My MBTI Story

I often see the question "how did you get into MBTI?" On Reddit. My story is too long for a Reddit post, so I decided to put it here: 

The first time I took a personality test was in my high-school CALM (career and life management) class. The test gave me the result of INTJ. At the time, I did not look into it in much depth, but I did find it interesting to compare with my friends. To this day I remember a few of their results too: ISFP, ENFP, ESTP. I learned a bit about what each letter meant but did not concern myself with our compatibility or anything deeper.

Fast forward ~6 years to the time frame right before and after graduating from University with a bachelor degree in Kinesiology. In 4th year university I started to wonder if I had chosen the right field. I had completed a couple of practicums and decided I wanted to pursue a masters in physiotherapy to become a Physiotherapist. Despite my interest in the subject, I couldn’t help but wonder if I should have chosen a more technical field of study. I also started to receive very subtle feedback from instructors and professionals suggesting they questioned my interest in physiotherapy. The career counselor for kinesiology more directly questioned if I would like that field, saying she wondered if I would enjoy the “lack of creativity”. After graduating I spent a couple years trying to fulfill additional academic prerequisites for the physiotherapy program, and attempting to get more practical experience by getting a job in the field. The pattern of subtle negative feedback continued, this time from potential employers. I also did not pass the interview component for entrance to the Physiotherapy program. Eventually I wondered if I should just go to a career counselor to sort myself out because I could not quite put my finger on what I was doing wrong.

 Then a friend told me about their experience with the career counselor and doing a personality test that helped them decide their whole university path. After what felt like a never ending beat down of my confidence, the thought of doing a test to tell me what career path would likely work best sounded like a huge relief. I booked an appointment. I did a few personality tests with hundreds of questions involved, then attended an appointment where two career counselors discussed the results with me. They asked me more questions and explained the meaning behind the results. One of those tests was the Meyer’s Brigg’s test, and my result was INTJ. After reading more about what it meant, and especially about the potential weaknesses of this type, suddenly all my struggles started to make sense - and I was not flawed. I was simply attempting to open a door to a career path that highly favoured people whose strengths were all my weaknesses. I started to recall exact moments during interviews where I had “messed up” (from the interviewer perspective). The more I thought about it, the more my rejection from the Physiotherapy program made complete sense. Most of my answers were focused on objective criteria, research, and creative ideas when they should have been focused on client feelings, present moment criteria, and tried and true methods. After this experience, personality typing became a small guilty pleasure hobby that I occasionally indulged in, but usually amounted to “high brow” gossiping.

Luckily during this same timeframe, I had discovered a new “spark” inside. I volunteered for a small startup that created an iOS application for rehabilitating stroke survivors, and found the design process very interesting. I also took a course called Computers for Kinesiologists. I really enjoyed the programming portion, so much so that I decided to take an Intro to Programming continuing education course, and I really liked that course too. I could feel the allure of the unknown pulling me towards computer programming and eventually I took the leap and applied for the Information Technology Software Development program at a polytechnic school.

At school, one of the classes focused on career planning, which included taking a personality test. Once again I got INTJ (the only one in my class). This time was a bit different because of my previous experiences and interest in the subject. Now I understood what the results meant and I felt more interested in learning the theories behind it, and analyzing how it showed up in my life. It helped that a couple other people also took interest in it and were willing to indulge me in analytical analysis (once again, high brow gossip). But alas, my focus shifted again towards graduation and getting a job in this new field. To my surprise and happiness, I received job offers almost immediately after graduation. It felt so much easier than my previous experience. I felt confident, like all my strengths were exactly what employers were looking for. My weaknesses seemed barely noticeable; sometimes like they were also strengths. I began my career as a software developer!

On one particular team, we had a little bit of fun taking the 16 personalities quiz. Interestingly enough, our team results were very diverse! I again typed as INTJ. This time, I could compare the type my coworkers received to how I perceived them and how they solved problems. The introvert vs extrovert differences were most obvious and predictable. The S vs N dichotomy was more predictable if I worked closely with someone to solve a problem and our problem solving styles were very different - or if they focused on details or steps in the sequence of plan vs the end goal. The F/T dichotomy was much less obvious to me (not predictable), and the P/J dichotomy was only predictable for people who were highly organized or very conscientious (not all Js, but always J types). 

Fast forward a number of years… my interest in personality theory comes and goes in waves. In the last year I have been riding another wave of interest in the subject. Diving deeper into the theories including the cognitive functions and type stacks. Learning the differences between various interpretations of the same idea, and evolving my understanding and analysis to uncover new ideas and perspectives on various situations in my life. I have many new questions and paths to explore. I also can’t help but wonder how I have changed so much and yet “not at all”. Understanding personality theory has helped me develop more empathy towards how other people think. It has also helped me identify and work on my weaknesses. At the very least, it continues to provide me with a lot of mind entertainment.

