Over the course of my academic and professional career I have taken a bunch of different personality tests and I have failed every single one! From Persogenics, to Jung Typology/Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, to True Colors, to Facebook style “What Animal best represents your personality” quizzes, I always fail. How do you fail a personality test you ask? Simply put: don't fit in with any of the possible results. Every time I take one of these tests the results say that I am diametrically opposed with myself; I am an even split between the 2 completely opposite personality types. I am both Expressive and Analytical, Type A and Type B.
I could be completely insane, but I suspect it is more likely that I am not the only one out there who fails personality tests in this way. This isn’t to say that all personality tests are meaningless; rather, they are useful tools for identifying certain characteristics about yourself in certain situations.
My company (like many others) makes all candidates take the Persogenics personality test as a part of the application process. One thing I did like about this test is that it gives you a primary and a secondary personality type, but I still managed to fail; there are four personality types and I managed to tie for three of them. The test showed a graph at the end and one of the types did technically edge out the other two by about a percent so maybe there is hope for me...
We had a big company meeting a couple of weeks ago where we had to sit in groups based on our primary type. They had someone from Persogenics come talk to us about the different types and how to effectively communicate with each other based on our personality type. The presenter even conceded that sometimes we lean toward our secondary personality type depending on the situation.
Do you know anyone who acts completely different at work and around their friends? Do you you it yourself? We adapt how we act to better communicate with those around us, to deal with a uncomfortable situation, or simply to fit in. If you have ever worked on a group project at school or work you may have either been or watched the usually shy and reserved nerd taking charge because they want to succeed and everyone else is goofing of. We may come home for the holidays from college and expect our mom to make dinner while we watch TV or stay up all night gaming with our college buddies because that behavior is familiar in that situation.
The TV show “How I Met your Mother” even gives this phenomenon a wonderfully fitting name:
I’ve seen enough evidence of ‘revertigo’ to say it is a thing, but is that the only way inconclusive personality test results could make sense? I say no because 4 Persogenics or even the 16 Jung Typology types cannot account for all of the unique personality types out there. In a completely neutral situation our trains of thought can change tracks for no real reason at all and we may be able to see something from a different perspective. When my co-workers laughed at me for not fully identifying with my “primary” personality type at the meeting I just laughed it off and said that means I’m well rounded. So I guess that’s my point here: you can fail a personality test by simply not clearly fitting within the established parameters, but that means you just got a better idea of what makes you unique.
But before I get too sappy, just remember:
***Have any thoughts about this post? Am I way off or did I miss something? Comment and let me know!
Also, here are links to a few of the personality tests I mentioned if you want to see how you score:
http://truecolorsintl.com/
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