OMG I sound like an agony aunt!! --- I am a great believer in the advantages of diversity and would advise against any profession narrowing down its work-force to cookie-cutter clones. Diverse personality types are as likely to strengthen a community as a diverse gene pool is a species. An impassioned view, well articulated, is often much more convincing than a coldly analytical bullet-point approach.

However, as we know from evolution, strengths in some contexts may be weaknesses in others. This relativity means that we should always be alert to how best to respond to any given situation. So the Q is not whether your style might work against you in general but in which contexts it might do so and what to do about it just then. In other words, play to your strengths but choose your moment.

Source author: Biljana Scott biscott@diplomacy.edu