My company wants me to do a Myer-Briggs type personality profile survey. I’m sceptical that these things have any value. The HR manager explained that the results would help the team members understand each other, and help guide personal development needs, but it seems BS to me. So are these types of personality profiles really useful, or would doing astrology charts be just as effective?
I’ve taken Myer-Briggs a couple of times, and I do think they provide a good insight into your personality, how you like to relate to people, and how you approach tasks.
However, will taking this test at work and having results shared with co-workers improve the work environment? - probably not.
The psychology research community has done much more successful validation of Myers-Briggs than it has of astrology charts, FWIW. A google search will probably unearth tons of info for you, pro and con.
I have taken Myers-Briggs and its abbreviated versions several times and the results have been stable over time.
I think the greatest value is understanding yourself better with respect to personal development needs. As far as helping team members understand each other, I think Myers-Briggs encourages individual results to be kept confidential. You may want to see if your HR Manager is up on that. But knowing that there are people who see things other ways, and that there is a pattern to their behavior, can be generally helpful.
Anything can only be useful if the person is willing to use it, not if they are unwilling to change.
I would say Myers-Briggs is very widely accepted as an industry standard in these things, and you should give it a try with an open mind. Social science research isn’t physics, but it isn’t tarot cards, either. People are difficult to study.
Don’t expect the profile to solve all of your problems, but if it points out a few of your strengths that you can maximize and weaknesses to address or compensate for, consider it a win.
Thanks for the input. We aren’t required to share the results, but we can if we want. At a minimum the HR manager will see it, which is still 1 too many people for me. If I can get a chance to review the results before releasing it to anybody, I’ll do it. Otherwise they can get bent.
It’s pure hokum. See the Skeptics Dictionary entry on it. I esp. love their quote: " Thus, no behavior can ever be used to falsify the type, and any behavior can be used to verify it."
It is trivial to fake it, giving any personality profile desired for your purpose.
When I tried it out, I ran into questions that just didn’t make sense for a person like me. Questions that asked my preference between theoretical and artistic things. Umm, my theoretical works are quite beautiful creations to me. They are not opposites.
Note that these personality tests are in the same category as ink blots in usefullness. Many younger pros are trying to get them removed from practice because of their obvious non-Scientific character.
It is helpful, whether ftg agrees or not. The Skeptics Dictionary makes it seem like it’s all random like the Chinese year of the Rat and stuff. If you know Myers-Briggs well you can pretty much guess your friends’ types down to the letter. The use in this for organizatinal design is not in perfectly describing oneself, it’s really in making sure you don’t have 5 INTP’s or 5 ESFJ’s or whatever working on the same project. Spread the wealth man, spread the wealth. The argument that it’s not science so it’s not useful doesn’t fly. Scientific proof would require perfection and repeatability, which the M-B surely does not have perfectly. However, it is better than its absence and is thus useful.
I’d like to see Cecil’s take on this.
I have taken MB tests privately, with a psyc doctor, with my wife, to share with each other. I thought it was great.
But then, I was “asked” to take one at work. At first I declined, but after being pressured, I took the test. I did not think it was useful or appropriate for the workplace. The test itself seems to say as much about the test makers (their view of personalities) as it does for the test takers. I do not like to get pidgeon-holed like this with people I work with. With your spouse or family, it’s entirely different, since you can discuss your results in a way that can improve your relationship. At the office - forget it, there’s too much politics and beureaucracy in the way.
When I took the test at work, I just answered “number 1” for every answer. Of course, this gave a bogus result, but nobody seemed to notice.
My company uses something called TDF. You take a survey and then a class with about 50-100 people. At the end you get a button that shows your “tendancy”. ‘T’ is for Thinking, ‘D’ is for Deciding, and ‘F’ is for Feeling. The order in which you use each of these determines your type. TDF acknowledges that you use all three constantly and simutaniously, but that you have strengths and/or preferences in one of them.
I’m usually VERY critical (to the point of being openly hostile) of this kind of “HR/Soft Skills” nonsense, but I hafta admit they nailed me pretty good. Everyone in the company displays their button proudly (usually stuck in their cube’s wall) and there’s NEVER an attempt to engineer a team or project based on it. There is sometimes a little good natured ribbing, but never anything that would be considered hurtful.
I think that its good when taken in moderation. For instance, I’m a TFD, and as such I value planning and hate to be locked down to one position. My boss, however, is a DFT, which means he values results and isn’t interested in the details. That means that as a programmer, I understand that he wants to see buttons that he can press that do things, but HE also understands that I didn’t write a 50 pages of specs to kill time.
But ultimately its never a big deal.
I wouldn’t try this myself. Probably a better simple strategy is to randomly vary your answer. (Ignore the question entirely.) Better still, but more time consuming, is to read the questions and then respond in the “blandest” way. Avoid extremes. Figure out the personality type being queried and flip flop on them.
I have seen a few questions on MB that seem to be “consistancy” questions. Pretty much the same question. If you answer it differently, then a red flag might be raised. The MMPP has quite a few of these.
As to daniel801’s point about unscientific being better than nothing:
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But it pretends to be Science. I have no objection to Magic 8 Ball. But when something pretends to be Science when they know it isn’t, it really is in the same category as Homeopathy and such. I don’t see a distinction at all.
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In Computing, an analogy are the infamous web surveys many sites require you to fill out before you can even read their pages. One wag noted that 60% of the visitors to his site were CEOs of their own companies and made over $500,000 a year. Better than nothing? Not really.