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The History and Development of the SDI 2.0
I have been working full-time with the SDI since 1995 and have contributed to its development and utility through research, authorship, and application. Given my role, people often ask if I am the founder or creator. I am not. That distinction rightly belongs to Elias Porter, or “Port” as his friends called him. I have assumed the mantle of SDI development, and someday that mantle will pass to someone else. I never had the opportunity to meet Porter, but I do know one word that says a lot about him: Blue (shorthand for his Altruistic-Nurturing Motivational Value System). He wanted to help people and was not overly concerned about getting credit for his work. The more I learned about him, his Relationship Awareness Theory, and the SDI, the more I became convinced that his modesty and desire to help others succeed caused him to become an overlooked figure in psychology. This is the story of the SDI 2.0, so named to reflect its evolution since Porter created it. The SDI 2.0 is now a single assessment that produces four interrelated views of a person:
Motivational Value System – a personality type when things are going well.
Conflict Sequence – a personality type when experiencing conflict.
Strengths Portrait – a ranking of productive strengths used at work.
Overdone Strengths Portrait – a ranking of non-productive strengths used at work.
But this is not just a story of a product; it is a story of people interacting with each other and the social forces of their times. I am both the narrator and an actor in this story. I use the first person when I narrate my own involvement or add personal observations. I wrote this article because I realized that I was the sole keeper of an “oral history” of the SDI. I wanted to commit the facts to writing and hoped that the story would be interesting for anyone who uses the SDI 2.0. Let’s rewind the clock a bit and get started.
