I am INFJ…what are you?

I am INFJ…Introverted, iNtuitive, Feeling, Judging. Know what this means? Well, neither did I until my Vice President came to me a few years ago asking me to observe my fellow colleagues using the Myers Briggs Type Indicator assessment. I was like….Sure! Absolutely! Yes, of course I know what that is! And then I quickly went online to gather as much information as I could to familiarize myself. Of course my VP realized I wasn’t a psychologist, nor remotely close to being able to accurately analyze their behavior, but he was looking to get a raw assessment of his team. So for an entire week during their annual sales meeting, I had to sit in the back of the room and secretly study their behavior using the Myers Briggs Type Indicator assessment. The reason I needed to “secretly” observe is so they didn’t change their normal behavior. For those of you that don’t know, like me, MBTI is a questionnaire designed to measure psychological preferences in how people perceive the world and make decisions. Many companies use the MBTI as a tool for leadership training and development.

There’s lots of literature you could read if you wanted to learn about the MBTI assessment and how to use it. But for the purpose of my blog, I’ll simply say that, basically it’s observing behavior using four attitudes: Extraversion-Introversion and Judging-Perceiving as well as four functions Sensing-Intuition and Thinking-Feeling to determine how people take in information, make decisions and deal with the outer world.

Here’s a link to my good friend Wikipedia if you’d like to learn more: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Myers-briggs

So anyway, after doing this assessment of my team, I was really interested in learning more about my own personality type. I came across this online version of the test and my results were quite interesting! I have to admit I was shocked at the accuracy of the results as I feel this is spot on to my personality. Now, I know many things can alter a test’s results such as your mood at the time of taking it, having it in paper form rather than online etc however, given that the results indicated that I am “little more than one percent of the population”…I’ll go with it! I always knew I was an original! :-).

Take the test and see what you can learn about yourself! I believe this is an abbreviated version of the true test but it’s still fun to take. http://www.humanmetrics.com/cgi-win/JTypes2.asp

Here is a summary of my personality type:

Idealist Portrait of the Counselor (INFJ)

Counselors have an exceptionally strong desire to contribute to the welfare of others, and find great personal fulfillment interacting with people, nurturing their personal development, guiding them to realize their human potential. Although they are happy working at jobs (such as writing) that require solitude and close attention, Counselors do quite well with individuals or groups of people, provided that the personal interactions are not superficial, and that they find some quiet, private time every now and then to recharge their batteries. Counselors are both kind and positive in their handling of others; they are great listeners and seem naturally interested in helping people with their personal problems. Not usually visible leaders, Counselors prefer to work intensely with those close to them, especially on a one-to-one basis, quietly exerting their influence behind the scenes.

Counselors are scarce, little more than one percent of the population, and can be hard to get to know, since they tend not to share their innermost thoughts or their powerful emotional reactions except with their loved ones. They are highly private people, with an unusually rich, complicated inner life. Friends or colleagues who have known them for years may find sides emerging which come as a surprise. Not that Counselors are flighty or scattered; they value their integrity a great deal, but they have mysterious, intricately woven personalities which sometimes puzzle even them.

Blessed with vivid imaginations, Counselors are often seen as the most poetical of all the types, and in fact they use a lot of poetic imagery in their everyday language. Their great talent for language-both written and spoken-is usually directed toward communicating with people in a personalized way. Counselors are highly intuitive and can recognize another's emotions or intentions - good or evil - even before that person is aware of them. Counselors themselves can seldom tell how they came to read others' feelings so keenly. This extreme sensitivity to others could very well be the basis of the Counselor's remarkable ability to experience a whole array of psychic phenomena.

Mohandas Gandhi, Sidney Poitier, Eleanor Roosevelt, Jane Goodall, Emily Bronte, Sir Alec Guiness, Carl Jung, Mary Baker Eddy, Queen Noor, Martin Luther King, Nelson Mandela are examples of the Counselor Idealist (INFJ).