The MBTI Step III is a tool that describes an individual’s progress toward healthy type development.  Psychological  type is not a static label but a dynamic path leading toward maturity of the personality.  At the Association for Psychological Type International meeting in 2011, Dr. Allen Hammer, one of the co-authors of the Step III instrument, listed these possible manifestations of inadequate type development:

• One being a caricature of one’s type
• Lack of awareness of one’s type blind spots
• The tendency to blame others for shortcomings
• Life stress and dissatisfaction
• Reduced competency and performance

He also listed possible factors that can detour type development including:

• Lack of faith in one’s type ( not seeing one’s type as being as valuable as another
• Lack of acceptance by others of one’s type
• Lack of opportunity to develop one’s type gifts
• Lack of challenge to develop one’s type especially the 3^rd and 4^th functions

The MBTI Step III overview was a 3-hour presentation that covered the essence of the MBTI Step III instrument.  Allen Hammer and Sondra Von Sant, who teach the certification course, presided.  A panel of Step III practitioners including Charles Martin, Laurie Hillis, Sydney Courtice, and me added to the discussion by sharing case stories about how the this tool led to personal examination  of type development for various clients.  Through the discussion of the assessment findings, a release of psychic energy (similar to an “aha moment”) to address life’s challenges and goals is made possible.   Sometimes even one statement on the report can trigger a flood of insight! The panelists shared cases from both counseling and coaching perspective as the MBTI Step III is meant to address both scenarios.

According to Dr. Hammer, healthy type development has these 3 characteristics:

• The dominant function is developed and used effectively.
• A developed auxiliary functioning leading to a balance of perception and judgment
• Awareness and comfort with the tertiary and inferior functions (Knowing when to non-preferred functions best suit a situation)

The MBTI Step III does provide the awareness piece that is so critical to making changes in one’s life.  After all, if you are blind to what may be holding you back from a greater and more satisfying life, it is difficult to decide what to change or how to do it!

For those who did not attend the APTI 2011 conference but would like to experience the Step III, there are several ways to get more information.

1. Contact the Center of  Application of Psychological Type capt.org
2. Join the LinkedIn Step III Group to join in a discussion, ask a question, or start a new discussion.
3. Contact an MBTI Step III practitioner to learn more about it or even experience it yourself.

Many people have encountered the MBTI either at work, at a career center, or in counseling.  Several online tests incorporate MBTI principles.  The MBTI I describes the broad strokes of an individual personality with the goal of identifying people with similar cognitive preferences.  The MBTI II (Form Q) serves to capture individual differences in people who have the same personality type. The newly released MBTI Step III measures how effectively you are using the unique qualities of your type.

The Rationale: Most of us are using only a fraction of our talents and gifts. In addition, we are frequently dissatisfied with home life, career choices, and relationships.  This can lead to burn-out, lack of motivation, or resigned acceptance that we are about as good as we are going to be in this lifetime.  With self-knowledge, energy is released and new paths and solutions are unveiled.  The MBTI Step III is a personalized road map  to begin this journey.

The Design : The MBTI Step III is a questionnaire that has 222 forced choice items that not only uncover an individual’s psychological preferences but also examines type development. How effective are psychological preferences being used so they are manifested as strengths in everyday life?  How are environmental factors influencing opportunities to use and develop psychological type? Ultimately overall satisfaction with career, relationships and home life hinge on effective use of psychological type. The MBTI Step III instrument generates both positive statements about what is functioning well  in an individual’s life and statements that might suggest a need to improve in a certain area.  While knowing your strengths and continuing to use them effectively is the best way to use mental energy, it is also helpful to know which areas need increased self-regulation, development, or assistance from others to optimize an outcome. The Step III is written in everyday language and serves as a springboard for discussion between a coach/counselor and clients seeking to uncover their potential.

