Type Model

Introduction

The type model is probably the most comprehensible and widely used, even without any sophisticated formal or statistics-based assessment technique.

Types help answer questions about whether a phenomenon exists or doesn’t, such as with hot temperature: Is it hot? Or with competences: is this person competent? Unlike factors and traits, which have continua, types have none. By doing so, the measurement of types disregards anything that doesn’t characterize and is distant from the phenomenon of interest.

Like traits, types are easy to understand, probably easier, because how questions are asked and answered come even more naturally and spontaneously with types. Types are easy to learn and use, though they cannot convey nuances as the factor and trait models can.

Representation

Types only provide a rough estimate of a characteristic, whether it be competence or behavior. This is represented by the red square on the map, which indicates that a person is somewhere in the San Francisco region, without knowing the exact location. If you like to go from A to B on that red map you can’t possibly know, because you don’t have the information. Or if you come from another location, you may end up in the region, including the Pacific Ocean.

By design, types cannot capture nuances that may be important. This becomes evident when comparing the results of types with those of trait and factor models: those two reveal characteristics that types can’t. If you only use types, you can’t really know until you repeatedly try other techniques, and as in our example, you will land on different locations of the square every time.

The measures of types suggest that these rough characteristics are likely to persist over time and are attached to people. But that’s far from reality and what everyone can experience on their own. As for competencies, behaviors develop and grow. People adapt, and eventually change, or not. Some behaviors may be engaging; others may be less engaging, in different ways for everyone.

Having a picture of whether someone is competent and exhibits a particular behavior type today cannot capture how they will be competent and behave tomorrow and beyond. The type being measured is only a far-from-perfect indicator of competence and behavior at the time of assessment. The first impression of being of a type subsists and further misguides consistent development. Types may inform about a person’s modus operandi, but inconsistently, due to their limitations.

Some systems combine the type and trait models to inform about a person's type’s representativeness and intensity, as traits do, as shown in the example below on the right. The results are presented on the left as types, and on the right as types + traits. But we see type first and trait second because types, or red dots, are easier to capture and use. It’s no effort for the brain, but also for the immediate deductions made from the types being measured. When combined, the same limitations apply to understanding traits: only one side of the continuum is revealed, and the other is ignored.

Measure

A type is measured with all the elements used to conceptualise the phenomenon of interest by a person or a technique. The phenomenon of focus, which contains all the elements, is the white square at the center. Other elements that are not are outside in the outer black square.

In the example on the right, the focus is on answering the question “Is it hot?” The characteristics that qualify as hot are in the square. Others are out. The considerations differ from those of the factor and trait models, which address the phenomenon's development or proximity.

The measure of a type may contain nuances, but this is not of concern for the representation and use of types. In comparison, the factor and trait models will reveal nuances that differ from those of a type assessment, especially from the factor model. As for traits, types can be any individual characteristics one may think of. But unlike traits, types have no intensity. As with traits, factors will reveal how types are expressed and learned, with additional nuances that the type measurement cannot reveal.

Types’ Measurement and Use

Types, like traits, are generally measured with forced-choice scenario surveys.

Types have been used in personal development and coaching to form a first impression of a person: gauge who they are, and establish a connection. Factor and trait models are used this way, too, each revealing additional precision and capabilities. When taken at the organizational level, types are used to regroup people into categories, typically a 2x2 matrix, and provide a first understanding of a group’s dynamics and of people who may fit into them. But they lack the nuances needed to, for instance, better characterize what is expected of a person in a job or what happens at a team level. The limitations and imprecision of type measurements prevent making any meaningful, valid deductions at the individual and job levels.

Types are used for team building, which, through their far-from-perfect descriptions, enables people to think about behavioral differences. At a minimum, a team-building exercise helps challenge assumptions that focus exclusively on cognitive abilities or other characteristics that are more evident but less relevant to understanding social interactions.

Types tap into people’s curiosity, are easy to start a discussion with, and benefit from what we’ve called art GRI medium effects: the capacity of a technique to help engage people in discussion. Some people may not otherwise share without the type used as a medium, which can be a first great accomplishment.

Adaptation Efforts

With social behaviors, types provide an approximate estimate of individual characteristics but, without more nuance, fail to inform what it takes to adapt the behaviors to a job demand, from an emotional, cognitive, and social-behavioral standpoint, nor the amount and quality of support needed for the change to occur.

In the map analogy, the location of someone’s behavior is broad. When going somewhere like San Francisco, the departure may be anywhere within the red square on the map. As for the trait model, the departure may be in the Pacific Ocean, in Sonoma or Santa Clara Counties, all of which are 40 to 80 miles distant. Or it may be in San Francisco and even in Union Square, the targeted destination in our example: there is no possible indication of the distance to the target, as with the trait and factor models. You may well already be at the destination, but the model cannot tell and only provides a rough sense that you are around.

Factors versus Types

Unlike type models, which roughly describe someone’s characteristics in a square, factor models provide their coordinates on the human spectrum. When applying factor models to types, people’s behavior doesn't cluster into "types." Instead, they fall on a continuum. Applying a standard deviation scale, most, around two-thirds, fall in the middle of the continuum. The "type" is an arbitrary cut-off on the factor scale, with a divide between the two halves that looks like an empty space rather than being filled with most people.

Type models fail factor analysis because they assume a bimodal distribution of human behavior: people are either in one of two categories, type A or type B. With the geolocation analogy, a type model divides the world into two halves: "The East" and "The West." Anyone at 1° West is grouped with someone at 179° West. A Factor model gives the exact longitude. It recognizes that 1° West is actually much more similar to 1° East than it is to 179° West.

Some techniques measure dimensions along continuums, but then reduce their representation to types. They do that because it’s easier to think in terms of types than continuums, but it is not appropriate when requiring nuances, as for instance in personal and organizational development.