What Kind Of Change Artist Are You??!! - By: Kenneth Meyer

My wife and I were shopping over the weekend and I got another "real world" everyday example of the usefulness of personality type.

My wife was out of hose and needed a new pair or two and went to her favorite place to buy them. In the past she had been most satisfied with the product at this particular store. This shopping also had a strong element of "last minute" to it as she needed the items for work the nest day.

As she shopped it became immediately clear that the brand she had relied upon had been changed by the store that she had relied upon!! Well, that is when I got another reminder of the power of personality type and how predictable and thus usable type knowledge can be.

My wife reacted exactly as one of her personality type (ISTJ, Intorverted with Sensing, Thinking and Judging) is predicted to act under the circumstance of rapid and strong "change"...she got irritated by the change. In fact, her verbal reaction both immediately as she learned of the change and to me privately as we drove away was..."Ken if it isn't broke why fix it??!!".

In other words, to her those hose had provided all the benefits she needed and she relied upon them. She could use that brand of hose from now until the end of time! To change something for her, and for the ISTJ when it is working perfectly fine in their view is nuts, stupid, and irritating to say the least!

The explanation is that all ISTJs are strongest in the "sensing" or detailed, in-the-moment, practical and common-sensual realities of whatever they are focused upon in the moment. The ISTJ is also constantly comparing what they are experiencing NOW with what they have already experienced BEFORE because they are strongly detailed and internal oriented. They are always checking with their unrivaled memory for past, already experienced facts and sensory data to see if the present reality matches. If it does well that is fine we move forward....but if it is not as in a strong change in what has been perceived and understood to be the functional norm...the ISTJ DOES NOT LIKE IT, they get frustrated and irritated. Again, it worked before, and it is not broken or not functioning so to change it makes no sense and "rocks" the ISTJ view of reality!

Add this dislike of change to something perceived to be fine and normal with the fact that the ISTJ is a "judger" and thus psychologically needing things to work along lines of "closure", accepted "methods" of doing things; toward a "end result" or along the path of accepted procedure and well you have someone who just flat will not react to change "instinctively" as easily or with a more positive behavior as some others personality types.

In a broader more practical sense then how can we use this awareness of type?
Well, firstly in knowing your type. If you know which of the 16 personality types you are you can easily identify wether you are a sensor, as my bride is, or perhaps a intuit, as I am. Understanding the differences between the two can for-warn you of how the sensor may react to change as opposed to the intuit. It is similar on each of the other 3 psychological levels within the Myers-Briggs approach to personality type. When you know your type and what that means you can project, predict and forecast, if you will, behavior and circumstances that may illicit certain behavior from your type, etc.

The "intuit" as a quick example may not have gotten as irritated as the sensor in the above example got due to the fact that intuits usually see the overall, conceptual reason that a change with something accepted might be needed. That is because the intuit is always looking to the future, what is over the horizon is almost always more interesting than what is happening in-the-moment anyway. So in the above example, the intuit may be thinking something like "....well I can see how new technology in fabric may make the hose wear even longer than the old ones!" or something like that. Oh believe you me intuits can get irritated with change also but not typically as rapidly as the sensing counterpart.

So, if you or folks you know seem to not tolerate "change" as well as others, those folks may be "sensors" and that is great! They are folks who need what is happening right now to continue pretty much as it always has....and/or they can try to re-frame themselves temporarily when things trusted do change and understand the temporary irritations they are experiencing are just fine and to be normally expected in times of change.

All of us are "change artists" of one kind or another. Some of us tolerate more instinctively than others; but all of us can understand what is happening and what is LIKELY to happen when we have a knowledge of personality type and we practice using it every day!

Hope you have a type-oriented "change" today!

About the Author

Kenneth L. Meyer, MIS, MBTI Ken is a charter-certified (C118608) Myers-Briggs Type Indicator practitioner and President of Solid Rock Consulting Group, LLC. Myers-Briggs Consultant to Business, Families, Churches and Organizations. Career Planner. Web Site Consultant. http://www.personality-power-for-everyday-living.com

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