The Financial Benefits of Understanding Your Personality Type

Credit to image used in pin goes to American Advisors Group and Images Money. – Changes were made to the original image.

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Hey everyone! Today I have an awesome guest post done by Catherine Treme from My Work Money Life! 

I’m excited to share this with you since I know many of you have struggled with financial issues and are looking for new ways to gain control of them. 

Catherine gives some amazing advice on how your personality type might be affecting your money situation. So check out her post and let her know what you think!

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Spend less and save more. It sounds like a simple enough concept right? Yet for years, it’s been incredibly difficult to master. According to USA Today, over 75% of Americans live from paycheck to paycheck. In other words, if one financial mishap happens you are in for really bad financial situation!

People often look to the mechanics of budgeting so that they can physically see how to spend money but solely looking to this is a huge mistake.

Related Topic

“What’s Your Money Personality” Quiz

We need to look at the behavior of yourself in order to change it. If you don’t understand why you do what you do, how can you expect to change what you do!  In other words, if you want to change your behavior, you need to understand why you do what you do. This is why it is important to understand our personalities and what makes you who you are!

How Do You Determine What Your Personality Is?

For those of you that are new to personality analysis, there is one called Myer Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI). It is a theory from a well-renowned Psychiatrist, Carl Jung that claims there are 16 different personality types with 4 different categories. The categories are in the following:

1. How you get your energy.
   1. (E) The Extrovert=get energy from being around other people.
   2. (I) The Introvert=get energy from solitude
2. How you prefer to process information
   1. (S) Sensing=You focus on the “here and now” present sensory details
   2. (N) Intuition=You focus on the patterns of situations
3. How you prefer to make decisions
   1. (T) Thinking=Taking a look at the potential use of things when applied to a situation
   2. (F) Feeling=Taking a look at the particular person or special circumstance of the situation
4. How you like to handle the outside outcomes
   1. (J) Judging= You prefer to take control of the situation and plan out your outcome
   2. (P) Perceiving= You prefer to stay open to new options and information

If you don’t know what your personality type is you should take your personality test here.

The Financial Benefits Of Knowing Your Personality

1. Know what stresses you out – Let’s look at an introvert who has a job that is dealing with people all day every day. That would create a chronic level of stress for an introvert! Do you think that person with excessive stress level will care about whether or not they are overspending at the end of the day?
2. Maximize your strengths in your career Everyone has natural talents. And with those natural talents you are more likely to be way more efficient and with fewer mistakes than someone with a lesser natural skill set in that one particular area. For example, someone who has a keen eye for financial details; they’re more likely do better as an accountant, rather than the creative who loves and is good at creating an appealing website, right? If both people just happened to be in that position who do you think is going to get the promotion?  (more value you bring= more money can be leveraged)
3. Prevent potential issues – Let’s continue with the previous example of the creative. That loving, well-meaning yet somewhat scattered creative. The one that’s constantly looking at new and exciting ideas. The brainstorming that that does not bode well for practical matters such as doing their own taxes. Not paying attention to such important details could lead to hefty financial fees. All that could be avoided by simply outsourcing it due to the fact that they know that’s not their strong suit.

Need Some Real Life Examples?

If this is your first time reading about this, it can get a little confusing. So, below are the four different categories that Myers Briggs Personality Type Indicator has grouped the like-minded personality types into. Within those four categories, are similar personality types.

The Defenders (Sensor-Judger)

ESFJ, ESTJ, ISTJ, and ISFJ

The one trend of this pragmatic personality group is that they appreciate seeing things get done in a practical and logical fashion. Given the fact that you are a Sensor, you like to use previous facts and figures in order to make decisions. In other words, change is not something that you are a big fan of. Now as for the Judging aspect (no I don’t mean that you’re a judgmental person), that means that you like to have things in your life planned out in an orderly fashion.

What could this mean for your finances?  

