The full form of INTJ is Introversion, Intuition, Thinking, Judgment.

INTJ (introverted, intuitive, thinking, and judging) is one of the 16 personality types identified by a personality assessment called the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI). Sometimes referred to as the “Architect,” or the “Strategist,” people with INTJ personalities are highly analytical, creative and logical.1 According to psychologist David Keirsey, developer of the Keirsey Temperament Sorter, approximately one to four percent of the population has an INTJ personality type.

The MBTI is one of the most popular psychological assessments, but critics have argued that it lacks both validity and reliability.2 If you take the MBTI, be sure to use caution when considering the meaning of your results.

You can learn more about the INTJ personality in this overview. However, this should not be interpreted as health, psychological, or professional career advice.

Key INTJ Characteristics

• INTJs tend to be introverted and prefer to work alone.
• INTJs look at the big picture and like to focus on abstract information rather than concrete details.
• INTJs place greater emphasis on logic and objective information rather than subjective emotions.
• INTJs like their world to feel controlled and ordered so they prefer to make plans well in advance.

To outsiders, INTJs may appear to project an aura of “definiteness”, of self-confidence. This self-confidence, sometimes mistaken for simple arrogance by the less decisive, is actually of a very specific rather than a general nature; its source lies in the specialized knowledge systems that most people of this type start building at an early age. When it comes to their own areas of expertise — and INTJs can have several — they will be able to tell you almost immediately whether or not they can help you, and if so, how. INTJs know what they know, and perhaps still more importantly, they know what they don’t know.

People of this type are perfectionists, with a seemingly endless capacity for improving upon anything that takes their interest. What prevents them from becoming chronically bogged down in this pursuit of perfection is the pragmatism so characteristic of the type: INTJs apply (often ruthlessly) the criterion “Does it work?” to everything from their own research efforts to the prevailing social norms. This in turn produces an unusual independence of mind, freeing them from the constraints of authority, convention, or sentiment for its own sake.

INTJs are known as the “Systems Builders” of the types, perhaps in part because they possess the unusual trait combination of imagination and reliability. Whatever system this type happens to be working on is for them the equivalent of a moral cause to an INFJ; both perfectionism and disregard for authority may come into play, as INTJs can be unsparing of both themselves and the others on the project. Anyone considered to be “slacking,” including superiors, will lose their respect — and will generally be made aware of this; INTJs have also been known to take it upon themselves to implement critical decisions without consulting their supervisors or co-workers. On the other hand, they do tend to be scrupulous and even-handed about recognizing the individual contributions that have gone into a project, and have a gift for seizing opportunities which others might not even notice.

In the broadest terms, what INTJs “do” tends to be what they “know”. Typical INTJ career choices are in the sciences and engineering, but they can be found wherever a combination of intellect and incisiveness are required (e.g., law, some areas of academia). People of this type can rise to management positions when they are willing to invest time in marketing their abilities as well as enhancing them, and (whether for the sake of ambition or the desire for privacy) many also find it useful to learn to simulate some degree of surface conformism in order to mask their inherent unconventionality.

Personal relationships, particularly romantic ones, can be the INTJ’s Achilles heel. While they are capable of caring deeply for others (usually a select few), and are willing to spend a great deal of time and effort on a relationship, the knowledge and self-confidence that make them so successful in other areas can suddenly abandon or mislead them in interpersonal situations.

(INTJ stands for Introvert, iNtuitive, Thinking, Judging and represents individual’s preferences in four dimensions characterising personality type, according to Jung’s and Briggs Myers’ theories of personality type.)