The Theory: There is a finite amount of mental energy that one has available to take in information (perception) and draw conclusions about those perceptions (judgment).  How that energy is allocated, according to type theory, is based on psychological preferences.  The dominant function has access to the most abundant and readily available energy, followed by the auxiliary or assisting function, then the tertiary or third function, and lastly the inferior or 4th function (everyone uses all of the functions: sensing, intuition, thinking and feeling but at different levels of  frequency and competence, hence the terms: dominant, auxiliary and so on).   Effective use of type preferences insofar as perceptionand judgment are concerned  is often dependent on both theopportunity to use a a natural  function and support from the environment to foster it’s development. According to type development theory, “good type development”  is comfort and effectiveness in the processes that come most naturally to your verified type AND the ability to use the processes that go against one’s natural tendencies.  Knowing which process is most adaptive to the task and the ability to shift among preferred and non-preferred functions is also critical.

Applications: The MBTI Step III is a comprehensive inventory covering your approach to:  Yourself and Your World,  People and Relationships, Responsibility and Work, and Problem Solving and Decision Making.  It is newly released and unique in it’s scope and capability to illuminate what is working well for you and what isn’t and what to do about it.   It has the potential to streamline the coaching/counseling experience especially in the early stages of the coaching alliance. It is also a potential reference tool to return to when setting goals and evaluating progress.

The MBTI Step III is a stand alone instrument. There is no need to have taken previous MBTI assessments.  Step I and II data are an inherent part of this instrument and can be highlighted separately as needed. At this time, there are relatively few practitioners of the MBTI Step III due to the professional prerequisites required to become certified in the use of this instrument..

For more information: Coaches can contact me to assist in using this tool with clients on a consultation basis or interested individuals can contact me directly to take the assessment. MBTI Step III feedback sessions are available in person, via phone, or Skype. Current MBTI practitioners can also contact me if they are interested in learning more about the MBTI Step III certification experience (What did I learn? How am I using this instrument now?).  Inquiries about certification criteria and to sign up for the class can be directed to The Center for Application of Psychological Type/ capt.org .

The April 22, 2010 issue of the Wall Street Journal profiled the use of the MBTI in career planning: It seems that this old classic is still pertinent even today. I will have to write a comment to the paper to let them know there is now a MBTI Step III, an instrument that is highly individualized and particularly useful in jump starting a coaching or counseling dialogue.  It can be an excellent tool  for  effectively navigating a career path.

Identifying your unique personal qualities is a key factor in maximizing potential.  The challenging part is to find out how you can parlay these characteristics into behaviors that are actually going to yield improved competence, a better job, or general life satisfaction.   I was honored to have the St. Paul Pioneer Press feature me in their “Open for Business” section in the April 11, 2010 paper.   In this article, I  describe how I address both of these factors.  First, there are self-discovery tools that help to identify these qualities.  One that is unique to my business is the newly released Myers-Briggs Step III instrument which is a highly personalized indicator of where your strengths and developmental challenges appear to be right now. I also use other tools including a personal interview to find out what is on your mind.  Once this is known, it is important to develop strategies to make your goals a reality.  That is where the challenge is because it is in that phase that we suffer set backs and self-doubts.  That is where a life coach can be very useful.

Ann C. Holm featured in the Saint Paul Pioneer Press Open for Business April 11, 2010 column (PDF)

I have a very poor sense of direction.  I have driven down roads that have turned into pastureland.  I have taken routes that I thought were correct  only to find myself miles away from my intended destination.   I have ridden on the wrong subway or hopped on the wrong bus so often that I am usually surprised when I get it right.   I have been lost so many times that I  usually don’t say, “I’m lost”. Instead I say, “This is not the most efficient route, I know, I know…”  One of the roadblocks that I frequently encounter is that I usually don’t know where I am in the first place!  Where is Point A in relation to Point B?    Poor topographical orientation (the cognitive scientist’s way of saying, “You don’t know where the hell you are!”),  is an effective analogy to describe how many of us feel at during our lives. Where am I? Where am I going?  How do I get there?

