What is the Point of a Personality Assessment?

In 1917 Katharine Briggs and her daughter Isabel Myers worked for over twenty years developing the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator.1 Even the father of business, Peter Drucker, wrote a book about Managing Oneself.

Beyond Briggs and Drucker, we have a plethora of books that give strategies to develop your emotional intelligence. Do you find yourself overwhelmed with information about various assessments?

It can be overwhelming even thirty-something years ago, at the University of Tennessee, we took the Myers-Briggs assessment in almost every class. To this day, I can confidently tell you my Myers-Briggs results. We are fortunate today in our society because we have all kinds of assessments.

Naming a few of the popular options we have Myers-Briggs, but also the Enneagram, DiSC personality assessment, the Big Five, CliftonStreghts 34, High5 Test, Emotional Intelligence Quiz, the Five Behaviors, and the Working Genius Assessment.2 I had not heard of some of these assessments until I was conducting research for this article. With all this information thrown at us, do you ever ask yourself what is the point?

Socrates answers this question with two words he says, "Know Thyself." You can use information from an assessment to appreciate who you are and your co-workers. Why is this important?

Our lives can produce a great deal of stress, frustration, or a myriad of other negative emotions. When you possess emotional intelligence, you can remind yourself that these negative emotions are temporary. The ability to see that this is temporary and control your reactions shows that you have emotional intelligence and are in the top 36% of employees.3

As you are reading this, if you believe you are not in the top 36% of people with developed emotional intelligence then you are in luck. The point of the assessments is to grow your awareness to appreciate your strengths and those around you. Emotional intelligence is the ability to understand, use, and manage your own emotions. It dives into effective and efficient communication, handling stress and emotional triggers, and how to defuse conflicts so that you are emotionally, physically, and spiritually healthy.

It is important to remember that every assessment has a goal. That goal is to explain your strengths and give an overview of what challenges you face and places to grow. The options to find an assessment are easy, each will contribute to your emotional intelligence growth and can help you achieve the goals you are striving towards.

1 Harrell, Eben, A Brief History of Personality Tests, (Harvard Business Review March-April 2017)

2 Crawford, Hallie, & Snider, CFP, Susannah, 9 Online Personality Tests to Take Now, (U.S. News & World Report L.P., 20 September 2023)

3 Linder, Jannik, Emotional Intelligence Statistics [Fresh Research], (Gitnux: A Global Commerce Media LLC Company 24 December 2023)