3 Assessments to Uncover Your Personal Talents Explained: Assessment 3

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This is a third post in 3 post series on how to discover personal talents through self-assessments.

First post covered Kolbe assessment.  Second post is about Strength Finder 2.0

Today we will cover Myers-Briggs Type Indicator(MBTI)

First who invented the theory of personality types was Carl Gustav Jung. He is the founder of Analytical Psychology. Jung emphasized the importance of balance and harmony. He cautioned that modern people rely too heavily on science and logic and would benefit from integrating spirituality and appreciation of unconscious realms.

He considered the process of individuation necessary for a person to become whole. This is a psychological process of integrating the conscious with the unconscious while still maintaining conscious autonomy. Individuation was the central concept of Analytical Psychology.

Jung collaborated with Sigmund Freud and they supported each others theories. In Jung’s famous book “The Psychology of Unconscious” he introduced different from Freud’s views on unconscious and their professional relationship ended.

Myers-Briggs Type Indicator assessment designed to measure psychological preferences in how people perceive the world and make decisions. These preferences were extrapolated from the typological theories originated by Carl Gustav Jung, as published in his 1921 book “Psychological Types“.

From Wikipedia:

Katharine Cook Briggs and her daughter, Isabel Briggs Myers were original developers of the personality inventory. They began creating the indicator during World War II, believing that a knowledge of personality preferences would help women who were entering the industrial workforce for the first time identify the sort of war-time jobs where they would be “most comfortable and effective The initial questionnaire grew into the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, which was first published in 1962. The MBTI focuses on normal populations and emphasizes the value of naturally occurring differences.

The primary theory behind the MBTI is that each person’s personality fits into only one of 16 types. These categories are based on four features of personality, each consisting of two opposite preferences. According to the theory, all people have an innate preference that determines how they will behave in all situations.

The four dimensions are:

Favorite world: Do you prefer to focus on the outer world or on your own inner world? This is called Extroversion (E) or Introversion (I).

Information: Do you prefer to focus on the basic information you take in or do you prefer to interpret and add meaning? This is called Sensing (S) or Intuition (N).

Decisions: When making decisions, do you prefer to first look at logic and consistency or first look at the people and special circumstances? This is called Thinking (T) or Feeling (F).

Structure: In dealing with the outside world, do you prefer to get things decided or do you prefer to stay open to new information and options? This is called Judging (J) or Perceiving (P).

From Myers-Briggs foundation website:

Your Personality Type: When you decide on your preference in each category, you have your own personality type, which can be expressed as a code with four letters.  The 16 personality types of the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator® instrument are listed here as they are often shown in what is called a “type table.”

Read through all of the 16 type descriptions.

Here is table of description:

They have the disclaimer on their site that states:

MBTI® type indicates a person’s preference but not his or her ability or character. Personality type should be used as a way of understanding yourself and for assisting you in making choices. However, it should not be used as the only tool for choosing careers, partners, jobs, schools, etc.

If you look on each description you can tell more or less precise which personality type you belong to, but do not base your decision just on that.

I came across many opponents of theory behind MBTI and I tend to agree with some of the opponents. I like the idea behind this test, but I can tell just from the experience that description I have for my personality is pretty good indication of my behavior. At the same time I do not feel that description is completely accurate. Some parts of the description from different personalities describe me better.

They don’t claim that 16 personalities are set in stone. I want to add that 16 personalities is a good start to find out more about you, but it is not enough. There is too much variations between those 16 types that it is maybe a mistake to assume that you exactly one of those 16 types. As a model it serves well, but I wouldn’t rely on those 16 types to make a life changing decision about career or relationships.

I’ve been really fascinated by this model for years, and I still think that it is a great model to follow (not blindly though) but must admit that MBTI model probably has it flaws.

For example test can indicate that you are either introvert or extrovert. I agree that we born with inclination to be more if one type or another (extrovert or introvert). But at the same time I believe that there is an extravert-introvert scale.

I would consider myself an extrovert on a scale from 1 to 10 as being 9. Some people would say that they are not sure, because they tend to act differently in different situations. They would say that they know that are extroverted but on a scale from 1 to 10 can give themselves 6.

