Last week Stephen Colbert took the MBTI (Myers Briggs Type Indicator) as part of his Who am Me (photo credit: SplitSider) segment on the Late Show. He claimed that he took a bunch of personality tests including BuzzFeed’s Which Late Night TV Talk Show Host Are You?” When I took  BuzzFeed’s quiz, where all answers equated to late night show hosts, I gratefully ended up as late night show host Jimmy Fallon, my personal favorite! Okay, I admit I had to take it a few times to be labeled my host of choice.

Colbert then went on to say that he took the most definitive personality test of them all, the MBTI. Yup, the most definitive . . . in his quest to do a series of fun satires on personality tests. And what fun it was!

The highly edited segment was almost 15 minutes long and was filled with clever one-liners. It made me think of how ridiculous it is to box people into one of 16 different types like MBTI indicates and then prescribe their behavior. I was delighted that the MBTI labeled me an INFP (introverted, intuitive, feeling, perceiving) and according to the segment, I am brilliant and creative. Yes, let’s stick with that for the descriptor of me! Who doesn’t want to be that?

It made me think of past experiences where astrological signs were either poked fun at or used as a predictor of working relationships. My favorite was several years ago when a co-worker, upon hearing that my birthday was August 25, gasped in horror. She clutched her hands to her face in disbelief and all but shouted, “I can’t work with Virgos, something bad always happens when I work with Virgos!” Was our relationship doomed? No, it was not. We have an awesome relationship despite the astrological clash of my sign and her sign, Sagittarius. This time the descriptor didn’t work.

Seriously, MBTI?! While MBTI is widely valued and accepted as the standard and pioneer into the concept of personality assessments, I’m suggesting we move on. Let’s move to something that captures the nuances of me, not just one of 12 signs or 16 different boxes on a grid. Bruce Kasanoff’s LinkedIn article, Introvert and Extravert Labels are Nonsense, clearly makes the point that we need to move beyond labels to something that will increase our self-awareness and do more good than harm.

Let’s move beyond simplistic tools and labels that reduce not enrich to modern-day personality assessments that empower people to understand each other and build successful relationships (see my recent post on this: MadMen.) Despite the personality test of choice on one of Colbert’s first segments in the series, he does acknowledge that whatever the outcome of any test, he does need to just be himself, So I have to be myself for people to love me?

There’s hope that Colbert ups his personality game in future segments and uncovers an answer to his most pressing question, Is he fit for late night comedy?

Who’s tuning in with me?