By: Richard Felstow

I, like many of you, enjoy listening to music. I like many types of music. I have a 200 CD changer at home, and when it is placed on “random” you hear every genre imaginable, except perhaps Rap. Sorry to all you Rap fans, but it is just not my thing. You will hear Oldies, Classical, Rock, New Age, Celtic, Country and Jimmy Buffett – a genre all unto his own.

When I listen to music, it is the lyrics I enjoy most. The song must have a good beat to draw my attention, but it is the story in the lyrics that interests me most. A few years back Billy Currington, a country singer, had a song with the title and chorus, “God is great, beer is good and people are crazy”.  As I get older, my memory is not as good, but for some reason, when I heard this song, I immediately remembered the chorus, all 10 words, which was quite a feat for me.

Being in HR for the majority of my career, I adopted Billy Currington’s lyrics as my own personal HR philosophy. I took the liberty to do a little interpretation of his lyrics. “God is great”, goes without saying. I translated, “beer is good”, to being things that you find enjoyable. And the words “people are crazy” I interpreted to everyone is different.

That is the point of this article. Everyone is different. Whether it is your family, your customers, or the people that work for you, everyone has a distinctive story. Each person has a unique blend of heritage, gender, birth order, socioeconomic, family dynamics, genes, personality and other factors. There is an old adage that you should treat people the way you want to be treated. This is actually incorrect, you should treat people the way they want to be treated.

Many HR departments use the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, based on Carl Jung’s theory of psychological types. Myers and Briggs then created an inventory describing personality traits that followed basic ways people perceive or tend to behave. In a nutshell, there are 16 diverse personality types. The Predictive Index Survey is similar. These tools can be very effective, if used properly; however, many folks are not using them as they were originally intended, thus diluting their potential. When used properly, they can be another indicator providing insight into a person’s general personality traits and how they wish to be treated. This can be useful when taking into account how people interact with one another. An example is the difference between extroverts and introverts and how they approach things and react with others.

Unqualified interpreters of these instruments can cause people to be stereotyped and labeled. In fact, there are anecdotal stories of entire companies with people walking around with their types on a name tag.

I say, “No, don’t label me.” We are all individuals. The same holds true for the people that work for you. Do you treat them all the same? Or do you treat them as unique individuals, each with their own personal story?  Do you know who they really are?

In our previous issue, Deborah Gantos wrote an as article encouraging employers to walk around your company and get to know your people. As you do your walk around management, listening closely. Listen to that “beat” from each individual and discover the ”lyrics” that tell his or her unique story. You will be amazed, for God is great, beer is good, and people are crazy. Find out the craziness and uniqueness of each of your employees. The potential outcome may be an infusion of creativeness that your organization could find very useful.

For more information about how personality inventories can be professionally utilized to create better harmony and cooperation in your workplace, please contact Deborah K. Gantos, Licensed Professional Counselor at David Castlegrant & Associates. Telephone: 800-880-2485 or email

Deborah@dcastlegrant.com.