ESTP strengths and weaknesses refer to those subtle qualities that define their individual type characteristics. It signifies the key areas they are proficient in and also those that need to be developed overtime.
ESTPs are socially active and love to stay focused in their present. This is a strength that enables them to be more attentive to sensory impressions that they receive from the environment.
Contrary to this, ESTPs are spontaneous and impulsive. They tend to decide on haste. This weakness needs to be removed and they should learn to decide slowly after giving a wise thought into everything they are doing or planning to do in future.
Let’s learn more about the various areas of proficiency and loopholes that they possess.
ESTP strengths and weaknesses
The personality strengths and weaknesses are a part of being human. All of us are born with it, somewhat more or less. Thus, ESTPs are not an exception to this rule.
ESTP personalities have a huge impact on their surroundings. They are socially dynamic, and always prefer the spotlight to be put on them always.
Armed with flexibility and openness to change, ESTPs can adapt to any situation happily. They are not nitpicky and complaining types at all.
ESTPs are also practical-minded and creative individuals who love to be present to their immediate surroundings.
Thus, they can easily notice changes because of their great observation power. Since they are sensing personalities, they love to perceive sensory impressions and assign meaning to them. They are keen observers with an eye for detailing.
Some key areas that they need to improvise are their hasty decision making and impatient nature. They seek adventure and thrill in life and as such make weird decisions that they later repent.
Their spontaneous and free flowing nature makes them a less serious personality type who others adore and love to be with in any given social setups.
ESTP strengths
ESTP strengths are those qualities and abilities that they are skilled with. It refers to the positive personality traits that equip them with more knowledge, good vibes, and fulfilled living.
Some of the vital strengths of ESTP personality type are discussed below:
1. Bold and brave
ESTPs are naturally bold and fearless personality types. They love to take challenges and accomplish them with comfort.
They are effortless workers and never sit back till they have reached their goals. ESTPs will always push their boundaries far and wide because they crave new experiences.
These individuals are courageous to face any odds in life. They never break down in times of distress but somehow make their way out of a difficult situation.
2. Reality-oriented
ESTPs are practical-minded and love to approach life now and here. They believe in learning and doing things that have some practical implications. ESTPs are not long term planners.
They prefer making short term goals, achieving them easily, and then moving on to the next one. An ESTP is always direct and logical. They do not like to do anything that is impractical or has no value in the real world.
3. Good perceptual power
ESTPs have strong perceptual ability. Thus, they are full of life, spontaneous and easygoing types. They hate finding faults in others or the system in general. An ESTP person is adaptable and can easily notice changes in other people. ESTPs will be quick enough to understand the hidden motives of others.
4. Believes in collaboration
ESTPs are good administrators because they can readily collaborate and network with others in a system. They are outgoing, able communicators who can inspire and motivate others to take decisive actions in life.
ESTPs prefer group activities because they are proactive and love to interact and network in diverse group settings. A collaborative social space is always welcoming for them. It energizes an ESTP and helps them learn and create new things effortlessly.
5. Outgoing and loves to talk
ESTPs are always high on energy. They hate to sit back and do nothing. These individuals love to fill each and every moment of their life with pure joy and madness. Thus, they prefer relating to all sorts of people and discussing varied issues.
Armed with flawless communication and an assertive mindset, they speak logically and prefer discussing real life stories of people. From this, they learn how to resolve practical problems without feeling overwhelmed and irritated.
6. Creative bent of mind
A person with ESTP personality is creative and innovative. Being a rational thinker, they ponder over many known and unknown issues. This inner brainstorming makes them think out of the box. These individuals prefer analysis but also prefer creating novel ideas and work on them.
In most cases, their impulsivity fuels their creativity and they remain open to explore new avenues and soar high with confidence. ESTPs dislike mundane ideas that they find as monotonous and non-creative.
7. Straightforward communication style
Another key strength that these people possess is their straightforward communication style. They will never say or do things under a cover. They hate twists and turns while talking to others.
ESTPs are brutally direct when it comes to delivering advice or suggestions to someone. They do not like turnaround talking and avoid it completely. They prefer straight talk from others as well.
For an ESTP, clarity in speech is more important than anything else. They never show interest if things are not clear and distinct, just as the way they prefer.
8. Self-confident
ESTPs are confident and feel worthy of them. Although they are extroverts, they are not people pleasers. They are always self-assured and show immense respect for who they actually are.
ESTPs are humble and assertive. Their self-confidence speaks for them. They always have a can-do attitude and are proactive in their decision making policies.
They love working individually and pursue new challenges that most others will not even dare to think of and accomplish in reality.
9. Quick thinkers
ESTPs are quick, rational thinkers. They think logically and will prefer to analyze people and situations as per their past experiences. Sometimes, this quick thinking ability may backfire and they may decide on haste, making many errors in their decision making ability.
10. They’re naturally persuasive
ESTPs are people-focused. Being a typical extrovert, they have the ability to persuade others and make them think and act in diverse ways. They can make others fall into their ideas and work collaboratively.’
ESTP Weaknesses
Some of the weaknesses or blind spots that ESTPs possess are as follows:
1. Insensitive
ESTPs are known as pragmatic doers. They are not emotional fools rather they decide everything rationally and objectively. They cannot understand finer emotions and appear insensitive and rude to others.
Their feeling function is not well-developed and they find it hard to connect with others emotionally. ESTPs are not ruthless but they are firm in their speech and actions.
They cannot understand emotional drama and refrains from getting into such a complicated situation. People with ESTP personality type appear cold and affectless because they cannot express themselves emotionally.
2. Impatient
ESTPs may become too impatient if they find that others are taking a lot of time understanding a concept or situation.
