Knowing Your Personality Type Is Important

Are you an Introvert or Extrovert (sometimes spelled as Extravert)? Does it even matter? Most importantly, does it contribute in any significant way to the progress you intend to make towards your goals?

Most people I know have a general idea of what personality type seems to dominate them the most based on a general self-analysis.

They look at whether or not they like going out and hanging around other people. They look at whether or not they enjoy having entire weekends and evenings all to themselves and those kinds of general habits.

While this can often be enough to give you a general indication of the type of person are, there is still more you can unpack about yourself and your potential capabilities by digging deeper.

Taking a personality test is a good way to find your potential strengths and weaknesses. You may be an introvert, but what kind of introvert are you exactly?

Do you need complete isolation from others to be most the most productive when comes to working? Or are you a silent person that doesn't want to be a leader but has the passion to work (behind the scenes) with those that intend on becoming leaders?

Introverts and extroverts come in a variety of configurations. And it's not just about whether or not you like hiding in the corner or being the life of the party every single time you are in a crowd.

In an organization, for example, knowing people's personality types can help you better organize your team in a more strategic way. People that perform best when they keep to themselves or when they are not always thrown to the frontlines... can be hard to train into great salespeople.

But those that are already very comfortable with meeting new people and always get excited about the idea... will benefit most from whatever sales training you throw at them. Because selling is really a people skill.

It works the other way as well. I have been a developer for a number of years now and there is nothing that makes me more productive than NOT being interrupted or distracted. I perform best when I interact less with people.

But those are just general examples. Again, there's a lot more to personalities than just what we see on the surface.

I don't intend to make this a technical blog post, so forgive me if I don't dive too deep into describing in detail what you can expect to dig out of a proper personality exam.

However, let me give you a breakdown of my personality type from a test I do almost every year on https://www.16personalities.com/

According to the results of my personality test from that site, I am INFJ-T. You can get a general description of this and other personality types here https://www.16personalities.com/infj-personality

Basically, I'm the type of introvert that values having deep and authentic relationships with certain people. Apparently, amigos like me believe in having a purpose in life and we rarely give up on what we chase.

You can read the rest and get your own assessment after doing the test.

But this assessment sees the type of role you play in your personal pursuits, personal relationships, etc.

Why is this helpful?

People are different and react differently to different stimuli in their surrounding environment. It is in your best interest to understand as much as you can about yourself in order to see what you can improve on or double down on.

It can help you make more sincere decisions when it comes to what you want to do next. If you should make a change right now. If you should better align yourself with what empowers you and pull yourself out of what doesn't it.

Many of us don't really have a clear idea of who we really are sometimes. We seem to just wake up and fall into a routine based on what we see all around us. Many of us don't question the things we do. Many of us have little understanding of why we are the way we are while others are different.

Getting to understand your personality type is one step in getting to understand yourself. Understanding your fears and motivations. Understanding your strengths and weaknesses.

Or understanding others.

I believe it is important to get to understand yourself a lot more. I have written and published podcasts on self-awareness before.

Getting to better know who you are is part of the self-development process.

#makeProgressNotExcues