1 00:00:15,031 --> 00:00:20,931 Encoded by Dr. B~ 2 00:00:34,231 --> 00:00:39,100 [soft female voice] Breathe in... 3 00:00:39,121 --> 00:00:41,121 and relax. 4 00:00:43,081 --> 00:00:44,231 Know yourself. 5 00:00:46,021 --> 00:00:49,140 Become your own attention. 6 00:00:49,161 --> 00:00:52,030 [intriguing electronic music] 7 00:00:59,041 --> 00:00:59,231 [electronic beep] 8 00:00:59,250 --> 00:01:04,230 This test is about your personality. 9 00:01:04,251 --> 00:01:07,081 You must answer, "strongly agree" 10 00:01:07,100 --> 00:01:14,111 "agree," "neutral", "disagree", "strongly disagree" 11 00:01:18,021 --> 00:01:19,051 Agree. 12 00:01:20,040 --> 00:01:22,171 [pulsing music] 13 00:01:24,120 --> 00:01:26,221 Our lives are shaped as profoundly by personality 14 00:01:26,240 --> 00:01:29,120 as they are by gender and race. 15 00:01:32,111 --> 00:01:34,060 A lot of people say, it's what makes somebody tick. 16 00:01:34,081 --> 00:01:39,171 To me it's more around how somebody portrays themselves. 17 00:01:39,191 --> 00:01:43,141 Who we are, what we're good at, what we are capable of doing. 18 00:01:43,161 --> 00:01:48,090 These are really big questions and one way of answering them 19 00:01:48,111 --> 00:01:51,161 in our society has become taking a personality test. 20 00:01:51,180 --> 00:01:53,210 I am somewhat of a thrill seeker. 21 00:01:53,231 --> 00:01:58,171 I get angry more often than nervous. 22 00:01:58,191 --> 00:02:02,120 People's feelings are sometimes hurt by what I say. 23 00:02:02,141 --> 00:02:06,060 Personality testing can be the key that unlocks the life 24 00:02:06,081 --> 00:02:07,190 that you want to live 25 00:02:08,240 --> 00:02:12,180 or something that seems against you 26 00:02:12,201 --> 00:02:14,250 in ways that you may not even be aware of. 27 00:02:25,210 --> 00:02:28,231 Okay, so this is my first YouTube video. 28 00:02:28,250 --> 00:02:31,071 The first one with my face in it anyway. 29 00:02:31,090 --> 00:02:35,090 I look like an idiot. I've got these cherry lips. 30 00:02:35,111 --> 00:02:39,201 My lips are chapped, I don't know what's going on. 31 00:02:39,220 --> 00:02:41,191 [sighs] So it's... 32 00:02:42,240 --> 00:02:48,021 it's about 4am on January 1st 2017, 33 00:02:48,041 --> 00:02:49,150 so it's the new year 34 00:02:49,171 --> 00:02:54,160 and I'm already feeling like depressed about it 35 00:02:56,191 --> 00:02:58,231 I'm an introvert. 36 00:02:58,250 --> 00:03:01,060 If you're in the Myers-Briggs I'm an INFJ. 37 00:03:01,081 --> 00:03:04,120 For those of you out there who are introverts 38 00:03:04,141 --> 00:03:06,051 or if you've taken that test 39 00:03:06,071 --> 00:03:07,250 and you're an INFJ, 40 00:03:08,030 --> 00:03:12,101 I'd be interested to hear from you if you feel the same way. 41 00:03:12,120 --> 00:03:16,041 Are there any other INFJ women out there? 42 00:03:17,090 --> 00:03:21,120 Are you new to MBTI or are you just getting started? 43 00:03:21,141 --> 00:03:22,071 Ladies and gentlemen, greetings 44 00:03:22,090 --> 00:03:24,191 from the other side of YouTube. 45 00:03:24,210 --> 00:03:26,231 When I first started making videos on YouTube, 46 00:03:26,250 --> 00:03:30,051 the personality niche was really small. 47 00:03:30,071 --> 00:03:33,180 But over the past few years it's gotten really big 48 00:03:33,201 --> 00:03:34,250 it's really exploded. 49 00:03:35,030 --> 00:03:37,021 Hey guys, it's Lizzie, so today's video, 50 00:03:37,041 --> 00:03:38,150 it's about Myres-Briggs... 51 00:03:38,171 --> 00:03:39,160 ...and it's just like a trend going around. 52 00:03:39,180 --> 00:03:43,240 People keep randomly saying, "Oh, I'm HIJK..." 53 00:03:48,041 --> 00:03:49,201 The most definitive personality test of them all 54 00:03:49,220 --> 00:03:51,041 is the Myers-Briggs. 55 00:03:51,060 --> 00:03:54,021 If you don't know what the Myers-Briggs is, 56 00:03:54,041 --> 00:03:56,090 that's alright, just know that it is the most well known 57 00:03:56,111 --> 00:03:58,030 personality type quiz in the world 58 00:03:58,051 --> 00:04:01,250 and it breaks us all down into 16 distinct types. 59 00:04:03,231 --> 00:04:05,201 The theory is that your personality 60 00:04:05,220 --> 00:04:07,190 is constructed in such a way 61 00:04:07,210 --> 00:04:11,051 where you are blind to certain things that you do 62 00:04:11,071 --> 00:04:14,021 and ways that you cause problems for yourself. 63 00:04:14,040 --> 00:04:16,121 You find it difficult to introduce yourself 64 00:04:16,141 --> 00:04:18,061 to other people? 65 00:04:19,150 --> 00:04:21,050 -Yeah, disagree. -Yes. 66 00:04:21,071 --> 00:04:24,210 So typology is a tool for you to be able to see the things 67 00:04:24,230 --> 00:04:27,160 that your mind is hiding from you. 68 00:04:28,230 --> 00:04:31,220 "You often find yourself lost in thought when you 69 00:04:31,241 --> 00:04:34,150 were walking in nature." Strongly agree. 70 00:04:34,170 --> 00:04:35,251 Often find yourself lost in thought 71 00:04:36,030 --> 00:04:37,150 when you're walking in nature? 72 00:04:37,170 --> 00:04:40,030 Does this test think I'm active? What's walking? 73 00:04:40,050 --> 00:04:42,180 When I first took the test and I got my results back 74 00:04:42,201 --> 00:04:45,131 I was like, wow, this thing knows me better 75 00:04:45,150 --> 00:04:46,210 than I know myself. 76 00:04:46,230 --> 00:04:51,100 I am ENTP-T. Wooo-hoo-hoo! 77 00:04:51,121 --> 00:04:53,241 ENFP-T, a campaigner. 78 00:04:54,021 --> 00:04:55,121 Mediator, no one can stop you from dreaming. 79 00:04:55,141 --> 00:04:58,230 As a Beta personality type is ultimately devil's advocate. 80 00:04:58,251 --> 00:05:01,210 That's me! Hello devil. 81 00:05:01,230 --> 00:05:04,181 Cause when you find out your personality type 82 00:05:04,201 --> 00:05:07,251 you realize that you're not alone. 83 00:05:10,021 --> 00:05:11,030 My personality type is INFJ. 84 00:05:11,050 --> 00:05:14,090 So that means the first letter is I 85 00:05:14,110 --> 00:05:18,090 which stands for introverted versus extrovert. 86 00:05:18,110 --> 00:05:19,220 The second one is N, 87 00:05:19,241 --> 00:05:23,251 which stands for intuitive rather than sensing preference. 88 00:05:24,210 --> 00:05:26,220 Then the next letter is F 89 00:05:26,241 --> 00:05:30,090 which stands for feeling and that's opposed to thinking. 90 00:05:30,111 --> 00:05:35,040 And then the last letter is J, and the dichotomy there 91 00:05:35,061 --> 00:05:37,121 is J-O-P which is judging or perceiving. 92 00:05:40,220 --> 00:05:43,040 For an INFJ, the description is usually 93 00:05:43,061 --> 00:05:45,081 something like their mind works in a way 94 00:05:45,100 --> 00:05:48,040 that's very different from everyone else. 95 00:05:48,061 --> 00:05:51,050 They can be disconnected from the real world 96 00:05:53,241 --> 00:05:56,131 and INFJ's are the rarest type. 97 00:05:58,081 --> 00:06:01,141 People want to understand themselves 98 00:06:01,160 --> 00:06:04,100 and the Internet is a great tool to really dive 99 00:06:04,121 --> 00:06:09,021 into what are the differences between everybody. 100 00:06:09,040 --> 00:06:10,061 Love is like beauty and the beast. 101 00:06:10,081 --> 00:06:13,141 Love is what you are looking at right now. 102 00:06:13,160 --> 00:06:14,100 There is no such thing as love. 103 00:06:17,131 --> 00:06:19,081 Everyone wants to know who's going to be 104 00:06:19,100 --> 00:06:21,201 their perfect partner, who they're going to marry. 105 00:06:21,220 --> 00:06:23,040 Want to know when Prince Charming 106 00:06:23,061 --> 00:06:24,131 is going to walk through the door 107 00:06:24,150 --> 00:06:25,131 that you have his personality type. 108 00:06:25,150 --> 00:06:29,071 And you can say there he is, there is the ENFP 109 00:06:29,090 --> 00:06:31,081 that I'm supposed to be with, right? 110 00:06:32,030 --> 00:06:34,210 Nothing becomes trendy, 111 00:06:34,230 --> 00:06:37,160 nothing becomes important in pop culture 112 00:06:37,180 --> 00:06:40,150 if there isn't some aspect of it working in reality, right? 113 00:06:43,030 --> 00:06:45,201 There's a trend about something because people like it 114 00:06:45,220 --> 00:06:46,131 and there's value in it. 115 00:06:50,021 --> 00:06:52,131 [upbeat music] 116 00:07:01,081 --> 00:07:04,191 When I was 21, my first job out of college 117 00:07:04,210 --> 00:07:07,251 was as a management consultant at a large corporation. 118 00:07:08,030 --> 00:07:09,110 And one of the first things 119 00:07:09,131 --> 00:07:10,100 all new employees were asked to do 120 00:07:10,121 --> 00:07:14,040 was to take the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator. 121 00:07:15,181 --> 00:07:22,021 They whisked us away to a very luxurious offsite... 122 00:07:22,040 --> 00:07:24,170 ...and they brought in a career counselor 123 00:07:24,191 --> 00:07:25,230 to tell us what our types were 124 00:07:25,251 --> 00:07:30,021 and how we might fit into the corporation based on our types. 125 00:07:33,170 --> 00:07:38,201 And I remember her telling me... "You are an ENTJ." 126 00:07:38,220 --> 00:07:40,180 "You are the CEO type... 127 00:07:43,050 --> 00:07:45,040 ...and one day you might even become... 128 00:07:45,061 --> 00:07:46,241 head of this organization." 129 00:07:51,040 --> 00:07:53,141 I was completely taken in by it. 130 00:07:55,220 --> 00:07:57,030 Fast forward six months 131 00:07:57,050 --> 00:07:59,181 I was a terrible management consultant. 132 00:07:59,201 --> 00:08:03,040 I spent most of my time reading novels under my desk. 133 00:08:04,131 --> 00:08:07,220 And I quit to become a writer. 134 00:08:07,241 --> 00:08:10,141 And I thought I might write something on personality. 135 00:08:10,160 --> 00:08:13,110 And I remember the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator 136 00:08:13,131 --> 00:08:15,141 and I started doing some digging into it. 137 00:08:17,081 --> 00:08:20,150 And I discovered that the people who invented it 138 00:08:20,170 --> 00:08:24,121 were not two men, Myers and Briggs... 139 00:08:26,210 --> 00:08:29,150 ...but two women, a mother and a daughter. 140 00:08:31,170 --> 00:08:33,170 And that really moved and intrigued me. 141 00:08:37,141 --> 00:08:39,080 And I wanted to understand how these two women 142 00:08:39,101 --> 00:08:43,150 who had no formal training in psychology 143 00:08:43,170 --> 00:08:44,231 had come to design the world's most popular 144 00:08:44,251 --> 00:08:47,030 personality test. 145 00:09:21,160 --> 00:09:22,160 I think what's absolutely essential 146 00:09:22,180 --> 00:09:27,121 to the history of type is that it begins it's life 147 00:09:27,141 --> 00:09:29,080 as a domestic experiment. 148 00:09:30,060 --> 00:09:30,150 [baby crying] 149 00:09:38,050 --> 00:09:41,180 Katharine Cook Briggs gives birth to three children. 150 00:09:44,211 --> 00:09:47,150 Only one of whom, Isabel, survives past infancy. 151 00:09:51,080 --> 00:09:53,251 And after seeing the incredible fragility 152 00:09:54,030 --> 00:09:56,180 of human life, 153 00:09:56,200 --> 00:09:58,190 Katharine starts to wonder about what it means 154 00:09:58,211 --> 00:09:59,200 to bring a person into the world 155 00:09:59,221 --> 00:10:02,211 and what it means to be a person in the world. 156 00:10:02,231 --> 00:10:03,241 [baby cries] 157 00:10:08,180 --> 00:10:11,141 She cordons off her living room, into what she calls 158 00:10:11,160 --> 00:10:15,030 the cosmic laboratory of baby training 159 00:10:15,050 --> 00:10:17,221 and she starts with what she begins to think of 160 00:10:17,241 --> 00:10:21,050 as a series of experiments on the personality 161 00:10:21,070 --> 00:10:22,150 of her daughter Isabel. 162 00:10:26,160 --> 00:10:28,170 Years later, Isabel goes away to college 163 00:10:32,121 --> 00:10:36,190 and Katharine has a complete crisis of faith 164 00:10:38,170 --> 00:10:39,190 because she's dedicated her whole life, 165 00:10:39,211 --> 00:10:43,160 not just to her child but to her child's personality 166 00:10:43,180 --> 00:10:47,101 and she doesn't know what to do with herself. 167 00:10:50,131 --> 00:10:53,180 But one day she reads in the New Republic 168 00:10:53,200 --> 00:10:55,160 a review of a new work by Carl Jung 169 00:10:55,180 --> 00:10:57,030 called "Psychological Types" 170 00:10:57,050 --> 00:11:00,131 and she's entranced and she orders it immediately. 171 00:11:00,150 --> 00:11:03,251 We need more understanding of human nature 172 00:11:04,030 --> 00:11:09,131 because the only real danger that exists is man himself. 173 00:11:11,060 --> 00:11:13,131 He is the great danger 174 00:11:13,150 --> 00:11:17,091 and we are pitifully unaware of it. 175 00:11:17,111 --> 00:11:19,170 This psyche should be studied 176 00:11:19,190 --> 00:11:24,241 because we are the origin of all coming evil. 177 00:11:30,200 --> 00:11:34,190 After Katharine read "Psychological Types" in 1923, 178 00:11:34,211 --> 00:11:36,160 she writes to Isabel and says 179 00:11:36,180 --> 00:11:39,131 that she needs to burn all of her notes 180 00:11:39,150 --> 00:11:43,121 and she needs to begin her life anew 181 00:11:43,141 --> 00:11:46,050 as one of Jung's disciples. 182 00:11:50,200 --> 00:11:52,200 And she sees a way of bringing the language of types 183 00:11:52,221 --> 00:11:55,190 that Jung has developed, to the United States... 184 00:11:57,221 --> 00:12:00,200 ...and use it to transform American society. 185 00:12:03,060 --> 00:12:05,221 [expectant music] 186 00:12:12,251 --> 00:12:15,170 Can you handle a fast paced working environment? 187 00:12:15,190 --> 00:12:19,111 I had always really wanted to do comedy. 