
In short, the answer is yes. All behaviour happens for a reason, so it’s really useful to understand the triggers and/or possible purpose behind why people behave in the way they do.
Let’s first take a moment to recognise that people are complex. Human behaviour is influenced by so many different things, and everyone is built uniquely. Imagine trying to capture and create a master list of all the distinct personalities and behaviours – we’d be there forever and still miss lots because you just don’t know what you don’t know. Appealing to each of these individual traits will be hard to get it right every time unless you have the gift of being a mind reader and knowing what’s coming before you experience it.
However what we can do is look more broadly by using generic personality mapping tools to help guide you. A great starting point is looking to understand the behaviours your tenants display as their way of expressing a need:

When people behave in a way that challenges, we need to question why they’re behaving in this way. Consider where that behaviour comes from and what the message behind this might be. That will give you a better understanding on how to respond, and as a result, help deliver a more rewarding outcome for your tenants.
But given we don’t spend every hour of every day having 1-2-1 moments with multiple tenants, how can you even get close to understanding behaviours?
Mapping Tenant Behaviours
To keep things simple, established mapping tools are useful to understand how someone presents themselves to you, and where they are in their relationship with you.
Over time you will begin to see more of a pattern in behaviours and triggers which will help to determine how to reduce the frequency of any issues, and also better manage and recognise those that support the organisational values and beliefs.
Be careful to manage your expectations. Inevitably these patterns will change; the key in ensuring these change in the way you need, to deliver the outcomes you desire.

Talking With The Right Narrative
When it comes to ‘talking’ to tenants, knowing if your interactions are relational or transactional will support you with your communications efforts. Information sharing and story telling is an art form in itself, but knowing how your tenants feel about you in the first place will help you create the right narrative.
Tenants who are passive in their interactions will need some convincing, whereas active tenants will be engaged with your organisation and more responsive to benefits and new features in service you bring to them.
Personality traits are a contributing factor to understanding behaviours so starting with this knowledge will guide you in your marketing content planning. That feeling of connection and interaction is essential to storytelling.
We used theory to create a simple model which will help you get closer to understanding your tenant behaviours.

We all want and need motivated and engaged tenants to achieve the right results. Understanding tenant behaviours is a great starting point that enables you to think about what practical solutions can be created to help meet the personal and business objectives.
Driving Long Term Engagement
There is no doubt that having engaged and motivated residents is a win-win for everyone. Happier tenants who are keen to be inclusive, will strive for collaboration in order to achieve a better living environment. This in turn delivers better results for your Housing Association. Utilise the many mapping tools readily available to give your planning process a valuable kick start, and recognise and reward the behaviours that help achieve objectives.
Afterall, happy tenants leads to happy communities.