Judgers and Perceivers

This is Part 5 of my series on personality types (character traits) based upon the Kiersey Personality Sorter. You can find Part 1 here, Part 2 here, Part 3 here, and Part 4 here.

Remember, I'm an EXFJ. My "X" is special, so if you want to understand that, you'll need to read Part 3.

Today we're talking about the final pair, P and J.

Perceiving: These folks tend to prefer open-endedness, delaying judgement (decisions) in order to collect information. Because of this, deadlines are not their friends since they prefer flexibility and open options. They're frequently playful and are apt to put things off.

Judging: We judgers like closure. We want things to be tied down because things tend to be more orderly that way. Judging folks like deadlines and take them seriously, seeking decisions. The can believe work comes before anything else.

Um, I'm not that last statement.

Things to be wary of for each:

Perceivers can spend so much time gathering information that they miss out on opportunities (deadlines). I just need a little more time before I decide.

Judging types must be careful not to be in such a hurry to get  closure that they make a decision too soon, that they don't collect enough data.

Perceivers are big picture people. They like to look at the grand design. Judgers are detailed oriented--mix the J with and S, and you have really organized people.

Real life examples.

My husband is a P. He was a general contractor before he retired and had to balance things all the time between various jobs. Seriously, he would have five jobs going at once and when the weather was bad or supplies didn't arrive in time, no biggie. He'd work on one of his other jobs.

Hmm. That would absolutely drive me nuts. I'm a J. I start a project and finish it. Then I start another project. And finish it. Having several unfinished projects hanging over me would make me run screaming from the room.

Hubby's Perceiverness came into play when we first got married. His approach to bookkeeping (I used to be a bookkeeper) is very different from mine. Once again, he's a big picture guy. I'm into the details. When we were looking to pay our debt down, he was interested in things like interest rates overall. I just wanted to know if I could pay our bills that month. But don't mistake my concern for the current for being a long-range planner. Budget? That's me, right down to the day something's paid off and those funds then move to pay something else off.

Until I took the Kiersey the first time and found out the his approach was a legitimate way to view the world, I thought he was being irritating on purpose. Learning about his Kiersey results, took a lot of strain off our relationship. I know. Petty of me to assume he was doing it to bug me. I know. I suck.

Work example. I worked in a place that oversaw hundreds of building. The director (my boss) was a hands-on, detail guy. The finance guy prepared the initial budget proposal accordingly because the director was right in there all the way. However, he retired. I'm sure the new director was a P. Very big picture. The finance guy put the initial budget together just like he did for the old director. Finance guy made the observation after the first budget meeting with the new director: "I would have planned that very differently if I'd known."

What kind of potential conflict do you see in your WIPs with characters who view things so differently?

Personalities, Again

One of the goals I had for 2012 was to do a series of posts about personality types, based upon the Kiersey Personality Sorter, which I find fascinating.

Epic fail.

Not the Kiersery, but my follow through. Well, I'm going to try again. Someday, I'd like to write a novel where I base the characteristics completely upon the sixteen personality types. Which is kind of funny, really, considering that I'm a hybrid on one area. Keep reading to find out.

My first two posts will be repeats of posts I did last year.

I've been fascinated for years (all right, decades) with the Kiersey Personality Sorter. It was based on the MMPI, which is a comprehensive test, something like 600 questions. The MMPI is used a lot in dealing with mental illness, but for people trained in what to look for it tells a lot more about the people taking it than they would ever dream.

The Kiersey is much shorter and has many practical uses. They give it to department heads at work. There are no right or wrong answers to the questions, but merely give insight into how the taker views the world.

Here's a real life example from the business world. I used to work as the lead secretary for a department that oversaw physical facilities--buildings, etc. My old boss developed a health issue and retired. He was a detail-oriented person when it came to the budget and was very hands on. His replacement, however, was a big picture kind of guy. The finance director commented after the first budget meeting with the new director that he wished he'd known this about the new boss because he'd have prepared his presentation completely differently.

People's personalities change a lot as they mature, but settle in somewhere around age twenty-five. So for young people under that age, their results are . . . questionable. Once you reach twenty-five, your scores aren't likely to change much. Now, there can be traumatic things people go through that would impact how they answer the questions, but eventually things settle down again.

Some people also answer the questions differently if they're looking at them as they are at home as opposed to at work. When I had a coworker mention that, it floored me because I am what I am. I'm the same at home or at work. With me, what you see is what you get.

What does this have to do with writing? When you're creating characters, their personality traits are important if you don't want them to be flat. But what characteristics fit which personality types? The Kiersey would be a great tool for that.

So over the next few blog posts, I'm going to be talking about different aspects of the Kiersey and what it has to say about people. It separates people into sixteen different personality types. I'll start with me.

I'm an EXFJ.

The E means I'm an extrovert. (the other option is introvert, of course)

The X is going to be confusing because it means that I test dead even between the two options: S (sensing--dealing with information from your five sense) and N (intuitive).

The F means I'm a feeler. (the other choice is a thinker--don't even say it!)

The J is for judging. (the other option is perceiving).

If you have the time, I suggest you go and take the test and find out what you are. I'll start with the introvert/extravert topic next week.

ETA: I think it's important to know what your split is between the types, so if you're interested in taking the test to find that out, email me and I'll send you a pdf of the test.

Have you ever taken a personality test? If so what kind was it? What did you think of the results?