188 00:12:19,131 --> 00:12:21,231 The speed at which you're asking me these questions 189 00:12:21,251 --> 00:12:24,180 makes me question how fast paced it truly is. 190 00:12:24,200 --> 00:12:26,160 The first one I did was the 16 personalities 191 00:12:26,180 --> 00:12:27,241 at a job interview. 192 00:12:28,030 --> 00:12:29,170 Okay. You're hired. 193 00:12:29,190 --> 00:12:31,160 -We're interviewing you. -Oh. 194 00:12:31,180 --> 00:12:33,050 My Channel started to blow up. 195 00:12:33,070 --> 00:12:34,050 Like... what! 196 00:12:34,070 --> 00:12:36,101 I am killing it. 197 00:12:36,121 --> 00:12:39,221 People just like to see this format over and over again 198 00:12:39,241 --> 00:12:42,190 because they can learn more about themselves 199 00:12:42,211 --> 00:12:45,131 and about other people in like a quick humorous format. 200 00:12:45,150 --> 00:12:48,231 Dating can be a struggle for introverts. 201 00:12:48,251 --> 00:12:50,251 What with the talking to people 202 00:12:51,030 --> 00:12:53,211 and leaving the house but fear not. 203 00:12:53,231 --> 00:12:56,180 This is the introverts survival guide to dating. 204 00:12:56,200 --> 00:13:00,170 Good first date spots for introverts include 205 00:13:00,190 --> 00:13:04,211 the coffee shop, the library and the cemetery. 206 00:13:06,251 --> 00:13:10,160 I get comments and emails all the time 207 00:13:10,180 --> 00:13:13,160 and they range from things like 208 00:13:13,180 --> 00:13:15,141 what would a relationship look like 209 00:13:15,160 --> 00:13:18,211 between an ENFP and INTJ? 210 00:13:23,131 --> 00:13:25,221 But then I also get people saying 211 00:13:25,241 --> 00:13:28,251 "You're the only person who really understands me." 212 00:13:30,251 --> 00:13:35,040 People who are like going through like a fresh divorce. 213 00:13:35,060 --> 00:13:37,200 Yeah I'm here with my INFJ girlfriend. 214 00:13:37,221 --> 00:13:39,040 It is Valentine's Day. 215 00:13:39,060 --> 00:13:41,231 For those of you who did not know I'm an INFJ... 216 00:13:41,251 --> 00:13:45,160 Even once I had someone who was feeling suicidal 217 00:13:45,180 --> 00:13:47,021 and posting about it and it's 218 00:13:47,040 --> 00:13:49,101 all these really deep weighty things 219 00:13:49,121 --> 00:13:51,021 and some people viewing this 220 00:13:51,040 --> 00:13:53,121 form a very strong emotional bond, 221 00:13:53,141 --> 00:13:56,251 when they know that they are not a freak, 222 00:13:57,030 --> 00:14:00,021 when they are not alone, when they're not broken. 223 00:14:00,040 --> 00:14:02,231 When someone else can just say what they've been thinking 224 00:14:02,251 --> 00:14:04,251 and feeling and make it seem normal. 225 00:14:06,170 --> 00:14:08,251 [suspenseful electronic music] 226 00:14:12,091 --> 00:14:15,221 Personality testing is a multibillion dollar industry 227 00:14:15,241 --> 00:14:19,050 and is growing at at least 15% a year. 228 00:14:20,070 --> 00:14:24,101 What I'm helping my clients do is to compete and win. 229 00:14:25,251 --> 00:14:28,180 The world is like a large poker game, 230 00:14:28,200 --> 00:14:30,150 where we're trying to crunch the numbers 231 00:14:30,170 --> 00:14:31,211 and we're trying to count the cards 232 00:14:33,180 --> 00:14:34,241 and trying to ascertain 233 00:14:35,021 --> 00:14:39,060 do they have a full hand or are they bluffing? 234 00:14:41,060 --> 00:14:43,101 [electronic music continues] 235 00:14:44,211 --> 00:14:49,101 Approximately 70% of an organization's expenditures 236 00:14:49,121 --> 00:14:50,221 is on human capital. 237 00:14:50,241 --> 00:14:54,141 And when there's all kinds of psychological data available 238 00:14:54,160 --> 00:14:56,080 that can help inform companies 239 00:14:56,101 --> 00:14:58,190 on what kind of human capital they invest in, 240 00:14:58,211 --> 00:15:01,221 it's going to be very appealing to organizations, 241 00:15:01,241 --> 00:15:03,050 to use that data, 242 00:15:03,070 --> 00:15:06,050 to try to maximize their return on investment. 243 00:15:06,070 --> 00:15:08,070 The two most popular personality assessments 244 00:15:08,091 --> 00:15:09,030 on the market today 245 00:15:09,050 --> 00:15:12,050 are the Myers-Briggs and the Big 5. 246 00:15:12,070 --> 00:15:13,121 The Coke and Pepsi 247 00:15:13,141 --> 00:15:15,150 of the personality assessment world. 248 00:15:19,060 --> 00:15:23,170 They have similar categories and several things in common. 249 00:15:23,190 --> 00:15:26,211 Most of the personality assessments on the market today 250 00:15:26,231 --> 00:15:30,200 are based on the Myers-Briggs and or the Big Five. 251 00:15:30,221 --> 00:15:32,141 Sometimes the two of them together. 252 00:15:40,160 --> 00:15:43,170 Algorithms are everywhere. 253 00:15:43,190 --> 00:15:47,101 They sort and separate the winners from the losers. 254 00:15:47,121 --> 00:15:51,101 The winners get the job or good credit card offer. 255 00:15:51,121 --> 00:15:54,160 The losers, don't even get an interview. 256 00:15:54,180 --> 00:15:57,021 I actually think personality tests are fun to take. 257 00:15:57,040 --> 00:15:58,231 You know, in a loose stakes environment 258 00:15:58,251 --> 00:16:00,231 if have you ever taken a personality test 259 00:16:00,251 --> 00:16:02,211 it's like fun because you basically get 260 00:16:02,231 --> 00:16:04,121 to think about yourself, 261 00:16:04,141 --> 00:16:05,211 and talk about yourself. 262 00:16:08,080 --> 00:16:11,131 It's not fun if it's high stakes. 263 00:16:16,200 --> 00:16:18,141 [dog barking] 264 00:16:18,160 --> 00:16:22,200 Good thing I got my my cold sleeves. 265 00:16:24,231 --> 00:16:25,040 I am set. 266 00:16:29,121 --> 00:16:33,141 We have two different types of people right here. 267 00:16:33,160 --> 00:16:35,211 We got Barrett. He's doing the pulling. 268 00:16:35,231 --> 00:16:39,121 And then Danny, he's the one keeping us in check. 269 00:16:40,180 --> 00:16:42,111 So we couldn't just have two Barrets 270 00:16:42,131 --> 00:16:43,050 because that'd be too much. 271 00:16:47,251 --> 00:16:48,211 I was already on 272 00:16:48,231 --> 00:16:52,121 to the whole personality test industry 273 00:16:52,141 --> 00:16:55,030 and I came across Kyle's story 274 00:16:55,050 --> 00:16:56,131 and it just seemed... 275 00:16:57,070 --> 00:16:58,141 ...amazing. 276 00:17:02,110 --> 00:17:03,201 But it wasn't just Kyle. 277 00:17:05,191 --> 00:17:07,100 It was anybody who would have answered 278 00:17:07,120 --> 00:17:08,151 questions like Kyle. 279 00:17:11,110 --> 00:17:13,040 So I guess it starts really 280 00:17:13,060 --> 00:17:15,221 with I was in school up in Nashville 281 00:17:15,241 --> 00:17:18,231 and I ended up having to take a leave of absence 282 00:17:18,251 --> 00:17:22,241 during which I was diagnosed with bipolar disorder. 283 00:17:23,021 --> 00:17:25,060 And then after I graduated 284 00:17:25,080 --> 00:17:28,161 I decided I would get a part time job. 285 00:17:29,251 --> 00:17:33,161 And one of my friends that I had made, 286 00:17:33,181 --> 00:17:36,110 he worked at Kroger, in the pharmacy 287 00:17:36,130 --> 00:17:38,241 and I told him I have to take my own medication myself. 288 00:17:39,021 --> 00:17:42,030 so I'd really like to be on the other side 289 00:17:42,050 --> 00:17:44,060 helping people with their medication. 290 00:17:46,201 --> 00:17:50,030 And he brought my case before two of his managers there 291 00:17:50,050 --> 00:17:52,080 and he came back to me and explained 292 00:17:52,100 --> 00:17:53,251 they are both on board with this, 293 00:17:54,030 --> 00:17:55,090 let's move forward. 294 00:17:55,110 --> 00:17:58,090 All we've got to do now is you've got to submit 295 00:17:58,110 --> 00:18:00,030 your resume to online and take a test. 296 00:18:02,110 --> 00:18:05,221 The next day I go upstairs into my room. 297 00:18:05,241 --> 00:18:08,151 Lock myself in my room because I'm taking a test. 298 00:18:09,120 --> 00:18:10,171 So, no distractions. 299 00:18:12,021 --> 00:18:13,130 [soft keypad punching] 300 00:18:18,191 --> 00:18:21,090 I start taking this test and I'm thinking to myself, 301 00:18:21,110 --> 00:18:24,130 "This is easy, I'm good at this, 302 00:18:24,151 --> 00:18:25,231 I'm good at being honest." 303 00:18:25,251 --> 00:18:29,040 "I'm just going to go right through this exam, 304 00:18:29,060 --> 00:18:31,241 submit." And did it. 305 00:18:36,040 --> 00:18:36,251 And then over the next few weeks 306 00:18:37,030 --> 00:18:40,021 I'm kind of still waiting to hear back. 307 00:18:40,040 --> 00:18:43,161 My friend drops in again and I asked him, 308 00:18:43,181 --> 00:18:46,140 I said, "Hey, how's the job going?" 309 00:18:46,161 --> 00:18:48,080 "Like I submitted the online test." 310 00:18:48,100 --> 00:18:53,140 And he then explained to me that the manager said 311 00:18:53,161 --> 00:18:54,221 that he could not hire me 312 00:18:54,241 --> 00:18:59,060 because I had scored a red on the test 313 00:18:59,080 --> 00:19:02,221 and red on a specific area of the test. 314 00:19:02,241 --> 00:19:05,201 In the specific area which I scored red 315 00:19:05,221 --> 00:19:12,060 indicated that I was very likely to ignore customers 316 00:19:12,080 --> 00:19:14,231 if they were either upset, 317 00:19:14,251 --> 00:19:18,231 or if they were making me upset and frustrated. 318 00:19:18,251 --> 00:19:23,090 And so I heard this news and I was a little taken aback 319 00:19:23,110 --> 00:19:28,221 because, you know, I've worked in customer service before 320 00:19:28,241 --> 00:19:31,171 and one of the things I've learned is 321 00:19:31,191 --> 00:19:33,181 you completely separate your personal feelings 322 00:19:33,201 --> 00:19:36,110 from the job. 323 00:19:36,130 --> 00:19:39,070 It's not fair that by answering honestly 324 00:19:39,090 --> 00:19:44,181 about things that were related to my mental health, 325 00:19:44,201 --> 00:19:46,151 I was excluded from work. 326 00:19:46,171 --> 00:19:50,030 So, in my head I'm thinking, there's no way 327 00:19:50,050 --> 00:19:52,110 that this can be legal. 328 00:19:55,181 --> 00:19:57,171 I've been an advocate for disability rights 329 00:19:57,191 --> 00:19:59,221 and disability justice for over the last decade, 330 00:19:59,241 --> 00:20:02,151 and when I was in high school 331 00:20:02,171 --> 00:20:04,021 I had decided to apply to several other jobs. 332 00:20:04,040 --> 00:20:07,211 Several of these places that I applied 333 00:20:07,231 --> 00:20:10,040 had a personality test as part of the application. 334 00:20:10,060 --> 00:20:12,090 I just remember that because one of the times 335 00:20:12,110 --> 00:20:15,040 that I was filling one out, I was with some classmates. 336 00:20:15,060 --> 00:20:17,050 We all crowded around the screen as a group to be like 337 00:20:17,070 --> 00:20:19,050 "This is a personality test?" "What the hell!" 338 00:20:19,070 --> 00:20:21,130 "How are you supposed to answer these questions?" 339 00:20:21,151 --> 00:20:23,050 "What is the correct answer supposed to be?" 340 00:20:23,070 --> 00:20:25,100 "Does anyone know, What should we put down?" 341 00:20:25,120 --> 00:20:26,080 "Does it matter?" 342 00:20:26,100 --> 00:20:28,040 I don't remember what the verdict was, 343 00:20:28,060 --> 00:20:29,070 but I do remember 344 00:20:29,090 --> 00:20:31,181 that I didn't get a single job that I applied for. 345 00:20:31,201 --> 00:20:32,251 And to this day, I don't know why. 346 00:20:33,030 --> 00:20:35,030 I have a lot of suspicions as to why. 347 00:20:35,050 --> 00:20:36,050 Perhaps one of the reasons that I was not hired was 348 00:20:36,070 --> 00:20:38,211 because I failed the personality test, 349 00:20:38,231 --> 00:20:40,060 or perhaps one of the reasons that I was not hired 350 00:20:40,080 --> 00:20:43,130 was that even if people didn't know affirmatively 351 00:20:43,151 --> 00:20:46,080 that I'm autistic, I still coded, 352 00:20:46,100 --> 00:20:47,241 I was perceived as you're kind of weird 353 00:20:48,021 --> 00:20:50,191 we can tell something's going on, 354 00:20:50,211 --> 00:20:52,090 so we don't really want you, 355 00:20:52,110 --> 00:20:53,181 you're not a good fit. 356 00:20:53,201 --> 00:20:55,191 That phrase that's supposed to mean 357 00:20:55,211 --> 00:20:57,090 maybe like this won't work out in particular. 358 00:20:57,110 --> 00:21:01,221 But really is usually code for you're too Asian, 359 00:21:01,241 --> 00:21:04,211 you're too disabled, you're too gay. 360 00:21:04,231 --> 00:21:07,110 So for me, when people say 361 00:21:07,130 --> 00:21:08,110 what's used personality tests to learn 362 00:21:08,130 --> 00:21:10,251 about who would be a better partner for you, 363 00:21:11,030 --> 00:21:12,251 or who would be a better student for the school, 364 00:21:13,030 --> 00:21:14,060 or who would be the best employee for this position. 365 00:21:14,080 --> 00:21:17,090 My instant reaction is, oh no, fuck that, no. 366 00:21:19,231 --> 00:21:21,100 It's not just a prediction. 367 00:21:21,120 --> 00:21:23,060 If it were just a prediction, it wouldn't be that important. 368 00:21:23,080 --> 00:21:25,241 But it's a prediction that's being used 369 00:21:26,021 --> 00:21:29,120 to make decisions about who is worthy and who's unworthy. 370 00:21:29,140 --> 00:21:30,211 We need to know what's going on. 371 00:21:30,231 --> 00:21:32,090 We need to stop trusting it. 372 00:21:32,110 --> 00:21:33,191 We need to look into it. 373 00:21:33,211 --> 00:21:35,181 See what is it really doing? 