A friend of mine recently passed along The MBTI Map, by the Integrated Design Laboratory at South Korea’s Ajou University. It’s a really fascinating information visualization project that displays the 16 Myers-Briggs Type Indicator types as a subway map, with ‘stops’ representing each of 39 representative personality words. It’s useful in understanding some of the fundamental differences, as well as similarities, among the various MBTI types. Also, I want a huge print of the poster, because it would look awesome on my wall.

I’m a sucker for anything involving the MBTI. I’m certainly not an expert, but I’m always on the lookout for tools that can help me better understand the different MBTI types and how they interact with each other. I’ve recently had the opportunity to take the lead on a summer project at work, and I spent a little time thinking about how my type, ENFP, affects the way that I manage projects.

Confessions of an ENFP

ENFP’s are not detail people, and I’d be lying if I told you that I automatically focus on the details in any situation. Fortunately, there has been no shortage of opportunities in my life to practice my attention to detail. I’ve spent years in school and at work training myself to think like a more detail-oriented person because it simply does not come naturally to me. Without practice, those situations feel a lot like trying to throw a baseball with my left hand.

As an ENFP, I need to be keenly aware of follow-through on long-term projects. I am able to generate a lot of enthusiasm about projects and endeavors at the outset, but unchecked, this can cause me to lose focus at the excitement of new possibilities and quickly jump from one thing to another. Case in point: two summers ago I dove headfirst into learning the piano, only to drop it two weeks later when I decided I’d rather learn to speak Japanese. Of course I ended up learning neither, but I ended up finding something I really wanted to focus on; I came out of that summer having taught myself HTML, CSS and a little Javascript.

Making it work

Given the previous two statements, you might think I hate the idea of project management, or worse, that I’d be terrible at it. That’s not the case, but I’ve had to rely on a couple tricks to make it work:

ENFP’s are naturally project-oriented, so I’m never lacking excitement at the start of any project. One thing I’ve learned to do is to take advantage of this, and really front-load as much of the ‘detail stuff’ that can be completed in the early stages. Because of that enthusiasm, I’m easily able to power through the things I find to be less fun, and save the more exciting stuff for when my enthusiam comes down to a more normal level. Every time I’ve used this strategy I’ve been able to avoid problems with follow-through.

The second thing I do is turn a large project into a bunch of smaller ones. Lots of people do this to make big projects seem more manageable (bonus!), but I do it mainly to avoid playing into my weaknesses. If I plan it right, the excitement at the start of each mini-project is enough to carry me all the way until that piece is finished — think of it like ‘star power‘ in Guitar Hero. This method is mostly a mental trick to keep my energy level up throughout, by taking advantage of the part of my brain that says “Ooh, shiny new project, how exciting!” each time I start one of the smaller pieces.

I can attribute a lot of my successes, both professional and social, to having a solid understanding of how I perceive the world and how I make decisions. The MBTI has been a great resource to gain a better understanding of both of those things, and how they impact my interactions with others. How does your understanding of your MBTI type impact the work that you do?

Photo credit: David Sifry on Flickr