INLS 131 - Management - Session 7 - What do Managers Do:

INLS 131
Management of Information Agencies
Fall 1999

Getting Ready for Class of Sept. 22, 1999
WHAT DO MANAGERS DO?
How Does It Relate to Personality?

In Monday's class I presented some roles and functions that managers must assume and perform and, in your interest groups, you tried to apply them as a way to analyze further one of the individuals in the AMS case. We will continue that activity on Wednesday, first hearing reports from the three groups who didn't report and then engaging in a general discussion of the case and what might/should/could happen and how, and if, individual managers mentioned in the case can/should make a difference.
Managing is a very personal activity in which you draw on traits in your personality as well as what you learn to do. You also learn to "read" a situation and to select from an array of possible actions the one that fits the best to that situation and is compatible with your personal style.
Because of the personal nature of management, we might do well to attend to Socrates' dictum: Know thyself. Many management consultants use a tool to help people learn a bit more about themselves as well as other people with whom they must develop a working relationship. Among the more well-known of these tools is an instrument called the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI). I'm sure some of the folks in the class have heard of it and may even have used it.
The Myers-Briggs is a self-report personality inventory designed to give people information about their Jungian psychological type preferences. Isabel Briggs Myers and Katherine Cook Briggs worked on the MBTI in the early 1940s (How does this relate to our timeline?) to make C.G. Jung's theory of human personality understandable and useful in everyday life.
The essence of the theory is that much seemingly random variation in behavior is actually quite orderly and consistent, being due to basic differences in the way individuals prefer to use their perception and judgment. MBTI results show a person's preferences on four dimensions:
Extraversion (E) OR Introversion (I)
Sensing (S) OR Intuition (N)
Thinking (T) OR Feeling (F)
Judging (J) OR Perceiving (P)
Results on the Indicator are generally reported with letters representing each of the preferences. Thus, there are 16 possible ways to combine the preferences, resulting in 16 MBTI types: ISTJ, ISTP, ESTP, ESTJ, ISFJ, ISFP, ESFP, ESFJ, INFJ, INFP, ENFP, ENFJ, INTJ, INTP, ENTP, and ENTJ.
Here is one consultant's list of some of the ways the MBI is used as a tool in organizations:
to communicate more effectively with supervisors, peers, and employees.
to solve organizational or personal problems.
to make the most of the organization's human resources.
to assist in career choice and professional development.
to improve teamwork.
to understand and adapt to differences in management style.
to understand individual contributions to the organization.
to resolve conflicts.

(http://www.ccens.com/mbti.htm)

The MBTI instrument is copyrighted but I have found a site that will enable you to determine your own MBTI type through a series of questions relating to
Your primary source of energy
How you prefer to take in information
How you prefer to make decisions
How you prefer to organize your life.
Please go to
Working Out your Myers Briggs Type and, as you read about the MBTI, see if you can answer the questions and work out your MBTI type. Read the descriptions of the 16 types at the end.
Do a little self-analysis comparing your responses on the MBTI and the roles and functions of managers. Comment on it in your portfolio.