What Type of Leader Are You?: Using the Enneagram System to Identify and Grow Your Leadership Strenghts and Achieve Maximum Succes

McGraw-Hill.

Introduction

This book is about leadership success—extreme success. It’s about growing by pushing your limits, personally, professionally, and organizationally. Along the leadership path, you will encounter numerous successes, but you may also face detours and challenges. Occasionally, you may have to forge your own trail through seemingly impassable places. It helps to take a cue from the sport of extreme mountain biking, where riders look on such challenges as invigorating opportunities to discover their true capabilities. I encourage you to keep that approach in mind as you work your way through the core leadership competencies in this book, challenging yourself to become the best leader you are capable of being.

Leadership excellence is one of the most critical challenges facing organizations today. Most top leaders leave their positions in three years or less under duress, even when they have had highly successful track records in previous jobs. Companies across the globe are in leadership succession crises, trying to find and/or develop sufficient leadership talent.

Why is it so difficult to find great leaders? One reason is that an individual’s prior leadership skills may not transfer to a new leadership position, company, or industry. Another factor involves the demands placed on today’s leaders. With a constantly changing business environment, a global marketplace, and the need both to get products to market quickly and to create sustainable organizations for the long run, today’s leaders are faced with confounding ambiguities and competing priorities. However, perhaps the biggest reason for the leadership shortage today is that we are not even sure what truly great leadership is, much less how to develop it.

The most helpful clue about what makes an excellent leader comes from the field of Emotional Intelligence (EQ). An individual’s EQ is the strongest predictor of that person’s leadership success, consistently outranking both traditional IQ and on-the-job experience. Of course, if you have all three—a high EQ, a high IQ, and relevant on-the-job experience from which you have learned and grown—your chances for success are even greater.

EQ is made up of two factors: intrapersonal intelligence, or the ability to know and accept oneself and to become self-managing and self-motivating, and interpersonal intelligence, or the ability to interact effectively with other people. The Enneagram—an ancient psychological and spiritual development system—is the most powerful and insightful tool available to help you develop your EQ.

The leaders with whom I have worked say that the Enneagram helps them to understand and accept themselves at a very deep level, and that it is a profound tool for developing their leadership capabilities. They find the Enneagram freeing; as one leader commented, I used to feel I was in a box. The Enneagram doesn’t put me in a box; instead, it shows me the box I’ve been in and provides a development path out of these constraints.

To that end, this book focuses on today’s most important leadership competencies and integrates them with the wisdom and insights of the Enneagram. Excellent leaders need to be skilled in the following seven core competency areas (see Figure I.1):

1. Drive for Results

2. Strive for Self-Mastery

FIGURE I.1 Core Leadership Competencies

3. Know the Business: Think and Act Strategically

4. Become an Excellent Communicator

5. Lead High-Performing Teams

6. Make Optimal Decisions

7. Take Charge of Change

In the first chapter, you will learn the Enneagram system and identify your Enneagram style. Each of the chapters that follow focuses on one leadership competency and includes the following information:

• Definition of the competency

• Description and analysis of how individuals of each Ennea-gram style demonstrate both excellence and developmental needs with respect to that competency

• Development stretches for individuals of each Enneagram style to accelerate their growth in that competency area

• Additional tips to assist everyone, regardless of his or her Enneagram style, in both personal and professional development

The final chapter provides additional tools for working on your personal and professional growth.

If your organization is to continue growing, so must you. Organizational growth requires a commitment to growth from both leaders and those whom they lead. Your challenge is to decide which leadership path you will take: no growth, moderate growth, or extreme growth (see Figure I.2).

You can, of course, take the route of no growth. If you make this decision—and be aware that making no decision is a decision— you will soon find that your organization and many of your peers have moved beyond you.

You can take the path of moderate growth, making yourself comfortable and going at your own pace. If you do, your teams and your organization will follow this rate of growth for a while, but then the organization, your peers, and your followers will begin to outpace you.

Or, you can follow the path of extreme growth. If you choose this path, you will be amazed at your capacity and at the vitality that a commitment to growth brings. You will also find that your rate of personal development and the growth rate of the organization are aligned and synchronized. There is no greater experience.

