How I Use Radar Charts and AI to Build Balanced Teams (w/ Free Templates)

Download this template (AI)

I’ve played competitive sports for most of my life, and one principle I hold firm: companies shouldn’t be treated as a ‘family’ — they should function more like a sports organization. Sports teams balance camaraderie with performance, creating a culture where teammates support each other while pushing for excellence. My role as a leader is to ensure my team is not only performing but continuously growing — just like in sports, where constant assessment and refinement are key.

Radar charts are used to evaluate athletes in every team sport, and they’re my go-to tool for understanding individual and team strengths, spotting hidden skill gaps, and making smarter decisions about development and hiring. And, with a little help from AI, I can use this data to build personalized growth plans, quickly spot trends, and create customized self-assessments in seconds. AI allows me to analyze patterns that would take hours manually, ensuring the process is both efficient and precise.

Let me walk you through how it all works and give you a sense of the categories and attributes we assess to get a full picture of our team’s skillset.

Self-Assessments: The Starting Line

Once a year, during our annual reviews, I have the team complete a self-assessment via Google Form (Here’s the one I currently use, if you need a template). It’s straightforward: rate yourself on a scale of 1 to 5 across a series of craft, soft skills, business, and leadership competencies. These categories cover everything from visual design and UX understanding to collaboration and time management.

I choose the categories to reflect what I believe makes a well-rounded designer. It’s not just about how well you can design a sleek interface, but also how well you can think strategically, lead a team, work with others, and understand the business strategy driving our decisions.

Incorporating AI for Tailored Self-Assessments

AI helps streamline the form creation process, making it quicker to deploy and easy to adjust based on team needs. Here’s the prompt I use to create the Google form via Google Scripts: (Pro tip: I use Google Scripts for all kinds of stuff, from presentations and docs to calendar events)

Generate a Google Apps Script that creates a self-assessment Google Form with the following categories: Design Craft Attributes, Design Soft Skills, Business, and Leadership. Each category should have multiple questions rated on a scale of 1–5. Include descriptions for each section and a final section for additional comments. Include instructions for setting up the script in Google Apps Script, running it, and generating the form URL.

The Categories and Attributes We Assess

Here’s the breakdown of the key categories and attributes we measure, each with a brief description.

Design Craft Attributes

• Visual Design: How strong are your core skills in layout, typography, color theory, and overall aesthetics?
• Product Design: Do you understand product development and how to design features that meet user needs?
• Front-End Development: Do you have the technical chops to bridge design and code, particularly with HTML, CSS, or JavaScript?
• Prototyping: How effectively can you create interactive prototypes to communicate design ideas?
• Accessibility Design: Are you designing with inclusivity in mind, ensuring your work meets accessibility standards (e.g., WCAG)?
• Prototyping Tools Proficiency: How adept are you with prototyping tools like Figma, Sketch, or Adobe XD to create detailed, interactive designs?
• Interaction Design: Can you create engaging, user-friendly interactions that guide users through a product or service?
• Illustration: Can you create custom graphics and illustrations that enhance the user experience?
• Animation: How well do you bring designs to life through motion, making interactions more dynamic?
• Motion Graphics: Do you use motion graphics to communicate ideas more effectively in digital experiences?

Design Soft Skills

• UX Understanding: Do you have a solid grasp of user experience principles and how they apply to your designs, even if you’re not conducting user research yourself?
• Creative Thinking: How innovative are your design solutions when faced with complex problems?
• User Empathy: How well do you understand and design with the user’s needs, emotions, and pain points in mind?
• Research Knowledge: Do you understand key UX research methods, such as interviews and surveys, and can you interpret research findings effectively to inform your design?
• Adaptability to Feedback: Are you open to and capable of integrating feedback — whether from users, peers, or leadership — into your design process?
• Data-Driven Decision Making: How proficient are you at using user data, analytics, and research findings to inform your design decisions?
• Cross-Functional Collaboration: Can you work seamlessly with teams outside of design (e.g., research, engineering, product management) to ensure smooth project execution?
• Problem-Solving: How well do you creatively solve complex challenges, especially when faced with conflicting user data or project constraints?
• Time Management: How effectively do you balance deadlines, project loads, and deliverables without sacrificing quality?
• Communication: How effectively do you present your ideas, both in writing and in person, to different audiences?
• Emotional Intelligence: How well do you manage relationships, understand team dynamics, and handle the emotional aspects of collaboration and leadership?