N vs S: Self Awareness During Problem Solving

I have now worked as a software developer for over 10 years. During this time I have had several profound moments of self awareness when it comes to cognition. Most of these moments happened when working closely with a coworker who seemingly used the opposite problem solving "strategy" (in terms of cognition). Normally, awareness of how we think tends to be unconscious - we just do it, in whichever way comes most easily to us, and maybe we might reflect on it later. My interest in MBTI has helped me become more conscious of how I think, and occasionally, if I slow down and notice, I can realize when I'm preferring a certain cognitive function over another.

 As an INTJ, I tend to rely on Ni (introverted intuition) often. I excel at reverse engineering, tend to "see" the conclusion first, then piece together information (jumping around, out of sequence) until a path to the goal finally materializes. The vast majority of them time this process is totally out of my conscious awareness. Before I started recognizing it consciously, I had several baffeling interactions with coworkers and project partners. I often wondered why someone was getting hung up on a detail or step that I viewed as irrelevant to the end goal (perhaps this was Ni - Te pushing to come to an objective conclusion). Sometimes I would think something in frustration along the lines of  "don't worry about that. We'll figure it out later - meet me at the next part". This usually occurred when my coworker preferred their Si (introverted sensing) function. Si tends toward step by step processing, concerned with gathering details and applying information from previous experiences. It helps with tasks that require a methodical approach where current and past data is compared to better inform decisions.

From my perspective, Si is like a having a strongly typed programming language running. It enforces type rules and catches errors at compile time in order to prevent errors later. Ni is opposite, allowing implicit  type conversions, which means faster compile time but probably more errors. 

With more experience and more self reflection and awareness, I started to recognize  Ni vs Si conflicts playing out during my interactions. I realized that sometimes that detail the other person was hung up on had the potential to become important later, or reveal a different path altogether if explored. To put on the brakes, I need to activate Ne-Ti and explore the possibilities in the process with more curiosity. Here are a couple stories that illustrate this phenomenon and hopefully show my growth as problem solver and software developer too:

Story 1: Gathering Evidence vs "Psychic" Phenomenon

One time the whole team had to jump in to solve a problem in production. I immediately recognized the location of the problem as being related to a recent change I had seen in a merge request. The change touched code that had the potential to effect that specific functionality of the app. I looked through the recently merged changes and immediately picked out that one. A quick glance at the code confirmed this change could have the result we saw in production (as I visualized it). "This is the one" I said. If we revert this change we can fix this issue. I jumped on a call with another team member and told them my thoughts with confidence. They insisted we go through each recent change one at a time to identify which change caused the issue. It felt like my insight was dismissed or ignored completely. As the pain stakingly slow and tedious process dragged on, I could feel myself becoming increasingly annoyed, and anxious as we got closer to the change I originally identified. Finally we reverted that change and sure enough it fixed the issue. I could feel the "I told you so" raging behind my pursed lips, but I also knew my coworker was right about the process. We required concrete evidence that proved without a doubt that that specific change was the one responsible for the error. Unfortunately "I just know" or an explanation about what the code does would not be enough to convince anyone who didn't know the code intimately or didn't believe in the power of the Ni cognitive function (haha).  This experience helped me realize the value of a methodical approach to problem solving especially when there's a need to justify a decision with concrete proof.

Story 2: Problem Solving Together from the Outside In

I took on a time sensitive task that involved remote configuration. A process totally new to me. I had a very short window to learn how to do it, get it done and into production. I had pieces of the puzzle floating around in my mind (and literally open in a number of tabs in my browser.) I started building the metaphorical puzzle.... At first glance it looked simple - but as I examined further I found several missing pieces. No problem. I asked around a couple questions, got some answers, including step by step documentation, and forged ahead. Then a coworker contacted me interested in learning how to do the task I was working on. I jumped on a call with them and I tried to explain my progress so far, but sheepishly realized I had no idea what I was doing (it's also a very Ni stereotype to be unable to explain your process). I jumped around to various steps...Perhaps my coworker noticed but they didn't let on. They were reading the step by step document and asking questions about each step. I realized I was ahead, but had skipped a couple important steps. We did those things as we went (all while screen sharing).  Eventually we completed the task. In the humble realization of just how many important steps I had missed, I felt a lot of gratitude for my co-worker and their approach to the task. I felt as if we had literally completed a puzzle together - like they had joined me just at the right time to hand me the missing pieces. Upon further reflection I realized most of the steps I had figured out were at the end of the process, like I had naturally been working backwards. Meanwhile my coworker stepped through the process from the beginning forwards, and we happily met in the middle. Later, to my surprise, my coworker thanked me for the knowledge transfer.