Personality Matters Blog
Global Marketing
What I'm Thankful For...
The cold, winter season is upon us. I absolutely love this time of year. The fog comes in a bit more often in San Jose, the leaves start falling (and falling… big thanks to our gardener Arturo for taking care of that!), and the air gets cool and crisp. California winters tend to be mild, and I’m thankful for that. With the holidays passing, it reminded me of being thankful for the little and big things that are part of our lives. I hope you all can find many things to appreciate in...
Global Marketing
MBTI® Users Conference—Type, Interpersonal Needs, and Stress: A FIRO-B® and MBTI® Workplace Culture Connection
My breakout session took place on the second day of the conference. I was glad to see so many familiar faces in the room, although it also makes me a bit more nervous to see so many people I know when I’m presenting. However, remembering that I’m presenting for the attendees and not for myself, helps temper my nervousness. In my session I addressed the stress we all face when our interpersonal needs are not being met. What we need, combined with what we fear, can have a huge impact ...
Global Marketing
MBTI® Users Conference—“Culture Matters” Panel: Macro and Micro Perspectives
For the second year in a row, I was asked to serve as moderator for the conference-wide panel session. Now that I have a little experience with panels under my belt, I was a bit more open to the idea of being a moderator. It helps to remind myself that the moderator’s key task is to encourage the audience to pay attention to the panelists and not himself. I just had to introduce the topic and the panelists and then keep things moving along. In the end of course, that is all easier said than done...
Global Marketing
MBTI® Users Conference—Networking and the Step II™ Receiving Facet Challenge
The conference is in full swing. Walking from session to session, I’ve come across people I have worked with in past trainings over the years. I always worry at these events that someone will come up to me and call out my name, but I won’t remember theirs. I work with so many people each year, it is hard to commit everyone’s name to memory. Just yesterday, as I waited in the hotel lobby for my room to be ready, I noticed someone looking at me. Her face was very familiar, but I wasn’t sure why. ...
Global Marketing
MBTI® Users Conference—Creating a Culture of Clarity / It’s Not Meant to Be Predictive
And finally, Patrick Kerwin shared the criticism that the MBTI® tool is not predictive of behavior. Guess, what? It’s not meant to predict behavior. Instead, the MBTI tool is about giving us some understanding around how we take in information (Perceiving processes of S-N) and make decisions (Judging processes of T-F). Isabel Briggs Myers called this “clearer perceptions” and “sounder judgments.” If you try to apply the MBTI tool beyond that, you are oversteppin...
Global Marketing
MBTI® Users Conference—Creating a Culture of Clarity / It Is Reliable
Patrick addressed that the criticism that the MBTI tool isn’t reliable all tracks back to one article published in 1993, before the current form was even published. Data show that test-retest reliability for the MBTI tool is actually very good. When people get a different result on the assessment from one time to the next, it is usually because they reported “slight” the first time. With a result of “slight,” you could have answered just a few questions differently ...
Global Marketing
MBTI® Users Conference—Creating a Culture of Clarity / It Doesn’t Just Flatter You
Continuing my overview of Patrick Kerwin’s session at the MBTI® Users Conference, Patrick noted that the criticism that the MBTI® tool just flatters people was somewhat odd. Those of us who know what the MBTI tool is really about know that it’s not a diagnostic tool. It’s not even a test. “Test” implies results of good and bad, pass or fail. The MBTI descriptions may indeed seem flattering at times. All of us bring something to every situation we are in. All of us have gifts. That may seem flatt...
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MBTI® Users Conference—Creating a Culture of Clarity / There is Plenty of Research
Continuing with Patrick Kerwin’s session at the MBTI® Users Conference, Patrick addressed the criticism that the MBTI assessment is not in clinical psychology journals. He noted it's not in clinical journals because it’s not a clinical tool. It doesn’t belong in clinical journals. A CPP board member didn’t use it in his published research for that very reason. His research, by the way, was on coronary disease and other health conditions. Why would he use the MBTI tool for this? There is plenty...
Global Marketing
MBTI® Users Conference—Creating a Culture of Clarity / Some Clinical Psychology Criticism
Patrick Kerwin then addressed a criticism about the MBTI® assessment he’s heard that “clinical psychologists don’t believe in the MBTI® tool.” I didn’t get training on the MBTI tool in my clinical program. Clinical psychologists are typically trained to administer “tests” that address psychological problems. As Patrick stated, the argument that clinicians don’t use the MBTI tool is like saying “it’s hard to find an engineer who uses a plunger.” The MBTI tool is not a test, and it doesn’t ident...
Global Marketing
MBTI® Users Conference—Creating a Culture of Clarity / Ambiverts?
Patrick also addressed the idea many have that “People are really ambiverts.” He reminded us to keep in mind that just because we use both hands to type doesn’t mean we are ambidextrous. This reminded me that when I was younger and played volleyball, I used to brag a little that I could spike with both my right and left hands. In my mind I was as lethal with either a left- or right-side attack. However, when I really thought about it and when my teammates were truthful with me, I realized I was ...