374 00:21:39,021 --> 00:21:41,251 I can only indirectly infer because I know a lot about this, 375 00:21:42,030 --> 00:21:43,060 but I imagine that there's just so many 376 00:21:43,080 --> 00:21:46,191 hundreds and thousands of other people that have been harmed 377 00:21:46,211 --> 00:21:47,090 that just don't know it, yet. 378 00:21:53,090 --> 00:21:54,090 I tell you all the time 379 00:21:54,110 --> 00:21:55,191 that it's survival of the fittest, isn't it? 380 00:21:55,211 --> 00:21:58,021 [students] Yes. 381 00:21:58,040 --> 00:21:59,070 Cos there's a million people in New York 382 00:21:59,090 --> 00:22:02,110 fighting, scratching, fighting for these jobs. 383 00:22:02,130 --> 00:22:05,100 And a lot of employers are just looking for one mistake. 384 00:22:05,120 --> 00:22:08,231 -We got to be mistake free. -[students] Yes. 385 00:22:08,251 --> 00:22:10,221 I think a lot of people of our community 386 00:22:10,241 --> 00:22:14,231 are not afforded many mistakes as other people, right? 387 00:22:14,251 --> 00:22:16,030 We have to go to extremes to show them, 388 00:22:16,050 --> 00:22:17,070 "I am the best candidate," 389 00:22:17,090 --> 00:22:19,201 because in a lot of people's minds, 390 00:22:19,221 --> 00:22:21,080 I hate to say unfortunately, 391 00:22:21,100 --> 00:22:23,080 they have an L on your forehead as soon as you come in. 392 00:22:23,100 --> 00:22:26,021 We're going to show them what's really what? 393 00:22:26,040 --> 00:22:28,100 -[all] W. -W for winner. 394 00:22:28,120 --> 00:22:29,191 And that's why we got... 395 00:22:29,211 --> 00:22:31,191 For over a decade now, my job has been 396 00:22:31,211 --> 00:22:34,130 to help New Yorkers find employment. 397 00:22:34,151 --> 00:22:37,151 I service different students from different populations. 398 00:22:37,171 --> 00:22:39,211 Some are long term out of work. 399 00:22:39,231 --> 00:22:40,231 Some are freshly incarcerated. 400 00:22:40,251 --> 00:22:42,231 But you'll be surprised, some have master's degrees 401 00:22:42,251 --> 00:22:44,070 and still can't find work. 402 00:22:44,090 --> 00:22:46,191 You apply for that doorman job? 403 00:22:46,211 --> 00:22:48,161 -Yeah. -Right, that's a good job. 404 00:22:48,181 --> 00:22:50,181 Many students aren't aware 405 00:22:50,201 --> 00:22:52,211 of how technology plays an important part 406 00:22:52,231 --> 00:22:54,151 in this job process. 407 00:22:54,171 --> 00:22:57,241 A lot of my students are still used to the one ads 408 00:22:58,021 --> 00:22:59,070 in the Sunday paper and thinking, 409 00:22:59,090 --> 00:23:02,060 "Oh, I see a job opening. I'm going to walk 410 00:23:02,080 --> 00:23:04,090 to that physical brick and mortar store 411 00:23:04,110 --> 00:23:06,070 and I'm going to apply in person." 412 00:23:06,090 --> 00:23:08,251 When those days are dead as the dinosaurs. 413 00:23:10,171 --> 00:23:12,221 When I was in prison, 414 00:23:12,241 --> 00:23:16,040 I was working with computers that... 415 00:23:16,060 --> 00:23:20,030 the software was in the 1980s. 416 00:23:20,050 --> 00:23:23,241 So being introduced to the Google world now is like 417 00:23:24,021 --> 00:23:26,090 what's the Google world? 418 00:23:27,201 --> 00:23:28,231 A couple of years ago, 419 00:23:28,251 --> 00:23:30,090 we started to see that job applications 420 00:23:30,110 --> 00:23:33,120 started to become longer and longer. 421 00:23:33,140 --> 00:23:36,231 When we looked at them closer the questions in the application 422 00:23:36,251 --> 00:23:37,161 were not actually about the job. 423 00:23:39,241 --> 00:23:41,050 These are questions about who you are. 424 00:23:41,070 --> 00:23:45,130 Psychological evaluations. 425 00:23:45,151 --> 00:23:48,110 Tends to dislike a person who has sold his payment forcefully? 426 00:23:49,191 --> 00:23:50,120 [sighs] 427 00:23:52,070 --> 00:23:54,090 Daily, I see frustration. 428 00:23:54,110 --> 00:23:56,040 These students, they are filling out tens, 429 00:23:56,060 --> 00:23:58,090 maybe hundreds of applications. 430 00:23:58,110 --> 00:24:00,060 A lot of times, my students will tell me, 431 00:24:00,080 --> 00:24:02,211 "Oh, Mr E. I applied to this job 432 00:24:02,231 --> 00:24:05,191 and I never heard anything back." 433 00:24:05,211 --> 00:24:08,171 It really sinks my heart because I've seen them trained, 434 00:24:08,191 --> 00:24:10,021 I've seen them wake up early, 435 00:24:10,040 --> 00:24:12,090 I've seen them get into a whole new routine 436 00:24:12,110 --> 00:24:14,161 and I've seen them get to the edge of, 437 00:24:14,181 --> 00:24:15,251 "Is this even worth it?" 438 00:24:19,120 --> 00:24:22,021 So me and my colleague David decided 439 00:24:22,040 --> 00:24:23,070 we needed to do something about this 440 00:24:23,090 --> 00:24:24,140 in order to give our guys a chance 441 00:24:27,130 --> 00:24:28,171 I often say "Is this a psych test?" 442 00:24:28,191 --> 00:24:32,080 And they would often say, "That's what it feels like." 443 00:24:32,100 --> 00:24:33,161 And so that's where they go. 444 00:24:33,181 --> 00:24:40,080 And so the personality profile is designed to distract you. 445 00:24:40,100 --> 00:24:43,070 It's designed to bring you into the personal, 446 00:24:43,090 --> 00:24:45,021 because what are they trying to do? 447 00:24:45,040 --> 00:24:47,090 They're trying to filter people out. 448 00:24:49,050 --> 00:24:50,231 Once you hit "apply now", you're in, 449 00:24:50,251 --> 00:24:53,030 you're committed, 450 00:24:53,050 --> 00:24:54,060 now what? 451 00:24:54,080 --> 00:24:56,060 You might be there for two hours. 452 00:24:56,080 --> 00:24:58,110 So when they give you these questionnaires 453 00:24:58,130 --> 00:25:01,171 psychologically how it messes with me, 454 00:25:01,191 --> 00:25:06,110 is sometimes it, it finds a way to try to trick you. 455 00:25:08,181 --> 00:25:10,030 [rumbling machine] 456 00:25:19,120 --> 00:25:20,120 Whereas Katharine was 457 00:25:20,140 --> 00:25:24,171 the more spiritual partner of the two 458 00:25:24,191 --> 00:25:28,191 Isabel was the more commercial, the more entrepreneurial. 459 00:25:30,171 --> 00:25:34,151 I think this had a lot to do with her own personality. 460 00:25:37,120 --> 00:25:41,080 She was a woman who had started her life 461 00:25:41,100 --> 00:25:44,201 as her mother's experiment. 462 00:25:44,221 --> 00:25:47,080 And once she had broken free from her mother. 463 00:25:47,100 --> 00:25:48,080 she seemed to have no real interest 464 00:25:48,100 --> 00:25:51,070 in her mother's obsession. 465 00:25:54,040 --> 00:25:55,151 But then World War II comes along 466 00:25:55,171 --> 00:25:58,191 and that changes everything for her. 467 00:25:58,211 --> 00:26:00,040 [thunderous explosion] 468 00:26:00,060 --> 00:26:05,140 December 7th 1941, 469 00:26:07,100 --> 00:26:10,191 a date which will live in infamy. 470 00:26:12,191 --> 00:26:14,120 The United States of America 471 00:26:14,140 --> 00:26:19,130 was suddenly and deliberately attacked. 472 00:26:19,151 --> 00:26:23,241 She says that, you know, she was sitting at home 473 00:26:24,021 --> 00:26:25,100 and she thought, "Well, what is it that I can do 474 00:26:25,120 --> 00:26:28,120 that would be helpful to humankind?" 475 00:26:29,171 --> 00:26:32,050 [Carl Jung] We need more understanding 476 00:26:32,070 --> 00:26:33,251 of human nature 477 00:26:34,030 --> 00:26:38,191 because the only real danger that exists... is man himself. 478 00:26:40,070 --> 00:26:41,080 "What if I took all of this knowledge, 479 00:26:41,100 --> 00:26:43,100 that my mother has been sitting on 480 00:26:43,120 --> 00:26:45,241 and I somehow operationalized it?" 481 00:26:46,021 --> 00:26:49,140 "What if I made it immediately usable for people?" 482 00:26:49,161 --> 00:26:50,161 [interview with Katharine Myers] 483 00:27:01,151 --> 00:27:03,100 So she gets her daughter 484 00:27:03,120 --> 00:27:05,021 and her daughter's three best friends 485 00:27:05,040 --> 00:27:06,130 to come to the house after school 486 00:27:06,151 --> 00:27:07,221 and to sit around the kitchen table. 487 00:27:07,241 --> 00:27:11,060 And she gets them to answer these forced choice questions 488 00:27:11,080 --> 00:27:12,161 about how they would behave 489 00:27:12,181 --> 00:27:15,021 in all sorts of different and ordinary scenarios. 490 00:27:15,040 --> 00:27:16,181 So, for instance, if you were at a party 491 00:27:16,201 --> 00:27:19,050 would you wait for somebody to talk to you 492 00:27:19,070 --> 00:27:21,161 or would you approach somebody to talk to them first? 493 00:27:24,130 --> 00:27:25,100 Or if you were walking down the street 494 00:27:25,120 --> 00:27:27,161 and the fire truck blazed by you 495 00:27:27,181 --> 00:27:29,181 would you follow it to see where it was going 496 00:27:29,201 --> 00:27:32,191 or would you just keep going about your day? 497 00:27:37,191 --> 00:27:40,211 And using her children and their friends 498 00:27:40,231 --> 00:27:43,021 and her husband's answers to these questions 499 00:27:43,040 --> 00:27:46,191 she started building up these profiles of people 500 00:27:46,211 --> 00:27:47,201 who were different types. 501 00:27:50,050 --> 00:27:53,151 [Katharine Myers] 502 00:27:58,060 --> 00:28:01,050 Many many many people find the language of type 503 00:28:01,070 --> 00:28:04,030 that Myers-Briggs offers extraordinarily seductive. 504 00:28:04,050 --> 00:28:07,070 And I think for me the interesting question is 505 00:28:07,090 --> 00:28:09,030 why are they so seduced by it? 506 00:28:09,050 --> 00:28:11,171 [Myers voice] 507 00:28:22,251 --> 00:28:24,151 What is it about these words 508 00:28:24,171 --> 00:28:26,151 and the way in which they're grouped together 509 00:28:26,171 --> 00:28:28,181 that really commands people's imagination? 510 00:28:31,100 --> 00:28:31,221 [Myers voice] 511 00:28:43,120 --> 00:28:46,171 And why is it that the moment they have access to those words 512 00:28:46,191 --> 00:28:47,241 they actually start using them 513 00:28:48,021 --> 00:28:49,231 not just to describe their personalities 514 00:28:49,251 --> 00:28:54,030 but to kind of re-conceive the idea of personality itself. 515 00:28:54,050 --> 00:28:56,080 [Myers voice] 516 00:29:07,140 --> 00:29:10,090 And the most powerful rule of type is that you were born 517 00:29:10,110 --> 00:29:11,251 with essential personality type 518 00:29:12,030 --> 00:29:15,060 and you would die with that same essential personality type. 519 00:29:22,070 --> 00:29:25,090 The most important part of personality, 520 00:29:25,110 --> 00:29:26,171 the North and South of it all, 521 00:29:26,191 --> 00:29:28,201 is the introvert-extrovert spectrum. 522 00:29:31,171 --> 00:29:32,231 -Hi, how are you? -I'm good. 523 00:29:32,251 --> 00:29:37,221 One really easy way to ask yourself who you are 524 00:29:37,241 --> 00:29:43,110 is to think about how you feel when you go to a party 525 00:29:43,130 --> 00:29:47,030 that you're truly enjoying, with company that you truly like 526 00:29:47,050 --> 00:29:49,221 and think about how you feel after about two or three hours. 527 00:29:49,241 --> 00:29:53,060 Because if you're an extrovert, it's as if you have 528 00:29:53,080 --> 00:29:55,211 an internal battery that's being charged. 529 00:29:55,231 --> 00:29:57,021 Check me out, ladies 530 00:29:57,040 --> 00:29:59,130 your boy is under the fake mistletoe. 531 00:29:59,151 --> 00:30:00,201 And if you're an introvert 532 00:30:00,221 --> 00:30:03,140 no matter how socially skilled you might be 533 00:30:03,161 --> 00:30:05,021 or how much you're enjoying it, 534 00:30:05,040 --> 00:30:06,221 it's as if your battery is being drained. 535 00:30:06,241 --> 00:30:11,221 What? No, I wasn't going off to be by myself again. 536 00:30:11,241 --> 00:30:16,140 I was just checking out your laundry room, yeah 537 00:30:16,161 --> 00:30:20,090 American culture really does prefer it's extroverts. 538 00:30:20,110 --> 00:30:22,251 This is a culture that comes from a kind 539 00:30:23,030 --> 00:30:25,151 of veneration of the man of action. 540 00:30:25,171 --> 00:30:27,140 You should be the doer, not the thinker. 541 00:30:27,161 --> 00:30:31,070 You often hear a preference for hiring of extroverts. 542 00:30:31,090 --> 00:30:33,161 Increasingly now offices are designed 543 00:30:33,181 --> 00:30:36,171 as these big open social spaces. 544 00:30:36,191 --> 00:30:39,030 Do you have any questions for us? 545 00:30:39,050 --> 00:30:40,110 Hey, forget the questions. 546 00:30:40,130 --> 00:30:43,161 I brought brownies. Let's just dig in. 547 00:30:43,181 --> 00:30:44,201 Also I was wondering 548 00:30:44,221 --> 00:30:47,110 do you have a kombucha bar for employees? 549 00:30:47,130 --> 00:30:50,060 We also know that introverts tend to get passed over 550 00:30:50,080 --> 00:30:52,040 and overlooked for leadership positions. 551 00:30:52,060 --> 00:30:56,070 So it's like there's this colossal waste of talent, 552 00:30:56,090 --> 00:30:58,161 because of these preconceptions we have. 553 00:30:58,181 --> 00:31:03,040 My message to fellow introverts in the world is 554 00:31:03,060 --> 00:31:05,100 to love being the way you are, 555 00:31:05,120 --> 00:31:06,231 there's a lot to love. 556 00:31:09,090 --> 00:31:14,050 I'm applying for more jobs and I'm finding more and more 557 00:31:14,070 --> 00:31:17,100 of these personality tests. 558 00:31:18,181 --> 00:31:20,140 I'm very outgoing. 559 00:31:22,151 --> 00:31:27,040 I am generally hopeful and optimistic person. 560 00:31:29,021 --> 00:31:31,040 And this is one that I see a lot, 561 00:31:31,060 --> 00:31:35,241 how would you describe your personal energy level? 562 00:31:36,021 --> 00:31:40,050 If you're someone who's suffering from depression 563 00:31:40,070 --> 00:31:42,201 if you're being honest, you're going to say 564 00:31:42,221 --> 00:31:44,241 I have less energy than most people 565 00:31:45,021 --> 00:31:48,070 that's part of what the illness is. 566 00:31:48,090 --> 00:31:52,060 But that's the type of person who is also forcing themselves 567 00:31:52,080 --> 00:31:54,151 to get out there and do things. 