Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI): Increase Profits

The Myers-Brigg Type Indicator (MBTI) is a psychological survey that can be used by employers on employees to determine four different types of preferences of the individual surveyed. It groups individuals based on their attitudes, perceptions, judgment, and lifestyles. Using the results, the employer can strategically place members of their teams into specialized groups to accomplish different types of problem solving.

The uses of MBTI results can be used in almost every type of work. Employers can use the results for employee placement based on communication aptitude, ability to solve problems, marketing traits, and other important factors to building a productive workforce.

How can a business place people based on their skills? One of the most common misunderstandings about the survey is that it categorized people based on their skills. The purpose of the survey is not to determine the skills of an individual but rather provide employers with the personal work preferences of employees. With this information, the employer can provide employees with positions in the work center or on teams that correspond to their own personal preferences.

And what do the results look like? What do they tell an employer? The results are split into four separate categories. These categories are further separated into two subcategories each. Each subcategory is designated with a single letter which forms a four letter code such as ENTP or ISFJ.

Category 1: Attitude. Attitude is broken into the subcategories extravert (E) and introvert (I). An extravert is expressive of their emotions, is very social, and works better when they are in groups. Opposite of extraverts are introverts, who prefer working alone and possibly in pairs. They have their own internal motivations and often keep their thoughts to themselves.

Category 2: Perceiving. Subcategories: Sensing (S) and Intuition (N). An employee that scores high in sensing desires to have solid facts and would like to have information given to them in pieces rather than all at once. Someone who has higher scores in intuition would rather be given the overall idea and are willing to experiment with new ideas and theories.

Category 3: Judgment. Subcategories: Thinking (T) and Feeling (F). Employees that have higher ratings in thinking solve problems using logical approaches. They prefer to be given rules and reasonable expectations. On the contrary, people that are categorized as being feeling individuals do not need specific rules and are more comfortable in situations that are new to them. In fact, they often do better when broad guidelines are set for them rather than strict standards.

Category 4: Lifestyle. Judging (J) and perceiving (P) are the two subcategories of judging; but do not get them confused with categories two and three. Individuals who are classified as judging need everything set up for them. They want rules, timelines, and prefer to have issues resolved for them by others. They also are known to take detailed notes and strictly follow schedules and checklists. On the contrary, perceiving individuals are oftentimes spontaneous. They are more adapt to being flexible and prefer not to be bogged down with schedules and deadlines.

Using this data, employers can have a better picture of their employee and their individual preferences and working styles. They can take full advantage of this data and assign work and form teams accordingly, greatly improving workplace productivity. Regardless of the reasoning, the MBTI is a great tool for any employer.

INTJ Brazil is a multi-language forum that has followers around the planet, because of the World Wide Web. Discussions about MBTI is one example of a topic of interest to posters.