. They were the ones whose environment fed their driving forces.
If you’re only measuring behavior, you’re reading half the equation. The DiSC workshop gives you the behavioral half. Add 12 Driving Forces, and you get the full picture.
When Your Team Needs This Assessment
Not every situation calls for a motivation assessment. But specific scenarios — the ones that keep HR and people leaders up at night — demand it. Here’s when we prescribe the 12 Driving Forces assessment:
1. Team conflict that won’t resolve. You’ve done communication training. You’ve tried DiSC. People understand each other’s style. But the tension persists. Motivation conflict is often the invisible driver — two people with opposing Market and Harmony forces will clash over decision-making speed, even when they agree on the goal.
2. Mis-hires in leadership roles. The resume was perfect. The interview was strong. Six months in, the new VP is miserable and the team is fractured. When the role’s reward structure doesn’t feed the leader’s driving forces, performance collapses. A motivators assessment for teams used during hiring prevents this.
3. Post-merger integration. Two cultures. Two value systems. When you merge teams without understanding the underlying workplace motivators, you get attrition, not alignment. According to McKinsey, 70% of mergers fail to achieve expected synergies — and cultural misalignment is the leading cause (McKinsey, 2021). 12 Driving Forces gives both sides a shared language for what matters.
4. Engagement surveys that show decline but no clear fix. Engagement scores dropped. You know what changed. You don’t know why. Motivation data fills that gap — it shows which driving forces your culture currently rewards and which ones it’s starving. Only 32% of U.S. employees report feeling engaged at work (Gallup, 2024). Understanding motivators is how you move that number.
5. Coaching and development stalls. A senior leader hits a plateau. Behavioral coaching addresses style. But if their core motivators are misaligned with role demands, style coaching is cosmetic. You need to address the why.
6. Designing reward and recognition systems. One-size-fits-all rewards miss the mark. A high-Utility person wants tangible return. A high-Compassion person wants to see impact on people. A high-Knowledge person wants learning opportunities. Match the reward to the motivator. Research shows that customized recognition improves employee performance by up to 32% (Deloitte, 2023).
In every one of these scenarios, the 12 Driving Forces assessment doesn’t just describe the problem — it prescribes the intervention.
Pairing 12 Driving Forces with DiSC: The Complete Picture
If the 12 Driving Forces assessment measures why, and DiSC measures how, then combining them gives you the most complete picture of a person at work. This isn’t theoretical. It’s practical. And it’s the approach we recommend most often.
DiSC maps observable behavior across four dimensions: Dominance, Influence, Steadiness, and Conscientiousness. It’s fast, intuitive, and immediately actionable. But it can’t tell you why a high-D leader is driven by competition versus control — Market versus Power. It can’t explain why a high-S contributor stays loyal — is it Structure (Method) or Service (Selfless)?
12 Driving Forces fills that gap. Together, the two instruments answer the two questions that matter most on any team:
- How does this person show up and communicate? (DiSC)
- Why do they invest their energy where they do? (12 Driving Forces)
Here’s how the two compare:
| Dimension | DiSC | 12 Driving Forces |
|---|---|---|
| Measures | Observable behavior | Core motivation / values |
| Answers | How someone acts | Why someone acts |
| Framework | 4 styles (D, i, S, C) | 6 motivators / 12 driving forces |
| Time to complete | ~10–15 minutes | ~20–30 minutes |
| Best for | Communication, team dynamics, conflict style | Role fit, engagement, reward design, values alignment |
| Rooted in | William Marston, 1928 | Eduard Spranger, 1928 |
| Publisher | Multiple (Wiley, TTI, others) | TTI Success Insights |
| Combo benefit | Alone: style awareness | Alone: motivation insight |
| Together | Behavior + Motivation = Complete talent picture |
When we facilitate workshops that combine both instruments, the difference is immediate. People don’t just nod at their profiles — they connect the dots. A leader sees why their urgency (high-D + high-Market) overwhelms a team member who needs process (high-S + high-Method). The conversation shifts from “you’re too aggressive” to “our driving forces are pulling in different directions — let’s build a bridge.”
That’s the kind of conversation that transforms teams. Your driving forces aren’t a label — they’re a tool. And like any tool, they’re most useful when you know how to work with them, not just what they’re called.