568 00:31:56,130 --> 00:31:58,050 While I'm doing this and finding that out 569 00:31:58,070 --> 00:32:01,070 my dad is doing all this research 570 00:32:01,090 --> 00:32:03,181 because he's sort of the type of dad 571 00:32:03,201 --> 00:32:06,030 that obsesses over things. 572 00:32:07,211 --> 00:32:12,161 We started with just Kyle applying to additional companies 573 00:32:12,181 --> 00:32:14,251 and when he applied for him to take screenshots 574 00:32:15,030 --> 00:32:16,231 of the questions that were asked. 575 00:32:18,181 --> 00:32:20,110 When we were looking back at screenshots 576 00:32:20,130 --> 00:32:25,021 we realized that you were being sent to other websites. 577 00:32:27,040 --> 00:32:29,090 When you go one level deeper 578 00:32:30,140 --> 00:32:34,211 you get to third party test providers. 579 00:32:34,231 --> 00:32:37,171 The second part of that was then to sort of take those names 580 00:32:37,191 --> 00:32:39,191 people I'd never heard before, 581 00:32:39,211 --> 00:32:42,231 Unicru or Kronos or some others, 582 00:32:42,251 --> 00:32:46,050 and just start doing research on them. 583 00:32:46,070 --> 00:32:47,181 This goes deeper than we thought. 584 00:32:47,201 --> 00:32:50,251 There's a whole industry of companies. 585 00:32:51,030 --> 00:32:53,241 They've infected the whole system. 586 00:32:57,171 --> 00:33:00,161 -[dog barks] -[birds chirping] 587 00:33:03,201 --> 00:33:06,090 [Isabel's granddaughter] We all, of course, knew type 588 00:33:06,110 --> 00:33:09,181 of everyone in the family and we all took the indicator 589 00:33:09,201 --> 00:33:11,100 at an early age. 590 00:33:11,120 --> 00:33:13,201 My grandmother was introverted and my great grandmother was 591 00:33:13,221 --> 00:33:17,110 introverted and my mother was introverted. 592 00:33:17,130 --> 00:33:19,021 So at first, I was a little concerned 593 00:33:19,040 --> 00:33:20,120 because I was extroverted 594 00:33:20,140 --> 00:33:21,231 but she was very reassuring. 595 00:33:21,251 --> 00:33:22,211 And when I went over the type description, 596 00:33:22,231 --> 00:33:24,251 I really liked my own type description 597 00:33:25,030 --> 00:33:29,120 which was extroverted, intuitive feeling with perception. 598 00:33:29,140 --> 00:33:32,191 I knew I wanted to be a reporter and she had done massive amounts 599 00:33:32,211 --> 00:33:36,151 of research on type and career and when I looked at the careers 600 00:33:36,171 --> 00:33:41,070 of reporters, there was a great concentration of ENFPs 601 00:33:41,090 --> 00:33:43,181 so, I felt like I had made the right choice. 602 00:33:46,151 --> 00:33:49,231 What I remember about her is that she spent most of her life 603 00:33:49,251 --> 00:33:52,211 in a big overstuffed chair in the corner of a living room 604 00:33:52,231 --> 00:33:57,040 where she worked, pretty much around the clock 605 00:33:57,060 --> 00:33:58,110 on type research. 606 00:34:05,151 --> 00:34:09,060 She had long gray hair which she braided every morning 607 00:34:09,080 --> 00:34:10,240 and put in a very complicated bun 608 00:34:11,021 --> 00:34:13,240 that really used to fascinate me. 609 00:34:14,021 --> 00:34:15,200 She was not remotely materialistic. 610 00:34:15,220 --> 00:34:17,080 I never saw her shop. 611 00:34:17,100 --> 00:34:19,060 I don't know where the clothes came from 612 00:34:19,080 --> 00:34:21,091 or where the furniture came from 613 00:34:21,111 --> 00:34:25,151 but it was a very warm house. 614 00:34:25,171 --> 00:34:27,191 She would come up and sing every night 615 00:34:27,211 --> 00:34:29,120 before we went to sleep. 616 00:34:32,140 --> 00:34:35,080 She made a cinnamon sugar toast in the morning. 617 00:34:35,100 --> 00:34:37,160 She had a special way of making scrambled eggs. 618 00:34:39,251 --> 00:34:42,191 She was always very much driven, 619 00:34:42,211 --> 00:34:45,060 and sometimes even watching her make scrambled eggs 620 00:34:45,080 --> 00:34:47,100 she was kind of like rocking back and forth, 621 00:34:47,120 --> 00:34:49,211 and then she was gonna get back to her desk. 622 00:34:54,171 --> 00:34:56,091 She would say that her dad always said 623 00:34:56,111 --> 00:34:57,080 that if a child asks you a question, 624 00:34:57,100 --> 00:34:59,200 no matter how many questions they ask you 625 00:34:59,220 --> 00:35:02,111 you have to answer their questions right away. 626 00:35:02,131 --> 00:35:05,131 So I think all of us grandchildren knew 627 00:35:05,151 --> 00:35:07,120 that the one way we could get her attention 628 00:35:07,140 --> 00:35:08,220 is if we'd ask her questions and then she would, 629 00:35:08,240 --> 00:35:11,120 she'd stop whatever she was doing 630 00:35:11,140 --> 00:35:14,031 and she would patiently answer our questions. 631 00:35:14,051 --> 00:35:18,051 I think she really felt that if you could help people 632 00:35:18,071 --> 00:35:19,231 understand themselves better 633 00:35:19,251 --> 00:35:24,021 and ways that other people are different 634 00:35:24,040 --> 00:35:25,231 that were not better or worse, 635 00:35:25,251 --> 00:35:27,051 that would be a better way 636 00:35:27,071 --> 00:35:29,100 of creating empathy towards others. 637 00:35:32,080 --> 00:35:34,131 [Myers' voice] 638 00:35:42,191 --> 00:35:45,220 She believes that what type can do is help manage 639 00:35:45,240 --> 00:35:49,200 the now growing labor force of the US. 640 00:35:51,120 --> 00:35:53,021 She says "If men came like shoes, 641 00:35:53,040 --> 00:35:56,191 with the number on the outside of the box 642 00:35:56,211 --> 00:35:59,160 then we could avoid a painful fit." 643 00:36:06,071 --> 00:36:09,091 It's about the idea that working at something 644 00:36:09,111 --> 00:36:10,211 that's not good for you, 645 00:36:10,231 --> 00:36:13,080 pursuing a profession that you're not suited to, 646 00:36:13,100 --> 00:36:15,021 and even marrying a person 647 00:36:15,040 --> 00:36:16,231 who is not suited to your personality type 648 00:36:16,251 --> 00:36:20,040 results in a great deal of pain. 649 00:36:23,220 --> 00:36:28,031 And so she's very interested in trying to mitigate the pain 650 00:36:28,051 --> 00:36:30,131 that these bad fits of people to their social roles 651 00:36:30,151 --> 00:36:32,231 might cause. 652 00:36:35,031 --> 00:36:37,111 And so it really started out small. 653 00:36:37,131 --> 00:36:41,191 Initially, when you look at the register of her accounts 654 00:36:41,211 --> 00:36:44,031 she was selling a couple of booklets here, 655 00:36:44,051 --> 00:36:45,151 a couple of questionnaires there. 656 00:36:45,171 --> 00:36:47,240 But then these accounts really through the 50s 657 00:36:48,031 --> 00:36:49,060 start to grow and grow and grow. 658 00:36:52,091 --> 00:36:55,171 Some of her biggest clients were places like Standard Oil 659 00:36:55,191 --> 00:36:58,180 or GE or the Home Life Insurance Company. 660 00:36:58,200 --> 00:37:00,080 And they were really intent 661 00:37:00,100 --> 00:37:02,160 on having her test their executives 662 00:37:02,180 --> 00:37:05,051 to figure out what made a good executive. 663 00:37:07,111 --> 00:37:08,160 There were companies like the 664 00:37:08,180 --> 00:37:09,120 Washington Gas and Light Company 665 00:37:09,140 --> 00:37:11,151 that had her come in to figure out 666 00:37:11,171 --> 00:37:12,240 whether extroverts or introverts 667 00:37:13,021 --> 00:37:17,120 were better at meter reading versus clerical work. 668 00:37:17,140 --> 00:37:20,100 She was being asked by hospitals 669 00:37:20,120 --> 00:37:24,111 to come in and type their nurses, 670 00:37:24,131 --> 00:37:26,040 to type their stenographers, 671 00:37:26,060 --> 00:37:27,220 to try to figure out what types were best 672 00:37:27,240 --> 00:37:30,211 for particular kinds of jobs. 673 00:37:34,071 --> 00:37:37,080 For Isabel, it was about imagining a better world. 674 00:37:41,060 --> 00:37:43,200 A world in which everybody was doing the thing 675 00:37:43,220 --> 00:37:45,220 that made them happy. 676 00:38:02,231 --> 00:38:04,071 One of the criticisms of the MBTI 677 00:38:04,091 --> 00:38:06,100 is that it's all positive, makes people feel good. 678 00:38:06,120 --> 00:38:10,151 I don't know why it's a problem but she purposely didn't include 679 00:38:10,171 --> 00:38:12,040 some of those negative things. 680 00:38:12,060 --> 00:38:14,040 Her whole point was, look, all types have value 681 00:38:14,060 --> 00:38:16,200 all types are good, we just approach 682 00:38:16,220 --> 00:38:18,040 the world in different ways. 683 00:38:18,060 --> 00:38:18,240 At the end of the day people find it useful, 684 00:38:19,021 --> 00:38:20,220 they find it very valuable. 685 00:38:20,240 --> 00:38:23,100 Even if it's not a perfect model. 686 00:38:23,120 --> 00:38:26,040 There's no personality model that captures every element 687 00:38:26,060 --> 00:38:29,171 of a human condition, they just don't. 688 00:38:29,191 --> 00:38:31,231 They're models, that's what they're for, right? 689 00:38:31,251 --> 00:38:35,071 To help us simplify the complex world we live in. 690 00:38:35,091 --> 00:38:37,220 We know that about 80 of the Fortune 100 691 00:38:37,240 --> 00:38:40,021 make use of the MBTI in some form or fashion 692 00:38:40,040 --> 00:38:42,151 from Ivy League schools down to community colleges 693 00:38:42,171 --> 00:38:43,240 in the US use it. 694 00:38:44,021 --> 00:38:45,251 We know that most of the branches of the military 695 00:38:46,031 --> 00:38:48,100 in the US and in England use it. 696 00:39:02,051 --> 00:39:04,151 To me that's what's so extraordinary about type. 697 00:39:04,171 --> 00:39:08,060 It's not the question of whether it's scientifically valid 698 00:39:08,080 --> 00:39:11,160 or reliable or not but rather how it is that these two women 699 00:39:11,180 --> 00:39:16,111 manage to create a language that would latch on to you 700 00:39:16,131 --> 00:39:18,111 and just never, ever ever let you go. 701 00:39:18,131 --> 00:39:21,111 A language you would never be able to shake loose. 702 00:39:21,131 --> 00:39:23,071 Since I've been in the Myers-Briggs company 703 00:39:23,091 --> 00:39:25,071 the admonition has been to not use it for hiring 704 00:39:25,091 --> 00:39:26,111 because there's no reason to assume 705 00:39:26,131 --> 00:39:29,151 that a person with one particular type preference 706 00:39:29,171 --> 00:39:32,151 can do a job better than someone who has a different type. 707 00:39:32,171 --> 00:39:35,080 We had a couple of organizations that we're using it for hiring. 708 00:39:35,100 --> 00:39:36,251 We knew they were using for hiring. 709 00:39:37,031 --> 00:39:38,051 We called them and say, hey you can't do that 710 00:39:38,071 --> 00:39:40,240 and they said, "Well we're going to," 711 00:39:41,021 --> 00:39:43,060 and so we stopped selling to them. 712 00:39:43,080 --> 00:39:45,231 In the United States copyright laws are particularly 713 00:39:45,251 --> 00:39:47,151 challenging to enforce. 714 00:39:49,131 --> 00:39:51,080 The four letters were never copyrighted. 715 00:39:51,100 --> 00:39:53,200 Terrible mistake by some lawyers somewhere. 716 00:39:53,220 --> 00:39:55,080 So they are in the public domain 717 00:39:55,100 --> 00:39:57,151 and anybody can use those combinations of letters. 718 00:40:02,211 --> 00:40:06,120 Many of these personality tests have now been copied, reworked, 719 00:40:06,140 --> 00:40:10,231 reformatted, reformulated, so it's hard to even know 720 00:40:10,251 --> 00:40:12,160 where they are or where they come from. 721 00:40:12,180 --> 00:40:16,040 There's been not a big increase in the number of competitors, 722 00:40:16,060 --> 00:40:18,211 as we call them knock-offs of the MBTI. 723 00:40:18,231 --> 00:40:21,091 One of our biggest challenge is that there's people out there 724 00:40:21,111 --> 00:40:23,071 who say they're doing MBTI and they're not. 725 00:40:23,091 --> 00:40:25,231 Or who say they're using our products 726 00:40:25,251 --> 00:40:27,111 and they're not using our products. 727 00:40:30,100 --> 00:40:33,040 The creators of the Myers-Briggs may have had a vision 728 00:40:33,060 --> 00:40:34,200 of simply helping people understand themselves 729 00:40:34,220 --> 00:40:37,021 and one another. 730 00:40:37,040 --> 00:40:38,040 But now that the genie is out of the bottle 731 00:40:38,060 --> 00:40:40,100 they can't necessarily control 732 00:40:40,120 --> 00:40:43,040 how it's being used and by whom. 733 00:40:43,231 --> 00:40:45,231 Just like pharmaceutical companies 734 00:40:45,251 --> 00:40:48,111 sometimes get in trouble for off label use 735 00:40:48,131 --> 00:40:49,180 of pharmaceutical drugs 736 00:40:53,151 --> 00:40:56,091 for an off label use to select people into jobs 737 00:40:56,111 --> 00:40:57,111 when they shouldn't be doing that. 738 00:41:00,120 --> 00:41:04,060 My job, of course, was to find evidence of harm. 739 00:41:04,080 --> 00:41:06,200 Show me the blood, right? 740 00:41:06,220 --> 00:41:10,100 Well, how do you find blood when they're these algorithms 741 00:41:10,120 --> 00:41:14,180 that are secretly harming people? 742 00:41:14,200 --> 00:41:16,100 Most people who get red-lighted 743 00:41:16,120 --> 00:41:19,021 with personality tests never find out they get red-lighted. 744 00:41:19,040 --> 00:41:21,111 But Kyle knew somebody, 745 00:41:21,131 --> 00:41:23,131 who told him, "You got red-lighted." 746 00:41:23,151 --> 00:41:27,140 So that was the first miracle for Kyle. 747 00:41:27,160 --> 00:41:32,040 The second thing is that his father is a lawyer. 