Aibu to say I don’t want to take a personality test at work

[PenelopeWhipStop]

My manager has told me he intends to have us all take a personality test as part of our 1-2-1 meetings. I queried whether this was an organisational thing or his own personal decision (it’s his idea). It’s to help determine if we’re introverts or extroverts, how we learn, possible career paths.

I already know I’m an introvert! Was I being unreasonable to tell him I’m not keen for n his idea?

Those things never seem to offer me the reply options needed.
I have been know to write additional answers into multiple-choice tests.

Anyway - collecting data from people is one thing. Interpreting that date is something else entirely.

Surely he is skilled enough to work out the office personality-types just by watching you work and looking at your results.

How interesting - I wouldn’t take that view of anyone in my team who refused to take one of those tests which lack scientific validity. Perhaps your rather negative and dictatorial approach is reflective of your managerial style though - has that shown up on previous personality tests you’ve done?

Was brilliant when we did one with our team (not MB) helped people understand each other’s strengths and weaknesses and how we could work effectively together and get the best out of people. It was genuinely a game changer for our team and even when people moved on there was a really warm hearted reference and consideration to this in presents.

There’s a sweeping cynicism on here about any of these sorts of things which just means that people are not going to benefit from them.

It will likely be the 16 personalities test he will hand out. It is fairly insightful but will not tell you if you are/are not suited to your current role. It is more about your strengths and weaknesses, why you react to certain people/situations in a certain way, how to get the best out of all your relationships

You can take it with a pinch of salt if you want but there is likely some new information you will gain from it

As someone said above a proper MBTI test has to administrated but a licensed professional and that is a lot more detail and lot more personal. The 16 personalities and other internet versions are a lot more generic and therefore there will be stuff in it that isn’t relevant to you.

From a managers perspective it does give a better view of the preferred working and communication styles across the team. So it does help them build better connections across the team

To those who’ve asked why I’m not keen ….it strikes me as intrusive and quite nosy of my manager to be doing this off his own initiative rather than approved and controlled through HR. I’m not convinced any results will be kept confidential. To be of benefit to the team we’d need to know each other’s results surely? We sit together as a team at least once a week (mix of full and part time, WFH and in the office) so it’s not like we don’t know what the others are like and how to work as a team.

Not at all - if something has validity and is proven to work then I’m more than happy to implement it in my dept, but I’m very well of the limitations of these and won’t use them for anything else but a bit of fun. If they worked for yours then great, but remember they are self reported, are based on a range of theories, only capture the mood of the respondents on that particular day at that time, and shouldn’t be used to define employees.

We’ve done the “insights” one quite a few times at work over the years. I’ve found it extremely helpful and also very consistent. It’s very focussed on helping understand others and - particularly the first time I did it - it really helped me working with others. Maybe with masses more time and experience and talking to others I’d have figured out the same things, but it really helped. And I’m generally v good at understanding how to work with others.

Also, we did it recently and in no way were all our “leaders” extrovert types. There was a very even distribution of all “types” - plenty of “introverts” too. It’s quite a science-y organisation so probably to be expected, but it was good to see.

I expect there are plenty of diff ones people use, and some are likely good and some bollocks.

There is always a personality type that doesn't like this sort of thing.

I do understand all of this, but what they can do is start an open conversation with a team about ways of working, or on an individual level with a manager / mentor to look at skills and development needs.

I don’t think anyone uses them to define employees unless they’re a particularly poor manager in which case this is likely to be the tip of the iceberg.

Yep, apparently we're "boring" because we don't feel comfortable opening up our feelings and emotions to our managers, for them to use the information against us, or to share it with our gossipy colleagues.

I didn't go to work to entertain people. I did however forge good relationships with my team and consequently we all understood how to work with each other.

I had to do one of these before attending a personal development course with an organisation I used to work for. For one part of the course we were all left in a room and were meant to sort out a challenge by grouping together with similar personalities and work together using all our different strengths. We weren’t told what to do but supposedly we should have been able to work it out. Instead, we all wondered why the course organisers had left the room and then chatted about what we had been watching on tv etc! When the organisers came back they weren’t impressed.

I do understand all of this, but what they can do is start an open conversation with a team about ways of working, or on an individual level with a manager / mentor to look at skills and development needs

A conversation about ways of working or development needs based on a non scientific test which only reflect how a person feels at that point in time is precisely what should be avoided - that’s exactly what is meant by not defining employees. If you want to use them as a bit of fun in a wider context then fine, but they don’t provide any real insight because of their limitations.