The answer to the question, “How do I GET there?” in life is as varied as the maps and gadgets that are available to help us reach a physical destination.  Deciding what tool provides the most effective guidance is really dependent on several factors including how familiar we are with the area, our general sense of direction, or whether we want a map or written directions. For that matter, we may have a preference for north-south/east-west directions versus  left-right/”turn at the Target store on the corner” type directions.   I have found the GPS system to be most helpful but believe it or not, I had to learn to actually listen to it before it was of much use to me.  The point is, what we use to navigate our surroundings is a matter of personal choice.  One must seek the most understandable and the most effective option. Read the rest of this entry »

The Rationale: Most of us are  using only a fraction of our talents and gifts. In addition, we are frequently dissatisfied with home life, career choices, and relationships.  This can lead to burn-out, lack of motivation, or resigned acceptance that we are about as good as we are going to be in this lifetime.  With self-knowledge, energy is released and new paths and solutions are unveiled.  The MBTI Step III is a personalized road map  to begin this journey.

The Design : The MBTI Step III is a questionnaire that has 222 forced choice items that not only uncover an individual’s psychological preferences but also examines type development. How effective are psychological preferences being used so they are manifested as strengths in everyday life?  How are environmental factors influencing opportunities to use and develop psychological type? Ultimately overall satisfaction with career, relationships and home life hinge on effective use of psychological type. The MBTI Step III instrument generates both positive statements about what is functioning well  in an individual’s life and statements that might suggest a need to improve in a certain area.  While knowing your strengths and continuing to use them effectively is the best way to use mental energy, it is also helpful to know which areas need increased self-regulation, development, or assistance from others to optimize an outcome. The Step III is written in everyday language and serves as a springboard for discussion between a coach/counselor and clients seeking to uncover their potential.

The Theory: There is a finite amount of mental energy that one has available to take in information (perception) and draw conclusions about those perceptions (judgment).  How that energy is allocated, according to type theory, is based on psychological preferences.  The dominant function has access to the most abundant and readily available energy, followed by the auxiliary or assisting function, then the tertiary or third function, and lastly the inferior or 4th function (everyone uses all of the functions: sensing, intuition, thinking and feeling but at different levels of  frequency and competence, hence the terms: dominant, auxiliary and so on).   Effective use of type preferences insofar as perception and judgment are concerned  is often dependent on both the opportunity to use a a natural  function and support from the environment to foster it’s development. According to type development theory, “good type development”  is comfort and effectiveness in the processes that come most naturally to your verified type AND the ability to use the processes that go against one’s natural tendencies.  Knowing which process is most adaptive to the task and the ability to shift among preferred and non-preferred functions is also critical.

The MBTI Step III is a comprehensive inventory covering your approach to:  Yourself and Your World,  People and Relationships, Responsibility and Work, and Problem Solving and Decision Making.  It is newly released and unique in it’s scope and capability to illuminate what is working well for you and what isn’t and what to do about it.   It has the potential to streamline the coaching/counseling experience especially in the early stages of the alliance.

The MBTI Step III training and my series of blogs (used to share the experience with others but also solidify my own learning) deepened my understanding of psychological type. Then, just like when I see a good movie, I continue to mull it over in my head and new thoughts emerge. I wanted to share these thoughts in closing.

1. The Step III instrument generates both positive statements and statements that might suggest a need to improve in a certain area. I see this as beneficial because while knowing your strengths and continuing to do more of that is the best way to use mental energy, it is also helpful to know which areas need increased self-regulation, development, or assistance from others to optimize an outcome.

2. Developmental scales which are one factor in triggering rules that produce statement about current behavior or level of functioning can reflect type development.  For instance, statements pertaining to use of logic can reflect type maturity when logic is used it to solve problems effectively rather than as a weapon to catch others in inconsistencies or point out their flaws.

