Probably most of us have wondered, at some point in our lives, “who am I?” Or, as Stephen Colbert put it in his recent, comical, quest for self-discovery, “who am me?” However you ask the question, finding the answer by increasing your self-awareness can have tremendous benefits – in your working relationships, personal relationships, career and, well, your life overall.
The trouble is, most of the tools that purport to help us with self-discovery are actually aimed at fitting us into one of their predefined boxes, types, or labels. An example of this is the tool that Colbert talked about on his show – Myers-Briggs (MBTI). As described in the segment, MBTI divides society into 16 personality types. Types are made up of different combinations of 4 out of 8 different preferences: Introversion OR Extraversion (I or E); Intuition OR Sensing (N or S); Thinking OR Feeling (T or F); and Perceiving OR Judging (P or J). In Colbert’s case, his type is: INFP.
There are more than 7 billion people in the world. Can we really fit them all into only 16 personality types?
I’ve been working with people, personalities, and behavioral assessments for more than 20 years. I’ve learned through my work that it’s both limited and limiting to put people in neat little boxes. Think about it. People are a whole lot more complex (and interesting!) than that. At Lumina Learning, we recognize that personalities are not EITHER/OR, they’re AND. You can be an Introvert AND an Extrovert. You can be tactical AND still see the big picture. You can focus on tasks AND care about the people. And you can be driven at times by discipline AND at times by inspiration. It all depends on the situation. You may pull on certain qualities in your job that lie dormant when you’re at home. Or you may have an underlying quality (a “hidden gem”) that isn’t being used right now and is just waiting to be discovered and leveraged. Based on the latest research in psychometrics – the Big 5 – and the best of Carl Jung, the Lumina Spark assessment provides a more comprehensive, more personalized, and more usable portrait of you in all your uniqueness. You are so much more than what can be contained in a label.
That’s what Bruce Kasanoff, Ghostwriter and LinkedIn Influencer found when he took the Lumina Spark assessment. Read his experience here.
Then, if you want to know more about Lumina Spark and how it can help you understand yourself, others, and your full potential, contact me at kcolligan@PeopleThink.biz.
