Few people can argue that I didn’t get
a honest, realistic personality label given that I took the test at 0230 in the
morning while holding my son with essentially no sleep – if your true
personality doesn’t come out there, I don’t know if it ever will (I took again
right before writing this and ended up with the same personality). As it ends up, I am a INTJ, or an Introverted
iNtuitive Thinking Judging personality, and I think that suits we rather well
when the percentages of each are taken into account. I would hardly call myself an extroverted
person, but I also wouldn’t call myself an introvert either. This makes sense given that I was 33%
inclined towards introverted. I was
rather heavily intuitive, coming in at 56%.
I was barely a thinker with a 1% leaning, and I was strongly judgmental
with a 67% leaning. Reading the description
of an INTJ definitely fits much of my personality as I tend to be rather
reserved but not a recluse, I have never been described as someone in tune with
my senses but have been described as keeping the big picture in mind, am
certainly a thinker more than in touch with my feelings (especially when
thinking is described with lots of synonyms for integrity), and am much more
likely to think things through rather than act spontaneously.
It is incredibly important to
understand what type of personality you are in order to understand how you
communicate with the world around you.
One might question why they are always taken the wrong way or are perceived
in a light that was unknown to the person.
Knowing that you have a hard time expressing emotions (as is my case)
can make you aware that you need to take the extra effort to show that emotion
when it is called for. For example, I
might need to go out of my way tomorrow to ensure that my subordinates
understand that I appreciate their efforts and that they are doing a great job;
I need to ensure I verbalize my inner thought process. So knowing what your personality is will help
you overcome the shortcomings associated with it and help you understand how
people are going to perceive you. On the
other hand, knowing the descriptions of other types of personalities can help
you communicate with them as well, assuming you are able to label them. Just as it is important to understand your
short comings, knowing some problems associated with the different types can
help you overcome those weaknesses and allow you to communicate more
effectively. Continuing from my previous
example, if I knew my boss was also an INTJ, I would understand that his praise
of my work might be spread a little thin and to not take it to heart.
In the end, communication skill is
probably the most important trait for a leader to possess. Any skill you can learn to help your communication
ability will only help you as a leader.
Knowing and understanding the different traits of the various
personality types will help you mitigate the weaknesses while exploiting (in a
purely ethical manner) the advantages. At
the very least, knowing someone is a feeler will help you cope with some of the
emotional fatigue that one might experience while working with them (the general
I worked for in Iraq was an extrovert feeler that was prone to wild mood
swings).
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