How 20 Years of Coaching Changed My Myers-Briggs Type

I've been a certified Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) instructor for a long time. I've administered the assessment to hundreds of executives, debriefed the results, and used personality type as a lens for communication development for leaders. 

So you'd think I'd have my own type pretty well figured out by now.

Over the years, each time I completed the MBTI, I would show up as someone who prefers Thinking, i.e. being analytical and logical, for how I approach communicating. But, somewhere along the way, my work as a leadership coach changed that.

Today, I test as an ENFP. If you're familiar with Myers-Briggs, you know that the T/F distinction is one of the most impactful — and most misunderstood — dimensions of the framework. The shift from T to F is no small thing. It speaks to something fundamental about how we make decisions and how we lead.

So why am I even writing about this? If you’ve received feedback that your natural way of communicating is not as effective as it could be, the good news is you can practice a different approach and up your game. It’s a perfect case where practice makes perfect!

The "Non-Dominant Hand" Analogy

Let me explain how I think about this, because it matters for every executive I work with.

The MBTI is based on the presumption that everyone has preferences that they’re born with — like being right-handed or left-handed. What’s implicit in this is the belief that everyone’s natural tendency is to operate with stronger preferences. So, if you’re right-handed you would tend to use your right hand way more than your left. Now, we all know that right-handed people can also use their left hands - it just takes a little bit more effort. Using your non-dominant preference feels less natural, and you're rarely at your best with it. The same is true for your personality preferences. 

An MBTI “Thinker” can absolutely tap into their non-dominant “Feeling” preference when the situation calls for it. So for example, a “Thinker” can approach a situation with considerable empathy and sensitivity even though this is not their initial, most natural approach. On the flip side, a “Feeler” can look at things from a logical, data-driven standpoint, but it will take considerable energy and effort to do that.

According to Dr. Rachel Cubas-Wilkinson, a psychologist who specializes in MBTI, the assessment is measuring your core personality — not your behavior at a snapshot in time. And she points to something Carl Jung first observed: as people move into midlife and beyond, they tend to "balance themselves out," developing the parts of their personality they've relied on less throughout their twenties and thirties.

That's exactly what I believe happened to me.

What Two Decades of Coaching Does To A Person

When you spend twenty years sitting across from executives, leaders, and up-and-comers — really listening and leaning into their stories and blind spots — something happens. You practice empathy so consistently and deliberately that it starts becoming an innate reflex.

Research published in 2020 suggests that work experiences shape and influence personality over time, and that this can lead to genuine changes in personality traits. For me, coaching was that work experience. Where my previous inclination was to operate from my head, i.e. with logic and analytics, over time I have leaned more into operating from the heart — over time, that muscle got stronger and stronger until, eventually, it became dominant.

I know I didn’t stop being a Thinker. I just developed my Feeling preference so dramatically that it became the lens I naturally reach for first. The T is still in there, I just don't lead with it anymore.

Why This Matters for Executive Coaching Myers-Briggs Work

This personal evolution has made me a better coach — and a more empathetic one — but it's also given me a front-row seat to what happens when leaders lean too far in either direction.

Right now, I'm working with a CEO who is a strong F-type. She is genuinely well-liked and her team feels seen, supported, and valued. She creates an environment where people want to show up. Those are real strengths and F-type leaders are known for building strong team connections and fostering inclusive, collaborative environments. 

But her Feeling preference also creates a real challenge: She struggles to make decisions that might disappoint or disrupt the people around her. She's reluctant to remove underperforming employees, even when it's the right call for the organization. She filters nearly every decision through one question: How will people feel about this?

Feelers can develop a blind spot for bottom-line priorities like revenue and costs, values that are necessary for a business to function successfully. While this isn’t a character flaw, it's certainly a preference operating without enough counterbalance.

My job as her coach is to help her realize when she needs to be just a little tougher — and I guide her on how to be that way without feeling like she’s ruining someone’s life. What I’m actually helping her do is access her T preference when the situation calls for it, so she can make the hard calls and do it in a way that honors her values.

This is the real promise of leveraging the Myers-Briggs at work: not changing who you are, but expanding the range of who you can be.

The Danger Of The Untested Preference

Here's what I've learned from both sides of the T/F divide:

Thinkers who never develop their Feeling preference can make technically correct decisions that dampen team morale. What a Thinker thinks of as objective and helpful feedback may come across as a personal attack to a Feeler. That's not just a communication style issue and it has real organizational consequences.

On the flip side, Feelers who never develop their Thinking preference can create organizations that feel wonderful to work in and consistently underperform. The most successful leaders tend to balance their preferences — not by abandoning their natural instincts, but by deliberately building capacity in the preferences that don't come as easily.

This is why I incorporate the concept of personality type into my leadership coaching practice, and why I'd encourage every leader reading this to revisit their own MBTI results through this new lens. Don’t think of your type as a fixed label, but rather as a starting point for a real conversation about where your natural strengths lie and where your growth possibilities are hiding.

What My Shift From T to F Taught Me About Leadership

The version of me that has incorporated greater “Feeling” over twenty years of coaching asks better questions and considers people’s values more effectively. She sees the person in front of her more fully.

And because my “Thinker” is still, beneath the surface, considering the logic and the data, I know how to make the hard call when it matters.

Your type isn't your ceiling; it's your starting point.