748 00:41:32,060 --> 00:41:34,031 Kyle said, "I don't know what to do, dad." 749 00:41:34,051 --> 00:41:35,120 He asked, "How broken am I?" 750 00:41:37,100 --> 00:41:40,031 -[tense music] -[soft emotional breath] 751 00:41:42,131 --> 00:41:43,251 And... 752 00:41:44,031 --> 00:41:47,051 that statement really... 753 00:41:48,120 --> 00:41:48,140 ...hurt. 754 00:41:51,021 --> 00:41:52,191 Can we afford to slip in this room? 755 00:41:52,211 --> 00:41:53,080 -[all] No. -No, we can't. 756 00:41:53,100 --> 00:41:55,071 That's the problem. 757 00:41:55,091 --> 00:41:56,021 Because these things will add up quickly. 758 00:41:56,040 --> 00:41:57,091 We're all human beings 759 00:41:57,111 --> 00:41:59,171 but there's a computer behind this 760 00:41:59,191 --> 00:42:02,211 and it adds it up super fast in nanoseconds 761 00:42:02,231 --> 00:42:04,071 and if you have too much wing in the wrong category 762 00:42:04,091 --> 00:42:07,080 you are out of the running. 763 00:42:08,040 --> 00:42:10,111 Between 2012 and 2014, 764 00:42:10,131 --> 00:42:14,231 I was doing a very in-depth two year project 765 00:42:14,251 --> 00:42:16,231 where we looked at online job applications 766 00:42:16,251 --> 00:42:20,140 from every aspect. 767 00:42:20,160 --> 00:42:24,171 We found that a company named Unicru was marketing 768 00:42:24,191 --> 00:42:27,200 most of these tests to each company 769 00:42:27,220 --> 00:42:32,060 as being uniquely suited to identify the workers 770 00:42:32,080 --> 00:42:34,100 that that company wanted. 771 00:42:34,120 --> 00:42:38,080 So, presumably every company wouldn't want 772 00:42:38,100 --> 00:42:39,160 the same type of person 773 00:42:39,180 --> 00:42:41,160 because they're different kinds of companies 774 00:42:41,180 --> 00:42:43,200 and they're different kinds of jobs. 775 00:42:45,171 --> 00:42:51,071 Every single test we looked at evaluated mental state. 776 00:42:51,091 --> 00:42:53,120 And I would say a good third of the questions 777 00:42:53,140 --> 00:42:56,220 actually evaluated mental states of applicants. 778 00:42:58,211 --> 00:43:02,080 And it's unfair and wrong to not hire someone 779 00:43:02,100 --> 00:43:04,191 based on a mental disability. 780 00:43:05,080 --> 00:43:07,240 You can screen them out 781 00:43:08,021 --> 00:43:11,100 if you are unable to make an accommodation to them 782 00:43:11,120 --> 00:43:15,100 after you've already hired them. 783 00:43:15,120 --> 00:43:19,060 But you can't pre-screen and disqualify somebody 784 00:43:19,080 --> 00:43:20,160 based on a perceived disability. 785 00:43:23,191 --> 00:43:27,191 Every one of the tests was administered nationwide. 786 00:43:27,211 --> 00:43:31,191 You went on a national website to take this test. 787 00:43:31,211 --> 00:43:34,031 These were not New York City employers. 788 00:43:34,051 --> 00:43:40,080 We're talking about Macy's, Dunkin' Donuts, McDonald's... 789 00:43:40,100 --> 00:43:45,200 and they all had some variant of this inappropriate test. 790 00:43:49,160 --> 00:43:53,220 They don't really understand personality testing. 791 00:43:53,240 --> 00:43:55,160 They don't understand what they're dealing with 792 00:43:55,180 --> 00:43:59,091 and you have vendors who are telling them 793 00:43:59,111 --> 00:44:02,131 this is going to save you oodles of bucks. 794 00:44:02,151 --> 00:44:05,021 It sounds like the magic bullet. 795 00:44:05,040 --> 00:44:09,060 It's a process by which technologists hide ugly truths 796 00:44:09,080 --> 00:44:11,191 inside blackbox algorithms and called them objective. 797 00:44:13,120 --> 00:44:15,120 Call them meritocratic. 798 00:44:17,040 --> 00:44:19,131 When they're secret, important and destructive 799 00:44:19,151 --> 00:44:22,080 I coined a term for these algorithms, 800 00:44:22,100 --> 00:44:24,140 weapons of mass destruction. 801 00:44:24,160 --> 00:44:27,151 [audience applauds and cheers] 802 00:44:32,051 --> 00:44:35,180 That's when you realized, it's not just me, 803 00:44:35,200 --> 00:44:37,180 it's not just Kyle, 804 00:44:37,200 --> 00:44:39,180 it's much broader than that. 805 00:44:39,200 --> 00:44:43,140 And that led us to talk with people 806 00:44:43,160 --> 00:44:46,191 who are more qualified lawyers 807 00:44:46,211 --> 00:44:49,231 and then turn that hopefully into change. 808 00:44:49,251 --> 00:44:54,191 The concern I have is that people seem okay 809 00:44:54,211 --> 00:44:57,251 with kind of innovating and testing out things 810 00:44:58,031 --> 00:45:01,191 where there isn't a lot of scientific support 811 00:45:01,211 --> 00:45:03,071 to really document that it works. 812 00:45:03,091 --> 00:45:04,151 Whereas you wouldn't do that 813 00:45:04,171 --> 00:45:07,091 if you were testing out a new drug, right? 814 00:45:07,111 --> 00:45:10,200 You would actually develop the science to support it. 815 00:45:10,220 --> 00:45:13,200 Somehow people think this is like a low risk area. 816 00:45:13,220 --> 00:45:16,100 So let's just test on all these humans 817 00:45:16,120 --> 00:45:19,060 before we know exactly what the consequences are. 818 00:45:19,080 --> 00:45:20,111 What came to my mind is job applicants 819 00:45:20,131 --> 00:45:22,220 are crash test dummies, right? 820 00:45:22,240 --> 00:45:25,180 Because we don't know if it's going to work, but... 821 00:45:27,171 --> 00:45:28,160 how could it hurt? 822 00:45:28,180 --> 00:45:30,100 But unlike the crash test dummies 823 00:45:30,120 --> 00:45:33,151 the people are there like the dummies don't have feelings. 824 00:45:33,171 --> 00:45:36,140 The crash test dummy does not have 825 00:45:36,160 --> 00:45:38,080 economic survival needs or feelings. 826 00:45:38,100 --> 00:45:39,131 Correct. 827 00:45:39,151 --> 00:45:44,071 Personality tests are by a large constructed to be ableist, 828 00:45:44,091 --> 00:45:47,160 to be racist, to be sexist and to be classist. 829 00:45:47,180 --> 00:45:49,240 That's what happens when you have a test 830 00:45:50,031 --> 00:45:52,220 that decides whether you're friendly or not based on norms 831 00:45:52,240 --> 00:45:55,220 devised from college educated straight white men 832 00:45:55,240 --> 00:45:58,021 who don't have any known disabilities. 833 00:45:58,040 --> 00:46:02,240 Personality tests are useful for individual people 834 00:46:03,021 --> 00:46:05,091 sometimes on journeys of self discovery. 835 00:46:05,111 --> 00:46:07,021 But when they're used to make decisions 836 00:46:07,040 --> 00:46:09,160 by other people, affecting somebody's life, 837 00:46:09,180 --> 00:46:12,091 they become dangerous tools. 838 00:46:13,251 --> 00:46:15,191 My dad was just pushing forward with this 839 00:46:15,211 --> 00:46:18,200 and we started getting some more publicity. 840 00:46:18,220 --> 00:46:21,151 There was a Wall Street Journal article 841 00:46:21,171 --> 00:46:23,100 that was written about us. 842 00:46:23,120 --> 00:46:26,231 Being on the Wall Street Journal cover page, this is important. 843 00:46:28,151 --> 00:46:30,060 Kyle is having an impact. 844 00:46:31,240 --> 00:46:34,231 And so now he's obsessed with this idea. 845 00:46:34,251 --> 00:46:37,120 And he keeps digging, and he keeps talking to people 846 00:46:37,140 --> 00:46:40,160 and he would go with third party like test providers 847 00:46:40,180 --> 00:46:43,100 and ask how they made their tests. 848 00:46:43,120 --> 00:46:46,060 We found that many of them used something called 849 00:46:46,080 --> 00:46:48,240 the five factor model of personality. 850 00:46:49,021 --> 00:46:56,231 They look at five major factors in the context of hiring. 851 00:46:56,251 --> 00:46:59,140 The way the Big Five theory developed was over decades. 852 00:46:59,160 --> 00:47:03,060 Academic researchers took thousands of attributes 853 00:47:03,080 --> 00:47:07,131 adjectives that you might use to describe people. 854 00:47:07,151 --> 00:47:10,060 They found that five attributes explain 855 00:47:10,080 --> 00:47:13,120 most of the variants in human personality. 856 00:47:15,031 --> 00:47:19,120 Conscientiousness, agreeableness, neuroticism, 857 00:47:19,140 --> 00:47:22,220 openness to experience and extroversion. 858 00:47:24,111 --> 00:47:28,131 With a Unicru reading their statements 859 00:47:28,151 --> 00:47:29,111 and marketing materials, 860 00:47:29,131 --> 00:47:32,140 what it read was Unicru allows you to clone 861 00:47:32,160 --> 00:47:34,131 your best performers. 862 00:47:36,171 --> 00:47:38,031 Cloning your best employee 863 00:47:38,051 --> 00:47:41,091 sort of led me down the path of, "Who is that employee?" 864 00:47:44,160 --> 00:47:47,220 There's actually medical papers out there explaining 865 00:47:47,240 --> 00:47:51,180 how you can generally diagnose mental illnesses 866 00:47:51,200 --> 00:47:53,220 using the five factor model. 867 00:47:53,240 --> 00:47:56,140 So under the Americans with Disabilities Act, 868 00:47:56,160 --> 00:47:59,031 it's illegal to ask prospective employees 869 00:47:59,051 --> 00:48:01,080 for medical information or about anything 870 00:48:01,100 --> 00:48:03,080 about their physical or mental health. 871 00:48:03,100 --> 00:48:06,160 You can't ask somebody about a mental condition, 872 00:48:06,180 --> 00:48:09,180 but perhaps the technology can tell whether somebody 873 00:48:09,200 --> 00:48:11,040 has a medical condition. 874 00:48:11,060 --> 00:48:13,220 You might not even know you have a mental illness 875 00:48:13,240 --> 00:48:15,180 and taking these personality tests 876 00:48:15,200 --> 00:48:19,151 you might keep getting denied and just have no idea. 877 00:48:19,171 --> 00:48:23,211 I just cheated on Myers-Briggs with another personality test. 878 00:48:23,231 --> 00:48:28,051 That's right, I took the Big Five test. 879 00:48:28,071 --> 00:48:31,220 What I wanted to do is go through the results live. 880 00:48:33,140 --> 00:48:35,091 We'll see how much of a loser I am. 881 00:48:35,111 --> 00:48:38,071 All right, so first up is agreeableness. 882 00:48:38,091 --> 00:48:43,051 Agreeableness? I scored 77 which probably means 883 00:48:43,071 --> 00:48:44,231 I'm a big doormat. 884 00:48:44,251 --> 00:48:46,131 So now we move on to the next one. 885 00:48:46,151 --> 00:48:48,171 Conscientiousness, which I think 886 00:48:48,191 --> 00:48:52,140 basically translates to how hard you work. 887 00:48:52,160 --> 00:48:53,251 Conscientiousness. 888 00:48:54,031 --> 00:48:59,100 Oh, I'm in the 4th percentile of conscientiousness. 889 00:49:00,031 --> 00:49:01,080 Dang! 890 00:49:01,100 --> 00:49:03,171 Oh, now we're getting to the stuff I'm good at. 891 00:49:03,191 --> 00:49:05,080 Neuroticism. 892 00:49:05,100 --> 00:49:08,160 Neuroticism, I scored in the 97th percentile. 893 00:49:08,180 --> 00:49:10,031 No surprise there. 894 00:49:10,051 --> 00:49:13,171 People with exceptionally high levels of neuroticism like me 895 00:49:13,191 --> 00:49:18,080 tend to think that everything in life has always been going wrong 896 00:49:18,100 --> 00:49:19,211 and always will. 897 00:49:21,240 --> 00:49:23,040 [electronic music] 898 00:49:40,021 --> 00:49:41,151 When you steer someone away from a job 899 00:49:41,171 --> 00:49:43,200 that they're not as likely to do well in, 900 00:49:43,220 --> 00:49:46,060 you've done them a favor 901 00:49:46,080 --> 00:49:48,021 even though it doesn't feel like a favor. 902 00:49:48,040 --> 00:49:50,251 If you help someone land in a job 903 00:49:51,031 --> 00:49:53,021 that they're likely to enjoy and do well 904 00:49:53,040 --> 00:49:54,140 it's a win for everybody. 905 00:49:54,160 --> 00:49:57,051 And, of course, companies have a vested interest 906 00:49:57,071 --> 00:49:58,071 in picking the best people. 907 00:49:58,091 --> 00:50:03,051 The problem of why are some people more interested 908 00:50:03,071 --> 00:50:06,111 and capable in specific types of work? 909 00:50:06,131 --> 00:50:08,060 That's an interesting question. 910 00:50:09,040 --> 00:50:12,191 And I just fell in love with it early on. 911 00:50:15,251 --> 00:50:17,220 We use Big Five. 912 00:50:17,240 --> 00:50:20,220 It's certainly not the only theory of personality 913 00:50:20,240 --> 00:50:23,211 but it's got a strong research basis. 914 00:50:25,191 --> 00:50:28,151 And I built some of the earliest examples 915 00:50:28,171 --> 00:50:32,080 of automated psychological testing that employers use 916 00:50:32,100 --> 00:50:35,180 to pick better employees. 917 00:50:36,231 --> 00:50:40,021 One of my first companies that I worked for 918 00:50:40,040 --> 00:50:45,040 was trying to validate an honesty test. 919 00:50:45,060 --> 00:50:47,091 Did you write number one? 920 00:50:47,151 --> 00:50:49,111 No. 921 00:50:49,131 --> 00:50:52,080 When I was in college, you couldn't get a job 922 00:50:52,100 --> 00:50:54,171 at a convenience store or a gas station 923 00:50:54,191 --> 00:50:56,220 without taking a polygraph. 924 00:50:56,240 --> 00:50:58,211 It was a very common practice. 925 00:50:58,231 --> 00:51:01,231 It wasn't reliable. It wasn't scientifically valid. 926 00:51:01,251 --> 00:51:06,131 And so Congress passed the Polygraph Protection Act 927 00:51:06,151 --> 00:51:09,040 which forbade the use of the polygraph 928 00:51:09,060 --> 00:51:11,160 for employee selection in most of the jobs. 929 00:51:18,251 --> 00:51:23,040 In the late 80s there were a few influential developments 930 00:51:23,060 --> 00:51:25,220 in machine learning and pattern recognition 931 00:51:25,240 --> 00:51:28,091 one of the major branches of artificial intelligence. 932 00:51:28,111 --> 00:51:29,220 I was all about trying to implement that research. 933 00:51:29,240 --> 00:51:34,091 And finally, a group of entrepreneurs 934 00:51:34,111 --> 00:51:35,100 from the West Coast called me and said, 935 00:51:35,120 --> 00:51:38,240 "We'd like to talk to you about your research." 