3. When I poured over the manual after the course was completed, I noted that there was even more validity data than I had initially thought. For example,  the sufficiency scales namely: Confidence (not actual adequacy but how one feels about his/her adequacy) , Stamina (how well one tends to “hang in there”), and Compensatory Strain (How one uses projection to ease internal strain) are used to generate interpretative report statements. These factors have positive correlations with the six  major character strengths identified by Peterson and Seligman in 2004.  Positive psychology is the new wave in psychology as reflected in current tools such as Strengths Finders. It is important to note that the MBTI Step III instrument positively interfaces with the what is current in the field today.

Ok!  I think that covers it!  If you have any questions about this blog or the other 3 MBTI Step III blogs on annholm.net, leave me a comment and contact information and I will be happy to respond.  PLEASE NOTE:  Although I am a capable and certified practitioner in the use of the MBTI Step III instrument, I am merely a learner and not an expert on how it was constructed. Those questions should be directed to capt.org

Today was the final day of training for the MBTI Step III. After 2 days of studying the theoretical underpinnings of the instrument as well as the construction and validity, today we practiced using it under the watchful eye of our esteemed instructors.  We examined 3 different cases  of people who had donated their Step III report for the purposes of training.  Therefore, these were real people who had answered inventory questions and received a report that was based on the rules they triggered resulting in specific statements about their current behavior and accompanying suggestions for personal growth.  Everyone had the opportunity to play the role of the client, the coach and/or counselor, and the observer.  Final questions and answers about our own reports or any other topic were also discussed.

The first thing I noticed about using the Step III report in a real life setting was even though it was rich with information and feedback,  there was infinite flexibility in how this information could be used to promote a discussion. Because the report is not a diagnosis or a final rendering of an individual’s personality, a statement contained in the report could be discussed in any number of ways.  For example, a statement might read: “You seem to be indifferent to or ignore logical consequences in matters that are of immediate concern to you, perhaps because other things are more important to you at the time.”  From there, a client might say, “Well yes. I don’t tend to worry too much about what I consider small stuff.”  Or, “You know, I am just not myself these days. I usually pay my bills on time but lately, they have been piling up on my desk.   My mother broke her hip 3 months ago and it seems all I do is tend to her needs.”  For one individual, ignoring certain things that are of immediate concern is simply a reflection of their laid back attitude. For another, it is recognized as an important problem that requires further discussion.

Another observation I had about the report is that it is important to keep an individual’s known type  as well as dominant function in mind when evaluating the data.  For example, an INFP  and an ENTJ might both receive the following statement in his Step III report:  “You find it hard to deal with situations that require you to take a detached and logical approach in making a decision.”  Well, for INFP who is a dominant introverted feeler (and whose inferior or least preferred function is logical, detached thinking, this statement might no raise any special concerns only to point out that many INFP’s do not tend to use “detached, logical thinking” when approaching a situation.  They are more likely to think of people or values first.  They may add logical thinking into their cognitive mix but it is likely to require a little extra mental energy.  An ENTJ, on the other hand, IS a dominant thinker and should therefore be using detached, logical thinking competently and with relative ease.  If this is not the case, it may be important to probe for some sort of stress that might be compromising optimal functioning which is often the case when someone is not using his dominant function well. Read the rest of this entry »

Welcome again to Portland, Maine where I have just finished day 2 of the MBTI Step III training.   To review, yesterday the theoretical basis of the instrument was discussed including the allocation of mental energy based on type,  type development theory and defining what is considered good type development versus ineffective type development.  Also a general overview of the factors that generate the Step III interpretive report were discussed, namely, sufficiency scales, developmental scales and patterns that trigger “rules”, which ultimately  create  an interpretative report of statements (verbal descriptions of current behavior) and corresponding suggestions for personal growth.  It is worth repeating that even as the construction of this instrument is highly complex, the end product is user friendly and highly personalized for the  client.  The ultimate goal of the instrument is to initiate and give some direction to a productive dialogue between the client and the counselor/coach regarding personal growth and insight.

