Johari Window

Johari Window by Alec McPhedran

The Johari Window
 
The Johari Window is a psychological tool used to help people better understand their relationships with themselves and others. Alec McPhedran, creative arts coach and mentor, provides an introduction to the incredibly useful self awareness model.
 
Background to Johari Window
The Johari window is a psychological tool to help people better understand their relationships with themselves and others. Named after Joseph Luft and Harry Ingham having developed the model in 1955, is a window pane through which you can look at yourself, your character and your attributes. The window is a tool to illustrate the balance between what you and other people do or do not know about you. 
 
The Four Quadrants
The Johari Window is represented as a four-quadrant grid, divided based on the interplay between what is known/unknown to oneself and what is known/unknown to others.
 
Open Self
What is known about the person bout him/herself and is known by others.
Items known to yourself and known to others are referred to as being in the public arena, sometimes called the Open or Free Area. This is an area of confidence and all attributes of your character, being public knowledge, are known both by yourself and others.
 
Blind Spot
What is unknown by the person about him/herself but which ithers know.
This quadrant is hidden from you but open to others. It is where other people observe and form their own opinions about you. They can only give this information to you in the form of feedback. Once feedback has been given and shared, this knowledge then becomes public and the size of the public arena (top left) is increased.
 
Hidden self
What the person knows about themselves that others do not know.
In the bottom left corner, are matters you know about but others cannot see without your help. Your may choose to reveal these facts about yourself e.g. politics, beliefs, love, in which case they move into the public arena. The more you reveal about yourself the larger the public arena comes in the downward direction.
 
Unknown
What is unknown by the person about him/herself and is also unknown to others.
The bottom right hand box is unknown and unexplored territory, which reflects a lot of your personal potential.
 
Using the window
1. Workplace Team Building:
   - Facilitates better communication and collaboration.
   - Encourages feedback and reduces misunderstandings.
  
2. Personal Development:
   - Helps individuals gain insight into their behaviours and relationships.
  
3. Counselling and Therapy:
   - Aids in identifying unrecognized issues affecting mental health or relationships.
 
By engaging in feedback and self-reflection, the Johari Window encourages growth by making the Open Self Area larger, thereby improving interpersonal and intrapersonal dynamics.
 
As you extend your Unknown Area, through giving of yourself and receiving feedback you will discover some of your potential by challenging and revealing some of the unknown or potential quadrant. Using the window productively is a question of striking the right balance. If you reveal too much about yourself, you become transparent; if you do not reveal enough about yourself and refuse to accept feedback, you will have a small public arena which makes you a very private and difficult person to understand.
 
Alec McPhedran Chtd Fellow CIPD, Chtd Mngr CMI,  MCMI  is a creative arts coach and mentor. He helps emerging talent to develop and build on their aspirations. If you want to know more about Alec and his work, visit www.mcphedran.co.uk.

​Copyright © Alec McPhedran 2024