Many of us classify our personality types as introverted or extroverted. And we can be quite rabid about the distinction, congregating with our fellow introverts or extroverts and enumerating the reasons our personality type is superior.
But in reality, there is one group of personalities that is most successful of all. And they are not introverts or extroverts. Actually, they’re a little bit of both.
Ambiverts are individuals who fall somewhere in the middle on the introverted-extroverted spectrum. Sometimes, they’re the life of the party ― other times, they crave being alone. This personality type is much more common than you might think: As many as 38 percent of us are somewhere in between introvert and extrovert, personality psychologist Robert R. McCrae previously told The Huffington Post.
As AsapSCIENCE explains in the video above, there are many measured differences between introverts and extroverts. But when it comes to success, ambiverts may have them both beat. According to a 2013 research paper by The Wharton School’s Adam M. Grant, call center employees who didn’t identify as either introverts or extroverts generated the most revenue. Grant dubbed this “the ambivert advantage,” because ambiverts were able to listen better than pure extroverts and assert themselves better than pure introverts.
While this example is strictly related to sales acumen, ambiverts have personality traits that set them up for other types of success. They’re flexible, balanced and can connect with a variety of people. Self-aware ambiverts are able to move between extroversion and introversion depending on the situation.
If you’re not strongly introverted or extroverted, you might be somewhere in the middle. While you might miss out on some pretty great swag, you’ll be set up for success. Sounds like a pretty good tradeoff to us.