This book is intended for multiple audiences. Current and future leaders at all organizational levels can use it for their own personal and professional development. Executive coaches will find it a valuable aid in helping their clients. Training and devel-

FIGURE I.2 Choices

opment, organization development, and human resource professionals can utilize the information in this book to help them develop leadership capability within their organizations.

This book is ideally suited for companies competing in the global marketplace. The Enneagram describes people of every culture accurately. However, there can be subtle cultural nuances to the actions of individuals who come from different countries but have the same Enneagram style; thus, this book offers organizations the opportunity to create a global cadre of highly skilled leaders who share a common frame of reference and a commitment to self-development and leadership excellence.

As an organization development consultant, training professional, and executive coach for more than 30 years with clients in Fortune 500 companies, service organizations, nonprofits, and law firms, I have observed that every excellent company has excellent leadership. It is equally true that every organizational problem that I have helped to solve has required that a leader change his or her behavior. This is not to say that leadership issues are the cause of all organizational problems, but simply that effective leadership is required to solve all organizational problems.

There is, therefore, a great deal of pressure on today’s leaders, many of whom are already carrying an overwhelming amount of weight on their shoulders. Leadership is not easy. I have been a leader myself, in both for-profit and nonprofit organizations, so I understand leadership’s challenges and rewards. There were times as a leader when I never felt more fulfilled and inspired, and other times when my fatigue and frustration led me to wonder whether I even wanted to be in a leadership role.

To be a great leader requires talent, commitment, effort, and guidance. It is my hope that this book will provide that guidance to both current and future leaders and to those who support them.

Chapter 1 What Type Are You?

The Enneagram, which dates from at least 2,000 years ago and has its roots in Asia and the Middle East, derives its name from the Greek words ennea (nine) and gram (something written or drawn). The term refers to the nine points, or numbers, of the Enneagram system seen in the Enneagram symbol (Figure 1.1). This ancient system offers profound insights into the different ways in which people think, feel, and behave, since the nine different Enneagram styles represent distinct worldviews, with related patterns of thinking, feeling, and taking action. Even more important, each Enneagram style is connected to a specific high-impact development path. Thus, the accurate identification of your Enneagram style is important if you want to grow and develop as a leader and as a person.

FIGURE 1.1 Enneagram Symbol

Although each of us has only one position or number on the Enneagram and our style remains the same throughout our lifetime, our Enneagram style–based characteristics may soften or become more pro-nounced as we grow and develop. In addition, there are four other Enneagram styles that may also contribute traits to our personality. These fouradditional Enneagram styles, explained later in this chapter, do not change our core style; they merely add to our complexity as a person and can provide us with useful development opportunities.

How to Determine Your Enneagram Style

Although there are several helpful Enneagram tests currently available, none of them will determine your Enneagram style with absolute certainty. Ultimately, you must rely on your own self-assessment to identify your Enneagram style. While you know yourself best, including what motivates you and drives your actions, you may be so used to thinking, feeling, or behaving in certain ways that you may not even notice some of your customary patterns. As a result, the process of determining your Enneagram style can take you on a self-reflective journey that can be invaluable to your growth as a leader. Having to identify your Enneagram style yourself will not only help you in learning the Enneagram system, but also help you become more introspective and objective about yourself.

In this chapter, you will first gain information about each Ennea-gram style that includes the following:

• A graphic image and style description

• The core focus associated with the style

• The common labels used for the style

• The style's four basic issues

• Leadership paradigms for each style, along with related strengthsand areas for development

• Questions to ask yourself to assess whether this is your style

After you understand the nine Enneagram styles in more depth and begin to identify your Enneagram style, additional information about the Enneagram system will be provided.

The Nine Enneagram Styles

As you read through the nine Enneagram style descriptions that follow, keep this question in the back of your mind: Which of the Enneagram styles most accurately describesme?

Ones

Basic Issues for Ones

PERFECTIONISM Ones continuously compare what is to what should be. They appreciate something that is exceptionally well done—for example, a play, a symphony, a book, a project, or anything else that exemplifies quality to them. Ones hold both themselves and others accountable for acting responsibly and for measuring up to their high standards.

A RIGHT WAY Ones believe that every problem has a correct solution; they are quick to react to a situation by offering what they believe is the right approach or the right answer. Even when Ones do understand that the correct answer is rarely black and white, they will still assert that there is one right way by saying, Nothing is ever black and white. It is almost always gray.

