I think that anything like MB that whittles a person down to an easily identifiable category can be dangerous only if people take them too seriously. They're good prompts for self-reflection and I've yet to find someone that earnestly answered the questions and then thought that the assessment they were given was wildly inaccurate. Also, it's worth noting that they're all quite different. For example, if I were told I was the personality style that was assessed to crafty, I wouldn't buy it for a moment. In regard to the five categories the Sales Executive Council established, if you read the book Challenger Selling they make it pretty clear that most people have different gradients of each style. But, it's been my experience that their claim that Challenger's are the most successful is spot on. As someone that has made a living being able to read personality styles in order to quickly create a buying environment, I know that there is validity to these index tests. Are they static? No. But they can provide insight in to yourself and others. And... like you said, they are fun.
First off, it is not at all difficult to generate a text that sounds like it fits you - especially with a questionnaire of over 60 questions as an input. Second, for me 'taking it too seriously' is taking it serious at all. To put it bluntly, it's a completely made up test, based on 8 completely random traits, that only allows you to label / categorize / put people in boxes. People are complex, are changing over time and act different in different situations. All factors that the M-B completely ignores. I don't think any index can fix this properly, unless you want seven billion boxes to put people in. From what I know about you and what you do, I would argue that you make much more use of experience, people knowledge and skill than whatever simplified label you can tag on them in the first five minutes. Once you've concluded that a person is, say, a sensing introvert, it becomes very hard not to fall prey to selection bias and framing. Hence my opinion that these kinds of tests are just toxic.As someone that has made a living being able to read personality styles in order to quickly create a buying environment, I know that there is validity to these index tests.
Let me be clear, I don't think the tests are anything but a device to get people thinking and discussing our different ways of experiencing the world and recognizing that others have different motivating factors. I phrased the part you quoted poorly. The validity isnt the test, it's that we all have different "styles" as I mentioned before, these are not static. I don't think we would disagree on much regarding these except hat I find them to be much more benign than you do, perhaps because I've never known someone to really take them too seriously. That said, I think everyone wants to think they're a precious, unique flower when in reality, yes on a level you are but on another level you can be pretty damn predictable.
I really wish I had omitted any mention of MB. It was an afterthought in a post about the death of relationship and solution based selling.
I've always considered the MB to be better than most systems, because it uses several individual axis addressed independently. None of the traits exclude someone from having any of the other traits (besides the polar opposite). One thing the test you linked doesn't do so well is focus on the gradients of each. I'm pretty strongly introverted and intuitive, but the other two are rather borderline, switching depending on timing and the test. From my understanding, it was originally developed as a tool for psychoanalysis. By placing the patient in a category, the psychoanalyst could then more easily focus on releveant problems. However, Jung's theories, off which the MB is based, have largely been passed over in the academic world. So, while a detailed analysis done by a professional (as opposed to a 12 minute test) could be useful for a patient and therapist, the use of MB for employment purposes is slightly terrifying. Plus, apparently even as the theory was first being published, there were questions as to its validity and that of the methods used to arrive at it.