Conscientiousness with a side of steadiness.

Just days before, a little something known as a 'Personal Profile System' helped us identify ourselves based on a series, 28 sets to be exact, of personality traits towards which we decided which of the four in each set captured our essence most and which was a stretch from how we took ourselves to be. Whether we felt we were more daring and less cautious, there were plenty to choose from and each trait had two correlating letters (Z,Q,X,W, or Y): one for the Most column and another for the Least column. After careful consideration and progressing through each set of traits one by one, we were left with a page-long list of letters and no idea where we'd be headed with it. With a few little calculations and plotting a few points on a graph, we were able to see what we fit the mold of most and what was a close second. The four possibilities were: Dominance, Influence, Steadiness and Conscientousness, and what I came to see was that I was mostly Conscientious and quite Steady, a Cs, at that. Each characterization had a brief walk-through as to what described each kind of person/potential manager and the first thing going through my mind when reading that was: whoa.

The guidelines for interpretation definitely got it right in terms of how I am when it comes to life at work, at school and anything I do apart from those settings. Conscientiousness involves working in such a way that ensures quality and accuracy in the circumstances at hand. If that's not me in a nutshell, then I don't know what is. I tend to be about as conscientious as one can get especially at work, always finding something to be meticulous about, always wondering what can be done to better the present situation, and being way self-critical all the time as well as equally weighing out the pros and cons whenever that can be done. When i'd started out at my internship, even to this very day and it's been several months since that first day, I would spend time focusing on the little aspects of the given task as well as the generally significant ones almost to a point that it seemed like I was finding reasons to critique something about what I was doing but in my defense, it was all in the name of a good impression for a dedicated intern who just wants things to be done the way they should be done.

In regards to conflict, I can take a step in bringing it down to a minimum; if it just so happens to be a decision-making one, i'll either collaborate or accomodate but will I be the first to take a stand and bring everybody's attention to the fact that there is a conflict to begin with? Not the majority of the time and it really is something that strikes me as not so great because that's something that I should be able to do effortlessly as a part of the workforce so in terms of what i hope to be, that would be a dominant D who can say what needs to be said and enforce what needs to be done whereas I'm stuck in my bubble of being subtle and often indirect. I also tend to become a systematic thinker when approached with a problem, meaning that I approach those very problems in a rational, step-by-step and very analytical fashion. Everything to me is fact-based, always asking myself like "how do I know this is the way it is?"...it gets a little ridiculous, I can admit that freely. Organization and planning is key to me especially at work; when I feel like i have enough organization and things laid out accordingly in front of me to the extent that I can continue on with whatever it is, I will.

Then there's the Steadiness quality. Consistency is a big thing for me but I do like to vary it up every now and then; a day at the office filled with the same structured task for eight hours straight can make even the most steadiest of people lose it. I like to think I'm a pretty patient person and if there's a voice that needs to be heard, I'm the ear to listen. The ideas of 'sincere appreciation' as well as enlisting others to encourage my creativity, as the section of Steadiness points out to be something a steady person prefers and must have in order to prove themselves a little more effective, I don't think that's really the case with me. If it just so happens that my work is appreciated, that's all fine and great but the effort put in wouldn't diminish if that were to not be the case. Also, I'm a firm believer in being creative whenever you can be so encouraged creativity is unnecessary for me because whenever i can 'sass something up' or step outside of the box, that's a chance I'll take.