# The psychology of IT professionals

- **Episode:** [135](https://agents.truthliesandwork.com/episodes/135.md) (2024-10-10)
- **Type:** panel-interview
- **Tags:** it-professionals, personality-types, psychology, workplace
- **Time:** 11:54–14:14 (start 714s)
- **Listen:** [https://truthliesandwork.com/135?t=714](https://truthliesandwork.com/135?t=714)

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[11:54] Al Elliott: Leigh, quick question. Do people in IT have certain personality types, or do certain personality types suit a job in tech?
[12:01] Leanne Elliott: What—
[12:02] Al Elliott: give me, give me the psychology, psychological breakdown of it
[12:06] Leanne Elliott: Well, the psychological breakdown is— first questions first. Do people in IT have certain personality traits? Yes, there is some evidence for that. So IT professionals have been shown to have high levels of curiosity, as Nick and John were talking about there, um, high levels of tough-mindedness. Open-mindedness and agreeableness. So what that basically means is they're a bit more logical, very good at problem solving, but also good team players. They do also tend to be lower in traits such as conscientiousness, extraversion, and emotional stability, and that does fit in with the nature of IT work. If we think about it, it involves lots of analytical problem solving and very focused tasks. But it is important to remember that IT roles are diverse, as we've heard. So there is a big difference between, say, a software developer and an IT project manager. So different roles might attract different types of people. As for whether certain personality types are better suited to tech roles, that's where things get a little bit tricky. So some traits, as we've said, like being logical, being adaptable, do help in tech. Being tough-minded and agreeable is useful because IT work requires logical thinking and some level of teamwork. Openness, another really valuable trait since tech does involve lots of learning of new tools, innovation, and adapting to change. But we need to be really careful about relying too heavily on personality to predict success in a job, because while personality may draw us to certain occupations, our jobs can also shape our personality. So studies have shown that over time, job demands can have an impact. For example, consistently facing high workloads could make a person more open, or even more sociable, perhaps they're asking for some help from their colleagues, regardless of how they started out. So yes, certain personality traits can make someone more suited to the world of tech, but it's only one factor of many. It's really about how your personality interacts with the environment you're working in, the skills, experience that you have, and also the company culture too. That all plays a part