By Peter Barrett - Executive Coach
Intro
So what is the point of understanding personality types? Since everyone is unique, the idea of cramming people into categories seems inherently wrong. And they can appear either too complex or too vague to be meaningful – grab bags anyone can read anything into.
You may have heard these objections before. They are valid objections but they miss the mark.
The behaviour of others – and even our own behaviour – is at times strange and unsettling. The more insight we have of ourselves and others the better – understanding ourselves and others should make us happier.
Identifying the Enneagram Personality Type (pronounced ANY- a – gram) is a powerful tool that we utilise in coaching at The Coaching Room. It provides the opportunity to ‘zoom in’ on aspects of our client’s personality that they may like …or possibly dislike. The door is open for an honest assessment of their current way of being (CWOB) in the world.
The problem is that while everyone wants insight into others, few people are as willing to look so intently at themselves. We would like to be able to figure out people as if we had x-ray vision while not wanting others to see our weaknesses and shortcomings.
These hidden or suppressed aspects of our personality (the stuff we don’t like!) can hold us back. It is difficult to be an authentic, fully expressed person if we refuse to see ourselves for who we really are.
How can we acquire the knowledge and sensitivity we need to put this into practice? How can we develop insight so that we can lead fuller, happier lives? We believe the Enneagram is the map of human nature that best suits this purpose and therefore becomes a powerful coaching tool.
What is the Enneagram?
The Enneagram is a distillation of teachings from several schools of spiritual wisdom, combined with insights from modern psychology. It has been in existence (in varying forms) for thousands of years.
The organising principle of the Enneagram is simple:
There are 9 personality types - 3 personality types in each of the 3 core groups (or Triads) of thinking, feeling and instinctive.
The Enneagram’s three Triads specify whether your fundamental psychological orientation, which includes positives and negative traits, has to do with your emotion and self image (if so you are in the Feeling triad) or with your thought processes and how you find security (if so you are in the Thinking Triad) or with your gut instincts and how you relate to the world (if so you are in the Instinctive Triad).
We can characterise the resulting 9 personality types very simply (for now).
In the feeling Triad the types are the Helper (type 2) – the encouraging, demonstrative, possessive types, the Achiever (3) – the ambitious, pragmatic, image-conscious type and the Individualist (4) – the sensitive, self absorbed, depressive type.
In the Thinking Triad we see the Investigator (5) – the perceptive, cerebral, provocative type, the Loyalist (6) – the committed, dutiful, suspicious type and the Enthusiast (7) – the spontaneous, fun loving, excessive type.
In the Instinctive Triad we find the Challenger (8) – the self confident, assertive, confrontational type, the Peacemaker (9) – the pleasant, easygoing, complacent type and the Reformer (1) – the rational, idealistic, orderly type.
Obviously no one person fits the type description exactly but what it does indicate is what predominantly drives us. We then have the opportunity to determine whether we are being driven (subjective to our personality - stuck) or whether we are the driver (objective to our personality - growing).
Levels of Development
As previously mentioned, and illustrated in the type descriptions, each type has positive and negative traits. It can be challenging for us to accept the more negative aspects of our personality and sometimes frustrating for us as we do not know why we react as we do to issues in our lives (sometimes in a positive, healthy way and sometimes in a negative, unhealthy way).
To assist in our understanding, acknowledged Enneagram authorities Don Richard Riso and Russ Hudson, formulated the 9 levels of development within each personality type.
The analysis of each type begins with a description of healthy traits, then moves to its average traits and then to its unhealthy traits. Using this additional information it is possible to identify where a person lies along the Levels of Development of the personality type and to better understand that whilst behaviour may differ greatly in a given circumstance (healthy and unhealthy) the differences can be identified on the Levels of Development continuum.
In short, we may, at different times display healthy and unhealthy aspects of our personality type but the different type and level descriptions allow us to identify at what level we are at most of the time (our CWOB).
Importantly our position in type and level of development is not static, they are open ended allowing for psychological growth. This introduces the concept of how the personality types are linked and the relationship between types assists us to denote the Direction of Integration (towards health and self-actualisation) and which is often synonymous with our desired New Way of Being (NWOB).
In summary
The Enneagram assists us in seeing the habitual nature of our thoughts, reactions and behaviours and as we see they often work against our best interest, we find the serenity and freedom to let go of them, thus opening the possibility of a richer, more fulfilling life.
Indeed, observing our fears, hurts and weaknesses without judgment and without justification is one of the most compassionate things we can do for ourselves and it frees us to extend this gift to others.
For coaches, the Enneagram is a valuable tool in helping us to understand how and why our client may react as they do in a given circumstance, helping them understand themselves better and to formulate their NWOB.
Coaching Room coaches understand the uniqueness of each of our clients whilst recognising that we all possess common personality traits. This can assist our client in understanding themselves better and how they relate to others - leading to a happier, more rewarding life!
For more information about The Enneagram and how it is used in Coaching, or to engage or talk with Peter Barrett and The Coaching Room, call us on 1300 858 089.
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