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Why companies are interested in Myers-Briggs types

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Re: Why companies are interested in Myers-Briggs types

#41

Post by Waterluvian »

biomcgary wrote: post #36

When I was managing, I informally typed people during the interview process, which was very helpful in predicting both how they would interact with other team members and how they would do at particular tasks. However, I learned not to rely on self-reported personality types or tests, which are often answered aspirationally, not realistically. To me, MBTI or Big 5 (not the actual tests, but their framing of aspects o…

Better yet, you should scan the shape of each candidate’s skull and use that as a metric to aid in decisionmaking.

Re: Why companies are interested in Myers-Briggs types

#42

Post by Barrin92 »

throwaway0asd wrote: post #22
compiler-guy wrote: post #3

I appreciate it when a company asks about or tests my Myers-Briggs type early in the hiring process, because then I know that I don't want to work for them, and they wouldn't be happy with me either. Win/win.

I feel the exact opposite. At least they are measuring something vaguely objectively. Interviewing with most potential employers, at least in software, is like when children guess at picking players for sports teams while wearing a blindfold. Everything always seems to come down to biases applied non uniformly. Changing jobs is a big life investment. I would prefer it not be a blind date with one-way conversations fr…

"It doesn't work and is junk science, but at least it doesn't work for everyone equally" is an interesting methodology.

I'd rather take the intuition of some interviewer because at least that's based on something real. I mean if objectivity is the only criterion you simply may want to roll a set of dice for the applicants because those are cheaper than Myers-Briggs consultants.

the attitude of replacing useful human judgements with useless metrics in the name of eliminating bias is one of the worst trends in modern hiring.

Re: Why companies are interested in Myers-Briggs types

#43

Post by IWillForgetThis »

drchopchop wrote: post #25

My company gave managers Clifton Strengths tests, and it was fairly interesting (and tracked with my own self-introspection). Wasn't used for hiring or performance, but more as a tool to people recognize their traits and how others may differ. https://www.gallup.com/cliftonstrengths/en/253790/science-of...

Same, it was surprisingly on point when I took it.

Re: Why companies are interested in Myers-Briggs types

#44

Post by chefandy »

notch656a wrote: post #30
chefandy wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your professional network extends to every organization you'd aspire to work with, and you actually care about those organizations' goals? I assure you– that isn't the case for most people.

Quoted post unavailable.

No post body was provided.

Re: Why companies are interested in Myers-Briggs types

#45

Post by yjp20 »

notch656a wrote: post #30
chefandy wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your professional network extends to every organization you'd aspire to work with, and you actually care about those organizations' goals? I assure you– that isn't the case for most people.

Quoted post unavailable.

Be civil

Re: Why companies are interested in Myers-Briggs types

#46

Post by anonymousiam »

LordGrey wrote: post #35

Apple went through the Myers-Briggs phase in the 90's, along with a lot of the other tech giants. It was a half-day seminar. "Professionals" gave the tests and told everyone their type. That took only an hour. The rest of the time was spent doing role-playing, where you were supposed to use your coworkers' MB types to adjust your interaction with them in various settings. It was a waste of time then and I bet it stil…

I never worked for Apple, but I went through a similar exercise in the late 1980's. I found the role-playing useful, and I found the techniques we were trained on to be enlightening. Not everybody thinks the same way, and even though it's not valid to categorize people into 16 personality groups, it's useful to understand that people prioritize things and think differently from each other. Here's a great example of that:

https://generallythinking.com/richard-feynman-on-thinking-pr...

Re: Why companies are interested in Myers-Briggs types

#47

Post by biomcgary »

Waterluvian wrote: post #41
biomcgary wrote: post #36

When I was managing, I informally typed people during the interview process, which was very helpful in predicting both how they would interact with other team members and how they would do at particular tasks. However, I learned not to rely on self-reported personality types or tests, which are often answered aspirationally, not realistically. To me, MBTI or Big 5 (not the actual tests, but their framing of aspects o…

Better yet, you should scan the shape of each candidate’s skull and use that as a metric to aid in decisionmaking.

A stethoscope in the hands of a doctor is a useful, if limited, tool. Don't judge its value if you have never seen one except in the hands of the village idiot. (One could say the same about various programming languages.)

If measuring skull shape during the interview process was a) socially acceptable and b) actually predictive of outcomes, why not? The problem is that it is neither. The reason that it is not a) is because it was not b) and thus easily misused to justify stereotypes.

Re: Why companies are interested in Myers-Briggs types

#48

Post by YurgenJurgensen »

slothtrop wrote: post #29
StevePerkins wrote: post #14

Myers-Briggs is essentially horoscopes for people who spend too much time on LinkedIn.

The analysis is, but "types" are just preferences/tendencies that everyone has, reflected back from the test. It says "I tend towards introversion or not, being detail-oriented or not" etc. That's it. Mind you, that's of no use to your employer who wants you to do your damn job whatever it happens to be. If you want the job, it's for you.

The types themselves are also nonsense. There's sixteen of them, and all sixteen have significant tendencies in all four axes. It seems extremely unlikely that someone would always have a tendency in every axis all the time, so the types themselves are set up wrong. They're not even acknowledging the possibility of an inconclusive result.

It's also easy to see the financial incentive of removing the possibility for someone to get an "unremarkable" result. Telling people that they're mostly average, even if for a lot of people it's the truth, doesn't convince them they're getting their money's worth.

Re: Why companies are interested in Myers-Briggs types

#49

Post by savryn »

It's funny how defensive hn and other parts of the internet are about being put in made-up 'no-evidence' /psuedoscience boxes....

yet everyone here completely understands the dozens of archetypes and human personality portraits invoked by hundreds of ever changing memes and meme-speak...

"don't be that guy" "tell me youre x without telling me ..." ms-paint wojacks, etc

I think people who's pattern recognition works great on classifying others in the private (read:petty) freedom of their own mind are also the exact brittle, neurotically vulnerable hypocrites bristling about other's pattern recognition seeing them... (I'm all the latter but embrace it lol)

The same crowd that loves quantified self and concrete "evidence" would hate to be seen as they are by actual tally of what they do and how their time is spent, or especially to have their most common interpersonal reactions categorized into a dozen buckets, of gut-reactions, core values, status stuff, etc.

Any whiff that someone has figured you out and hark, all of a sudden you contain multitudes! Meanwhile, developing advertising software to build ever more accurate portraits of consumer types...

MBTI is as useful as you make it, as are harry potter groups, memes, vibes, DSM-mental illness groups, shakespeare's tragedies, etc.

They work great if you put them to work, shrug. It's just a word-substrate to better deal with the intuitions you already have going on about people subconsciously.

meh, I guess I'd just much rather know exactly what stereotypes / impressions I invoke in others with my looks/identity markers (age sex race etc), behaviors, class mannerisms, aesthetics, posture etc.... and then take it from there if I don't like what I see in the mirror.

(seeing people seeing us is always a mirror i think)

Re: Why companies are interested in Myers-Briggs types

#50

Post by Waterluvian »

biomcgary wrote: post #47
Waterluvian wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Better yet, you should scan the shape of each candidate’s skull and use that as a metric to aid in decisionmaking.

A stethoscope in the hands of a doctor is a useful, if limited, tool. Don't judge its value if you have never seen one except in the hands of the village idiot. (One could say the same about various programming languages.) If measuring skull shape during the interview process was a) socially acceptable and b) actually predictive of outcomes, why not? The problem is that it is neither. The reason that it is not a) is…

A galvanometer in a physician’s hand is even more dangerous than that of the village idiot. Just ask my late grandmother who was preyed on until the board de-certified that “doctor.”
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