Why the Conflict Dynamics Profile® (CDP) is a game changer for leadership and teams

Conflicts are inevitable – but how we respond to them determines cooperation, trust, and performance. The Conflict Dynamics Profile® (CDP) reveals precisely that: our emotions and the specific behaviors associated with them in conflicts. The CDP is a scientifically standardized and long-term evidence-based method.

What are the benefits of the CDP?

• Clarity about your own emotions and their effects on conflict behavior
• It reveals individual emotional triggers and behavioral patterns – both constructive and destructive, active and passive – and makes solution options and blind spots visible.
• More effective leadership: Leaders recognize how their reactions in conflicts influence dynamics among individuals and within the team, and how they can de-escalate and resolve conflicts.
• Strengthened team communication: Teams better understand why conflicts arise, escalate, or are resolved—and develop joint strategies.
• Improved conflict competence: Concrete recommendations for action turn conflict response from chance to skill. Conflict competence is widely regarded internationally as one of the top key competencies in collaboration and leadership.
• Prevention instead of escalation: The CDP identifies emotional triggers (“hot buttons”) and thus the stressors that have the greatest influence in conflicts and are therefore important for conflict resolution.
• Mediation instead of polarization: The CDP is more than just a profiling tool specializing in conflict competence (self-assessment to 360-degree feedback); it is also a diagnostic and development tool for individuals and teams. It has also been used successfully for years in concrete conflict and crisis intervention.
• Transformation of collaboration and leadership cultures: The CDP has also become a proven tool in transformation processes and in shaping leadership cultures in many countries.

✨ Why it is particularly effective

The CDP is not based on personality types, but on emotional triggers, their chains of effects on conflicts, and the associated observable behaviors. This makes it practical, developable, and immediately implementable.

For anyone who wants to take leadership, teamwork, and collaboration to the next level—a proven tool without frills and with clear results.

ILD goes Zortify

Yesterday, our ILD team was successfully qualified and certified in Zortify Profiling by Dr. Marcus Heidbrink in Berlin. The intensive session offered inspiring discussions among specialists, exciting content, and clear added value—both for our internal work and for our customers.

Zortify enables data-based, objective profiling and thus supports our work in the areas of analysis and development of cross-functional collaboration and effective leadership, as well as the associated establishment of modern leadership cultures.

We look forward to applying this new expertise directly in our projects. Thank you to Markus and his team – it was both an honor and a pleasure.

The 2025 awards season has come to a festive close! ✨

Out of several dozen submissions, 20 outstanding nominations made it to the final round. Yesterday in Berlin, the Institute for Leadership Dynamics (ILD) and its independent jury of experts selected the winners of the ILD Leadership Awards—and the decision was so close that there are two winners in each category.

Congratulations to all nominees, who were honored with medals, loud applause, and much appreciation from their mentors! Special congratulations go to this year’s winners of the ILD Leadership Award:

1. Future Leader: Myria Kanus (Stadler) and Hecham Nasser (BVG)
2. Impact Leader: Nils Köster (ViaMobility) and Heiko Leißling (Toll Collect)
3. Inspiring Leader: Christian Hauck (Heraeus Groupe) and Claudia Pohlink (Fiege Logistic)

The Leadership Dynamics Award (special prize/honorary prize from ILD) was presented to:

1. for transformation performance: P&O Team (Encericty AG)
2. for professional lifetime achievement: Frank Hörl (nextGenHospility)
3. for social and community engagement: Eckhard Baumann (strassenkinder e.V.)

The 5th ILD Leadership Awards ceremony has once again demonstrated:

• We make effective leadership visible.
• We share this passion with our volunteer jury and many others.

And they really do exist:

• good leadership – future leaders, impact leaders, and inspiring leaders
• teams that show how transformations can succeed
• people who inspire as (leadership) personalities, who are tirelessly committed to social causes for the good of humanity

We are already looking forward to 2026!

Change starts with your voice – use it!

Leadership evaluation. Staffing quality as a decisive success factor.

Today, the quality of leadership appointments is a decisive factor for the success of any organisation and is of particular importance in transformation processes. The question that managers are often so reluctant to ask themselves: ‘Have I filled my key positions with the best managers?’ And then honestly: ‘Yes or no? The question may not be easy to answer, but ‘hand on heart’: What is my role and responsibility as a manager? Depending on the role requirements, an appropriate professional competence and experience profile is sometimes good, sometimes perhaps not sufficient. For example, in the case of transformations. Our experience is that technical experts are still often placed at the head of transformations or people who take on this role as functionaries or whose personality and attitude are more in favour of preserving the tried and tested. The question then arises as to what could be achieved more effectively with a different line-up. There may often be a lack of alternatives. This makes it all the more important to conduct a development-orientated assessment that focuses on personal suitability, attitude to leadership and performance, key competencies in cross-divisional collaboration and leadership effectiveness. Conflict skills (dealing with resistance), emotion management (storytelling) and empowerment skills (winning others over to the path) should be diagnosed and developed, especially in transformation processes. When ensuring the quality of appointments to key positions in companies, it is therefore important to find a better balance between the necessary technical expertise, past biographical and performance data, the recognition of potential and the consistent assessment of key leadership skills.
However, one thing is certain: not every expert with excellent technical expertise is automatically a suitable manager. It is also no secret that wrong appointments not only cause immense economic costs, but in many cases are also no longer an acceptable way of finding, attracting and retaining good employees. What needs to be done? Put the issue of staffing quality at the centre of HR policy. Act more consistently – no compromise with people – and look for new solutions together with those affected with respect and appreciation. What does it take? Courage, a proactive approach to this conflict-prone challenge and, above all, scientifically sound diagnostics (profiling) and position assessment that focus on the development of the person in a suitable role (best fit / best placement). We speak here of ‘leadership evaluation’.