Come Gather Round

A woman told me that she had occasion to complete two personality inventories within a few months, the Myers-Briggs Type Inventory and the Kiersey Temperament Sorter. She is skeptical about such things and, because the results from the two inventories were very different, she dismissed both of them. She was quite surprised and confused when I told her that they were probably both right.

Her surprise and confusion are understandable. The results of both instruments are presented using Carl Jung’s typology, which categorizes people as having tendencies toward introversion or extraversion, sensing or intuiting, feeling or thinking, and judging or perceiving. Because their results are presented in the same way, many people make the mistake of assuming that they measure the same thing. They don’t. The Myers-Briggs is based on preferences—what is in your head about what you would like to do. The Kiersey is based on skilled action—what you do well.

The results will be different to the degree that what you do well is not what you prefer. This woman, for example, is a skilled and accomplished manager who, after twenty years in management, felt burned out because, in her words, “I can’t be who I am.” The Kiersey told her who she had learned to be, while the Myers-Briggs told her who she preferred to be. They were, in fact, both right.

The lesson here is that whenever we do any kind of self-assessment we ought to understand exactly what it is that we are assessing. Those who complete either of these two instruments usually say afterward something like, “I am an INTP”. It would be more accurate to say something like, “I prefer to be INTP-like,” if the instrument was the Myers-Briggs or, “I have learned to be INTP-like,” if the instrument was the Kiersey.

The same lesson applies to recognizing your genius. As I use the term in Is Your Genius At Work?, it does not refer to skills, traits, talents, or behavior, nor to intellectual brilliance or extraordinary creative achievement. It is, rather, the energy that is expressed through those characteristics and accomplishments. It is a spirit that is unique to you.

— Dick Richards