Personality Plus

Personality Plus is the name of a book by Florence Littauer (ISBN 1854245090).
This article is intended to understand personality types for improved communication.

What we talk is about four key personality types. They are generalizations - which means they are never exactly right, because people seldom fit into exactly one type of personality. However, when mixing profiles the fit can be accurate.

Here are the principles in practice.

Choleric: This is the commander-type. Cholerics are dominant, strong, decisive, stubborn and even arrogant.
Melancholy: This is the mental-type. Their typical behaviour involves thinking, assessing, making lists,
evaluating the positives and negatives, and general analysis of facts.
Sanguine: This is the social-type. They enjoy fun, socializing, chatting, telling stories - and are fond of promising
the world, because that’s the friendly thing to do.
Phlegmatic: This is the flat-type. They are indifferent, unexcitable and relaxed.

None of these types is specifically positive or negative - the point is they all have their upsides and their downsides.
A Choleric is great at getting things done, but they can run rough-shod over others. They are decisive and stubborn.
A Melancholy is fantastic at planning, and making sure things happen, although sometimes they can paralyse themselves with over-analysis. Lists and "doing things the right way" are characteristics of this personality type.
A Sanguine gets on great with people and can get others excited about goals, but you can’t always rely on them to get things done. They love interacting with others and feel it is their role to keep people entertained. They have a tendency to over-promise and under-deliver.
A Phlegmatic is neutral - they tend not to actively upset people, but their indifference can really frustrate people. They try not to make decisions, and generally go for the status quo.

Understanding which personality profile (or profiles) best describes a person will help you appreciate who they are, and why they react they do. But the real skill comes in understanding the way your type interacts with their type, and taking advantage of that. This is perhaps best covered through examples:
A Choleric might get frustrated by a Phlegmatic who doesn’t seem to want to get things done now. This pairing actually works well, though, because Cholerics tend to tell people what to do, and Phlegmatics tend to do what they are told. This coupling often have relationships with each other - and what is interesting is that although the Choleric will be frustrated by the Phlegmatic’s refusal to make decisions, their own behavious is likely to make the other even less prone to make decisions!
Melancholies might make lists and work through them point by point, and get frustrated by Sanguines who tend to bounce from one idea to the next, often without completing the first.

A simplification might be that a Choleric likes it "my way", a Melancholy likes it "the right way", a Sanguine likes it "the fun way", and a Phlegmatic likes it "any way".