An Introduction To The Myers-briggs Type Indicator (mbti)

In the workplace environment, as managers and executives we often find that our best business tool is an understanding of people; how they operate, how they respond, what drives and influences them. However, the sheer unpredictability of individuals can lead to frustration when their motivations and preferences are in conflict with our own. Well, think positive because the theory behind the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) can help us analyse these misunderstandings objectively and find ways to work with differences towards better business results.

MBTI is a psychometric questionnaire designed to assess how people prefer to perceive the world and make decisions. Marketed as "the world's most widely used personality assessment", MBTI theory can be applied to communication, problem-solving, ways of working, customers and marketing, coaching, responses to stress and has also been extended to examine organisational behaviours.

The theory identifies four pairs of preferences. A person will choose one preference from each pair, giving them a profile of four; usually they will be guided by their questionnaire results and a licensed coach but the basic theory is easily understood and applied. The key word here is "preference". It does not identify ability or skill, which can be learned and developed, but rather an inborn preference similar to left- or right-handedness. After all, you can learn to sign your name with the other hand quite competently but your preferred hand will always feel more natural. The four pairs are as follows.

ATTITUDE: Extraversion - energised by activities and interactions with people; a preference for thinking out loud; likely to have a wide range of interests. Introversion - energised by the internal world; contemplative; tend to reflect on thoughts and ideas and think them through before sharing them; likely to have a few, deep interests. (It is worth noting that these labels do not refer to the common dictionary meanings of extroversion as outgoing and introversion as shy.)

PERCEPTION: Sensing - gather information through the senses; tend to focus on fact and detail; concentrate on practical realities. INtuition - prefer to consider ideas, implications and abstract possibilities; focus on the 'big picture' and how facts connect to each other.

JUDGMENT: Thinking - favour analysis and logic for decision-making; prefer objective criteria; tend to take a detached viewpoint. Feeling - prefer decisions based on values (their own and others); tend to understand a situation by empathising with the issues.

LIFESTYLE: Judging - prefer life and work to be timetabled; make lists and plans and follow them; tend to book in advance. Perceiving - prefer spontaneity and flexibility; 'go with the flow'; can feel constricted by too tight a structure.

The underlined letters are used to create abbreviated names for the different combinations that are possible; e.g. ESTJ or INFP and so on.

Reading this, hopefully you begin to see that the different preferences can (and do) result in very different ways of viewing the world. In business, the advantage lies in being aware of these differences and accordingly; whether it is adapting your communication style to fit the preferences of colleagues, or marketing to attract a wider range of customers, using a decision-making process which weighs the concerns of everyone.

So the next time you disagree with someone else, think positive and try to find a way in which their preferences can work with yours.