Motivated people who are happy to contribute their knowledge and energy are what organizations need these days! When people are the biggest asset of a company in 2022, creating conditions for them to excel with joy and collaborate with passion is key. To focus on strengths rather than on weaknesses is one rewarding way to do so. Global player Red Bull developed and released a cool personality assessment in 2017 which focuses on strengths in work environments. We’ve tested it on our organization and with selected customers to collect results in this article.

Find out what the tool is about and why this strength assessment might be for you as a leader or HR professional.

In this article you find:

  1. What is Red Bull Wingfinder
  2. 5 reasons why it might be for you
  3. Wingfinder use cases for HR and leaders

What is Red Bull Wingfinder?

Red Bull Wingfinder is a free and online personality assessment. It’s based on 30 years of psychological research – strongly focused on what people are able to do best. The personality assessment gives insights into people’s individual powers in four key areas that were scientifically determined as key factors of professional success.

The four success dimensions of Red Bull Wingfinder: 

  • Connections: How do you manage relationships? And how do you manage yourself?
  • Creativity: How adaptable are you? How do you create alternatives and seek new information & experience?
  • Thinking: How able are you to reason abstractly? How do you react to complex challenges?
  • Drive: How’s your motivation, ambition, and self-discipline? How do you handle setbacks?
Red Bull Wingfinder

In each area, different strengths are located and compared to each other. There are 25 in total, which offers millions of unique combinations. Once the test is completed, each unique result comes automated to your e-mail inbox together with a detailed feedback report as well as a tailored coaching plan with ideas and action steps in order to develop your strengths even further. Another extra feature: On their website, Red Bull is offering a complex multi-media e-learning to dive into the topic of strength orientation.

Red Bull Wingfinder – At one glance

  • Online personality assessment
  • Fun strength test based on pictures and scenarios
  • Takes about 35 minutes to complete
  • Available in English, German, Spanish, Portuguese and Italian
  • Completely free of charge
  • Comes with a personalized feedback report & tailored coaching plan
  • Used worldwide by about 25.000 people a month

And here’s a quick backstory of the creation of Wingfinder: Long before Daniel Pink published his highly acclaimed book and concept on Drive-Motivation 2.0, Red Bull was already successfully implementing this strategy. Influenced by the Austrian Psychologist Viktor Frankl, the people at Red Bull from the very beginning designed the way of working around meaning, freedom, responsibility, and mastery, making sure that people understand their contribution to others and the overall purpose of the company. Providing a work environment in which people can work towards that meaning the way they want to. And, finally, having the opportunity to use their strengths to achieve both, individual and company goals. This is how Red Bull “Gives wings to people and Ideas”, probably one of the most famous company claims in the world. Wingfinder from this perspective seems a perfect exemplification of this motto as it helps people better understand their potential and find adequate workplaces where they can put their strengths to work.

Red Bull Wingfinder assessment questions – What makes it special?

Red Bull is worldwide known as the company that gives wings to people. Offering an entertaining and modern tool developed directly by them and completed by sports icons like World Champion skier Lindsey Vonn, fencer Miles Chamley-Watson or surf legend Carissa Moore immediately adds coolness and reputation to your development initiative. Of course, impact and usability for your corporate purpose must not run short with a tool you choose.

So, here are 5 more reasons why Wingfinder might be a beneficial ingredient for your next leadership development program or HR endeavor:

1. It’s fun and elevates candidate experience
People want to be supported in their daily challenges – but not in a tedious, old-fashioned way. Although e-learning isn’t the cure-all for the numerous challenges HR and L&D are facing today, it can be a very smart way to offer tailor-made online support to your people. Red Bull Wingfinder is a virtual tool to do so, providing big insights in an entertaining way. As an assessment based on pictures and special scenarios, it’s up-to-date with what people want to see in development initiatives.

2. It doesn’t put people in boxes
Taking assessments and personality tests can offer deep insights. At the same time, it bears the risk of putting people in boxes. Like: “Your result is A? You’re a total A-person!”, which is a pity as it absolutely negates the complexity of us human beings and is not favorable to individual development at all! Wingfinder results come on a scale. For example: Even if you hit a full score in the field of being diplomatic, the result won’t say: You’re a diplomatic person. Instead: On the scale from direct to diplomatic, you tend to behave diplomatically in most cases. That instantly opens up an otherwise narrow result while at the same time offering context and alternatives.

3. It’s hard to be manipulated
We all know these tests where we clearly sense which answer leads to which results, right? By offering pictures as answer solutions and creative scenarios with unexpected options to choose from, Red Bull Wingfinder is very intuitive and therewith hard to manipulate. Which in turn means that it has rather high validity.

4. Comparison with others
Wingfinder does not only reveal insights about the individual but also about one’s own strengths and behavior patterns compared to all the other people who did the test before.

5. Deep reporting
A key question for us in people development: What to do with a result, with an insight gained? Many online personality assessments leave you with a certain astonishment and agreement or disagreement towards the result. And then they end. Red Bull Wingfinder takes that one step further by offering the obligate feedback report but also a tailor-made coaching plan. With countless ideas of how to behave in a way that leads to even more desired results.

Red Bull Wingfinder tips – Use cases for HR & leaders

  • Wingfinder in recruiting & onboarding
    The assessment can be a beneficial resource in hiring by giving insights to questions like: Does a candidate contribute the qualities we need right now? Which team would be the perfect fit? And what do they need to really arrive in our company and are able to unfold their potential as soon as possible? Furthermore, it elevates candidate experience during the hiring process.
  • People leadership supported by Wingfinder insights
    Many leaders today are more than willing to support their people as good as they can. Only the HOW is often hard to define and complex to identify in busy working life. Having access to Wingfinder reports of your people and openly using them as a base for development and feedback talks can open a completely new dimension of leadership impact, motivation, and engagement.

  • Thomas Olesch explains WingfinderTeam building & team performance
    Teams are complex entities, and the more people contribute the harder dynamics are to name and address in the desired way. Using Wingfinder as a team tool opens ways for better understanding and therewith improved collaboration. For example, Wingfinder expert Thomas Olesch likes to advance the individual result scales (remember from above: where are you on the scale from direct to diplomatic?) with team scales. That way you have beautiful graphs showing things like: How many of us tend to communicate very direct? How many very diplomatically? Who is in-between? And most important: Based on that knowledge, which levers do we have to improve collaboration, communication, and our performance as a team?
  • People development
    As a professional in the field of people development, you most certainly know that assessments are a very good entry for people development programs and initiatives. Wingfinder is an entertaining and deep-dive tool to do so. For example, for new leaders who want and need to invest in their self-leadership skills. But at the same time, for very advanced leaders who already “did it all” when it comes to leadership workshops and therefore can need a fresh impulse.

And once more the reminder: The assessment is completely free of charge so you can start right now! You’d like to discuss in detail how Wingfinder can add value to your HR and L&D initiatives? Book a free call now!