Global Marketing
MBTI® Users Conference—Creating a Culture of Clarity / Type Dynamics
Another criticism Patrick Kerwin addressed is that “Jung even said there is no such thing as a pure Introvert.” Patrick (and I) actually agree! We all live in both the extraverted and introverted worlds. And, if you understand type dynamics, we all use a mental process in the extraverted world and a mental process in the introverted world. For example, I have preferences for INFP. I am not an Introvert. Instead, I introvert (I use this word as a verb since I don’t believe in ...
Global Marketing
MBTI® Users Conference—Creating a Culture of Clarity / Proper Type Language
Continuing Patrick Kerwin’s session at the MBTI® Users Conference on addressing criticisms of the MBTI® tool, he noted that we sometimes hear, “The MBTI tool uses artificial binaries.” Patrick reminded us that while the MBTI tool sorts, we stress that all of us use both sides of a preference pair. We just prefer one or the other. That is why when we are using the MBTI tool, proper language is so crucial. Strictly speaking, we are not “Extraverts” or “Introverts.” Instead, we have a preference fo...
Global Marketing
MBTI® Users Conference—Creating a Culture of Clarity
Just after lunch I attended a conference-wide session by Patrick Kerwin in which he addressed some misconceptions about the MBTI® tool. Patrick started by saying, “Doing what we do often leads to talking to strangers we meet to clarify what the MBTI tool really is. So much of this misunderstanding is misinformed.” So Patrick shared with his audience several topics related to these misunderstandings. Patrick said he sometimes hears people criticize Briggs and Myers because “They weren’t psycho...
Global Marketing
MBTI® Users Conference—Communication Breakthroughs: The Genesis for Better Understanding of Others
The next session of the day was led by Daniel Granchanin. Daniel is a cloud platform sales engineer at Google. He was also in one of the MBTI® Certification Programs I facilitated last year. It was great to see him again and to attend his session at the conference. Daniel’s session provided tips on how Google employees hypothesize different people’s MBTI® type preferences by “reading” their body language, conversation, and communication through text, email, and so on. Daniel works with many en...
Global Marketing
MBTI® Users Conference—From Diversity to Inclusion to Engagement
There was a short break in between the keynote and the first breakout session of the day. I planned my day out the night before and knew I wanted to attend Dr. Pete Hammett’s session. Dr. Hammett is the director of HR at Oklahoma Gas & Energy. In his session he asked us to consider how personality type can influence a culture of inclusion. Hammett made the point that culture is a matter of life and death at the organizations he has been a part of (including NASA and many others). He has f...
Global Marketing
MBTI® Users Conference—The Art of Culture Hacking
The perfect way to kick off the conference was Robert Richman’s keynote. Author of The Culture Blueprint: A Guide to Building the High-Performance Workplace, Richman shared that only one-third of organizations feel that their culture is in line with their business strategy. When he asked the audience for a definition of organizational culture, he got about 30 different answers, including traditions, moods, and feelings that are encouraged or discouraged. Richman shared the idea that “experience ...
Global Marketing
MBTI® Users Conference—A Step II™ Day
Like last year, I facilitated a full-day MBTI® Step II™ workshop. I had an engaged group of participants with varying levels of personality type knowledge, which can get tricky to facilitate. I didn’t want to go too fast and lose people just learning about type, nor did I want to go too slow and bore those who already knew a lot. However, the one thing I’ve learned over the past couple of years is that many people could use a basic MBTI type refresher. For anyone needing a ...
Global Marketing
MBTI® Users Conference—Culture Matters
If you didn’t get a chance to attend the 2016 MBTI® Users Conference, you missed out on a wonderful event. I will do my best to help you feel like you were there by covering it in my next blog series. Similar to last year, the conference took place in San Francisco. We were at the legendary Sir Francis Drake Hotel for three days of learning, laughing, eating, and connecting. The theme of the conference was the impact the MBTI tool has on organizational culture. Speakers from every business sec...
Global Marketing
I’m Back and Summer Is Almost Here!
Hello, everyone. I’m back and writing again after my very busy travel schedule has finally slowed down just a little. Thanks so much to Mathew David Pauley for filling in on my blog duties with his very insightful writing. I loved reading his posts as I traveled from city to city. I’m going to continue Mathew’s emphasis on the mental processes in this next blog series. As I sit back and get ready to write once more, I’m a bit startled by how fast the year is going by. It ...
Global Marketing
Type at the Family Conference Table: In the Grip
Written by Mathew David Pauley, JD, MA, MDR This is the final post in my 10-part blog series, “Type at the Family Conference Table,” and I would like to begin by thanking CPP for a great collaboration throughout my participation in the MBTI® Certification Program and throughout these posts. Certification Trainer Michael Segovia and his team went out of their way to assist me during the program (which was sort of a birthday present), increasing the pressure for me to have the...