MBTI
What Type is your compassion?
When junior doctors are threatening strike action you have to wonder what has gone wrong with a profession which you expect to set the highest standards among the caring professions.
Anyway here’s a MBTI type table (courtesy of OPP) which illustrates how different types demonstrate their compassion.
Managing your Boss
If you read all the research about how people can no longer trust their bosses, you might wonder if there is anything that you can do to manage the situation.
Of course if you are devious and manipulative or have high level influencing skills, you probably already have but most people probably put up with the poor relationship and just complain behind their boss’s back.
Not a healthy way to spend a good part of your life.
“Most business schools don’t teach anything about how to manage your boss, although it is a critical relationship,” says Sir Cary Cooper, professor of organisational psychology and health at Lancaster University Management School.
“Maybe we don’t like talking about the fact that we do it, because people see ‘managing up’ as manipulating managers . . . but we should look at it instead as managing the relationship. Get it right and both your career and the company’s prospects should benefit.”
One way to approach this is by working with psychological profiles eg as measured by the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI). Knowing your own type and that of your colleagues and boss can pay dividends.
Understanding the differences in communication style between people with Extravert and Introvert preferences, or Sensing and Intuitive preferences can make all the difference in a relationship. The MBTI is claimed to be the most widely used psychometric tool for personal development and team building and well worth trying out.
Although it has its critics I’m a firm believer in its use for raising self-awareness (one of the key elements in emotional intelligence) and personal development.
An alternative but similar approach is to compare temperaments rather than types and this is an article on how to manage your boss based on the Keirsey Temperament measure.
This is an updated version of a post on SGANDA.
My most read posts in 2014
My output on this blog was pretty paltry last year as I was busy writing elsewhere and tweeting (probably too much!)
However the number of countries in which my lists were read more than doubled to 85 countries, mainly the USA, the UK, and Brazil but also in Suriname, Belize, Lebanon, Qatar, Algeria, Sri Lanka, the Faroe Islands and China. So thank you for such an international interest.
For what it’s worth the most read posts on this blog in 2014 were:
- Thinking outside the box – literally
- MBTI typies – for the believers
- Empathetic introverts make the best carers
- Learning to become an optimist
- Using social media impacts on academic performance
- Mentally challenging jobs are good for you
- Can scientists really change your memories
- Were the Victorians really smarter than us?
- Your partner’s personality adds value
- End of the road for Positive Psychology at work? jointly with Gender differences in responding to stress
MBTI Typies – for the believers
Following my skeptical colleague’s comments yesterday about the MBTI I thought you might like something a little more positive.
This is the full Typie Table which comes to you courtesy of OPP (more information about the information included on each Typie here).
Biz Psycho 