Belbin Reports
The Belbin Test: What It Is and How to Take It
Most people arrive at this page looking for a “Belbin test”. What Belbin actually produce is a Self-Perception Inventory: a short questionnaire about how you work, which becomes a report describing the contributions you make to a team.
There are no right answers and no score, so it’s not a test. That is worth understanding before you start, because it may change the way you perceive Belbin and the way you use it.
What you actually do
You complete the Self-Perception Inventory online. It presents a series of statements about how you behave at work - how you approach a problem, what you do in a meeting, what colleagues can rely on you for - and asks you to distribute points across the options that fit you best.
It takes most people ten to fifteen minutes to complete. There is no time limit and nothing to revise for. The questionnaire is about recognising your behavioural style, so your instinctive answers are usually more accurate than overly considered ones.
Why it is not a test in the usual sense
A test implies a pass, a fail, or a score to be beaten. A Belbin report has none of those. It does not measure ability, intelligence or personality, and no Team Role is better than another. What it describes is the contribution you tend to make when you are working with other people.
While Belbin reports may be often referred to as a psychometric report, they are not a psychometric test of the traditional kind. Our FAQs set out the difference in more detail, and the Team Roles versus Personality page explains why behaviour and personality are not the same thing.
Because Belbin is not a test, you cannot “fail it” nor prepare for it. What you should do is answer the way you actually behave rather than as you would like to, to give the most accurate result.
Is there a free Belbin test?
Not an official one. A Belbin report is produced by Interplace, Belbin’s own reporting system, and it is a licensed product - so any site offering a free Belbin test is either using someone else’s questionnaire or reproducing Belbin’s without permission. Results from those are not Belbin results and may be in breach of trademark and copyright laws.
What is genuinely free is some of the thinking behind it. Our free downloads include a one-page summary of all nine Team Roles, Belbin Team Roles in a Nutshell, the Team Wheel and a guide to reading a report - no charge and no email required. The nine Team Role pages describe every role in full, and the FAQs answer most of what people ask before they buy.
If what you want is your own profile properly, and not just an understanding of the Belbin model, the Individual Report is £49 plus VAT.
What the report tells you
Your Individual Report ranks all nine Team Roles by how strongly they describe you, and explains the top roles in plain language: what you bring, where colleagues are likely to rely on you, strengths and allowable weaknesses.
Most people contribute through three or four Team Roles rather than one.
How accurate is a Belbin Report?
The way you think you behave and how colleagues perceive your behaviour are not always the same. That difference is understood through the completion of Observer Assessments: people who work with you complete a short form, five to ten minutes each, and their view is combined with your own to give a wider perspective.
We normally recommend asking around four to six observers to give a more rounded picture. Four is the minimum needed before an Observer Report can be produced.
A report built on self-perception alone is still useful, but it is limited to one person’s view of themselves, and having an observed version can help improve the way we see ourselves.
How reliable is it?
Belbin Team Role theory was developed after nine years of research at Henley Management College and has been further developed over more than forty years since. Report reliability and validity are strongest where Observer Assessments are included alongside self-perception.
Behaviour is not fixed. A change of role, team or organisation can shift which contributions you make, so a report is usually worth revisiting every eighteen months to two years.
How to get your own Belbin Report
- Order an Individual Report. We send you a link to the Self-Perception Inventory.
- Complete it online, in about ten to fifteen minutes.
- Add Observer Assessments if you want the fuller picture, and we will send the feedback questionnaires to colleagues you nominate.
- Your final report is sent to you, accompanied by our free guide to reading and using it.
If you are looking at Belbin for a whole team rather than one person, a Team Report builds on the individual ones and shows the team’s balance in a single picture.
Because we are the Licensed Belbin Distributor for Scotland, you can be confident in knowing you are buying from an approved source.
If you need any further support, or you want to run a session to talk through the results, we can help.
Ready to Find Out Your Team Roles?
An Individual Report is £49 plus VAT, with observer feedback as a free option if you want it.