Sunday, September 4, 2022

Coaching for Managers: Helping Employees Loosen their Personality Traps

I've almost finished revising a small handbook for managers that I created for a client company more than a decade ago--a slant on change that's common among psychologists but I haven't seen addressed in other Enneagram books except my own: a detailed version, with business examples, of why it doesn't work to hit someone while saying "Don't hit!"  

The premise here is for managers to approach each employee from the perspective of the employee's key Enneagram fixation with the goal of helping to loosen their fixed point of view and broaden their perspective. For example, if you're coaching someone who's stuck in black and white thinking, it's ineffective in the long run to say, "You're taking the wrong approach here." 

That employee already thinks in terms of right/wrong, and while they may comply with a specific instruction, you won't be helping them loosen the shackles of Enneagram point One, and different versions of their being too judgmental a voice on the team will continue to show up.

More in Out of the Box Coaching with the Enneagram