Let’s say for instance there is a job opportunity that pays $30,000 in a different city in an industry that interests you but it’s a newer company and again a major change that makes you uncomfortable. Subsequently, you do not take the pay raise because it’s simply too much of a risk and lost out on the $30,000 extra per year! 

The Adventurers (Sensor-Perceiver)

ESFP, ESTP, ISTP, ISFP

Budgets and income restraints are everywhere and simply ruin your fun! All you want to do is just enjoy what’s going on in the here and now. Is that so much to ask? Sometimes it’s almost unbearable how many rules and regulations dictate your life. Does it ever stop? You have more important things to do like go rock climbing, drink with friends, buy things for your new project your working on, etc.

What could this mean for your finances?  

The fact that you have a natural appreciation for adventure and sensory details, is a great thing! However, let’s say there is a whitewater rafting trip that your friends are going on and you need $500 to withdraw from your account in order to go. You know that you have a couple of things that are soon to be coming out of your account but not sure the day. So you just decide whatever, you’ll just figure it out later. This causes 10 items to overdraft at $35 a piece totaling out to $350 in overdraft fees. Yikes!

The Dreamers (Intuitive-Feeler)

ENFP, ENFJ, INFP, INFJ

You are naturally high spirited and want to think the best of people! All that you really want is for everyone to get along and live together in peace and harmony. However, that is not necessarily everyone’s intentions. We live in a world where being practical and down to earth is highly valued and rewarded. That typically does not bode well for The Dreamer.

What could this mean for your finances?  

You had a previous co-worker that was not exactly known for honesty. In fact, your co-worker was known for being a gossip and backstabber. It caused waves at work but they eventually got a job in a different city. You forgave and forgot the previous transgressions because you want to see the best in people. Then you got a call saying there was a position opening up in their new office. It was in a cool and fun city that you just adored. However, the pay was vastly under the cities cost of living ($15,000/annual) but you still interviewed because you just “know that it will be okay” and got the job! But there was a starting of gossip in your new office about you and within just a few short months your boss is looking at letting you go. You’ve been set up! Your coworker has been gossiping about you the entire time and now is trying to get you fired, and is actually successful. This costs you $15,000 + annual salary. Yikes!

The Investigators (Intuitive-Thinker)

ENTJ, INTJ, INTP, ENTP

You’re a visionary with a long-term goal. They must see what they are working towards in a logical fashion. You need to be around intelligent individuals that you deem worthy of your presence. Dealing with people that appear lazy, incompetence or simply inefficient will set you over the edge and you will disregard them as well as any potential advice that they may bring to the table.

What could this mean for your finances?  

You have a person in your (outer) circle of friends and your volunteer kickball team that you feel is a bit incompetent. They are slow with getting things done and make careless errors. You hereby deem them incompetent and disregard their piece in a conversation after a game about a blog that they just started and is currently making them over $1000 a month in passive income. You’ve never heard of a blogging for profit before and because you deem them as incompetent, you miss out on that opportunity, thus missing out on the $1000+ in passive income each month.

How Can I Know My Personality Better?

1. Find out What your personality is! Take your personality test here.
2. Join my Free Facebook Community called Let’s Talk Personality Type. It’s a free and safe community to get all of your questions answered that will help you in all areas of your life whether it’s via money, relationships, career or just life in general (as it relates to your personality)!
3. Take my fun (yet informative) Money Personality quiz “What’s Your Money Personality” Quiz. It tells you what you are naturally inclined to do in terms of your finances and how it relates to your personality type. It’s actually scary how accurate it is.
4. Find out more about what your spending habits are and why they are the way that they are.

In Conclusion

All in all, we are all built very differently and need to be approached as such. Understanding yourself is incredibly important to your finances. This is true from a mental and productivity standpoint and subsequently financial standpoint. Being self-aware of the positive and negative aspects of your personality type needs to be taken into careful consideration when looking at what you need to do to take care of your financial matters and possibly improve it.

If you’re looking to understand your personality better here please use my resources as mentioned in the previous paragraph. I want nothing more than to see you succeed! Let me know in the comments what you think!