Is it Myers-Briggs? Because it is totally discredited and despite this, people still use it.

Of course they look accurate, reading your horoscope in a magazine can look accurate.

😂

Yep - count me in.

To all these managers relying on disturbing levels of pseudo science and accusing people of lack of teamwork,
how will you handle it when an employee turns out to be one of the 9.1% of the population with a personality disorder and the lid is blown off in your "fun test" because they didn't actually know this about themselves until they either can't do the test or get repeatedly totally different results each time? What will you do when someone with PTSD dissociates in one of them? What will you do when someone with anxiety is accused of a lack of team effort when really they're just anxious?
Nothing. You'll wash your hands of it and say "it was only a fun test to learn something about each other haha".
Do any of you actually THINK before throwing around potentially dangerous shite that some people take too seriously?
OP YANBU and if your manager thinks otherwise ask him where he got his psychiatry qualifications from.

I disagree.

Of course they’ve got limitations, pretty much anything has if you want to explore the evidence around it, but if used well they can be a great way to start a conversation. People can take on board what they want and leave want they don’t (a bit like horoscopes). Again, if a manager wants to label people based on this there are bigger issues. Likewise the suggestion that managers will gossip about results.

I personally wouldn’t do them individually in an enforced way but as part of a team away day, perhaps what you describe as ‘fun’ they can be great. As I say, it was a game changer for our team.

Surely a manager should know their own staff well enough, unless they've literally just got the job.

Also a flippant reason for not wanting to do it - those men on dating websites who put their personality type codes in their profile 😐it reminded me of those

The person who mentioned Imposter Syndrome. You’re probably right there. Now if you can glean that from some words on a screen, imagine how well my manager should know me after spending time with me IRL.

• I wouldn’t say it was the hill I wanted to die on. I just don’t like the idea and queried why he was intending to do this and let him know I wasn’t keen. He said he wouldn’t make me.

I’d consider myself quite open and honest at work and have already had discussions about what my strengths and weaknesses are (perhaps a personality test would bring out strengths or weaknesses I don’t know?). My main worry is what if a test comes back to say I’m totally unsuitable for my role? How will that then influence my manager and how he acts towards me?*

No test would be ever tell you you were unsuitable for your job. Also, You've probably been misinformed about these tests. They're not to test your personality, they're normally to help your manager understand your 'working style'. Like if you thrive in teams/autonomy, if you're more likely to be conscientious/steady etc etc. and there is no one desired style, certified facilitators of these tests will emphasise that all of these styles are required for a thriving team. The point of the tests are to understand how to work best in your team and how to understand how you and your team can work more cohesively. There really isn't anything to worry about. If anything, it shows your manager can be bothered to run an effective team. He/she is trying. I hope this helps

Thank you.
you’ve just described my innermost, deepest darkest fears about a personality test and, ultimately, I don’t think it’ll do my mental health much good. I also don’t have confidence that my manager could manage the consequences!

Absolutely this.
Myers Briggs type testing is accurate and reliable on the test, retest scores. It's not a fun FB quiz but an organisational tool to identify strengths and weaknesses. When used as part of a performance appraisal, it can highlight areas where employees need to develop and this can then be linked to the year's action plan for training and development. It's actually a good way to tick off progression points.

But I would definitely ask if a qualified person is conducting the tests. If it's just an unqualified manager, then ask the purpose, as any results will be unlikely to get any proper analysis.

Even the good ones have extremely limited accuracy. They are just guides for you as an individual, another person wouldn’t understand the nuance.

I’d send him a few reputable links as below, and say that you think that the evidence suggests they do considerably more harm that good and what managers should really be doing is talking to their staff.

I’m assuming he’s very young. This will probably put him off. You could also gently raise ir with HR, if your company doesn’t use them, it’s unlikely they will be happy with individual managers doing so.

ed.ted.com/lessons/how-do-personality-tests-work-merve-emre
ed.ted.com/lessons/how-do-personality-tests-work-merve-emre#review

ed.ted.com/lessons/how-do-personality-tests-work-merve-emre
ed.ted.com/lessons/how-do-personality-tests-work-merve-emre#review

If it’s the “Insights” training, it’s actually quite helpful

And that’s great your team enjoyed them, but I’m terms of accuracy they are to be taken with a big dollop of salt.