Friday 25 November 2016

Type A? Type B? Which are you?

I must admit that I don't know much about Type A personalities and Type B personalities. What I guess is that Type A personalities are the ones that set goals and go hell for leather to try and accomplish these goals.

And in the other corner is everyone else. I suppose you could say that the Type A personality is the extrovert and Type B personality is the introvert. I doubt whether that is true or not. Lets see.

I came across this article the other day which tried to dispute the idea that because you are not Type A then you must be lazy and pretty much laid back. This as you would find in this article is pretty far from the truth.

Dr. Bradberry says that just because you are quiet and laid back does not make you any less focused and you are not trying any less hard to achieve your goals than the Type A person who is probably trying hard to make sure everyone knows about it.

Judging from this article Type B's can be under-appreciated and undervalued because they don't make a big song and dance about it.

Sounds familiar doesn't it?

In Susan Cain's book Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a world that can't stop talking she talks about examples of children who aren't as outgoing as the more extroverted children been asked why they are so mellow or why are they not talking? I can imagine this happening to Type B people.

The recently elected President of the United States of America, Donald Trump had a reality show in which he invited budding entrepreneurs to New York for a chance to work for him. Most of the contestants would have been considered Type A and throughout the series both Donald Trump and his assistants would say that because that person didn't show the required level of energy then he or she couldn't really work for him.

I'm sure that Type B's or introverts are more than capable of doing the job but because they don't jump up and down and make a big song and dance about it, a few times in the series Donald Trump would dismiss them because of their "lack of energy."

Lack of a big mouth more like it.

For people who identify themselves as Type B, first of all, like introverts and extroverts you are probably going to be a mix. I doubt whether you can identify as one or the other and like the introvert and extrovert I can imagine that it is like a spectrum and people fall along that spectrum.

The second piece of advice I can give you is that in your quiet way you can still outwork and outsmart these Type A's and then when you are successful they will start listening to you, believe me. You will sound confident and people will stop cutting you off and stop talking over you.

The moral of the story is just because you identify yourself as one thing or the other doesn't mean you have to conform to that stereotype.

You can still be successful without all the hoopla.

If you are interested, here is a Youtube link to the first episode of Donald Trump's TV series. You judge for yourself.


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