Building a Motivation-Informed Team Strategy
Knowing your team’s driving forces is only the start. The real change happens when you build systems around what you discover. Here’s what that looks like in practice:
Hiring. Add 12 Driving Forces to your selection process. When you understand a candidate’s workplace motivators, you can evaluate whether the role, the team culture, and the reward structure will actually feed what drives them. Companies using structured assessment tools in hiring see 36% higher retention rates (SHRM, 2023).
Onboarding. New hires who understand their own motivators adjust faster. They can articulate what they need — and managers can meet those needs from day one instead of guessing for six months.
Team development. Use driving forces data to design team norms, meeting structures, and decision-making processes. A team with three high-Market members and two high-Harmony members needs a different decision cadence than one where everyone leans the same direction.
Conflict resolution. When two team members clash, driving forces data gives you a shared, neutral language. It moves the conversation from “you always do this” to “your Market driver pushes for fast decisions, and their Harmony driver needs consensus — how do we bridge that?”
Leadership coaching. Pair 12 Driving Forces with DiSC for coaching conversations. When a leader sees both their behavioral style and their motivational drivers, they gain clarity on why certain situations drain them — and what environments help them thrive.
The Everything DiSC on Catalyst platform integrates these insights into an ongoing tool your team can reference daily, not just during a workshop.
FAQ
What is the 12 Driving Forces assessment?
The 12 Driving Forces assessment is a motivation assessment published by TTI Success Insights. It measures six core motivators — each split into high and low poles — to reveal why people act, decide, and engage the way they do. It takes 20–30 minutes online.
How is 12 Driving Forces different from DiSC?
DiSC measures how people behave — their communication style and observable actions. The 12 Driving Forces assessment measures why — the underlying motivators and values that drive those behaviors. Together, they give you a complete picture.
What are the 6 motivators in 12 Driving Forces?
The six motivators are Knowledge, Utility, Surroundings, Market, Power, and Method. Each has a high pole (intensity toward the motivator) and a low pole (orientation away from it), producing twelve driving forces total.
How long does the assessment take?
The assessment takes approximately 20–30 minutes to complete online. Results include a detailed report showing motivator intensity, primary and secondary driving forces, and interpretive narratives.
Can 12 Driving Forces help with hiring?
Yes. When you understand a candidate’s workplace motivators, you can assess whether the role’s environment, reward structure, and culture will feed their driving forces. This prevents mis-hires caused by motivator-role mismatch — a gap behavioral interviews alone can’t fill.
Who publishes the 12 Driving Forces assessment?
The assessment is published by TTI Success Insights, which has certified 100,000+ administrators globally. The model is rooted in Eduard Spranger’s 1928 research and refined through decades of workplace validation.
Is the 12 Driving Forces assessment scientifically validated?
Yes. The assessment is grounded in Spranger’s nearly century-old research framework and has been validated through decades of workplace application by TTI Success Insights. It uses forced-choice methodology to reduce response bias.
About our facilitator: Dr. Rachel Cubas-Wilkinson, former VP at The Myers-Briggs Company and former Head of Learning Consulting at Pearson.
What to Do Next
You now have the framework. The 12 Driving Forces assessment gives you something personality tools can’t — the why behind the how. Six motivators. Twelve driving forces. A proven model anchored in nearly a century of research, published by TTI Success Insights, and validated across thousands of organizations.
When you understand what motivates employees, you stop managing symptoms and start addressing causes. You match people to roles that fuel them. You build reward systems that resonate. You facilitate conversations that resolve the conflicts style training alone couldn’t fix.
This is what personality-informed expertise looks like. We’ve spent our careers — from VP at The Myers-Briggs Company to Head of Learning Consulting at Pearson — helping organizations move beyond surface-level tools to assessments that actually transform team performance. We don’t push one tool. We prescribe the right one. With 7+ validated assessments in our toolkit, we match the assessment to your team’s specific challenge.
Ready to discover what’s really driving your team?
👉 Explore our workshops — facilitated sessions where your team discovers its driving forces and learns to work with them, not against them.
👉 Book a Free Strategy Call — tell us your team’s challenge, and we’ll prescribe the right assessment approach. No generic recommendations. Just proven tools matched to your situation.
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