STYLETHREAD -- LET'S TALK SHOP!

travelgirl · Kate Spade

What do you think about workplace psychological testing?

Dizzy · Marc Jacobs

I think it's interesting background info to use in your relationships at home and work. It couldbe helpful in some situations: maybe helping an ISTJ boss to understand that her ENFP employee isn't failing to behave, just doign things differently. Or not. given the usual level of maturity in the offices where I've worked, I suspect it will devolve into bs and be used most often to justify poor managment decisions and waste time and allow managers to document crap that they're doing for their higher ups.

luckyclover · Dooney & Bourke

Dizzy wrote:

maybe helping an ISTJ boss to understand that her ENFP employee isn't failing to behave, just doign things differently.

Sounds like you've done the keirsey one. Which personality are you? This is what I came out to be. http://keirsey.com/personality/ntej.html

I've done tons of these personality things. A lot of them just dump people into a general group. The keirsey one IMO is the most accurate and specific. I would recommend it to anyone wanting to take one of these. It's available in the book "Please understand me II" In school we did a color one which was pretty much for the teacher's benefit so she didn't embarrass the shy people. I worked for a bank that did a few of these and I never saw any reason for it. I think at the time they were changing management and just went through a series of bullcrap because they had no idea what they were doing lol.

oh and for anyone not familiar with this here is a link with the basic info about the four temperments. http://www.advisorteam.org/the_four-temperaments/

-- Edited by luckyclover at 11:43, 2006-06-04

shopgirl82 · Chanel

i had to do one before i got the job at the hospital. it was basically, is this person, compassionate, moral, ethical, etc...

i didn't think it was a big deal, and the answers are pretty simple (i mean, anyone who would respond that they would ignore a person calling out in pain shouldn't be working in a hospital).

but i think the test that i took was a bit different than what you're explaining.

travelgirl · Kate Spade

Dizzy wrote:

I think it's interesting background info to use in your relationships at home and work. It couldbe helpful in some situations: maybe helping an ISTJ boss to understand that her ENFP employee isn't failing to behave, just doign things differently. Or not. given the usual level of maturity in the offices where I've worked, I suspect it will devolve into bs and be used most often to justify poor managment decisions and waste time and allow managers to document crap that they're doing for their higher ups.

Yeah, I agree. I think it is the "trendy" thing to do but to me it seems like a big time and money waster.

Bastet · Kate Spade

I don't think they're very valuable. They can be interesting, but at least at my old work place, they were useless. We spent a few days categorizing ourselves and learning how our "types" communicated with other types and how we could better address our own strengths/weaknesses and how to communicate with people that were different from us. No one used any of the skills we were supposed to have learned.

I think tests like that are pretty easy to manipulate if the bosses make it clear what "type" they want their employees to be. I also think that some of the tests that feature forced-choice questions are pretty useless because IMO it's inaccurate to plunk people into categories based on forced-choice.

Dizzy · Marc Jacobs

luckyclover wrote:

Dizzy wrote:

maybe helping an ISTJ boss to understand that her ENFP employee isn't failing to behave, just doign things differently.

Sounds like you've done the keirsey one. Which personality are you? This is what I came out to be. http://keirsey.com/personality/ntej.html
I've done tons of these personality things. A lot of them just dump people into a general group. The keirsey one IMO is the most accurate and specific. I would recommend it to anyone wanting to take one of these. It's available in the book "Please understand me II" In school we did a color one which was pretty much for the teacher's benefit so she didn't embarrass the shy people. I worked for a bank that did a few of these and I never saw any reason for it. I think at the time they were changing management and just went through a series of bullcrap because they had no idea what they were doing lol.
oh and for anyone not familiar with this here is a link with the basic info about the four temperments. http://www.advisorteam.org/the_four-temperaments/-- Edited by luckyclover at 11:43, 2006-06-04

I'm an ENFP - like, way off the charts in every category. I've read that book, too. It's uncanny how accurate the descriptions are in he workplace. I need to go back and reread the section on relationships now, too.

Haha - I just looked it up, and it turns out my ideal type is "less than 1 percent of the population." That explains a few things... Ok, not to hijack, but y'all should go look up your type now too and post what it is, and how accurate you think the test is...

-- Edited by Dizzy at 17:09, 2006-06-05

Kitty · Hermes

We did this awhile ago and I found it really disturbing. People STILL talk about each other in terms of what "color" they are. I honestly wish I never shared my results or even took the test.

member · Hermes

Bastet wrote:

I don't think they're very valuable. They can be interesting, but at least at my old work place, they were useless. We spent a few days categorizing ourselves and learning how our "types" communicated with other types and how we could better address our own strengths/weaknesses and how to communicate with people that were different from us. No one used any of the skills we were supposed to have learned. I think tests like that are pretty easy to manipulate if the bosses make it clear what "type" they want their employees to be. I also think that some of the tests that feature forced-choice questions are pretty useless because IMO it's inaccurate to plunk people into categories based on forced-choice.

I totally agree Bastet. I don't find them valuable at all. We had to do one called Personalysis a couple years ago and my company and it was a huge time waster. We spent 2 whole days in a conf. room going over what colors we were and what it meant. It's interesting to learn about your personality, but I didn't see any value it added to any of our jobs. But like someone else said, it's the trendy thing to do at company's.

bex · Chanel

we did this but i felt it was helpful b/c i communicate to all different types of people all day long- so it helped in giving me ideas in how to communicate to them so that they would understand better what i was trying to say.

anyway, the one we did was DISC. I forget exactly what the letters stand for but i was "I" which was extremely extroverted individual- someone who never met a stranger type person...