RESENTMENT Because being responsible is an overarching value for Ones, they usually approach their work with diligence, demon-strating qualities such as follow-through, timeliness, and attention to detail. When others do not display these same characteristics, Ones often feel resentful and think, Why do I work so hard, when others seem to get away with a less than stellar performance?Resentment can build up in Ones, and they tend to express it through flares of anger that often take others by surprise. Most Ones need to feel righteous or justified in their outrage in order to express the deep-seated anger that frequently lies below the surface.

JUDGMENT AND SELF-IMPROVEMENT Ones have a highly active inner critic that can be relentless, telling them what they have done wrong, what they should have said, and how they ought to have behaved. The self-recriminating inner voice, which is usually on 85 percent or more of the time, has a purpose: to keep Ones from making mistakes. This internal judge also assesses what has gone well and what can be done for self-improvement.

Ones also tend to be judgmental of others, expressing this through explicit verbal criticism and body language. Even Ones who do not appear to be critical may, in fact, simply bekeeping their thoughts to themselves. For example, when a One was asked why she did not seem to be overtly critical of others, she responded, Oh, but you should hear what's going on inside my head! The One's judgment of others may also be positive—for example, Ones can be thrilled when they observe excellence in someone's thinking process, behavior, or work product.

Ones: Leadership Paradigm and Related Characteristics

PARADIGM: A leader's job is to set clear goals and inspire others to achieve the highest quality.

Place a check next to the leadership characteristics that describe you well.

QUESTIONS TO ASK YOURSELF TO DETERMINE

WHETHER YOU MIGHT BE AN ENNEAGRAM STYLE ONE

1. Do I have a voice or message in my head, like a tape recorder, that continually judges me and other people in terms of what has been done wrong, what has been done well, and what needs to be improved?

2. Do the four basic issues—perfectionism, a right way, resentment, and judgment and self-improvement—apply to me?

3. Does the Style One leadership paradigm fit my view of leadership?

4. Did I check 10 or more items in Areas of Strength and Areas for Development?

Twos

Basic Issues for Twos

RELATIONSHIP ORIENTATION Most Twos believe that personal relationships are the most important part of their lives. It is quite common for Twos to have many close friendships, with the Twos providing support, advice, or whatever they believe another person needs. Although Twos often feel that others are dependent on them, they themselves become dependent on their relationships for personal affirmation and a sense of self-worth.

FOCUS ON OTHER PEOPLE Twos usually display an intuitive ability to understand what others need and a willingness to provide what is needed. Their capacity to reach out to other people can be either generalized (for example, anyone who appears in need) or highly selective (specific individuals who the Two believes have high status). In the latter case, Twos will alter their image and behavior to meet the other person's perception of desirability. Generally, Twos instinctively know how to present themselves so that others will like them.

DENIAL OF OWN NEEDS Because Twos focus so intently on others, they often pay little attention to themselves. When asked what they themselves need, most Twos either become confused or say, I need to be needed. Since they are out of touch with their needs, Twos often have difficulty getting those needs met directly. Instead, they give to others, often unaware that they want something in return.

PRIDE Twos typically take great pride in their self-image as a good person and in their ability to know what people need or situations require better than most other people do. Although they may be quite competent at orchestrating situations and managing people (often behind the scenes), there is a downside to this quality: while Twos become quite elated when things go well, they can become deflated and angry when events do not turn out as planned.

Twos: Leadership Paradigm and Related Characteristics

PARADIGM: A leader's job is to assess the strengths andweaknesses of team members and to motivate and facilitate people toward the achievement of organizational goals.

Place a check next to the leadership characteristics that describe you well.

QUESTIONS TO ASK YOURSELF TO DETERMINE

WHETHER YOU MIGHT BE AN ENNEAGRAM STYLE TWO

1. Do I focus on others rather than on myself, and do I intuitively know what someone else needs, but have a hard time articulating my own needs, even to myself?

2. Do the four basic issues—relationship orientation, focus on other people, denial of own needs, and pride—apply to me?

3. Does the Style Two leadership paradigm fit my view of leadership?

4. Did I check 10 or more items in Areas of Strength and Areas for Development?

Threes

Basic Issues for Threes

IMAGE Threes are known as the chameleons of the Enneagram, because they can change their image to match a particular situation. They do this not to blend in or fit in, but rather to create a positive impression—usually one of self-confidence, optimism, and success. This shape shifting is more intuitive than conscious; for instance, a Three might say, I'm just able to read my audience well.

