ENTJ 101 is a guide on how to make your ENTJ footprint in work, love, and life. Everything we think and feel in life is on a spectrum of related experiences, but it was Katherine Myers and Isabel Briggs who turned those spectrums into the instrument we call the MBTI.
The ENTJ personality type is often called the Commander or Executive. We’re considered natural born leaders, recognized for decisiveness and confidence. Our quick break-down of information and overarching willingness to talk about it gives the impression of authority, and we inspire many to follow our lead. ENTJs can sometimes come off as intimidating because of the weight we place on logic.
You’ll know you’re an ENTJ when…
• You want to be near the crowd, even when you don’t need to be in it;
• You love speaking in metaphor;
• You turn your flaws into plans of action.
When we are forced to face our flaws, or when we take a bad turn somewhere along the way, ENTJs have an edge in getting past it. Unpleasant, embarrassing, or even painful kickback from our choices is distilled quickly into a sequence of data points, which we use to guide our next decisions. Problems turn into plans, which turn into solutions, which turn into extraordinarily dynamic life strategies.
It was said best in the Hope and Crosby Road to Utopia—“The lead dog is the only dog that gets a change of scenery.” The ENTJ personality type is the dog that takes the lead, leveraging extroversion, intuition, and razor-sharp judgment to take on the world.
Qualities used to describe ENTJ include:
• Efficient
• Strategic
• Strong-willed
• Inspiring to others
• Clear-headed
• Gregarious
• Quick-acting
• Engaged in life and work
• Ambitious
• Mobilizing
• Influential
• Critical thinkers
• Organized
• Planners
• Scientific
The “NT” to our ENTJ—also known as the Function Pair—is where the strategy in our strategic leader persona comes from. By being intuitive and basing decisions in principles and objective reasoning, we tend to be discerning and consistent. Logic laces our actions, and our strategies are often spot-on.
ENTJs aren’t without our disadvantages. By being decision-based and goal focused, it’s not uncommon to be seen as machines. And the more to the “T” side of the thinking/feeling spectrum you fall, the more likely it is that people might not realize how emotional you are under that hat of objective analysis.
Some of the less attractive descriptions used to describe ENTJs are:
• Overly skeptical
• Overly critical
• Self-centered
• Emotionless
• Overly ambitious
• Opinionated
• Not a team player
• Arrogant
• Lacking tact
• Workaholic
• Inflexible
• Disdainful
• Intolerant
• Hard to impress
• Impatient
• Obsessive
Our interactions with other personality types are important to master, especially as extroverts who thrive on interaction. At work, our personality can build off a greater understanding of others in order to be more successful, and take everyone along with us.
In love and at home, and in a life filled with leaps of faith, as ENTJs we have tremendous potential. It’s just up to you to apply it.
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