Type on Teams | |||
The following is adapted from Linda V. Berens, Linda K. Ernst and Melissa Smith, Quick Guide to the 16 Personality Types and Teams (Telos Publications, 2005) *Used with permission.
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For them, team relationships are about sharing expertise. They want to have a joint area of interest and competence to share and energetically engage in collaborative problem solving and strategizing. They typically seek out relationships so they can have different thoughts and experiences yet often feel they lack interpersonal skills. In fact, their relationships can become competitive and may interfere with the intellectual needs that drove them to seek the relationships in the first place...
The disruption that comes from team conflict keeps them from thinking clearly, so they avoid confrontation unless it is absolutely necessary. They might avoid conflict for too long, hoping it will go away...
Provide a team environment that is calm and conflict-free and where consultative rather than hierarchical relationships are the norm. Give them enough freedom to reflect on how things work, to generate ideas, and to see connections and patterns. Offer them opportunities to direct their energy toward acquisition of knowledge and competence...
They are inclined to first analyze a situation, seeking to understand the principles that apply. Then they will want to integrate all kinds of information from a variety of sources. They tend to focus on how things work, why they work that way, and what makes them not work and then try to come up with an elegant solution that really solves the problem...
They tend to quickly decide on the accuracy of theories and frameworks, yet they labor over the accurate expression of ideas. They may avoid decisions regarding an action or establishing order and structure...
They are likely to say they are not resistant to change since they are constantly developing and revising their designs and approaches. However, they do tend to resist change that appears illogical and seems to violate principles. Change that means changing their habitual way of doing routine tasks is also hard for them, especially if a big learning curve is involved...