A psychometric instrument for identifying team roles
For each section, tick one, two, or three sentences that are most applicable to you. Do not tick more than three choices per section.
Once you have made your choices, allocate exactly 10 points between the sentences you have ticked. The distribution should reflect how strongly each applies to you — for example, 7 and 3, or 5 and 5. You must use all 10 points in each section.
It is highly unlikely in any section that you will allocate all ten points to a single choice.
Answer by describing your actual behaviour, not the behaviour you would like to have. There are no right or wrong answers — all choices are equally important.
About the questionnaire
This instrument was devised by Dr Meredith Belbin and first published in Management Teams: Why They Succeed or Fail (1981). It emerged from research conducted at Henley Management College, where Belbin and his colleagues observed teams competing in business simulations over many years.
The central finding was that a team's effectiveness depended less on the raw ability of its individual members and more on the balance of behavioural roles within it. Highly intelligent teams, for instance, often performed poorly because everyone competed to contribute ideas rather than attending to the practical and interpersonal work that makes a team function.
The four core propositions
Belbin's theory rests on four claims: that eight distinct management styles — team roles — can be identified; that individuals naturally gravitate toward one or two of these roles consistently; that these tendencies can be measured psychometrically; and that certain combinations of roles produce more effective teams than others.
Crucially, team roles are distinct from functional roles. A doctor, an engineer, and a marketing manager might all be natural Shapers, or all natural Plants. The role describes how someone contributes to a group, not what their job is.
The eight team roles
Inward- and outward-facing roles
The eight roles divide into four that are primarily oriented toward the world outside the team, and four concerned with the team's internal functioning. Outward-facing roles tend to score higher on dominance in psychometric tests.
| Outward-facing | Inward-facing |
|---|---|
| Chairman | Company Worker |
| Plant | Monitor Evaluator |
| Resource Investigator | Team Worker |
| Shaper | Completer/Finisher |
Interpreting your results
Most people have one or two dominant roles and one or two secondary roles. The absence of a role in your profile does not mean you cannot perform those functions — it means you are likely to find them less natural, and may overlook them under pressure. In smaller teams, individuals regularly cover two roles simultaneously.
Belbin emphasised that all roles are equally valuable. A team composed entirely of Plants and Shapers may appear brilliant but will be outperformed by a balanced combination that includes the less conspicuous roles responsible for organisation, evaluation, and cohesion.
Based on your self-perception scores across the seven sections
| Team role | Abbreviation | Score |
|---|