Meet the founder
Shawn Taylor
Creator of the story-based DISC assessment
He had the idea in his truck on the drive home. By 3:14 the next morning, the first story-based DISC assessment in the world was working code.
Shawn Taylor is the creator of the story-based DISC assessment: full-length pick-your-path storybooks in which the decisions a reader makes inside the story produce their DISC personality profile. He founded The Assessment Library, the first company built on this method, with story-based assessments for adults and kids and third-party observer versions that reveal how others expect a person to behave.
The night it started
On March 7, 2025, Taylor, a software engineer inside the assessment industry, sat through marketing meetings about a question the industry has never solved: how do you get people to take a standard DISC assessment even once a year? He knew the deeper problems by heart. Traditional tests are one-and-done. Answers can be steered: if you want to score as a leader, you can tell exactly which boxes to check. And when the data underneath is soft, no report can fix it.
The answer arrived that evening in his truck on the drive home: stop asking people to describe themselves, and let them show who they are through the choices they make inside a story. Not one test taken once, but a shelf of stories readers come back to, each one adding honest evidence to a profile that grows over time.
He walked in the door and started writing. At 3:14 AM on March 8, 2025, the first story-based DISC assessment existed as working code. The file was named for his son's birthday. The story inside it, Allie's Professional Journey, was named for his daughter.
Three days on paper
The first night proved the concept. It also exposed the problem that should have killed it: in a story where every decision branches four ways, a 10 to 20 question assessment balloons toward a thousand pages. Taylor solved it the way a carpenter would. He printed the story, spread the pages out, and physically rearranged questions and branch options by hand for three days until he found a structure that lets a branching story stay book-sized without the reader ever feeling the walls. That structural formula remains a trade secret, and it is the foundation every book in the library is built on.
A builder's path
Taylor's road to assessment science was anything but standard. He worked as a union carpenter in Kansas City, designed disc golf courses, ran a recording studio, served as a city councilman, and restored old cars, motorcycles, and homes, all while writing books and short stories on the side. That combination of builder's craft and storyteller's instinct landed him in the assessment industry in 2023 as a software engineer at Assessments 24x7, one of the field's most established companies, co-founded by his father-in-law, DISC pioneer Dr. Tony Alessandra, where he still works today.
The Assessment Library was built around that day job: nights, weekends, and the occasional 3 AM commit. It launched publicly on July 4, 2026, sixteen months after the first line of code, with a library of story-based assessments for adults and kids.
"I have spent more than fifty years in the DISC assessment world, and I had never seen anything like what Shawn built. The story-based DISC assessment is his invention, conceived and created entirely on his own with no help from me or Assessments 24x7."
"The Assessment Library is entirely Shawn's creation, developed independently on his own time and separate from his work with Assessments 24x7. While our company has long focused on traditional DISC assessments, Shawn saw an opportunity to create something different and brought that vision to life on his own. Assessments 24x7 has no ownership or claim to the Assessment Library, but we are proud to support Shawn and recognize the creativity, initiative, and innovation behind what he has built."
The first reader was nine years old
The first person in the world to read a story-based DISC assessment was Taylor's son, then nine. He did what kids do: he skipped ahead, clicking through without really reading. That turned out to be one of the most valuable things that ever happened to the product. Taylor built the defense before there was ever a customer to cheat: the assessments track how long a reader spends on every question and answer, report that timing to parents and educators, and if click-through behavior is detected, the assessment will not complete and observers are notified.
His kids have shaped the library ever since. His son beta tests the books, contributes ideas, and has drawn sidekick characters. When it came time to design the character lineup for the four DISC traits, Taylor let his kids decide: his son chose every boy character and his daughter chose every girl one. And the mission grew from his own house: a boy who would not read became a boy who reads, because the books watch what you choose and the next story is always waiting on the shelf.
The record
Key dates in the creation of the story-based DISC assessment.
- March 7, 2025 The idea arrives on the drive home from a day of marketing meetings about one-and-done assessments.
- March 8, 2025, 3:14 AM The first story-based DISC assessment is committed as working code: Allie's Professional Journey.
- March 8 to 11, 2025 The branching structure is solved on paper over three days. The formula remains a trade secret.
- October 2, 2025 The library takes shape: a second story, Shane's Day at the Park, joins the shelf.
- November 4, 2025 The Assessment Library is founded as its own platform.
- July 4, 2026 Public launch, with a growing library of story-based DISC assessments for adults and kids.
Meet yourself in a story
The method is simple to experience: step into a story that reads you back. Your first assessment is free.
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