My Personality and Temperament 1
My Personality and Temperament
Liberty University
BMAL 500
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Abstract
Discovering one’s own personality and temperament can help to provide possible strengths a
weakness. Armed with this knowledge, one can use the information to help better understand
themselves as well as the people that might work for them. Using the information from the
Myers-Briggs personality test, I have discovered that I am Extravert, Sensing, Thinking and
Judging which is what ESTJ stands for. In this paper I will break down each part of ESTJ and
relates it to my personal and professional life. This will then be followed by the 2-letter type
temperament and how it fits into my life. Lastly, I will take the information discovered to show
how it fits into the organizational environment that I am a part of. This will also include taking
the information that I have learned to help me become a better follower, leader and manger as I
move up through the organizational structure.
Keywords: Personality, Temperament
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Extrovert 22%
After looking through a few online sources as well as the texts books for this course, I
have discovered that while I am an extrovert I still display some introvert tendencies. Overall, I
am more extrovert than introvert, but as I read through the descriptions of an introvert I feel that
I do align closely with being an introvert. In the next few sections, I will go over my extrovert
tendencies, followed by the few introvert tendencies, ending with why I am an overall extrovert.
I was surprised to find that my percentage was as low as it was with being an extrovert.
If anything, I would have thought I would have been higher. However, after a little reading and
self-reflection I was able to see why the percentage was what it was. Growing up on a plantation
in South Carolina and living so far outside of town the only person I had to play with was my
brother. For us, we spent just about every day outside playing in the woods or the river that
flowed by our house. So naturally for us whenever we would go to school we hung out by
ourselves with the exception of a few friends that we had. By the end of the day, things would
go back it just being us as we traveled the ten miles outside of town to get home. Things
changed when we moved closer to town. At this point I feel that this is when I became a little
more outgoing since I was playing sports and hanging out with friend.
I feel that after joining the Air Force, is when I really became more of an extrovert. I
was away from small town life where everyone knew everybody and for once I was able to do
what I wanted. Something that I recall from Type Talk at Work which describes my personality
well is “WHAT YOU SEE IS WHAT YOU GET”[ CITATION Kro02 \l 1033 ]. For the almost
seventeen years that I have been in the military, this how I have been. Because of this, I have
found that I feel more comfortable around like-minded people who share the same ideas and
thoughts as I do. As I have moved forwarded in my career, I have found that I enjoy being in
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charge of a large work section. This has given me the ability to see how my actions and
leadership style has influence the airmen around me. Which mostly has been very successful.
As I have moved furthered along in my military career I have found that I share some
introvert tendencies. These tendencies normally come out after I have had a stressful week at
work. I feel a lot of it has to do with the type of work that I do, which is being a missile
maintainer for the United States intercontinental ballistic missile force (ICBM). My work has
included everything from transporting a nuclear weapon, leading the team that works on the
missile, to being in charge of the work section that is responsible for the maintenance actions that
happen at a missile silo. The stress and knowledge of what happens if I don’t make sure that my
people do their job right takes a toll on you. This would be when the introvert parts comes out.
Type Talk at Work says that “if you find it necessary to recharge or to be alone with your
thoughts” that you are an introvert[ CITATION Kro02 \l 1033 ]. Reflecting on this, I only seem
to do this when my work is very stressful. When I was stationed in Minot North Dakota, my
escape was hunting by myself on the weekends. Once I moved to California and became an
instructor I didn’t feel the need to be by myself and spent more time with the family. Four years
later we moved to Cheyenne Wyoming and the stress came back because of the work I was
doing.
Even though I feel that I have introvert tendencies, my extrovert tendencies are the most
noticeable. I truly believe that the military has been the strongest factor in my life that has
helped shape me into the person I am today. I am very outspoken and tend to share things that
might not necessary be important at the time but will be in the future.
Sensing 31%
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With regards to how I gather information, I am more sensing than I am intuitive. After
reading the difference between the two, I feel that I am a bit of both. Just from the examples
provided in Type Talk at Work, I can look back and see were these have come into play. This
next section will cover my sensing personality as well as my intuitive traits.
