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Many years ago, at least 5 years before I discovered the MBTI, I took a one-day workshop called “Managing Interpersonal Relationships”, offered through my day job.

The workshop used one of the “4-Quadrant Personality Models” as a way to explain and improve team communications (aka “interpersonal relationships”) in the workplace. In particular, it focused on the Social Styles model developed by David Merrill & Roger Reid. The Social Styles model theorizes that people operate with four distinct ways of interaction, or social styles: Analytical, Amiable, Driving and Expressive.

Prior to the workshop, I was asked to hand out survey questionnaires to my manager and co-workers. They filled out the answers based on how they saw me, in our work relationships. Their responses were then sent to the workshop facilitators to be analyzed and turned into a result. That result was the point where I supposedly fit in the 4-quadrant Social Styles diagram.

All I received on the day of the workshop was a printout of the graph and my supposed position within that graph. I wasn’t privy to the original data.

My co-workers placed me in the “Driving” box. This annoyed me, in large part because I disagreed so strongly with that assessment. From my own viewpoint, I belonged solidly in the “Analytical” box, not least because I was so obviously unhappy not to be able to see the data that put me in the “wrong” quadrant. (That “proved” to me that I was an “Analytical”. That and the fact that I didn’t get along with the other “Drivers” in the group.)

I spent the day learning about the Social Styles model, while silently stewing over misplacement and “being labeled” by other people. Then I went back to work, wrote up a 1-page memo for my manager, outlining why I thought the workshop was a waste of time, and went back to work.

Some 5 years later, I discovered the MBTI. I much preferred a 16-box model, especially because I was the only person responsible for labeling myself. Since then, I have occasionally thought about the Social Styles model but never figured I might some day find a nugget a truth in that long-ago workshop.

Flash forward two decades. I’ve done a lot of reading and learning since then and I still really like the MBTI model. Social media has introduced me to people with similar interests and, last fall, I joined the SF Bay Area chapter of the Association for Psychological Type (BAAPT). I’ve attended several meetings, dragging hubby Rich along to a few, and I’ve been exploring some previously unknown aspects of the MBTI in my endeavors to explain it better at home.

Recently, I came across additional terminology from Linda Berens and Dario Nardi (The Sixteen Personality Types: Descriptions for Self-Discovery) in which each MBTI type is given a two-word “title”.

ISTJ	Planner Inspector	ISTP	Analyser Operator
ISFJ	Protector Supporter	ISFP	Composer Producer
INFJ	Foreseer Developer	INFP	Harmonizer Clarifier
INTJ	Conceptualizer Director	INTP	Designer Theoriser
ESTJ	Implementor Supervisor	ESTP	Promoter Executor
ESFJ	Facilitator Caretaker	ESFP	Motivator Presenter
ENFJ	Envisioner Mentor	ENFP	Discoverer Advocate
ENTJ	Strategist Mobilizer	ENTP	Explorer Inventor

As these are described in a forum at personalitycafe.com (emphasis mine):

“Linda Berens and Dario Nardi theorize that the title of their descriptions carry a special meaning for the person claiming that type and others who know this person. The person generally relates well to the first word of the title, but do not see themselves in the second word and vice-versa for people who know this person.”

My MBTI Type is INTJ. “Conceptual Director”.

While I do relate (strongly 🙂 to the “Conceptual” portion of Beren’s & Nardi’s “Conceptual Director”, apparently people who know me see me as a “Director”.

In the “Social Styles” model, “Director” is one of the recognized synonyms for “Driver”.

Huh.
That “Managing Interpersonal Relationships” may have had some value after all!