Business

• Business Strategy: Can you align design goals with the broader business strategy to create value for both users and the company?
• Product Strategy: How well do you understand the product’s place in the market and design features that align with that strategy?
• Financial Strategy: How well do you understand the financial implications of design decisions and how to create cost-effective solutions?
• Market Knowledge: Are you familiar with market trends and how they impact your design decisions?
• Communication: How effectively do you present your ideas, both in writing and in person, to different audiences?
• Presentation Skills: Can you clearly and confidently present your work to stakeholders, clients, or the team?
• General Business Knowledge: Do you have a strong understanding of business fundamentals and how they influence design?
• Product Roadmap: Are you involved in planning and aligning design work with the broader product roadmap?
• Pricing: Do you consider pricing and value when designing features or products?
• Time Management: How effectively do you balance deadlines, project loads, and deliverables without sacrificing quality?

Leadership

• Vision: How clearly can you communicate a forward-thinking vision for your work and the team’s direction?
• Strategic Thinking: Do you think long-term, aligning day-to-day design decisions with broader business goals?
• Mentoring: Are you helping others on the team grow through advice, feedback, and sharing your experience?
• Project Management: How well do you plan, organize, and oversee design projects from start to finish?
• Experience: How many years of experience and breadth of projects have you accumulated in leadership roles?
• Emotional Intelligence: How effectively do you manage relationships, understand team dynamics, and handle the emotional aspects of leadership?
• Client/Stakeholder Management: How well do you communicate with clients or stakeholders and manage their expectations throughout a project?
• Innovation & Risk-Taking: Are you pushing boundaries and taking creative risks that could lead to new innovations for the team or product?

Incorporating Peer Feedback and Adjustments

The self-assessment is just the starting point. I don’t rely solely on an individual’s own perception of their abilities. After the initial self-assessment, I review each team member’s ratings alongside peer feedback collected throughout the year and my own observations. Sometimes, a teammate might be too modest about their skills, or conversely, overestimate their proficiency. By comparing their self-assessment to the feedback and my judgments, I make adjustments to create a more balanced and realistic representation.

From there, I use the Google Sheet of responses to create the radar chart. (learn more). The output looks roughly like this:

The initial radar chart in Google Sheets. View the actual sheet here.

From Google Sheets, I move into Illustrator to make them look nice and overlay them, but this is totally optional.

Presenting and Utilizing AI-Enhanced Radar Charts in Development

Once I’ve finalized the radar charts, I actively use them in one-on-one meetings and development discussions. AI assists in generating reports that compare a team member’s current performance with their previous assessments, highlighting progress and areas for improvement. This allows me to present a comprehensive view of their development over time.

During these sessions, we walk through the visual together, identifying areas of strength and growth opportunities. The AI-generated insights provide objective data, making it easier to align on development goals and create a roadmap for each individual’s growth. We discuss how their self-assessment, peer feedback, and AI-driven analysis align — or sometimes don’t — and what steps we can take to bridge any gaps.

The charts become a powerful tool for making development plans transparent and actionable. They’re not just a snapshot of where someone is today but a visual guide for where they can go next. By revisiting these charts in subsequent one-on-ones, we can track progress over time, adjust goals, and make sure each team member has the support they need to grow in their role.

Using AI-Driven Radar Charts in Team Planning and Hiring

Radar charts, enhanced by AI analysis, become invaluable tools for team planning and hiring. By visualizing each team member’s strengths and areas for growth, I can strategically plan for upcoming projects and assign tasks based on each person’s skills. If I notice a gap in a critical skill area, AI highlights team members who could be developed to fill that gap or suggests candidates with the required expertise based on previous hiring data.

When it comes to hiring, AI processes radar chart data to provide a clear map of the current team’s skill set. It suggests the specific skills and experiences needed in new hires, helping create targeted job descriptions and interview questions. It’s not just about filling a role; it’s about enhancing the team’s overall capabilities in a way that complements and strengthens the group.

Why This AI-Powered System Works

At the end of the day, this AI-enhanced process provides transparency and actionable data. Team members can see exactly where they stand, and AI-generated growth pathways give me a clear roadmap for helping them develop. AI streamlines the entire process, from data analysis to growth planning to hiring, allowing for quick adjustments and personalized development strategies.

Radar charts and AI aren’t just for data nerds — they’re tools that can transform your team’s development and keep everyone moving forward.