936 00:51:39,021 --> 00:51:42,021 And so I moved out to Portland 937 00:51:42,040 --> 00:51:44,171 and we put together a little company 938 00:51:44,191 --> 00:51:47,060 that grew quite quickly. 939 00:51:47,080 --> 00:51:49,021 Six or seven years passed. 940 00:51:49,040 --> 00:51:52,091 We were estimated to have about half 941 00:51:52,111 --> 00:51:56,060 of the domestic hourly hiring market in the United States. 942 00:51:56,080 --> 00:51:58,080 So we were processing 943 00:51:58,100 --> 00:52:01,071 between 70 and 90 million applications a year. 944 00:52:01,091 --> 00:52:05,211 Hotel, customer service, waiters. 945 00:52:05,231 --> 00:52:07,131 Our little system's here 946 00:52:07,151 --> 00:52:10,231 influencing the lives of millions of people. 947 00:52:14,240 --> 00:52:17,171 Even though I had so many positive things 948 00:52:17,191 --> 00:52:20,080 going on in my life I just couldn't stop revisiting, 949 00:52:20,100 --> 00:52:26,191 Why me, why am I un-hireable? What's wrong with me? 950 00:52:27,080 --> 00:52:29,091 Is my personality wrong? 951 00:52:29,111 --> 00:52:30,231 Is there something wrong with me? 952 00:52:30,251 --> 00:52:31,040 Am I broken? 953 00:52:34,080 --> 00:52:39,131 We could actually be explicitly making sure that hiring systems 954 00:52:39,151 --> 00:52:45,191 are inclusive and creating diverse workforces. 955 00:52:45,211 --> 00:52:47,120 That's not what we're doing, though. 956 00:52:47,140 --> 00:52:50,040 What we're doing is propagating past practices. 957 00:52:50,060 --> 00:52:52,240 We are repeating the past. 958 00:52:53,021 --> 00:52:55,231 [Kyle] Is this platform new? 959 00:52:55,251 --> 00:52:58,240 People constantly have to perform their personalities. 960 00:52:59,021 --> 00:53:02,080 They are always on the clock. 961 00:53:02,100 --> 00:53:06,131 And they not only have to perform their personalities 962 00:53:06,151 --> 00:53:07,211 but they have to be happy to do it. 963 00:53:07,231 --> 00:53:10,031 They have to do it willingly. 964 00:53:10,051 --> 00:53:11,251 I think one of the extraordinary things 965 00:53:12,031 --> 00:53:14,200 about the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator 966 00:53:14,220 --> 00:53:16,231 is that that's there from its very inception, 967 00:53:16,251 --> 00:53:19,160 almost incidentally. 968 00:53:19,180 --> 00:53:20,200 But of course it's not an accident 969 00:53:20,220 --> 00:53:24,131 because Isabel herself is a product of this ideology. 970 00:53:24,220 --> 00:53:27,140 [Myers voice] 971 00:53:40,200 --> 00:53:42,171 When I started researching the book, 972 00:53:42,191 --> 00:53:46,231 I thought it would be a fairly simple research process. 973 00:53:46,251 --> 00:53:51,021 But the more I got into it, the more I realized 974 00:53:51,040 --> 00:53:53,200 that there were things people didn't want me to find. 975 00:53:57,140 --> 00:54:01,080 So I would go up to archives and the files that I needed 976 00:54:01,100 --> 00:54:03,031 would have been removed. 977 00:54:04,060 --> 00:54:06,251 I would go to archives and there would be people 978 00:54:07,031 --> 00:54:10,040 assigned to watch me as I was doing my work. 979 00:54:10,060 --> 00:54:12,231 That does start making you a little bit paranoid. 980 00:54:14,021 --> 00:54:16,051 What is it that the people 981 00:54:16,071 --> 00:54:18,140 who have a vested interest in the indicator 982 00:54:18,160 --> 00:54:21,231 don't want disclosed about it's origins. 983 00:54:23,080 --> 00:54:27,160 I was completely stunned to realize that Isabel 984 00:54:27,180 --> 00:54:29,160 was a successful mystery novelist 985 00:54:29,180 --> 00:54:31,160 before she designed the type indicator. 986 00:54:34,111 --> 00:54:38,120 And in the late 1920s she had written a mystery novel 987 00:54:38,140 --> 00:54:39,211 in about five weeks. 988 00:54:39,231 --> 00:54:41,091 She had done it while her children 989 00:54:41,111 --> 00:54:42,251 were asleep at night. 990 00:54:43,031 --> 00:54:45,231 And she had entered it into a competition 991 00:54:45,251 --> 00:54:48,021 and it had won and was published. 992 00:54:49,200 --> 00:54:51,160 And then I realized 993 00:54:51,180 --> 00:54:53,060 that she had written a second novel, 994 00:54:53,080 --> 00:54:57,220 but that novel wasn't advertised anywhere on the website. 995 00:54:57,240 --> 00:55:00,180 It was very, very difficult to track down 996 00:55:00,200 --> 00:55:03,180 in any sort of mainstream library. 997 00:55:05,100 --> 00:55:09,160 And when I finally found it and I read it, I understood why. 998 00:55:15,131 --> 00:55:20,071 Because that novel features the same team of detectives. 999 00:55:20,091 --> 00:55:22,060 Only this time they're investigating 1000 00:55:22,080 --> 00:55:25,200 a series of suicides that take place among an old aristocratic 1001 00:55:25,220 --> 00:55:27,091 Southern family. 1002 00:55:33,151 --> 00:55:36,091 And it turns out that the reason the members of this family 1003 00:55:36,111 --> 00:55:39,021 are committing suicide is because they believe 1004 00:55:39,040 --> 00:55:42,040 that they have a single drop 1005 00:55:42,060 --> 00:55:44,131 of African American blood in their veins. 1006 00:55:46,231 --> 00:55:49,211 [ominous music] 1007 00:55:58,220 --> 00:56:02,131 And so it's a really horrifyingly racist novel. 1008 00:56:09,171 --> 00:56:12,111 Reading it I felt betrayed, 1009 00:56:12,131 --> 00:56:14,191 because you have this woman who on the one hand 1010 00:56:14,211 --> 00:56:19,131 is committed to a certain set of progressive ideals, 1011 00:56:19,151 --> 00:56:21,160 particularly for her time. 1012 00:56:21,180 --> 00:56:24,120 And on the other hand, everything she's doing 1013 00:56:24,140 --> 00:56:27,151 is weighed down by a very, very troubling set of ideologies. 1014 00:56:40,060 --> 00:56:43,080 So, for instance when Isabel is first administering 1015 00:56:43,100 --> 00:56:47,031 the indicator to people who work at a factory 1016 00:56:47,051 --> 00:56:49,220 she wouldn't test anybody she said with an IQ under 100 1017 00:56:49,240 --> 00:56:51,080 because she didn't believe 1018 00:56:51,100 --> 00:56:53,071 that they have the cognitive capabilities 1019 00:56:53,091 --> 00:56:56,091 to differentiate their personalities. 1020 00:56:59,060 --> 00:57:00,160 And she argues that the people 1021 00:57:00,180 --> 00:57:03,060 who have the clearest personality preferences are 1022 00:57:03,080 --> 00:57:05,131 research scientists and CEOs. 1023 00:57:11,180 --> 00:57:13,151 When the type indicator was first designed 1024 00:57:13,171 --> 00:57:16,051 there were separate answer keys for men and for women, 1025 00:57:16,071 --> 00:57:18,021 under the assumption that women 1026 00:57:18,040 --> 00:57:20,111 were simply biologically predisposed to feeling 1027 00:57:20,131 --> 00:57:22,111 and so you couldn't actually evaluate 1028 00:57:22,131 --> 00:57:26,051 men's and women's answers on the same scale. 1029 00:57:26,071 --> 00:57:27,111 They had to have different scales. 1030 00:57:31,140 --> 00:57:34,100 All of these little moments in the history 1031 00:57:34,120 --> 00:57:35,131 of the type indicator contain these traces 1032 00:57:35,151 --> 00:57:40,021 of Isabel's classicism and her racism and her sexism 1033 00:57:40,040 --> 00:57:42,091 and her ableism. 1034 00:57:50,080 --> 00:57:52,160 It's primarily the white managerial class, 1035 00:57:52,180 --> 00:57:54,071 around which the idea of personality, 1036 00:57:54,091 --> 00:57:58,031 as Isabel understands it and articulates it 1037 00:57:58,051 --> 00:58:00,160 through the type indicator, is constructed. 1038 00:58:01,111 --> 00:58:04,171 The way the indicator was designed 1039 00:58:04,191 --> 00:58:07,091 and the way that any personality test 1040 00:58:07,111 --> 00:58:11,080 really is designed is to perpetuate the language 1041 00:58:11,100 --> 00:58:13,140 of individuality and of the self 1042 00:58:13,160 --> 00:58:15,160 for people who already have access to it. 1043 00:58:19,120 --> 00:58:23,071 If people create something they bring into that something 1044 00:58:23,091 --> 00:58:25,060 all of their preexisting values. 1045 00:58:25,080 --> 00:58:27,111 There is no way to preemptively excise 1046 00:58:27,131 --> 00:58:28,231 those values from the creation. 1047 00:58:28,251 --> 00:58:31,231 Problem is what does it mean when those biases are tied 1048 00:58:31,251 --> 00:58:35,151 to systems of power that harm whole communities of people. 1049 00:58:41,171 --> 00:58:43,200 It was really telling to me how Isabel's prejudices 1050 00:58:43,220 --> 00:58:48,060 which it would be very easy to dismiss as being of her time, 1051 00:58:48,080 --> 00:58:51,031 were not of her time, they're of our present 1052 00:58:51,051 --> 00:58:52,191 and they continue to be used today 1053 00:58:52,211 --> 00:58:54,180 to sustain the powers of the dominant classes. 1054 00:59:02,060 --> 00:59:05,140 Merve Emre came out with a book of the personality brokers. 1055 00:59:05,160 --> 00:59:09,021 She made some assumptions and implied some things 1056 00:59:09,040 --> 00:59:11,040 I don't even want to repeat because I found them 1057 00:59:11,060 --> 00:59:13,160 so profoundly offensive. 1058 00:59:13,180 --> 00:59:18,100 Isabel did care deeply about preventing another Hitler 1059 00:59:18,120 --> 00:59:19,160 about intolerance. 1060 00:59:19,180 --> 00:59:24,200 And I think that her really primary focus was to appreciate 1061 00:59:24,220 --> 00:59:26,120 your own uniqueness 1062 00:59:26,140 --> 00:59:30,040 and be able to appreciate people who are different, 1063 00:59:30,060 --> 00:59:33,191 which has never seemed more relevant to me than it does now. 1064 00:59:39,131 --> 00:59:42,111 I think there are ways that it's being used 1065 00:59:42,131 --> 00:59:47,140 that she would want to get in there and correct. 1066 00:59:47,160 --> 00:59:51,120 I don't think she ever wanted to see it used to discriminate 1067 00:59:51,140 --> 00:59:52,200 in hiring, for example. 1068 00:59:56,091 --> 00:59:58,080 Increasing the speed 1069 00:59:58,100 --> 01:00:00,140 and memory capability of computers. 1070 01:00:00,160 --> 01:00:04,131 Like most sociologists I'd learned about bias, 1071 01:00:04,151 --> 01:00:07,131 in terms of human bias, and I never really thought 1072 01:00:07,151 --> 01:00:11,051 about the fact that bias could also be encoded 1073 01:00:11,071 --> 01:00:13,040 in computer programming. 1074 01:00:13,060 --> 01:00:15,151 With new technologies we're actually encountering 1075 01:00:15,171 --> 01:00:17,100 new forms of discrimination, 1076 01:00:17,120 --> 01:00:19,180 that were not really conceived of 1077 01:00:19,200 --> 01:00:22,031 when we created the antidiscrimination laws 1078 01:00:22,051 --> 01:00:23,171 that we have now. 1079 01:00:27,091 --> 01:00:28,220 Is there really evidence 1080 01:00:28,240 --> 01:00:32,040 that employment personality tests can be racially biased? 1081 01:00:32,060 --> 01:00:34,251 So, I would say yes. 1082 01:00:41,021 --> 01:00:45,231 The whole idea of people beating the system has definitely been 1083 01:00:45,251 --> 01:00:49,140 an idea that has it has existed for quite some time. 1084 01:00:49,160 --> 01:00:51,200 You know, people react to programs 1085 01:00:51,220 --> 01:00:54,171 that they feel are exclusionary and they resist. 1086 01:00:58,251 --> 01:01:01,220 Alright, so superstars, I've introduced you to a concept 1087 01:01:01,240 --> 01:01:06,040 about how to handle personality assessments, right? 1088 01:01:06,060 --> 01:01:07,111 This training is a follow up. 1089 01:01:07,131 --> 01:01:09,080 We call this the results show. 1090 01:01:09,100 --> 01:01:11,191 So that you'll see the results of your actions. 1091 01:01:11,211 --> 01:01:13,160 Whether your clicks, whether your answers 1092 01:01:13,180 --> 01:01:14,191 would have either proved valuable for you 1093 01:01:14,211 --> 01:01:18,131 or would have drained your access to the job, right? 1094 01:01:18,151 --> 01:01:19,140 Okay, so we start with number 14. 1095 01:01:19,160 --> 01:01:23,160 For the most part, all of you love yourself. 1096 01:01:23,180 --> 01:01:25,151 You're happy, you're happy with yourself. 1097 01:01:25,171 --> 01:01:27,031 All of you. For the most part... 1098 01:01:27,051 --> 01:01:28,151 You have to be able to be like water 1099 01:01:28,171 --> 01:01:31,220 as Bruce Lee said, you know, to be flexible 1100 01:01:31,240 --> 01:01:33,100 and the person that's the most flexible is going to be 1101 01:01:33,120 --> 01:01:35,160 the person that gets the job. 1102 01:01:35,180 --> 01:01:36,160 All right, here's another question. 1103 01:01:36,180 --> 01:01:40,120 It's hard to be optimistic about the future? 1104 01:01:40,140 --> 01:01:43,060 Adrian said yes, and Clyde, 1105 01:01:43,080 --> 01:01:45,160 I feel bad for you. 1106 01:01:45,180 --> 01:01:47,080 Not to get personal. This is not personal. 1107 01:01:47,100 --> 01:01:51,100 I mean, the click says maybe 1108 01:01:51,120 --> 01:01:53,071 what you felt at the moment, right? 1109 01:01:53,091 --> 01:01:55,021 And I agree, 1110 01:01:55,040 --> 01:01:55,240 sometimes it is hard 1111 01:01:56,021 --> 01:01:56,231 to be optimistic about the future. 1112 01:01:56,251 --> 01:01:59,111 But would you in the interview say, yeah. 1113 01:01:59,131 --> 01:02:01,200 now, that you mentioned it? 1114 01:02:03,111 --> 01:02:03,211 Future. 1115 01:02:06,160 --> 01:02:09,171 Can we talk about, can we talk about this? 1116 01:02:10,180 --> 01:02:12,171 These questions are coming from a person 1117 01:02:12,191 --> 01:02:15,240 with a distinctive difference from the people 1118 01:02:16,021 --> 01:02:18,211 that are receiving these applications or assessments. 