Personality Survey - Choose Your Ideal Career

What is an ideal career? It starts with first understanding your personality, the traits you choose embrace and the side of your personality you’d prefer to ignore. Your personality strengths are what create your self image- the way you see yourself. Your self image is shaped over many years of succeeding and failing in all areas of your life until you habitually believe that you are good or bad at something based on your past performances. Relating to your job role, how well you relate to a task is what will bring you the most success in your career and indeed the most pleasure.

People are not caricatures, but to make the four main personality types easy to understand I will bring them to life by describing them in extremes. The four factors we will be looking at are dominance, influence, steadiness, and compliance which makes the DiSC acronym, the highly accurate area of psychometric evaluation used by many of the world’s leading corporations. The personality is made up of many layers and nuances so at no time would we push an individual into only one of four descriptions.

Dominant people are very active in dealing with challenges, they are goal oriented, task oriented, workaholic, decisive, opinionated, innovative, tough, demanding, forceful, egocentric, strong willed, driving, determined, ambitious, aggressive, argumentative, pioneering, blunt, they work well under pressure and are pushy. They are directors of people, whose nature is to command not ask. Their reason for action is, “What’s in it for me?” They will have a tendency to see things in black and white, yes and no, and so are suspicious of grey areas. For them, power and control over their own environment and the ability to affect their own future is all important. They have a strong need to win, achieve and overcome obstacles and play the game to win not for the sake of “playing the game”. These people most fear failure, especially losing face. They are prepared to learn whatever is necessary in order to be successful. This personality may have been shaped by a high pressured harsh environment where such behaviour may have been rewarded.

Influential people influence others through talking and activity and tend to be highly empathetic. They are described as convincing, magnetic, enthusiastic, persuasive, warm, demonstrative, trusting, and optimistic. These people are known as “expressive,” they are influential, persuasive (but can also be persuaded), verbal, noisy, communicative, talkative, and emotional. They can be likely to forget that they have two ears and one mouth, will genuinely like people, and subsequently have a strong need to be liked. People who are high in the “I” factor have a major fear of rejection. Natural integrative leaders and people-orientated, they may ask, “How do you feel about that?” Influence indicates the desire to cause others to act to further one’s own aspirations. A person who has a high level of influence shows a strong need for acceptance and affection and is concerned with personal image. They never close the door a relationship and will work hard to maintain harmony. Generous hearted and self promoting they are not shy of blowing their own trumpet, what they do and sell comes as part of the package. Gregarious and often seen as charismatic (though may not see it in themselves) they need the interaction of dealing with other people. They hate to work alone and want to change the environment to suit them, but want others to help them achieve that. Status can be important and a good income is usually necessary to support the good lifestyle such people often aspire to and so can, at times, be motivated by money (for example, when they have none). How things look can often be more important than how things really are and so ask, “If I do this, will they still love me?” They are motivated by peer group recognition and status. They can be dreamers and for this reason may set unrealistic goals. Creative and excitable these people may also generalise. This personality can be shaped by harmonious, friendly environments.

Those described as ‘steady’ are reserved, steadfast, suspicious, thorough, stable, steady, reliable, tenacious and persistent. They have a desire to maintain things as they are. Amiable and easy-going, these people are trustworthy – the sort of person you’d trust on sight. Good listeners, counsellors and need people. They are the social glue, and no company can survive without them since they are generally the people who make things work and run smoothly. They have a strong need to question and gather all the information and compare facts, these people will ask, “Why?” They need to know the reason for everything and will waste time reading between the lines if denied an answer. They have a need for sincerity and security, and their single most fear is insecurity. These people are the “power behind the throne,” and see themselves as second-in-command. Such people are loyal to those they trust. People with High "S" factors want a steady pace and do not like sudden change over which they have no control. Deliberate in thought and action, they can be perceived as slow. However, where they have knowledge and experience (something they value highly) decisions will be made rapidly. High "S" persons are calm, relaxed, patient, possessive, predictable, stable, consistent, and tend to be unemotional and poker faced. Tend to relate strongly to the organisation and take personal pride in being part of it. Territorial and will guard their space with care. They prefer a cynical nature to their work; often happy with routine. High sympathetic such people are motivated by sincere appreciation and a sense of duty. They are often “put-upon” or overloaded but, at about 30-35 often decide they have had enough of that and appear to grow much tougher. They have tendency to defend the underdog or those they feel were unfairly treated. Have a strong sense of ‘fair-play’. Such people don’t get angry; they get even. A blame culture can sometimes shape this personality type.

If the major strength is a high “C” factor, this indicates a strong need for an orderly society with clear rules or criteria governing the authority and responsibility of the person and colleagues, and where the system is developed through the perfect logic and analysis. Need guidelines and to know where the limits are set. Naturally sceptical, they believe only that which can be proved. However, once proven they become believers. Such people are seekers of knowledge as a source of power. For these people, knowledge is power; therefore, they will learn for the sake of learning, are often highly qualified, and can be in several diverse disciplines. We call these people “analytics.” This person is good with words, accurate, precise, picky, pedantic, rule-orientated, logical, a perfectionist and law-abiding. They seek elegant solutions to problems and know what is meant by elegant. Exhibit high integrity, their word is usually their bond and would never work in a company selling a product they do not believe in. An “analytic” will most fear disorder and confrontation, unless of course they believe they are right! They can be uncompromising where their integrity, standards or rules are involved. Odd sense of humour in that they are quite happy to let others talk about subjects they know little or nothing about, then quietly shoot them down using their knowledge. They are also tactful and diplomatic. Motivated by intellectual rigour and the acquisition of knowledge but may get so involved in detail that they lose sight of the objective. They fear being wrong so may go to great lengths to prove that the decision was right at the time it was made. Persons with High "C" styles adhere to rules, regulations, and structure. They like to do quality work and do it right the first time. Accepting of authority provided it can authenticate itself and will challenge it to do so. May ask- “Can you prove that?” Or “Have you got the figures to back this up?” High "C" people are careful, cautious, exacting, neat, systematic, diplomatic, accurate, and tactful. Such personality can be shaped by harsh environments.

For an accurate assessment of your own personality and guide on how to choose your ideal career please visit http://www.PsychometricPractice.com/Personality-Survey.html

Money Management Mastery with Hanna Hunter: A new way to having your cake & eating it

Great show this morning, it was my first time listening and I enjoyed the nuggets of priceless information you shared with us all.

I will be negotiating from a much stronger stand point from now on, and not as you said compromising as we sometimes do. Negotiation is truly about creating win-win situations.

Can't wait for the next show :)

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