For my class I was asked to take
the Myers Briggs personality Type Indicator along with the Big five personality
indicator. This was somewhere around the 6th or 7th time I
have taken these tests for a class over my four years in college. This was
common for Business Management majors since the teachers strive for us to know
our selves and they also want to know our results to understand us better. The
Myers Briggs test has been sporadic over my four years and I don’t believe that’s
an error. I have significantly matured and changed over these last four years and
the result of an INTJ seems fitting for where I am in my life. This was very
different from where I was freshman year when I took this caring much more
about different things and trying to be as extroverted as possible.
The Big five test has been more consistent
in my experiences taking it, attaining “OCEAN” which says things like “prefer
traditional and familiar experiences, very well-organized, can be relied upon, enjoy
spending quiet time alone, easy to express irritation with others, tend to
become anxious or nervous.” In my own opinion, this is not too far off from how
I perceive myself. However, in another class the assignment started off with
myself taking it, then having a close friend and a family member take it, answering
those same questions about you. The results were drastically different between
the mine and theirs. I viewed myself as more of an introvert who is organized
and keeps to myself. Their view was someone who was outgoing, showed little
fear, and enjoyed being spontaneous. This truly was eye opening how the people
close to me view me could be so far off with how I viewed myself. This was a
much more retrospective way to go about taking these tests, showing me that my self perception varied from others perception of me. Rather than getting results and
locking that into my ideology of who I was, I got to see how someone else views
me and it was much more beneficial.
Relating this to a future in health
industry (preferable in management), it has showed that it’s important to know
how you view yourself but if you want to be a good leader it’s more important
to know how others view you. If you ignore how the people in your life view you
there will be a disconnect with your leadership and management style and it
will not be as effective as it should be. Seeing how you view yourself only
gives insight to yourself and might not be accurate. So, next time you take these
tests have someone else take it for you as well and see how they view you, for
that information is more helpful in knowing who you really are and not just who
you think you are.
