Clarifying Personality Type: The Why, What and How of Getting Clients to Best-Fit Type – DVD Program

This 3-hour program will provide a simple overview of how to use multiple lenses of personality type to triangulate “true self” qualities and help individuals differentiate between core behaviors and adapted style.

At the end of the 3 hours you will:

• Understand the three lenses that can be used to clarify type.
• Have practiced identifying similarities and differences between several types with one or more preference different.
• Have created a list of questions that can be used to help clients in their sorting process.

Why you need to be using a clarifying process?

Assessments such as the Myers Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI®) provide one valuable data point in the process of determining best-fit type. Many factors however can influence the accuracy of the results. While the ideal situation is for clients to complete an assessment with their “shoes off self,” life experience or work environment can skew this mindset. Depending on the situation, clients may complete the assessment with the following questions in mind:

• What would I like to be?
• What do I think I should be?
• What would be best for more current job?

As a type practitioner, one of the most important contributions you can make when working with clients, either one-on-one or in a group, is to help your clients identify their best-fit type by encouraging them to explore areas in which they are uncertain.

How do we identify best-fit type?

In addition to using an assessment tool, it can be very helpful to look through the three personality type lenses of Cognitive Processes, Temperament and Interaction Styles.

• Temperament can provide insight into WHY people do what they do, what motivates them what might be their key values and how their innate talents might manifest.
• Interaction Styles helps us to understand HOW we prefer to relate to and persuade others. Interaction Style represents a psycho-physiological drive: the affective lens.
• Cognitive Processes represent the specific ways in which individuals take in and make decisions about information, based on Jung’s theory of Psychological type.

What’s the big deal?

If your client’s assessment results do not accurately reflect the their own innate personality preferences and you proceed with more advanced application concepts, there are several disadvantages:

1. The client is unable to use this knowledge to completely comprehend their innate talents and potential challenges.
2. Any development plans might have limitations because they are based on inaccurate data.
3. It can discredit the theory because individuals do not appear to behave as their preferences might indicate.
4. Individuals might make observations such as “it’s a bit like a horoscope – some fits but some doesn’t.” which can result in lower commitment to any development process.

These 2 interactive sessions will provide a simple overview of how to use multiple lenses of personality type to triangulate “true self” qualities and help individuals differentiate between core behaviors and adapted style.