From the time I have entered a leadership position, I have found that certain situations
have dictated how I have gather information. In my current position, asking specific questions
and expecting a specific answer is what I demand from my airmen. When I see statements like
“would rather do something than think about it” or “why some people have to improve
everything” [ CITATION Kro02 \l 1033 ] are items that apply to me every day. For the work
section that I manage, there are aspects that my leadership has order to be change. Even if the
process doesn’t need to change, they demand that it be change. On the other hand, there are time
when vehicles or equipment break, and a decision is needed to be made. Instead of trying to
figure out why they broke and who broke it, the more important thing to do is just get a
replacement so that the team can get out the door. The detail can be figured out later.
When dealing with the specifics, I end up getting a long drawn out story that is not
needed at the moment. The moment an issue comes up in my work section, my airmen want to
tell me the whole story of how the event unfolded. In the military, there is not a lot of time for a
full-blown novel on how something happened. Normal leadership is breathing down your neck
and is wanting answers. Therefore, the airmen need to provide the specifics of what has
happened so that the message can be relayed as soon as possible. Once this is complete then we
can circle back to the full story. The downside to this and what I often find myself not doing, is
circling back to the full story to ensure I haven’t missed anything important.
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I had mentioned earlier that I feel certain situation dictate how information is gathered.
Type Talk at Work mentions that if you think about serval things at once then you have intuitive
traits[ CITATION Kro02 \l 1033 ]. To me this seems more like multitasking. In one of my past
jobs, I had a team of four airmen that were split into different position on a missile site. At any
given moment I would have to know what they were doing as well as knowing what I was doing
at the same time. It got to the point that I could pick up key word throughout the day that told
me where they were in the task. This kept me from having to stop what I was doing to ask them
a question. Even in my current job I still think about several thinks at once. The difference is I
have more people in leadership position under me that can take on these things so that all I have
to do is ask for updates.
Even though I have traits of both sensing and intuition, I feel that on a day-to-day basis I
use the sensing traits more often. It is stated in Type Talk at Work that “everyone has some
Sensing characteristic and some iNtuituve ones”[ CITATION Kro02 \l 1033 ]. As I move closer
to retirement I wonder if my traits will change or stay the same.
Thinking 31%
My first thoughts on the thinking and feelers traits, where that of feelers deal with
feelings and thinking deals with smarts [ CITATION Kro02 \l 1033 ]. Of course, after some
reading, I realized that I wasn’t the only. Reading through Type Talk at Work and seeing what
each trait meant, I knew that thinking was a strong trait that I have. Within this section I will just
be going over thinking, since I have now feeler traits in common with what is listed in Type Talk
at Work.
This trait would be the one that I could only recall from my time in the military. I don’t
really remember much from my childhood that would relate me as thinking. Once I put my
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uniform on and leave the house it game time. The only thoughts that go through my mind are
that of what my mission is for the day. Throughout my career I have had to make tough
decisions that have impacted not only individual airmen, but my entire work center. Everything
from career impacting because of poor performance to taking away a person’s weekend that they
thought they had off. In either case, it’s the choice that I had to make for the better good of the
Air Force. Because of this and many other things, I have been called cold blooded, heartless,
and many other names. Neither of these things could be further from the truth.
While reading Type Talk at Work, I knew I had mostly thinking traits. The statements of
“don’t mind making difficult decisions” and “are able to stay cool, calm, and objective”
[ CITATION Kro02 \l 1033 ] are traits that I deal with daily. Just this week, my leadership came
down to the office and was freaking out over what I consider small issues. I was able to stay
calm and ensure them that issues weren’t as bad as what they had thought.
While I might be considered the bad guy at work. At the end of the day someone has to
make the tough decision to get the mission accomplished. The above paragraphs just describes
part of who I am. Once I walk through the door at home, my professional life has ended for the
day and it is now time for my personal side.
Judger 28%
My last personality trait is one I kind of knew was 100% me. When I looked at
statements that set judgers and perceivers a part, it just clarified that I was a judger. Throughout
this whole project, I have been able to see a little bit of the other traits in me, but not this time.
In this section I will cover how being a judger fits into my life.
Type talk at Work list the following keywords of decided, structure, control, deadline and
scheduled [ CITATION Kro02 \l 1033 ] which resonate with whom I am. These words are part
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of my daily routine. I have a set time that I wake up every morning, followed by a specific time
that I need to leave the house by to get to work. Before I even get to work, I know what my day
is going to be like as far as what meetings I have and what taskers are due. I have even trained
my airmen to provide me with updates without even having to ask them. I do make list from
time to time to remember small details for things.