1119 01:02:18,231 --> 01:02:23,140 You can have questions worded in a way that a person 1120 01:02:23,160 --> 01:02:24,191 has never heard before 1121 01:02:24,211 --> 01:02:26,200 and it could throw them totally off. 1122 01:02:26,220 --> 01:02:30,200 So people... I love that word, people. 1123 01:02:30,220 --> 01:02:32,080 People may have to suffer some criticism 1124 01:02:32,100 --> 01:02:35,021 in order to achieve a goal. 1125 01:02:35,040 --> 01:02:38,180 And everybody said "yes" except Adrian said "no". 1126 01:02:40,111 --> 01:02:41,140 No criticism from me. 1127 01:02:41,160 --> 01:02:44,211 I can achieve my goal my own way. 1128 01:02:44,231 --> 01:02:49,231 It depends how you feel because I don't have no-- 1129 01:02:49,251 --> 01:02:51,100 You have to just ask yourself 1130 01:02:51,120 --> 01:02:53,220 why they're asking me this question, right? 1131 01:02:53,240 --> 01:02:55,171 And so they just asking you, I think, 1132 01:02:55,191 --> 01:02:57,060 Can you take some criticism? 1133 01:02:57,080 --> 01:02:59,180 Would you agree you could take some critic-- you might need. 1134 01:02:59,200 --> 01:03:01,251 Has Mr E ever criticized you? 1135 01:03:03,071 --> 01:03:04,231 -Yeah. -Ah, alright, so your answer 1136 01:03:04,251 --> 01:03:07,111 actually is yes if you think about it, right? 1137 01:03:07,131 --> 01:03:08,151 Oh, I love this one. 1138 01:03:08,171 --> 01:03:13,120 I do not recall... can't remember, 1139 01:03:13,140 --> 01:03:17,200 telling a lie in recent years. 1140 01:03:19,200 --> 01:03:22,040 And look at these angels. 1141 01:03:22,060 --> 01:03:23,200 Right down. 1142 01:03:25,240 --> 01:03:29,191 Now, that's very admirable. 1143 01:03:29,211 --> 01:03:31,171 They design these things very carefully 1144 01:03:31,191 --> 01:03:34,151 and I cannot get into the algorithms 1145 01:03:34,171 --> 01:03:36,220 of how they figure this stuff out, 1146 01:03:36,240 --> 01:03:38,220 but I do think it could be a trick question. 1147 01:03:40,211 --> 01:03:43,191 Obviously, it's very painful, it's discouraging. 1148 01:03:43,211 --> 01:03:47,251 See now, Adrian, you're getting consistent. 1149 01:03:48,031 --> 01:03:51,111 And now they're feeling where you're at, right? 1150 01:03:51,131 --> 01:03:52,220 That's right in the numbers. 1151 01:03:52,240 --> 01:03:55,200 The software is now saying, flashing red light. 1152 01:03:55,220 --> 01:03:59,200 I'm pleased to know that we believe we have a way 1153 01:03:59,220 --> 01:04:03,180 to train to it, but that's a very small portion 1154 01:04:03,200 --> 01:04:04,240 of the population. 1155 01:04:05,021 --> 01:04:06,211 You know, I have anywhere 1156 01:04:06,231 --> 01:04:09,071 from 10 to 25 students at a time. 1157 01:04:09,091 --> 01:04:13,160 We might get to 200, 250, 300 students a year. 1158 01:04:13,180 --> 01:04:17,031 It's New York City, that's not a lot of people. 1159 01:04:17,051 --> 01:04:21,100 Most people have no access to this kind of training 1160 01:04:21,120 --> 01:04:22,240 or this kind of framing. 1161 01:04:25,220 --> 01:04:27,171 I have suffered many times 1162 01:04:27,191 --> 01:04:31,180 before I even had this opportunity of coming to Hope. 1163 01:04:31,200 --> 01:04:34,231 But when I came here, it gave me hope. 1164 01:04:34,251 --> 01:04:36,191 It gave me a passion. 1165 01:04:36,211 --> 01:04:41,240 It gave me everything that I've been dreaming of, 1166 01:04:42,021 --> 01:04:45,131 when I couldn't get it nowhere else. 1167 01:04:45,151 --> 01:04:48,091 One day someone will take an interest in me. 1168 01:04:59,071 --> 01:05:01,071 Let's face it, most psychological tests 1169 01:05:01,091 --> 01:05:03,240 are written by middle aged, white guys like me 1170 01:05:04,021 --> 01:05:08,191 and we can't possibly assimilate all the complexity, cultural 1171 01:05:08,211 --> 01:05:11,180 and individual variation that our systems 1172 01:05:11,200 --> 01:05:13,200 are going to capture. 1173 01:05:13,220 --> 01:05:19,031 Therefore, we have to anticipate that our data sets themselves 1174 01:05:19,051 --> 01:05:21,091 could be the source of contamination 1175 01:05:21,111 --> 01:05:23,120 and we have to analyze that, 1176 01:05:23,140 --> 01:05:26,211 and in my own working life I've done research 1177 01:05:26,231 --> 01:05:30,180 with companies where patterns of discrimination were observed. 1178 01:05:30,200 --> 01:05:34,171 But I do also understand that if these algorithms 1179 01:05:34,191 --> 01:05:39,021 are configured properly, they're going to make far more 1180 01:05:39,040 --> 01:05:43,160 correct decisions than they're going to make errors. 1181 01:05:43,180 --> 01:05:45,040 [interviewer] 1182 01:05:48,111 --> 01:05:49,151 Of course, oh yeah. 1183 01:05:52,040 --> 01:05:55,120 I would say you may have applied for the wrong job. 1184 01:05:55,140 --> 01:05:57,140 Who wants a job you're going to hate? 1185 01:05:57,160 --> 01:06:02,200 Having work that is... makes us happy, 1186 01:06:02,220 --> 01:06:05,091 is the best, it's just the best 1187 01:06:05,111 --> 01:06:08,140 and it's a natural for human beings to actualize 1188 01:06:08,160 --> 01:06:12,060 as it is for a tree to put leaves out. 1189 01:06:12,080 --> 01:06:15,021 It's what we're designed to do. 1190 01:06:15,040 --> 01:06:16,111 And any time that doesn't happen, 1191 01:06:16,131 --> 01:06:19,171 that's a tragic loss. 1192 01:06:24,191 --> 01:06:26,171 Almost eight weeks ago, 1193 01:06:26,191 --> 01:06:30,021 my wife and I went over to Kyle's house. 1194 01:06:33,220 --> 01:06:38,021 We got there and saw that his car was in the garage. 1195 01:06:38,040 --> 01:06:40,131 The house was locked up. 1196 01:06:42,051 --> 01:06:46,051 We were able to open the garage door. 1197 01:06:46,071 --> 01:06:47,140 Went in the house 1198 01:06:48,051 --> 01:06:51,021 and went up to his bedroom 1199 01:06:51,040 --> 01:06:54,131 and found Kyle dead there. 1200 01:06:54,151 --> 01:06:58,140 He had taken his life and... 1201 01:07:02,171 --> 01:07:06,100 everything since then has been adjusting. 1202 01:07:14,080 --> 01:07:17,060 [sad music] 1203 01:07:18,240 --> 01:07:20,191 [child's voice] 1204 01:07:22,171 --> 01:07:25,240 [Kyle shouting cheerfully] 1205 01:07:30,171 --> 01:07:33,251 [sad music continues] 1206 01:07:37,031 --> 01:07:39,021 [indistinct chatter] 1207 01:07:48,220 --> 01:07:50,251 [slide projector clicking] 1208 01:07:51,031 --> 01:07:55,051 Kyle, had 29 years of wonderful life 1209 01:07:56,131 --> 01:07:58,021 that I am... 1210 01:08:01,111 --> 01:08:06,171 ever grateful for having had him for those 29 years. 1211 01:08:06,191 --> 01:08:10,051 For him having been a part of my life for that. 1212 01:08:11,060 --> 01:08:15,050 I would have liked it had been much much longer... 1213 01:08:17,231 --> 01:08:20,111 ...and it's not. 1214 01:08:20,130 --> 01:08:23,140 But while he's physically not with us, 1215 01:08:23,161 --> 01:08:26,210 he still connects. 1216 01:08:26,231 --> 01:08:30,031 You know, you go a lot of places where we used to go. 1217 01:08:30,050 --> 01:08:34,041 You do things that we used to do or you continue on in this case 1218 01:08:34,060 --> 01:08:35,170 you know, fighting the fights 1219 01:08:35,191 --> 01:08:37,191 that he thought were important to fight. 1220 01:08:42,191 --> 01:08:45,050 I never met Kyle and I don't want to presume 1221 01:08:45,071 --> 01:08:47,041 to know what did Kyle feel 1222 01:08:47,060 --> 01:08:48,130 what was Kyle thinking. 1223 01:08:48,151 --> 01:08:50,081 When I hear about what happened in Kyle's life 1224 01:08:50,100 --> 01:08:54,250 with facing persistent ableism and cynicism in his attempt 1225 01:08:55,031 --> 01:08:58,191 just to find a little bit of work to do 1226 01:08:58,210 --> 01:09:01,071 and when I hear about his ultimate... 1227 01:09:01,090 --> 01:09:06,151 the ultimate end of his life, that he died by suicide, 1228 01:09:06,170 --> 01:09:09,041 I think of dozens of other community members 1229 01:09:09,060 --> 01:09:13,170 that I know and anytime that I learn that somebody 1230 01:09:13,191 --> 01:09:15,031 from our community is no longer here, 1231 01:09:15,050 --> 01:09:17,140 it is deeply sobering, it is deeply upsetting 1232 01:09:17,161 --> 01:09:20,201 and it is a further indictment of the society that we live in 1233 01:09:20,220 --> 01:09:23,170 of just how profoundly fucked it all is. 1234 01:09:25,191 --> 01:09:28,130 [interviewer speaking indistinctly] 1235 01:09:29,220 --> 01:09:31,130 So my name is Dr Nathan Mondragon. 1236 01:09:31,151 --> 01:09:34,031 I'm the chief industrial and organizational psychologist 1237 01:09:34,050 --> 01:09:35,071 with a company called HireVue. 1238 01:09:37,250 --> 01:09:41,231 HireVue is, in a nutshell a video interview platform. 1239 01:09:43,031 --> 01:09:46,210 We're growing significantly year over year. 1240 01:09:50,041 --> 01:09:53,170 Dr Scarborough's tests were kind of multiple choice questions. 1241 01:09:55,151 --> 01:09:58,161 You then roll answers to 1242 01:09:58,180 --> 01:10:01,210 those questions up into a score of some sort. 1243 01:10:01,231 --> 01:10:04,170 Savvy applicants start to figure out 1244 01:10:04,191 --> 01:10:06,231 what the answer key might be. 1245 01:10:09,081 --> 01:10:11,201 The next level of research that we're doing is 1246 01:10:11,220 --> 01:10:14,081 we look at the words. 1247 01:10:14,100 --> 01:10:17,121 We also look at the audio patterns 1248 01:10:17,140 --> 01:10:18,210 and then we're starting to look at 1249 01:10:18,231 --> 01:10:20,140 what's called the facial action units, 1250 01:10:20,161 --> 01:10:22,041 the movement of the face. 1251 01:10:23,210 --> 01:10:26,090 So an example. Do you like your boss? 1252 01:10:26,111 --> 01:10:28,180 And you say, "I like my boss." 1253 01:10:28,201 --> 01:10:31,241 Alright, good, but "I like my boss," 1254 01:10:32,021 --> 01:10:35,021 has a different connotation to it when you layer 1255 01:10:35,041 --> 01:10:37,241 the video and the audio and the facial movement 1256 01:10:38,021 --> 01:10:39,191 on top of the text. 1257 01:10:41,210 --> 01:10:43,100 That's what we're researching. 1258 01:10:43,121 --> 01:10:46,241 That is unproven at this point. 1259 01:10:50,180 --> 01:10:53,100 When I first learned about HireVue 1260 01:10:53,121 --> 01:10:56,140 my reaction was, "I'm sorry, what? 1261 01:10:56,161 --> 01:10:59,210 Employers are trying to do what exactly? 1262 01:10:59,231 --> 01:11:03,050 How do you purport to be able to look at a video 1263 01:11:03,071 --> 01:11:05,210 of a person's speech and movement and say 1264 01:11:05,231 --> 01:11:07,100 "Oh, now, we know from this video, 1265 01:11:07,121 --> 01:11:10,041 whether or not you are going to be successful at this job." 1266 01:11:10,060 --> 01:11:13,170 What the hell does that have to actually do with anything? 1267 01:11:15,121 --> 01:11:19,060 Perception of emotions is very subjective, right? 1268 01:11:19,081 --> 01:11:23,161 And it's also very culturally specific. 1269 01:11:23,180 --> 01:11:26,060 So for example, somebody from Russia will have 1270 01:11:26,081 --> 01:11:31,111 different body movements or body language to express 1271 01:11:31,130 --> 01:11:36,191 even the same emotion as somebody from North America. 1272 01:11:42,071 --> 01:11:43,151 Humans are biased, yes. 1273 01:11:43,170 --> 01:11:47,021 But one biased human manager can only impact 1274 01:11:47,041 --> 01:11:49,220 maybe a hundred resumes at a time. 1275 01:11:49,241 --> 01:11:52,100 But one biased automated hiring system, 1276 01:11:52,121 --> 01:11:56,231 that is deployed throughout a corporation can actually impact 1277 01:11:56,250 --> 01:11:58,130 hundreds of thousands of resumes. 1278 01:12:01,250 --> 01:12:04,170 I think that very much goes against our Constitution. 1279 01:12:04,191 --> 01:12:06,121 It goes against who we are as Americans. 1280 01:12:11,100 --> 01:12:14,180 I mean what I'm saying we're doing is in accordance 1281 01:12:14,201 --> 01:12:15,241 with what's called the uniform guidelines 1282 01:12:16,021 --> 01:12:18,191 and professional standards and practices and principles. 1283 01:12:18,210 --> 01:12:22,090 Have we been sued? No. 1284 01:12:22,111 --> 01:12:27,100 There's stuff out there people are looking. 1285 01:12:27,121 --> 01:12:30,201 David Scarborough, he came under fire at Unicru 1286 01:12:30,220 --> 01:12:33,031 for some stuff as well years ago 1287 01:12:33,050 --> 01:12:35,250 and it's just part of the business 1288 01:12:36,031 --> 01:12:39,071 but if you do things correctly 1289 01:12:39,090 --> 01:12:42,151 you're maximizing that defendability. 1290 01:12:42,170 --> 01:12:46,050 One worry is the idea that automated hiring platforms 1291 01:12:46,071 --> 01:12:48,060 could actually create an underclass of people 1292 01:12:48,081 --> 01:12:52,241 who are permanently unemployable. 1293 01:12:53,021 --> 01:12:56,100 Once someone gets rejected from several jobs 1294 01:12:56,121 --> 01:13:00,151 that actually does create a gap in employment. 1295 01:13:00,170 --> 01:13:03,161 And then that gap in employment just gets bigger and bigger 1296 01:13:03,180 --> 01:13:06,041 each time they get rejected and that kind of puts them 1297 01:13:06,060 --> 01:13:08,201 in a position where they're now 1298 01:13:08,220 --> 01:13:11,201 no longer a preferred worker. 1299 01:13:13,140 --> 01:13:15,090 Then there's a worry that you're designating 1300 01:13:15,111 --> 01:13:19,151 certain groups of people as unfit for employment 1301 01:13:19,170 --> 01:13:22,250 and this really goes back to notions of eugenics. 