Empowering career search and enrichment

Written by Catherine Rains

Now here is a trick question if I ever saw one! To answer this question you have to look at how each preference goes about approaching a project with a deadline. When a student with a Judging preference is assigned a term paper, they usually begin working on it soon after it is assigned. They choose a topic quickly, outline what needs to be done, and start working through all the steps. In fact, they keep working these steps in a fairly focused manner until at some point they decide they need to get this off their to-do list. So then they focus their energy to get this project done. Consequently, they often get the paper complete long before the deadline.


Our student with a P preference, on the other hand, also begins working on the paper soon after assigned, however much of the actual work is in their head. They are thinking about the topic, maybe researching different ideas for it, talking it over with fellow students or their teacher, writing down ideas for how they want to approach the topic, etc. Then close to the deadline, and this could be a week before, three days before, or the night before, they get a flood of focused energy, and they bring all of their ideas together to write the paper in an efficient manner, finishing it on time.

Therefore, the question isn’t who gets things done quicker, but instead: when does each preference get energized to complete a project? Judging preferences are energized in the beginning and Perceiving preferences are energized at the end, with both using their energy when they are most efficient. So the answer to the original question is: Judging preferences are “quicker” in the beginning of a project, and Perceiving preferences are “quicker” near the deadline of the project. The trick is to tap into our student’s natural way of getting energized so that they are do things in a manner that is most efficient and energizing for them.