AT times, they fail to understand what all other Myers Briggs types think, feel, and act differently.
ESTPs cannot tolerate delays and want quick actions to be taken on the plan already laid down beforehand.
These individuals may feel extremely frustrated if others don’t listen to their suggestions and delay the decision making process for no apparent reason.
As already mentioned, ESTPs are prompt decision makers. They hate passive people who do not want to perform well but still find their place in a team meeting.
3. Risk-taker
ESTPs are spontaneous and impulsive. At times, they may take certain risks that may cost them badly in the long run. They get busy with action and want results now. This makes them do certain things without a good thought. They may find it hard to meet the challenges that have come out of hasty decision making policies.
4. Struggles to visualize the bigger picture
ESTPs are present-focused and cannot think ahead of ‘here and now’. They cannot plan long term because they are not systematic and methodical in their approach towards life.
ESTPs are sensing personalities and rely only on sensory impressions to work with real life situations. They cannot look into the big picture of a present opportunity. In one way, they are not future-focused at all. This mainly happens due to poor intuition skills.
Being an impatient type, they often lose out on important opportunities in life. They will execute small parts of a project quite easily because of their eye for detailing. However, they will lose focus if asked to find out the future implications of the project they are doing presently.
5. Defy rules quite often
ESTPs are perceiving personalities. Thus they hate to follow strict rules and regulations. They prefer to work in free work setups where structure and methodology are not in place. ESTPs defy authority and hate to be micro-managed by others, especially in work setups.
They love to do things their way and as such can turn impatient, defiant, and rebellious if someone tries to get them in an order or structure.
6. Lack of commitment
ESTPs are commitment-phobic because neither do they understand the subtle feelings of others nor express their own vividly. They are impulsive and may get bored quite easily. Thus, they prefer not to commit to anyone, not even to their partners in personal relationships.
They may feel stuck in one place if there is nothing new in the relationship every now and then. They crave excitement and never make a promise until they are sure that the relationship is worthy for them.
7. Poor emotional skills
ESTPs struggle a lot with their emotional skills. They may enjoy the company of others in a close social network but may not relate at deep emotional levels. They love and care for their loved ones, yet remain aloof when it comes to handling too much emotional surge in an intimate bonding.
ESTPs are less expressive and cannot verbally communicate their deepest feelings for others. They may be misunderstood as insensitive and haughty but in reality, they are not. Maybe, they lack the skill and ability to make themselves emotionally available in a relationship.
8. Gets bored easily
ESTPs love thrill and excitement to fill up their daily life. They cannot work in boring work setups where they will be asked to do the same thing every day.
These individuals are energetic and reckless. They are action-oriented and prefer new things to be added in their daily lives every now and then.
9. Poor long-term planners
ESTPs know the art of staying in the present. They are not far-sighted and as such they struggle to plan ahead of their time.
ESTPs lack the ability to formulate long term plans and look into the overall approach.
These individuals are good at breaking the tasks in parts and accomplishing it skillfully, but cannot overcome long term struggles that are attached with long term plans.
10. Cannot follow orders or obey rules
ESTPs are not good at following rules and pointless regulations of the society. They will feel stuck if asked to obey society traditions. They are independent minded and cannot tolerate micromanaging by the superior at work or their spouse in an intimate relationship.
ESTP personality growth and development
Each one of the 16 personality types described in the Myers Briggs personality testing needs to undergo certain modifications in their behavior and overcome some of their weaknesses to reach the optimum potential that they already possess.
Some of the ways in which ESTPs can develop themselves are as follows:
1. Self-introspect
ESTPs will benefit from looking inwards. They need to take some time out and ponder upon the weaknesses that need to be overcome for an overall personality growth. Self-reflection allows for ‘me time’ with oneself.
Their constant focus on the outside world led them to ignore certain aspects of ‘self’ that needed a revisit.
They overlooked their weaknesses such as too much impulsiveness that led to poor decision making, or poor emotional intelligence that never allowed free expression of emotions, etc.
By self-introspection, they will gain access to those hidden parts that needed a makeover for some time now.
2. Think about the consequences of your actions
ESTPs love to take risks but at times it becomes too much for them to handle. It may lead to serious consequences as well. Thus, they should never decide hurriedly and take time to think about the various consequences of their actions.
In a way, ESTPs should spend more time analyzing the situation in depth so that errors can be minimized. They will benefit if they give a good thought of the potential consequences and then move along with their plans.
3. Thinking ahead of the present time
ESTPs live so much in the present that they cannot foresee future opportunities lying ahead of them. Thus, if they want to develop their potential fully, they should make a framework or plan of their future goals and move towards them slowly. The plan will provide them with a definite direction so that they can smoothly move towards their personal and professional goals.
4. Follow through regularly
ESTPs are so engrossed in the moment that they cannot follow through any plans that they have made. They want immediate solutions to problems and dislike waiting and seeing what is coming next in line. This urgency leads to faulty decision making at times.
They should avoid hurrying up on things that are important and learn to follow through the entire project and not only a part of it. This will allow more thoughtful and cautious decision making in future.
5. Try to abide by the rules of the game
ESTPs are flexible-minded. They follow their own rules and avoid protocols as laid down in the social structure. They prefer to do things that are innovative and out of the box. But, they may mess it up due to lack of proper planning.
It is important that they learn to follow certain important rules so that conflicts in their professional life can be minimized or removed completely.
To Sum Up
ESTPs work for immediate gratification of their needs because of their affinity for the present time. They get inspired when others appreciate their contribution in the workplace.
They value realistic and objective things that have some relevance to everyday life. Similarly, they like to work with tangible facts and not abstract ideas that they cannot quantify.
Their persuasive display of speech and socially dynamic nature makes them popular people in all types of social setups.