1302 01:13:24,180 --> 01:13:28,180 Eugenics was this major movement at the turn of the 20th century 1303 01:13:28,201 --> 01:13:30,081 that gained enormous traction 1304 01:13:30,100 --> 01:13:31,121 to the point where several cities 1305 01:13:31,140 --> 01:13:35,121 in the United States founded their own societies 1306 01:13:35,140 --> 01:13:36,090 for the public hygiene. 1307 01:13:36,111 --> 01:13:39,060 Eugenics was the science of the future 1308 01:13:39,081 --> 01:13:40,170 of forward thinking people. 1309 01:13:40,191 --> 01:13:43,050 Eugenics was the science of devising a better society 1310 01:13:43,071 --> 01:13:44,060 by creating better humans. 1311 01:13:44,081 --> 01:13:46,130 But eugenics itself is, of course, 1312 01:13:46,151 --> 01:13:50,031 deeply white supremacist and deeply ableist, 1313 01:13:50,050 --> 01:13:51,250 because eugenics was the science of deciding 1314 01:13:52,031 --> 01:13:53,081 which kinds of people 1315 01:13:53,100 --> 01:13:55,090 deserve to reproduce and to be reproduced. 1316 01:13:55,111 --> 01:13:56,121 Which kinds of people deserve to exist 1317 01:13:56,140 --> 01:13:59,161 which kinds of people did not. Which kinds of people 1318 01:13:59,180 --> 01:14:00,241 would be counted as productive 1319 01:14:01,021 --> 01:14:02,041 and contributing members of society, 1320 01:14:02,060 --> 01:14:04,121 and in turn, which kinds of people 1321 01:14:04,140 --> 01:14:06,111 would instead be cast off as burdens. 1322 01:14:11,210 --> 01:14:14,060 And that's why we got to go the extra mile to show them 1323 01:14:14,081 --> 01:14:18,140 "No, I'm superior in so many different ways." 1324 01:14:18,161 --> 01:14:21,100 Eugenics continues to be mainstream science 1325 01:14:21,121 --> 01:14:22,250 in the United States, just not under that name. 1326 01:14:23,031 --> 01:14:25,111 We think that you're worthy because your personality is 1327 01:14:25,130 --> 01:14:27,050 the appropriate personality here. 1328 01:14:27,071 --> 01:14:28,130 Your personality is the one that matches those 1329 01:14:28,151 --> 01:14:31,170 of previously successful performers of this company. 1330 01:14:31,191 --> 01:14:34,100 And they want to see that you are the best person. 1331 01:14:34,121 --> 01:14:37,210 Not because you said it, because I demonstrated it. 1332 01:14:37,231 --> 01:14:41,170 Employers or other people who are using things 1333 01:14:41,191 --> 01:14:43,021 like personality tests to decide 1334 01:14:43,041 --> 01:14:45,111 who they want to offer opportunities to... 1335 01:14:45,130 --> 01:14:47,231 that is... let us be very clear about this and not mince words. 1336 01:14:47,250 --> 01:14:48,161 Who they want to make sure 1337 01:14:50,071 --> 01:14:51,090 and a roof over their head 1338 01:14:53,050 --> 01:14:55,060 fuck you, sucks to be you. 1339 01:14:55,081 --> 01:14:57,180 Then they're relying on the same type of pseudoscience 1340 01:14:57,201 --> 01:15:01,071 that you are doing when you were measuring people's skulls 1341 01:15:01,090 --> 01:15:04,121 to decide which person is intelligent or not. 1342 01:15:08,250 --> 01:15:12,100 [car engine] 1343 01:15:13,090 --> 01:15:15,121 Meeting today is an important step 1344 01:15:15,140 --> 01:15:18,170 because we're looking to change the law 1345 01:15:18,191 --> 01:15:25,220 to be able to more effectively protect those who are 1346 01:15:25,241 --> 01:15:27,071 discriminated against. 1347 01:15:28,031 --> 01:15:31,111 [plaintive music] 1348 01:15:44,130 --> 01:15:45,161 I don't think that there is an end to the quest 1349 01:15:45,180 --> 01:15:49,250 there's an end to this particular part of the quest. 1350 01:15:50,031 --> 01:15:52,161 He would have loved being part of today's meeting 1351 01:15:54,050 --> 01:15:54,161 up on the hill. 1352 01:15:57,050 --> 01:16:01,130 Yeah, he was there. 1353 01:16:01,151 --> 01:16:05,100 Just not as vocal as I would have liked him to be. 1354 01:16:09,170 --> 01:16:11,111 I mean, in my worst fears 1355 01:16:11,130 --> 01:16:14,021 of the future of hiring algorithms 1356 01:16:14,041 --> 01:16:18,210 it doesn't even just start at the moment of application. 1357 01:16:18,231 --> 01:16:22,100 We already have a system to get us to applying 1358 01:16:22,121 --> 01:16:24,090 that is problematic. 1359 01:16:24,111 --> 01:16:26,090 I would call it the pipeline, and that's now. 1360 01:16:26,111 --> 01:16:29,151 So the dystopian future that I worry about is this 1361 01:16:29,170 --> 01:16:32,100 but it goes backwards in time 1362 01:16:32,121 --> 01:16:34,161 in the sense that it starts in childhood. 1363 01:16:36,140 --> 01:16:38,250 These big tech companies are collecting data 1364 01:16:39,031 --> 01:16:42,021 about how our children learn. 1365 01:16:42,041 --> 01:16:46,060 At the age of seven, they are already pinned down 1366 01:16:46,081 --> 01:16:49,210 into their future job prospect 1367 01:16:49,231 --> 01:16:52,021 and as they go through junior high school and high school 1368 01:16:52,041 --> 01:16:54,130 they're just confirming, 1369 01:16:54,151 --> 01:16:56,050 "Oh, yeah, this is an unlucky person," 1370 01:16:56,071 --> 01:16:57,180 they don't deserve a good job. 1371 01:17:00,140 --> 01:17:03,130 I know people are like, "Well I'm not Kyle, 1372 01:17:03,151 --> 01:17:05,201 why should I worry about Kyle?" 1373 01:17:08,210 --> 01:17:10,060 Sorry. 1374 01:17:10,081 --> 01:17:12,231 That... it is their story. 1375 01:17:20,100 --> 01:17:23,100 This is happening to everyone... 1376 01:17:24,021 --> 01:17:24,170 ...all the time. 1377 01:17:27,151 --> 01:17:30,140 It's happening to literally everyone. 1378 01:17:31,231 --> 01:17:35,050 And the longer we let this... system, 1379 01:17:35,071 --> 01:17:36,201 the predictive AI system 1380 01:17:36,220 --> 01:17:40,140 the longer we let it remain completely unaccountable, 1381 01:17:40,161 --> 01:17:41,220 the more it defines us 1382 01:17:41,241 --> 01:17:44,220 the more it defines our futures. 1383 01:17:44,241 --> 01:17:48,220 I'd like to start by sharing a story of Kyle Behm 1384 01:17:48,241 --> 01:17:50,231 a bright college engineering student 1385 01:17:50,250 --> 01:17:54,231 who applied for an hourly job at Kroger. 1386 01:17:54,250 --> 01:17:56,191 He has held similar positions in the past. 1387 01:17:56,210 --> 01:18:00,071 Yet after taking a personality assessment, 1388 01:18:00,090 --> 01:18:03,031 he was scored red and rejected. 1389 01:18:05,121 --> 01:18:07,231 Sadly, Kyle is no longer with us today. 1390 01:18:07,250 --> 01:18:12,180 But his father Roland continues to abdicate to ensure people 1391 01:18:12,201 --> 01:18:16,130 with disabilities are not systematically excluded 1392 01:18:16,151 --> 01:18:19,060 by hiring assessment. 1393 01:18:56,071 --> 01:18:59,081 Breathe deeply with me and recite these mantras. 1394 01:19:02,041 --> 01:19:05,071 I am enough. I am capable. 1395 01:19:05,090 --> 01:19:07,081 That mean thing that my mom said on the phone 1396 01:19:07,100 --> 01:19:08,210 this morning is not accurate. 1397 01:19:08,231 --> 01:19:10,140 I don't know if I want to think about 1398 01:19:10,161 --> 01:19:12,151 what my life would have been like 1399 01:19:12,170 --> 01:19:16,250 if I hadn't come across typology. 1400 01:19:19,021 --> 01:19:22,050 It's like totally transformed everything. 1401 01:19:23,180 --> 01:19:26,050 It makes you realize that there are other people out there 1402 01:19:26,071 --> 01:19:28,130 who are functioning in the same way that you are 1403 01:19:28,151 --> 01:19:29,220 and that you're not alone 1404 01:19:29,241 --> 01:19:33,071 and you're not just some random weirdo. 1405 01:19:35,071 --> 01:19:37,111 [techno music] 1406 01:19:44,021 --> 01:19:45,170 The language of type 1407 01:19:45,191 --> 01:19:48,071 and the vision of the self that it encodes, 1408 01:19:48,090 --> 01:19:50,180 those are treated as naturally occurring phenomenon. 1409 01:19:50,201 --> 01:19:54,081 Just part of what it means to be a human being. 1410 01:19:54,100 --> 01:19:55,250 But they have histories and they have histories 1411 01:19:56,031 --> 01:19:58,241 that have all kinds of ideologies embedded in them 1412 01:19:59,021 --> 01:20:02,021 and that's why it's so important to understand, 1413 01:20:02,041 --> 01:20:03,220 where these instruments come from. 1414 01:20:06,180 --> 01:20:08,170 They wouldn't exist without corporations 1415 01:20:08,191 --> 01:20:10,060 and they wouldn't exist 1416 01:20:10,081 --> 01:20:11,161 without organizational psychology 1417 01:20:11,180 --> 01:20:14,111 whose whole purpose is to figure out 1418 01:20:14,130 --> 01:20:15,231 how to use the human psyche 1419 01:20:15,250 --> 01:20:20,060 to make corporations run better to run more profitably. 1420 01:20:20,081 --> 01:20:22,121 And to me, the most interesting response 1421 01:20:22,140 --> 01:20:23,220 to personality testing 1422 01:20:23,241 --> 01:20:26,250 would be to walk away from the individual 1423 01:20:27,031 --> 01:20:29,191 as a thing that we really, really need to understand 1424 01:20:29,210 --> 01:20:32,041 and think about what it might look like 1425 01:20:32,060 --> 01:20:36,031 to live in a world where was a sense of community 1426 01:20:36,050 --> 01:20:39,100 that we were invested in understanding. 1427 01:20:39,121 --> 01:20:41,121 To imagine a world where desires and needs 1428 01:20:41,140 --> 01:20:43,031 are more collective. 1429 01:20:46,220 --> 01:20:49,100 New generation of AI driven screens 1430 01:20:49,121 --> 01:20:53,060 are transforming the lives of America's workers 1431 01:20:53,081 --> 01:20:54,231 with profound implications for civil rights. 1432 01:20:56,161 --> 01:20:59,111 Employers are being bombarded 1433 01:20:59,130 --> 01:21:01,121 with thousands of applications sometimes. 1434 01:21:01,140 --> 01:21:05,180 And in its simplest form AI tools are capable 1435 01:21:05,201 --> 01:21:09,071 of simply scanning those applications or resumes 1436 01:21:09,090 --> 01:21:10,231 to screen out those who don't even have 1437 01:21:10,250 --> 01:21:13,250 the minimum qualifications for the job. 1438 01:21:14,031 --> 01:21:15,201 When video interviewing systems 1439 01:21:15,220 --> 01:21:19,201 are trained on white male voices and faces 1440 01:21:19,220 --> 01:21:23,151 this disadvantages both racial minorities and white women, 1441 01:21:23,170 --> 01:21:25,121 whose facial expressions and tone of voice 1442 01:21:25,140 --> 01:21:28,031 might be misinterpreted. 1443 01:21:32,170 --> 01:21:35,250 -[laughter] -Are you serious? 1444 01:21:36,031 --> 01:21:38,031 [people laughing and chatting] 1445 01:21:40,210 --> 01:21:44,090 Wow, I did not expect this right here. 1446 01:21:44,111 --> 01:21:46,041 I want to ask the whole panel 1447 01:21:46,060 --> 01:21:48,121 if there was one thing Congress could do right now 1448 01:21:48,140 --> 01:21:49,241 what would it be? 1449 01:21:50,021 --> 01:21:52,161 I believe a workers bill of rights is needed. 1450 01:21:52,180 --> 01:21:56,201 so that workers understand how algorithms are making decisions 1451 01:21:56,220 --> 01:21:58,130 and how that might impact them. 1452 01:21:58,151 --> 01:21:59,241 The person that I selected 1453 01:22:00,021 --> 01:22:04,100 for this week's employee of the week is... 1454 01:22:05,220 --> 01:22:07,191 [students cheer and yell] 1455 01:22:12,130 --> 01:22:15,220 The struggle for people is not merely one of insufficient 1456 01:22:15,241 --> 01:22:18,021 or inadequate laws and policies 1457 01:22:18,041 --> 01:22:21,140 but it is also one fundamentally of justice in society 1458 01:22:21,161 --> 01:22:24,090 to accomplish the kind of change that we want in the world. 1459 01:22:25,151 --> 01:22:27,191 [birds chirping] 1460 01:22:29,180 --> 01:22:33,210 Imagine you're looking out into your yard. 1461 01:22:33,231 --> 01:22:38,121 You can look in a magazine and see the perfect garden. 1462 01:22:38,140 --> 01:22:42,050 But what's going to happen over the years is, 1463 01:22:42,071 --> 01:22:45,180 as you put this garden together each time you add something 1464 01:22:45,201 --> 01:22:48,231 to the garden it's going to look 1465 01:22:48,250 --> 01:22:51,081 a little different from perfect. 1466 01:22:53,241 --> 01:22:56,021 And each time you add one more thing 1467 01:22:56,041 --> 01:22:59,161 it's not going to be perfect, it's not going to be perfect. 1468 01:23:04,140 --> 01:23:08,021 But then at the end of the day 1469 01:23:08,041 --> 01:23:12,220 after years of this imperfection you look out the window 1470 01:23:12,241 --> 01:23:15,050 and what you'll see is more beautiful 1471 01:23:15,071 --> 01:23:17,201 than you ever could have thought to put together 1472 01:23:17,220 --> 01:23:19,170 in the first place. 1473 01:23:26,081 --> 01:23:29,220 [friendly chattering] [uplifting music] 1474 01:23:37,071 --> 01:23:42,041 The white beads symbolize the loss of a child. 1475 01:23:42,060 --> 01:23:45,121 If you're wearing a white bead at this moment, 1476 01:23:45,140 --> 01:23:48,031 please take them off and hold them up high. 1477 01:23:51,111 --> 01:23:54,231 [triumphant music] 1478 01:24:39,180 --> 01:24:40,241 [cell phone rings] 1479 01:24:41,021 --> 01:24:42,111 - Hello. -Hello, this is Lashawn. 1480 01:24:42,130 --> 01:24:45,081 You get me Mr E? 1481 01:24:45,100 --> 01:24:47,130 Yes, Lashawn How are you doing, man? 1482 01:24:47,151 --> 01:24:49,060 I'm all right, about yourself? 1483 01:24:49,081 --> 01:24:52,090 I have some great news to tell you. 1484 01:24:52,111 --> 01:24:55,121 - What's that? -I got a job. 1485 01:24:55,140 --> 01:24:57,161 - You got a job? -Yeah, yeah. 1486 01:24:57,180 --> 01:25:00,130 - Oh, get outta here. -Seriously. 1487 01:25:00,151 --> 01:25:04,170 I am a superintendent for a building... 1488 01:25:04,191 --> 01:25:06,231 Oh wow, that's great... [fades]