Clifton Strengths vs 16 Personalities: Benefits of Knowing Your ‘Why’

Freshmen take the Clifton Strengths quiz at the beginning of the school year and review them throughout their four years at Marian. These activities are tailored to help students apply their Clifton Strengths to real life and learn how to utilize them. Counselor and Clifton Strengths coach Mrs. Anna Sparwasser believes in the importance of learning about yourself through Clifton Strengths.

“Clifton Strengths is about everything you’re good at. It’s not about anything you are bad at,” Sparwasser said. Every year during one Crusader Activity Block, students go through their results from freshman year. The application of these strengths does not stop after graduation.

“It is an expensive investment, but it won’t be the last time in your lives that you use Clifton Strengths because you’ll use them in college and business and teams. You’ll be very familiar with it by the time you enter the business world,” Sparwasser said. She has seen it used in the business world on email signatures and doorways. 

Even Marian’s staff review their strengths on a yearly basis. “We’ve had our own professional development where we do activities about our Clifton Strengths and we’ve had training in our departments where we learn how to interact with each other and our strengths and how each of us use our strengths. We’ve done many of the same activities that students have done,” Sparwasser said. 

While the Clifton Strengths are used at Marian to familiarize students with their strengths, other students take the initiative to learn even more about themselves through personality tests. Sophomore Harleigh Link has taken the 16 Personality test based on the Myers Briggs Type Inventory model or MBTI. 

“I feel like a lot more people know 16 personalities. If I were to go back in time to 2020 and look at people’s TikTok and bios, I would see ENFP or something similar. I feel like it’s a little more [popular] in our age group outside of school. If I were to ask someone if they took the Clifton Strengths test, they would be like no. But if I were to ask if they took the 16 Personality test, they would say ‘yeah I’m this’,” Link said.

The 16 Personalities test consists of 100 questions that dive into a person’s preferences. They’re placed based on the results into one of 16 different personality types that go by five letters such as INFJ-A (Introvert – INtuitive – Feeling – Judger- Assertive) or ESTP-T (Extrovert – Sensor – Thinker – Perceiver- Turbulent). These results are not permanent and it should be retaken every six months, as preferences and personalities change over time.

Freshman Elise Willson has also taken the personality test out of curiosity. “I just wanted to see if it could accurately represent how I thought about myself. And it enabled me to discover more about myself from it,” she said. For Willson, the results matched perfectly with how she saw herself.

When compared to Clifton Strengths, both see the benefits in each type of test. For Clifton Strengths, Link took it for the first time her freshman year. “I like the review but my first time taking it was my favorite. Overall I feel like all my strengths go with me. If I were to take it again, I’d a hundred percent get the same thing. It shapes me more and I know where to focus,” Link said.

Willson notes the importance of the test in the future. “It enables you to look at your future. Especially working with people and deciding your career and what you want to do, I feel like the strengths really help with that,” Willson said.

“For MBTI, I feel like being a student and a young person, you don’t know a lot about yourself. Knowing your personality type and having it written out for you definitely helps you to discover more about yourself,” Willson said. She suggests that students who want to know more about themselves take the 16 Personality test because of how deep it dives into personality.

Sparwasser said that personality tests can be helpful and has taken them in the past. “Myers Briggs was a really popular one when I was in grad school and True Colors is one we used to do with middle schoolers. It’s kinda fun to learn a little bit more about yourself. It’s fun to learn it,” Sparwasser said.

In the end, personality tests and Clifton Strengths are inventories meant to help someone learn more about themselves, whether it is about their personality or what they’re good at. 

“I hope that people learn something about themselves and learn what they’re good at and how to use what they’re good at. I think that’s the biggest thing in deciding what they want to do with their life where they can use these strengths,” Sparwasser said.