There are should be much more than just 2 variations on an introvert and extrovert scale. And if we assume that various degrees of introversion and extroversion exist, and that we can have the same 1-10 scale apply to another 3 dimensions (Sensing or Intuition, Thinking or Feeling, Judging or Perceiving) we can come up with much more than 16 personality types. It would be much more than 100. I am assuming that there is possible to develop more comprehensive model, but so far as far as I know no one have done it yet and it might become to complex to understand.

My conclusion that this model is a good indicator of our personality traits but it is not complete and should not be used blindly to make important decisions.

Two biggest supporters of this theory are Paul D. Tieger and Barbara Barron-Tieger.

Paul D. Tieger and Barbara Barron Tieger are nationally recognized experts and the authors of five books about Personality Type: DO WHAT YOU ARE, NURTURE BY NATURE, THE ART OF SPEEDREADING PEOPLE, JUST YOUR TYPE, and The PERSONALITY TYPE TOOLKIT.

You can take a quick personality quiz on their website.

I’ve read several of their books and they seems to be very descriptive, informative and easy to read.

My type is ENFP.

Here is the description of that type from Paul’s and Barbara’s website:

Curious, energetic, adaptable, and creative, ENFPs like considering unconventional approaches. They enjoy batting around ideas and finding creative solutions and are energized and intrigued by new possibilities and anything out of the ordinary. ENFPs tend to be talkative, enthusiastic, playful, and generally fun-loving people. Warm and caring, ENFPs have strong personal values upon which they base most decisions. Conversations with ENFPs can be very circular as they excitedly move from one topic to the next, making connections and associations. Unconventional and occasionally irreverent, they pride themselves on their uniqueness and originality. Optimistic, and spontaneous, ENFPs have a strong sense of the possible. For them, life is an exciting drama. Because they are so interested in possibilities, ENFPs see significance in all things and prefer to keep lots of options open.

If you want to take a professional version go to http://www.capt.org/take-mbti-assessment/mbti.htm and take test by calling them or sending an email. It cost $150 in the US and $175 international.

I want also introduce you to another model (similar on MBTI) which you most likely never heard of. It is called Socionics. The theory was developed in the 1970s and ’80s mainly by the Lithuanian researcher Ausra Augustinaviciute. It is very popular in Russian speaking courtiers and I am familiar with the model because I speak Russian

Wikipedia description:

Socionics is a theory of information processing and personality type. It incorporates elements of Carl Jung’s work on Psychological Types and Antoni Kępinski’s theory of information metabolism. Socionics is a modification of Jung’s personality type that uses all eight Jungian functions (in socionics called information elements), in contrast to Jung’s 4-function model, and also it’s supplemented with the idea of type-level interpersonal interaction (intertype relations).

The central idea of socionics is that information is divided into 8 different categories (information elements, in compliance with 8 Jungian functions), which a person’s psyche processes using eight psychological functions. Each socionic type has a different correspondence between functions and information elements, which results in different ways of perceiving, processing, and producing information. This in turn results in distinct thinking patterns, values, and behavior, all of which are encompassed within socionic type. Socionics’ theory of intertype relations is based on the interaction of these functions between types.

There is too much information about socionics that I will write a post about it in a future. I want to mention that I like socionics better than MBTI because they took more integral approach to personalities and tend to evaluate personality with integration of social role theory. In another world it considered social factor into the equation and therefore description of personality types tend to be more precise and accurate.

Socionics also based on 16 models that has it’s limitation for the reasons described above.

My type ENFP assigned social role: Psychologist / Reporter

Belong to club: Humanitarians (NF): ENFJ, INFP, INFJ, ENFP.

Temperament: Extraverted Irrational Temperament (EP).

This post concludes the 3 post series about assessments to discover your personal talents.

If you take all 3 assessments (if you don’t want to pay, you can just figure out a lot just by looking at the descriptions and by taking free versions) and combine the results by pondering it in your mind, you will get clarity on  your life directions, discover you talents and will understand other people better.

Taking various assessments is one of multiple ways to determine natural talent.   I personally was able to determine the direction I am on right now by being curious and by leaning various personality systems. Always remember to take your own judgment and do not follow blindly any of assessments.

Intuition is a best way to get on a right road. I believe that by knowing more about yourself will let you understand others people better that will lead to more money, better relationship,  self-fulfillment, happiness  and will allow you to enjoy journey toward your desired destination.

Let me know what do you think about MBTI and personality assessments in general. Do you think they can tell you about your persona, your talents?