It Takes All Kinds

Posted Apr 23, 2007 by Vidisha Priyanka

Updated Apr 23, 2007 at 09:34 AM

By DAVE SIMANOFF
The Tampa Tribune

Are you a thinker, director, relater or socializer?

Knowing the answer might help you succeed at work - and in life.

The thinker, director, relater and socializer are the four personality types outlined by motivational speaker and researcher Tony Alessandra in his 1996 bestseller “The Platinum Rule.”

The gist of Alessandra’s book is this: treat other people the way they want to be treated. (Compare that to the Golden Rule, which says you should treat people the way you want to be treated.)

To make that happen, Alessandra said you need to understand your personality, as well as the personalities of those around you. That’s where the thinker, director, relater and socializer archetypes come into play.

You can head to Alessandra’s Web site and take a free personality test at platinumrule.com/assessment.

The different personality types are basically dictated by the degrees to which someone is open or guarded, and aggressive or indirect.

When you understand the personality types of the people around you, you’ll have a good idea of how they think, how they interact with others and how they approach challenges, Alessandra said.

“It can be like learning a different language,” he said.

Let’s look at some examples:

•If you’re a director or socializer, remember that thinkers and relaters are more cautious and reserved - and might not appreciate being rushed into decisions.

Directors and socializers might not work well together because both tend to want to delegate tasks.

•Thinkers may become uncomfortable with a director’s need for control and speed.

Relaters and thinkers don’t like surprises.

Directors and socializers don’t like dealing with details.

Alessandra said that in social settings, most people will get along best with other people of the same personality type - although, of course, there might be a tendency for directors to bump heads. In the office, people with diametrically opposed personalities - a director and relater, or a socializer and thinker - can complement each other effectively so long as they understand each other’s styles, methods and expectations, he said.

“A simple rule of thumb is that socially, birds of a feather flock together, but at work, opposites attract,” he said.

Alessandra said he can’t take the credit for dividing people into four different behavioral groups. The modern concept of behavioral types was devised by Carl Jung, who described intuiters, thinkers, feelers and sensors in his 1923 book “Psychological Types.” Hippocrates described four human temperaments - melancholy, sanguine, phlegmatic and choleric - more than two millennia ago.

Reporter Dave Simanoff can be reached at (813) 259-7762 or dsimanoff@tampatrib.com.