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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

#101

Post by 121789 »

ncmncm wrote: post #78

People are always imagining they have "debunked" Myers-Briggs. All they demonstrate is that they didn't understand what it's for. What it's good for is to help you understand how people who think differently than you do are often not wrong. Other people are super great at things you can't hardly do at all, for reasons. Putting people good at X doing Y instead is a formula for dissatisfaction for those putting and tho…

it's a non-predictive meaningless classification that varies in time and has significant error bars. it is a horoscope applied by poorly trained, biased corporate managers. the only people that find it seemingly useful are inexperienced or incompetent managers

Re: Why companies are interested in Myers-Briggs types

#102

Post by axiomsEnd »

YurgenJurgensen wrote: post #51
biomcgary wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

Are you asserting that MBTI is either of those things?

MBTI is not a valid psychological test , so comparing it to frenology is not that riddiculus as it may sound.

Re: Why companies are interested in Myers-Briggs types

#103

Post by jahewson »

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.

Yep. Here in California it’s illegal for companies to use such tests in hiring.

Re: Why companies are interested in Myers-Briggs types

#104

Post by fezfight »

phkahler wrote: post #90
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.

>> Better yet, you should scan the shape of each candidate’s skull Ima guess you score low on openness. And probably T as opposed to F on MBTI.

My horoscope suggest he's a Reptilian.

Re: Why companies are interested in Myers-Briggs types

#105

Post by throwaway0asd »

kasey_junk wrote: post #86
throwaway0asd wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What if they were using astrology? Then it would be guessing just the same as using no metric at all. This is only worse if the candidate is so naive as to believe they are of superior consideration than the value of a simple measure.

Do we actually have any evidence that “when in the year you were born in” has worse statistical relevance than the admittedly weak relevance of personality tests? If not (and I’ve not seen it) then the candidate is just stating a preference for not working with companies that are lazy intellectually. That’s not naive that’s sensible.

Yes, Bridgewater.

Re: Why companies are interested in Myers-Briggs types

#106

Post by __derek__ »

WastingMyTime89 wrote: post #91
__derek__ wrote: post #64

A previous company used Real Colors, an MBTI knock-off, and it was striking how attached people got to those results. People openly stereotyped whole groups of people because they appeared to cluster in one sector (e.g., SDEs must be Green). They disregarded all counter-examples because they conflicted with these biases. It was weird.

People like boxes because it gives them an easy and reassuring way to approach complexity they are not equipped to grapple with. You see it all the time in the professional world: people who have to deal with others but are poorly trained and unconfident in their ability to handle human psychology relish these kinds of crutches. You see it even in this discussion: this type must be suited to this kind of job is simpl…

Kinda tangential to your actual comment, but you might be interested in this recent episode of the Rational Reminder podcast on "Shared Identities and Decision Making".[1] Even groups more arbitrary than these influence our decision-making, problem-solving, cooperation, etc. It goes beyond who's suited for what job to who's suited to be right about what kind of topic. Wild stuff.

[1]: https://rationalreminder.ca/podcast/214

Re: Why companies are interested in Myers-Briggs types

#110

Post by themodelplumber »

mdcds wrote: post #60

Myers-Briggs and Big 5 aren't the same thing. Knowing my MB category was amusing but not useful. Knowing my Big 5 percentiles - very useful. Understanding where I land on disagreeableness and openness to ideas made my life a lot easier (both at home and work). At least because I have a framework to understand personality differences when dealing with teammates and what frustrates me (like people being close-minded or…

That's funny. One of the biggest complaints about Big 5 is that it's too wishy-washy and doesn't have much to offer behind the scenes in soft theory.

For example the "generally people flip all their letters at the end of the work day" principle with four-letter type, or the way you can extract cognitive functionality from the four letters to explore potential cognitive gifts and blind spots.

I've arranged groups like you stated and found some interesting takeaways. Like one of the partners can perceive an annoyance with the work requirement and they become an effective interference machine team rather than a results-team. It's tricky because they are never really working in isolation and one partner will also be looking for outside opportunities and so on.

There is some interesting theory on this, which expresses that not only do some kinds of people work effectively together really well, but when they are also matched with the right project or field, they will carry the project out in a way that exceeds normal expectations. By definition they have more energy to spend and it replenishes quickly.

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