I’m a sucker for personality tests and new ways of understanding myself and other people. When I discovered Myers Briggs as a 23-year-old, I was all in (infj, woohoo!). In grad school, I enjoyed diagnosing myself, my family and all of my close friends using the DSM4. Enneagram? Sure! Of course I take it all with a grain of salt, but I figure the more personality tests I take, the more angles I have of understanding myself. My poor wife sometimes has to take them too.

When Gretchen Rubin, author of The Happiness Project, created a quiz to help us understand what motivates us and sets us up for success, I took it right away.

She calls it “The 4 Tendencies” quiz. She has split us up into 4 categories,depending on “how we respond to expectations.” Each of these 4 types is motivated by different kinds of expectations. When you understand what motivates you, you can set up your life so that it supports you in accomplishing your goals, creating the habits you want, and letting go of the habits you DON’T want.

As entrepreneurs, we really need to know how to get our stuff done. How well you can consistently accomplish tasks is a big predictor of how successful you will be in your business. You are your own boss, so no one is going to MAKE you follow through with tasks or stick with habits.

Just a small number of the things we entrepreneurs may need to do are: create and maintain your website, write a weekly blog, network regularly with colleagues, complete advanced training, write our notes, manage our business finances, and answer our phone and email. Some of that might be easy or pleasant for you, but probably not ALL of it! We all need strategies to stay on top of it.

Over the next few weeks, I’m going to break down for you how to adjust the way you work depending on which type you are.

Here are descriptions of the 4 types, in the words of Gretchen Rubin:

Upholders respond readily to outer and inner expectations.

Questioners question all expectations; they’ll meet an expectation if they think it makes sense.

Rebels resist all expectations, outer and inner alike.

Obligers meet outer expectations, but struggle to meet expectations they impose on themselves.

By the way, if you bristle against being categorized by this quiz, you’re probably a questioner.

Ok, now go take Gretchen Rubin’s quiz here

and then meet me back here next week.

Gretchen Rubin is a freak for these quizzes, maybe more than I am. Here are ALL of her quizzes.