Construction: The questions that make up the MBTI Step III come from 3 sources: the items from the  MBTI Form M; the items  from the MBTI Step II Form Q; and questions from the MBTI Form F.  The reason for the inclusion of the Form F items is that they were used to produce the original “Counselor Report” in 1972, a report that described how well a person perceives and judges. Recall that type theorists assert that the  basis of  good type development and ultimately, success and satisfaction in life was based on optimally developed perception and judgment.    Furthermore, a large archived data base of Form F responses had been gathered by Isabel Briggs Myers that provided evidence to back this assertion up.  This was in fact her unfinished work, developing patterns and scales of behavior that described type development

The  MBTI Step III was constructed using MBTI forms M, Q, and F.  However the interpretative report needed updating from it’s precursor, The Counselor’s Report,  so that the language describing a client’s current behavior (statements) and the corresponding suggestions for personal growth were understandable  irrespective of a client’s knowledge of type.  This is perhaps the  greatest strength of the MBTI Step III,  the notion that  often complex patterns of behavior based on how well a client is using his perceiving and judging functions can be described in layman’s terms with easy to understand suggestions for self-improvement. Read the rest of this entry »

I am in Portland, Maine learning about the recently released MBTI Step III Instrument.   It is conceptually similar to the MBTI  I and the MBTI II tools in that it is based on the work of Carl Jung and Isabel Briggs Myers regarding the identification  psychological preferences. However what is different about the new Level III Indicator is that it  focuses on type development. Specifically, how effectively does an individual use his preferred  perception and judgment functions and how well can he/she incorporate non-preferred perception and judgment  functions, when necessary,  to achieve success and satisfaction in life.

There is a finite amount of mental energy that one has available to take in information (perception) and draw conclusions about those perceptions (judgment).  How that energy is allocated, according to type theory, is based on psychological preferences.  The dominant function has access to the most abundant and readily available energy, followed by the auxiliary or assisting function, then the tertiary or third function, and lastly the inferior or 4th function (everyone uses all of the functions: sensing, intuition, thinking and feeling but at different levels of  frequency and competence, hence the terms: dominant, auxiliary and so on).   Effective use of type preferences insofar as perception and judgment are concerned  is often dependent on both the opportunity to use a a natural  function and support from the environment to foster it’s development.

According to type development theory, “good type development”  is comfort and effectiveness in the processes that come most naturally to your verified type AND the ability to use the processes that go against one’s natural tendencies.  Knowing which process is most adaptive to the task and the ability to shift among preferred and non-preferred functions is also critical.   There is an overall satisfaction with life that is a byproduct of being able to use perception and judgment competently.  On the other hand, ineffective type development is like a caricature of a given type, a distortion of one’s strengths and the prominent display of one’s weaknesses.  It is also the tendency to blame others for circumstances for failures or unhappiness and perhaps stress, dissatisfaction, and poor performance  in daily life are present.

So how does the MBTI Step III shed light on an individual’s type development?   Many of the details of how certain responses pattern trigger a statement about type development will be learned in tomorrow’s session.  Briefly though, the 3 Sufficiency Scales of Confidence(how adequate one feels in a situation), Stamina (the ability to function when conditions are tough), and Compensatory Strain (use of coping mechanisms that deflect the problem away from one’s personal control)  that occur independent of and as well in concert with Developmental Scales ( some examples include flexibility, defensiveness, and logic)  trigger a Step III pattern that yields a rule (or criteria that says “this is significant”) which ultimately is brought to the attention of the client in the form of a statement, via the Interpretive Report.   An example of a statement might be: “You find it hard to deal with situations that require you to take a detached and logical approach in making a decision.”  Furthermore, the significance of this statement is interpreted based on reported type. The significance of this statement will be quite different for an ESTJ whose dominant function is thinking versus an INFP whose 4th function is thinking. Read the rest of this entry »