AI career & retirement advice
When MBTI meets DISC:
“So you're an INTP? That explains why you analyze everything. And you're a Promoting Persuader? That explains why you analyze everything... loudly.”
A few weeks ago, I wrote a post titled “Am I really an introvert?” that described the use of the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) and FIRO-B tests to help me understand my innate personality. (Thanks to all of you who responded, and it appears that most of us fall somewhere between introversion and extroversion, consistent with the findings in this article.)
That said, while the MBTI provided a cool look at innate personality, I failed to mention that it doesn’t represent the complete picture as used by organizations for personnel management, team building, training, and other uses. Frequently, another test, DISC, is also used in conjunction with MBTI. The results of each of these tests produce a “shorthand” to describe a much more complete set of attributes, and there’s a good body of work written about how to utilize these results in practical ways.
And, of course, when there’s a well-documented body of work, AI can provide some quick answers when consultants are not available (or affordable!) For this post, I will show how AI quickly mapped my working career choices. Then, I will show how AI made recommendations on my retirement choices. I hope you find this case study both interesting and informative!
Why Myers-Briggs was not enough
Recall I profiled on the Myers-Briggs test as an INTP. I admit that I exhibit many traits of INTPs. Some of the notable ones include:
Logical and objective
Abstract thinker
Prone to self-doubt
Trouble expressing feelings
Here’s a humorous, but descriptive BINGO game describing INTPs that I found on Instagram. I greyed out the traits I don’t think apply to me.
I think I match 16/25 of the BINGO squares (in white) in this game but not all of them. Basically, there are some reputed INTP personality traits (in grey) that don’t really match my observed behaviors. In general, these include:
Quiet, reserved, and thoughtful
Struggles to follow rules
Feel limited by structure and planning
What else gives? I personally think innate personality does not complete the story for many people as we behave and act in real-world environments.
DISC is a framework that helps to describe observable behaviors and actions, rather than just innate personalities. Despite some debate about its scientific merit, DISC is often viewed in the corporate world as a practical framework to use alongside MBTI to inform employee and leadership development.
How does DISC work?
DISC is essentially another assessment tool that asks a series of questions to measure behavioral styles: dominance, influence, steadiness, and conscientiousness. The questions are also designed to differentiate Adapted versus Natural behaviors by analyzing when individuals say that they are “not” something (a stronger or Natural reaction) versus when they say they “are” something (an indication of Adapted behavior).
Here’s what my DISC report looked like back when I took the assessment over 15 years ago.
These scores were then mapped on a circular disc (get it?), traditionally associated with the DISC profile.
I tested as a “promoting persuader.”
Basically, this type is typically associated with the following attributes:
Outgoing and Persuasive: Naturally enthusiastic and enjoy working with and through people to achieve their goals.
Strong Communicators: Excellent verbal skills and can easily gain support and respect from others.
Optimistic and Energetic: Positive outlook and high energy levels make Promoting Persuaders effective at motivating and influencing others.
Preference for Variety: Thrive in environments that offer mobility, challenging assignments, and a variety of activities.
Need for Freedom: Desire freedom of expression and dislike boring tasks and routines.
Some of these attributes complement the INTP personality traits in MBTI, and some conflict.
AI Analysis using profile results
To look at my combination of MBTI and DISC, I asked Microsoft CoPilot how these two different test results interact. Below are screen captures extracted from my AI chat session. (If you don’t feel like reading the chat session extracts, feel free to skip to the next section to read my analysis.)
Analysis
Overall, providing to an AI chatbot just the results my MBTI and DISC types provided enough descriptors for the model to produce very specific recommendations. Behind this personality testing is a lot of information.
The career choices were a match!
Product manager was how I started my career. Even as I progressed to other roles like leading marketing or engineering organizations, I always used my background in product management as a “home base.”
Consultant was where I spent time starting in 2004, and I resumed this work back in 2018 once retiring from full-time work.
Entrepreneurship was a key part of my journey, as I was part of 7 different startups!
More importantly, the retirement activities were a match.
I spent most of my retired life doing mentorship and coaching activities. I even wrote a post about executive coaching.
With respect to traveling, I haven’t written much about the specific travel adventures, but I did write about how I manage the travel activity. We’ve done a bunch of trips in retirement.
I started a blog (this Substack!) I have a YouTube channel, but there’s not much activity on it! (So far, I’ve only made one YouTube short.)
As such, in my case study with a sample size of 1, these personality test results informed some pretty darn accurate recommendations!
Perhaps, the specificity it was able to deduce in my case was caused by the rarity of combining the INTP and “Promoting Persuader” types. INTP represents about 3.3% of the population (source). The “Promoting Persuader” (ID type) represents about 7% of the population (source). It’s likely reasonable to assume that the intersection of my MBTI and my DISC profiles represents less than 1% of the population.
I’d be interested to see how extensible this method of using MBTI and DISC with AI chatbots could be.
Do you have old MBTI and DISC scores? How well did AI work for you in mapping your career and/or retirement choices?