The one thing that drives me crazy is a person that just puts things were ever. I spend
more time helping my wife and kids find things around the house because they can’t seem to put
things back in their specific place. Every day when I come home, I put my keys in my hat and
then they both go on shelf in the kitchen. When I am working in my garage, every tool has a
specific place that it goes. Task preparation is a must for me. If I am working on my car, I have
to have everything set up in a specific order. This same preparation is something I use at work.
Type: ESTJ and Temperament: SJ
In this section I will go over my personality as a whole, followed by my temperament. It
is interesting how each individual trait comes together to make up my personality and
temperament. With everything I do, I put forth almost all my energy into completing
task[ CITATION BSM15 \l 1033 ]. Surely knowing this information will help in managing my
organization.
Thinking about some of my behaviors and how I act a few keywords come to mind,
which are outspoken, like-minded and tough. Naturally as an leader I am comfortable issuing
orders[ CITATION Kei19 \l 1033 ]. Even before knowing what my personality type was, these
words resonated with whom I was as a person. After reading the result of my test, I can see that I
am for sure an ESTJ. The keywords I mentioned can be found throughout description of ESTJ.
The statement of “power, position and prestige should be worked for and earned” [ CITATION
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Hum19 \l 1033 ] is something I wholeheartedly believe. This statement is a testament of hard
work and setting goals to reach the top.
Surrounding myself with like-minded people or groups helps me to accomplish daily
activities as well as planning for the future. Since I tend to hang with like-minded people, my
pool of friends is fairly small. I do feel that this is a weakness though and it because of this I
tend to dismiss others options and thoughts on subjects. The main reason has to deal with the
technical aspect of what my job has to deal with. This is the hard skills, which are technical
expertise and knowledge that are for a task[ CITATION Kni18 \l 1033 ].
As far as my temperament goes, I am sensing and judging SJ. Type Talk at Work says
that even if you don’t know the rest of a person personality that a person can figure out their
temperament based of just two letters[ CITATION Kro02 \l 1033 ]. Knowing this information
can be helpful in determining how I can use the people that work for me. During my time as a
technical training instructor I could tell how a trainee learned best based off their written test and
hands on performance. I also would talk to them about their past experiences to pinpoint what
the already knew. For example, if an airman told me that they use to work on cars, then I knew
they had some short of mechanical ability.
Lessons Learned
Throughout this exercise I have learned a great deal about myself. Even though I am
ESTJ, there are areas where are exhibit more than one trait. The trait might not be as dominant,
but it is there depending on the situation. Now knowing what each trait means, I can use this to
help hone my follow, leading, and management skills. These will also help me better understand
why my people and coworkers behave the way they do.
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For myself, I already knew some of the stuff that was mention in my personality test. If
anything, this helped me in understanding why I do what I do. For example, instead of
hammering down all the time, maybe I can look a little deeper into what is causing a person to
act a specific way before I make that tough decision. Or when I am asking a specific, I can be a
little clear on what I expect back as an answer. I also realize that with some of the example
provided in the Type Talk at Work that I do the same things either at home or to my leadership.
The main example would be between sensing and intuition. Even though I am sensing I do have
intuition tendencies like when I’m asked a specific question and I give back a non-specific
answer. In the end I feel that this information has been beneficial and will help me become a
manager and coworker.
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References
BSM Consulting. (2015, 02 18). The Personality Page. Retrieved from PersonalityPage:
http://www.personalitypage.com/
Humanmetric Inc. (2019, January 27). Extraverted Sensng Thinking Judging. Retrieved from
Humanmetrics: http://www.humanmetrics.com/personality/estj
Keirsey. (2019, January 27). Learn about the Guardian Supervisor. Retrieved from Keirsey:
https://keirsey.com/temperament/guardian-supervisor/
Knicki, A., & Fugate, M. (2018). Organizational Behavior: A practical, problem-solving
approach. New York: McGraw-Hill Education.
Kroeger, O., Thuesen, J. M., & Rutledge, H. (2002). Type Talk at Work How the 16 Personality
Types Determine Your Success on the Job. New York, New York: Dell Publishing.
