The Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) is a widely recognised and utilised personality assessment tool that categorises individuals into different personality types based on four key dimensions:
In this article, we explore the F (Feeling) and T (Thinking) preferences. These preferences refer to how individuals make decisions and evaluate information. Our personality shapes our decisions.
In any workforce, there are most likely to be both extraverts (spelling as used in MBTI publications) and introverts. Both personality types have distinct strengths and weaknesses in the workplace and understanding each type can lead to a winning work formula: greater harmony and greater productivity.
Icebergs are deceiving because what you see on the surface is usually only a small fraction of what lies below.
Anger is exactly like an iceberg – it is easy to observe on the surface, but it has so many other hidden emotions below the surface.
Most people think that the word “extravert” describes a party person and the word “introvert” describes a shy person. For psychologists, however, the terms have a more accurate and complex meaning.
Most parents want their children to be happy and carefree. That’s understandable. The problem comes when a parent thinks that to be happy and carefree a child must have lots of friends and be doing lots of different activities.
It’s a problem because for the introverted child, being constantly active and socialising is stressful and exhausting.
Bad vibes in the workplace are not only detrimental to staff morale and productivity they can also have a negative effect on your health and wellbeing, not to mention your career prospects. Every way you look at it, it is a good idea to learn to control your anger at work.
California in the USA, is portrayed as the land of summer sunshine, with its beaches, fruit trees, vineyards and fun in the sun. So when I was due to visit California one June I bought new summer clothes suitable for the hot weather I was expecting.
My first day out in Los Angeles, however, had me rushing back from the beach to change into jeans and a sweater because I was uncomfortably chilly. I never wore my new summer clothes in California at all because compared to the summer climate in Durban that I was used to, California was not really hot. I had not looked up a temperature table for the cities I would be visiting, when I assumed it would be hot in California.
The life lesson here is to never to assume you understand the meaning of ‘relative’ words like hot, cold, early and late. Check them out – ask questions and try to get objective measures. What is extremely hot for one person may be chilly for another, and what is ‘early’ for someone may be ‘late’ for someone else.
Most of us think we know how to have a conversation and so do it without thinking, but there is actually an art to conversation and it’s a skill well worth developing. If we want to do it correctly we must avoid the following common errors...
This article is one of a three-part series on Transactional Analysis. It follows on from the articles “Transactional Analysis – Part I (The Masks we Wear)” and “Transactional Analysis – Part II (The Games we Play)”. This article (Part III), is an outline of two more of the key concepts in Transactional Analysis – Life Positions and Life Scripts.
Based on decisions made in infancy, we assume one of four basic psychological life positions, which to a large extent determines our pattern of thinking, feeling, and behaving. The challenge is to become aware of our life position and if necessary, create a healthy alternative.
The four life positions were developed by Frank Ernst into the well-known OK Corral shown in this poster.
Read Transactional Analysis – Part III (The Scripts We Follow) for details of the four life positions.
