Meyers Briggs and SOF

[Chuckarthy]

Hello Sirs,

Yesterday my parents sat me down and made me take a Meyers Briggs personality test in an attempt to "Help me find my path" because dislike my decision to join the military and are trying to find something else that I might be interested in. I had never heard of this type of test before so I started researching it a little bit and it struck me that this could possibly be used to categorize soldiers and as a potential screening tool for soldiers. One thing that I have been musing over for quite some time is that given the fact that there is such a wide variety of SOF in the Armed Forces what makes certain people choose to pursue a career in one over the other. Everyone has their own varying reasons for picking their career path i'm sure, however I began to wonder if different SOF were simply better fits for different personality types. So my question you is which personality types to you would seem to fit the different SOF such as Special Forces, Air force PJs, Seals, Rangers, and Combat Controllers.

Here is a list of the personality types scroll down and mouse over them to get a brief overview of each.

http://www.myersbriggs.org/my-mbti-p...e/mbti-basics/


I did some searching and came across this thread back from 2009. The overwhelming result from this seemed to point to SF guys being INTJ's.

http://www.professionalsoldiers.com/...+briggs&page=2

[Bill Harsey]

Originally Posted by Chuckarthy

Hello Sirs,

Yesterday my parents sat me down and made me take a Meyers Briggs personality test in an attempt to "Help me find my path" because dislike my decision to join the military and are trying to find something else that I might be interested in. I had never heard of this type of test before so I started researching it a little bit and it struck me that this could possibly be used to categorize soldiers and as a potential screening tool for soldiers. One thing that I have been musing over for quite some time is that given the fact that there is such a wide variety of SOF in the Armed Forces what makes certain people choose to pursue a career in one over the other. Everyone has their own varying reasons for picking their career path i'm sure, however I began to wonder if different SOF were simply better fits for different personality types. So my question you is which personality types to you would seem to fit the different SOF such as Special Forces, Air force PJs, Seals, Rangers, and Combat Controllers.

Here is a list of the personality types scroll down and mouse over them to get a brief overview of each.

http://www.myersbriggs.org/my-mbti-p...e/mbti-basics/


I did some searching and came across this thread back from 2009. The overwhelming result from this seemed to point to SF guys being INTJ's.

http://www.professionalsoldiers.com/...+briggs&page=2

It's not always the test score, it's what your willing to do with what you have.

[1stindoor]

We have been taking that test and other similar tests for years. This is how I explained it to some regular Army senior NCOs awhile back. We (SF) want Soldiers that are twisted enough to do the job that is required of them...but not so twisted that we then have to explain their actions on the 6:00 news. It's a balancing act. For the most part we do well...occasionally one slips through and it's news at the national level.

[JSMosby]

Reminds me of that "we won't have any Crazy Harold running around" video.


NO MORE CRAZY HAROLD!!

[Dozer523]

http://professionalsoldiers.com/foru...highlight=INTJ
If you ain't INTJ you ain't . . .

[Surgicalcric]

Originally Posted by 1stindoor

....occasionally one slips through and it's news at the national level.

Or one -or more- slips thru who need to be on testosterone replacement therapy to get their nuts to drop...

Crip

[The Reaper]

Originally Posted by Chuckarthy

Hello Sirs,

Yesterday my parents sat me down and made me take a Meyers Briggs personality test in an attempt to "Help me find my path" because dislike my decision to join the military and are trying to find something else that I might be interested in. I had never heard of this type of test before so I started researching it a little bit and it struck me that this could possibly be used to categorize soldiers and as a potential screening tool for soldiers. One thing that I have been musing over for quite some time is that given the fact that there is such a wide variety of SOF in the Armed Forces what makes certain people choose to pursue a career in one over the other. Everyone has their own varying reasons for picking their career path i'm sure, however I began to wonder if different SOF were simply better fits for different personality types. So my question you is which personality types to you would seem to fit the different SOF such as Special Forces, Air force PJs, Seals, Rangers, and Combat Controllers.

Here is a list of the personality types scroll down and mouse over them to get a brief overview of each.

http://www.myersbriggs.org/my-mbti-p...e/mbti-basics/


I did some searching and came across this thread back from 2009. The overwhelming result from this seemed to point to SF guys being INTJ's.

http://www.professionalsoldiers.com/...+briggs&page=2

This should be the least of your worries.

TR

[Chuckarthy]

Originally Posted by The Reaper

This should be the least of your worries.

TR

Im not worried about it at all. Simply more of a curiosity. What really peaked my interest on this was the fact that of my HS class of 49 guys we have two who are now post buds, one in the 75th, one going through the selection course in the near future, and one in PJ training. We all have very similar backgrounds yet for some reason we all chose different paths.

[Richard]

We often place too much emphasis on tests and testing. Try this one - it only has four questions and tells us whether or not you are qualified to be a "QP". The questions are not that difficult.

1. How do you put a giraffe into a refrigerator?
(Tests whether you tend to do simple things in an overly complicated way.)

2. How do you put an elephant into the refrigerator?
(Tests your ability to think through the repercussions of your actions.)

3. The Lion King is hosting an animal conference. All the animals attend except one. Which animal does not attend?
(Tests your memory.)

4. There is a river you must cross. But it is inhabited by crocodiles. How do you manage it?
(Tests whether you learn quickly from your mistakes.)

Good luck!

Richard

** Let me know when you want the answers.

[Menschenschreck]

Originally Posted by Richard

We often place too much emphasis on tests and testing. Try this one - it only has four questions and tells us whether or not you are qualified to be a "QP". The questions are not that difficult.