GOAL ORIENTATION Threes focus on achieving results, which tends to make them highly productive. However, their productivity can come at the expense of their and others’ feelings. Threes usually perceive emotions, especially those of sadness or fear, as having the potential to derail their accomplishments, and they can become quite agitated when obstacles appear in their paths.

SUCCESS Because their sense of self-worth depends on their doing a job successfully, Threes tend to focus on doing rather than being. They believe they are valued for what they accomplish rather than for who they are. Ever active, most Threes are likely to respond with confusion if it is suggested that they might spend less time doing and more time simply being. Being? they might ask. What is that?

FAILURE AVOIDANCE In order to avoid failing, Threes often pursue activities in which they are competent and are therefore likely to be successful. If and whenthey fail—as everyone does at some point—Threes may still say, I've never really failed, or they may reframe the failure as a learning experience.

Threes: Leadership Paradigm and Related Characteristics

PARADIGM: A leader's job is to create environments thatachieve results because people understand the organization's goals and structure.

Place a check next to the leadership characteristics that describe you well.

QUESTIONS TO ASK YOURSELF TO DETERMINE

WHETHER YOU MIGHT BE AN ENNEAGRAM STYLE THREE

1. Do I do all the things I do so that others will value and respect me?

2. Do the four basic issues—image, goal orientation, success, and failure avoidance—apply to me?

3. Does the Style Three leadership paradigm fit my view of leadership?

4. Did I check 10 or more items in Areas of Strength and Areas for Development?

Fours

Basic Issues for Fours

EXTREMES OF EMOTIONAL LIFE Fours tend to live at the extremes of the emotional spectrum, with depression at one end and hyper-activity at the other. Some may swing between the two. Fours believe that their intensity of experiencing life's highs and lows far surpasses the ordinary happiness for which others settle. Many Fours give the impression that they believe the statement: I am my feelings.

LONGING Fours idealize that which they believe is beyond their grasp, romanticizing it and/or yearning for it. As a result, the commonplace can seem boring and ordinary by comparison. Most Fours think of melancholy as a positive, or at least not a negative, emotion that makes them feel both in touch with their deepest self and very much alive.

AUTHENTICITY Fours are on a continuous quest for the true, the real, and the authentic. Their primary focus is on the authenticity of their own self-expression (usually through the arts or interper-sonal communication) and the genuine connections they feel with other people. Searching for meaning through emotional expression, Fours tend to express themselves through personal stories and often believe that the world of personal experience and feelings is what is real.

COMPARISONS Blatantly or subtly, consciously or unconsciously, Fours compare themselves to others on a regular basis. As a result of these constant comparisons, Fours conclude that they are defective, superior, or both. When Fours assess that they fall short in comparison to another, they experience envy. Envy refers to the sense that Others have something that I am missing. Why not me? as opposed to jealousy, which refers to They have it, and I want it!

Fours: Leadership Paradigm and Related Characteristics

PARADIGM: A leader's job is to create organizations that give people meaning and purpose so that they are inspired to do excellent work.

Place a check next to the leadership characteristics that describe you well.

QUESTIONS TO ASK YOURSELF TO DETERMINE

WHETHER YOU MIGHT BE AN ENNEAGRAM STYLE FOUR

1. When I feel something very strongly, do I hold on to my emotions intensely for long periods of time, often replaying my thoughts, feelings, and sensations?

2. Do the four basic issues—extremes of emotional life, longing, authenticity, and comparisons—apply to me?

3. Does the Style Four leadership paradigm fit my view of leadership?

4. Did I check 10 or more items in Areas of Strength and Areas for Development?

Fives

Basic Issues for Fives

THIRST FOR KNOWLEDGE Fact-focused, objective, and analytical,Fives are fascinated by information, especially in their areas of interest. It is not unusual forFives to have an extensive personal library in a room that is entirely their own. This library, which may contain books, CDs, DVDs, or magazines, is not just a storehouse of knowledge, but a personal retreat—the place where the Five can be alone and free of external demands.

PRIVACY Fives usually crave privacy, as it allows them to recharge and ready themselves for interactions with others. At one extreme,a Five can be a hermit, leading a reclusive life of the mind. On the other hand,