Here we use the Myers Briggs Type Indicator to see how individual personalities might influence and be influenced by the team. We also use Meredith Belbin’s research into team types to indicate what types of individuals best make up an effective team.
MBTI and teams
The Myers Briggs Type Indicator suggests that if you are a particular type you have particular preferences and are different from other people of different types (see table 1.5 for MBTI types). This means that when it comes to change, people with different preferences react differently to change, both when they initiate it and when they are on the receiving end of it. This is also true when you are a member of a team. Different people will bring their individual preferences to the table and behave in differing ways.
When undergoing team change, individual team members will typically react in one of four ways (see illustrations above):
- Some will want to ascertain the difference between what should be preserved and what could be changed. There will be things they want to keep.
- Some will think long and hard about the changes that will emerge internally from their visions of the future. They will be intent on thinking about the changes differently.
- Some will be keen to move things on by getting things to run more effectively and efficiently. They will be most interested in doing things now.
- Some will be particularly inventive and want to try something different or novel. They will be all for changing things.
The use of MBTI, or any other personality-profiling instrument, can have specific benefits when teams are experiencing or managing change. It can identify where individuals and the team itself might have strengths to be capitalized on, and where it might have weaknesses that need to be supported.
Behaviours exhibited by team members will run ‘true to type’, and thus knowing your preferences and those of the rest of the team will help aid understanding. It is also true that different team tasks might be suitable for different types – either because they are best matched or because it provides a development opportunity. Surfacing differences helps individuals see things from the other person’s perspective, and adds to the effective use of diversity within the team.
Researching in the health care industry, Mary McCaulley (1975) made the point that similarity and difference within teams can have both advantages and disadvantages:
- The more similar the team members are, the sooner they will reach common understanding.
- The more disparate the team members, the longer it takes for understanding to occur.
- The more similar the team members, the quicker the decision will be made, but the greater the possibility of error through exclusion of some possibilities.
- The more disparate the team members, the longer the decision-making process will be, but the more views and opinions will be taken into account.
McCaulley also recognized that teams valuing different types can ultimately experience less conflict.
A particular case worth mentioning is the management team. Management teams both in the United States and the United Kingdom are skewed from the natural distribution of Myers Briggs types within the whole population. Typically they are composed of fewer people of the feeling types and fewer people of the perceiving types. This means that management teams, when making decisions around change, are more likely to put emphasis on the business case for change, and less likely to think or worry about the effect on people. You can see the result of this in most change programmes in most organizations. They are also more likely to want to close things down, having made a decision, rather than keep their options open – thus excluding the possibility of enhancing and improving on the changes or responding to feedback.