Personality Programs are ways we tend to experience the world. They are usually dominant, over arching tendencies that influence our lives in major ways.

We covered three at the pulse on October 29^th

1. Moving toward or moving away

As with all personality programs, they are not all or none. Everyone moves toward something and away from others. No one responds the same way to every stimulus, although everyone has a dominant mode, a strong tendency toward one program or another. Some people tend to be energetic, curious, risk takers. They may feel most comfortable moving toward something that excites them. Others tend to be cautious, wary, and protective; they see the worked as a more perilous place, they tend to take actions away from harmful or threatening things rather than toward exciting one. To find out which way people move, ask them what hey want in a relationship, home, car, job, or anything else. Do they tell you want they want or what they don’t want?

2. Internal or external frames of reference

This deals with how a person sees themselves being rewarded, motivated, or punished. Ask someone else how he knows when he’s done a good job. For some people, proof comes from the outside. The boss pats you on the back and says your work was great. You get a raise. You win a big award. Your work is noticed and applauded by your peers. When you get that sort of external approval, you know your work is good. That is an external frame of reference.

For others, the proof comes from the inside. They “just know inside” when they’ve done a well. If you have an internal frame of reference, you can design a building that wins all sorts of architectural awards, but if you don’t feel it’s special, no among of outside approval with convince you it is. Conversely, you might do a job that gets lukewarm reception from your boss or peers, but if you feel it’s good work, you’ll trust your own instincts rather that theirs. That is an internal frame of reference.

3. Matcher or Mismatcher

To determine whether someone is a matcher or a mismatcher, ask him about the relationship between any set of objects or situations and note whether he focuses first on the similarities or the differences. Can you imagine what happens when a sameness matcher gets together with a difference mismacther? When the one says they’re all alike, the other says, “No, there’re not, they’re all different!” Mismatchers are in the minority. Research indicates that anywhere from 25 to 35 percent of the population are mismatchers. It’s interesting that person may be a mismatcher on only certain subjects. This tends to e true on subjects mismatchers have a lot of interest in or information on. Mismatchers can be extremely valuable because they tend to see what the rest of the population doesn’t see.