1. How do you put a giraffe into a refrigerator?
(Tests whether you tend to do simple things in an overly complicated way.)

2. How do you put an elephant into the refrigerator?
(Tests your ability to think through the repercussions of your actions.)

3. The Lion King is hosting an animal conference. All the animals attend except one. Which animal does not attend?
(tests your memory.)

4. There is a river you must cross. But it is inhabited by crocodiles. How do you manage it?
(Tests whether you learn quickly from your mistakes.)

Good luck!

Richard

** Let me know when you want the answers.

1. Open door, place giraffe in refrigerator, close door
2. Open door, remove giraffe, place elephant in refrigerator, close door
3. The elephant
4. Open door, remove elephant, place elephant in river, use refrigerator as raft

[Richard]

Originally Posted by Menschenschreck

1. Open door, place giraffe in refrigerator, close door
2. Open door, remove giraffe, place elephant in refrigerator, close door
3. The elephant
4. Open door, remove elephant, place elephant in river, use refrigerator as raft

You scored a 75.

Richard

[Dozer523]

1. How do you put a giraffe into a refrigerator?
(Tests whether you tend to do simple things in an overly complicated way.)
1. Kill giraffe, butcher, wrap, stack neatly, close door.

2. How do you put an elephant into the refrigerator?
(Tests your ability to think through the repercussions of your actions.)
2. Open door, cook and eat giraffe steaks. Kill elephant, butcher, wrap, stack neatly, close door.

3. The Lion King is hosting an animal conference. All the animals attend except one. Which animal does not attend?
(tests your memory.)
3. Me, I'm not going. The lion king will be pissed I ate all the giraffe

4. There is a river you must cross. But it is inhabited by crocodiles. How do you manage it?
(Tests whether you learn quickly from your mistakes.)
4. Manage by delegating . . . YOU can do it.

[Badger52]

Originally Posted by Richard

Try this one - it only has four questions and tells us whether or not you are qualified to be a "QP". The questions are not that difficult.

Thank you for that Richard; I will enjoy passing this along to my 11yo grand-daughter. She is becoming quite the interesting young person. Then we can get her dad in the room and play the professionalsoldiers.com version of "Are you smarter than..." (Although after the "stick & shadow" tutorial in the backyard he might think she's piling on.)

[Badger52]

Originally Posted by Badger52

Thank you for that Richard; I will enjoy passing this along to my 11yo grand-daughter.

AAR

Subject #1: 11-yo grand-daughter (gd), home-schooled, asked that responses be given orally rather than written, having hurt her wrist learning valuable lesson in tree-climbing which she will no doubt apply later. Her father was isolated from the backporch test facility, listening to incredible distracting racket as neighbor down the street wrestled with tiller to get his wife's garden in. Interest in testing this subject piqued by previous discussion awhile back during Easter gathering regarding the importance & specificity of words; to wit, we established that words like 'some' or 'many' were often insufficient, but if she told her 4-yo male cousin to "put ALL the eggs in the blue basket" the task was defined and easily completed. Responses follow:

1. "I guess I must have a pretty big refrigerator so I would just open the door and put him in."

2. (furrowed brow) "I suppose... if we're talking about the same refrigerator then I have to let the giraffe out first and then I can put the elephant in."

3. "Well, the elephant 'cause he's still in that refrigerator."

4. "I guess I would just distract them & swim really fast."

4th response did not meet standard; I give her a 75, with some unofficial pride at least for her approach (distract, then execute). She will be going bass fishing with partner & self and there will be more land-nav/crawling the hunting property for her. She has also expressed interest in Morse; I might have to find her one of my spare J-37's to go with the practice oscillator sitting on the bench.

Subject #2: Subject #1's dad, mid-30's, very in-demand savvy computer tech, smart fellow, all-around good-guy, public education, incl post-secondary.

1. "Well, I suppose you could make the word 'giraffe' out of 'refrigerator'."
At this point I paused the test and pointed out:

- there are insufficient characters in the 2nd word to correctly spell the first,
- I don't currently have in the house a trigraph, OTP, or a Dell puzzle book and,
- reread the instructions, including the actual aspect being tested, take a deep breath, and begin again. This is your mulligan.

1. "I would butcher him up and put him in the fridge."

2. "Ditto."

3. "Well, the Lion; technically he's CONVENING the conference, so he's not attending."

4. "A boat."

Maintaining best smiling objective demeanor, they were thanked (and gd hugged) and sent on their way to plant strawberries. One calls me 'papa' while the other calls me a curmudgeon; I am livin' large.

Thanks again, Richard.
[BT] [AR] K

[Richard]

I've had several requests for the unofficially official answers, so here they are.

1. How do you put a giraffe into a refrigerator?
(Tests whether you tend to do simple things in an overly complicated way.)
A: Open door, place giraffe in refrigerator, close door.

2. How do you put an elephant into the refrigerator?
(Tests your ability to think through the repercussions of your actions.)
A: Open door, take out giraffe, place elephant in refrigerator, close door.

3. The Lion King is hosting an animal conference. All the animals attend except one. Which animal does not attend?
(Tests your memory.)
A: The elephant; he's in the refrigerator.

4. There is a river you must cross. But it is inhabited by crocodiles. How do you manage it?
(Tests whether you learn quickly from your mistakes.)
A: Simply swim the river because the crocodiles are attending the animal conference with all the animals (except the elephant).

Richard