Research is increasingly pointing to emotional and social competencies as effective predictors of both career success and satisfaction in our personal lives. The purpose of this discussion is for you to gain additional insights into your personality; identifying strengths and areas for improvement, and to look at ways in which personality testing is used in the workplace.
There are a number of personality tests used today; perhaps the most frequently used test is the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI). Many of you may have already taken this test at some point in your academic or professional career.
The results of personality tests are based on self-reported information. Therefore, validity and reliability have to be questioned when test results are used solely for making employment decisions. However, the results do offer us insight and opportunity to look at areas of relative strength as well as areas in which we might improve. In addition, as a current or future manager, appropriate use of this information can assist you in creating effective work groups and developing a more diverse and stimulating work environment.
Taking the full MBTI is too expensive, time consuming, and too long a wait for results for our purposes in this discussion. Therefore, we will use the Humanmetrics test which is free and based on the same principles. The results, while useful, will be less robust than those of the MBTI.
Preparation for your discussion
- Go to the website, http://www.humanmetrics.com/cgi-win/JTypes2.asp , complete the inventory, and print your results. You need to print the results because you may lose them if you click the back button, or click on other sites.
- Go to the http://www.personalitypage.com/high-level.html page and find your personality type based on the four letters of your type from the inventory in #1. Where it says click herebelow the brief description of your type, you will find a comprehensive description.
- Your discussion needs to include information from at least three recent articles, within the past two years, that discuss to the use of personality tests in the work place.
Discussion Requirements:
Respond to the following areas using the same sub-headers, in bold, as below:
Personality Summary:
Identify your personality type by stating your personality letter type and title, for example INFPThe Idealist. Provide a detailed discussion of this personality type. Present your information without stating whether or not you agree or disagree with the results. There should be no opinion in this section. Write in the third person to help avoid bias. Be careful to paraphrase and provide both parenthetical citations and References for your sources.
Strengths and Weaknesses:
Begin this section by discussing how you believe this personality type relates to your perception of your personality. Identify the strengths and weaknesses you believe you share providing examples from your personal experiences. Also include any differences you see.
Discuss how you can use your strengths in your current or future job or career. Also discuss what you can do to reduce your weaknesses, again avoiding generalities. Be as detailed as possible, providing specific examples. You may use first person writing in this section.
Personality Tests and Leadership:
Using information from your research, discuss how managers use the results of employee personality tests in the workplace to create highly effective work environments. Again, identify your sources within the text of your writing and include them in the References section at the end of your discussion paper. In this section limit your writing to third person. There is no personal opinion in this section.
Sample Solution