The Street-Wise Strategist:
A Counterphobic Six

"I come from a working class family," said Ray, "and both parents were strict, so I was rebellious and roamed the streets. I had friends on the honor roll and friends on dope. I was raised to give no quarter: if you showed that things bothered you, it was considered a fault. So in a meeting where others are getting really excited, I might go the other way, and keep it in." 

Eager to learn more about himself in the face of a potential career setback, Ray went on: "My parents weren't readers and they didn't have any money for college so and I never went to college. I went off on my own at age 17, and took up some pretty risky occupations until I started here. When I was a construction worker they'd send me to the top because they knew I'd try anything. Eventually I had my own construction business, but I was given an offer here I couldn't refuse, though I never expected to rise as high in the organization as I have. My former boss, Warren, was constantly putting me in undefined situations. The upshot is that until a couple of months ago I wasn't sure about my own competence. I think I'm intelligent -- at least no one's left me in the dust -- but I'm probably not above average."

Ray was cursed or blessed, depending on your point of view, with an extremely intelligent and visionary advocate in Warren, along with a blue-collar background that left Ray a little uneasy with the niceties of corporate life. Measured against Warren, Ray came off as more of an implementer than a visionary. But with a little drawing out, it became apparent Ray was bright and a tenacious learner with a highly-tuned curiosity. He was overly responsive to others' opinions of him, though, and tended to underplay his talents. 

When I asked him what he wanted from the development process, he said, "Warren told me I need to be more creative, more strategic and analytical. I don't think others see my curiosity, because I'm shy and because I don't want to appear stupid. So rather than ask a question, I'll go look it up myself. And they probably don't see my creativity because a lot of times when I have an idea I assume everyone else has already had it. Then somebody else will bring up the same idea and people will love it and I'll kick myself for holding back."

I said he seemed pretty smart to me, but he still hedged: "I feel I'm really learning and changing, but I may hide from people how hard I have to work to do something. When I decided to play golf, I first went to a driving range and hit balls until my hands bled, then played by myself until I could break 100. After that I read a book on golf, then went to a professional instructor for a whole week. It was only after I could play well that I began playing with people from work."

Ray worried about his management withdrawing their support. He pointed out that the Senior Committee, to which Warren belonged, "does thumbs up and thumbs down on people." And while Ray trusted Warren ("because it doesn't make any sense not to") and found him to be a good advocate, he also said Warren was "a practical and political creature." "And," Ray continued, "he's the last person you would want to have a decision made against you. People trust his open demeanor more than they should because he can be hard."

Finally, Ray felt in a bind because Warren was telling him "You need an education," but Ray had recently been assigned to another boss who was saying, "Don't go do anything that takes you too long away from work." Furthermore, Ray felt he'd been sidelined with this move because there was now one level of management between him and Warren: "I dealt with the move in a professional manner, but I was seething inside and I did everything I could to check out my options. It took me six months to begin feeling good about myself again. I started to say 'take this job and shove it' but then I discovered the golden handcuffs."

Warren was the first person I interviewed after talking to Ray, and he was very positive about Ray's potential except in the area of strategic analysis. "Ray's a great human being," he acknowledged, "very honest and forthright, and he has great street smarts. That's gotten him a long way, but it can't carry him any farther. I told him it was my opinion as well as others' that he needs to get some educational skills, to be a more sophisticated when it comes to using his quiver of analytical skills. This doesn't necessarily mean getting a college degree but it does mean tailoring a pretty ambitious educational experience to fill the gaps. We said we'd pay for it, but that was a couple of years ago, and he still hasn't taken advantage of it."

Ray was frankly relieved to learn about the Enneagram. He would otherwise have been more reluctant to share his anxiety about his competence. But the relief of being able to "name" his style of operating, and to understand he wasn't alone, led him to agree when I suggested he'd been shooting himself in the foot: Warren's suggestion to take an executive course in strategic management was clearly to Ray's benefit, but Ray kept finding reasons not to do it. I could see Ray would practically walk a tightrope to prove he wasn't afraid, but he'd been reluctant to test himself in an academic environment. In my written feedback summary I referred to Palmer's The Enneagram in Love & Work, weaving in additional comments that applied specifically to his situation. Also embedded in this summary was the solution to his dilemma:

"Sixes may unconsciously overvalue the opinions and perceptions of those in a position to influence their fate, while consciously insisting on their independence. They know implicitly it's part of their development to do so, but they may overdo it, 'toughing it out' and convincing themselves the opinions of others aren't important. Their self-doubt is particularly likely to emerge when their intelligence or conceptual ability is questioned by someone in authority. On the other hand, they want to know what people are thinking, because that places the opportunity for action in their own hands vs. leaving them powerless."

I gave Ray excerpts from Kenichi Ohmae's The Mind of the Strategist and coached him on specific components of analytical and conceptual skills, giving him concrete feedback on how he demonstrated these skills to me. When the subject was no longer an unknown to him and he could see he wasn't a total wash-out, Ray became enthusiastic about collecting data from others. We created a survey questionnaire to assess his analytical and conceptual skills, based on rating scales from Spencer and Spencer's Competence at Work: Models for Superior Performance. We sent this questionnaire to more than 30 people: co-workers, senior management, external colleagues, and even competitors.

As I'd predicted to Ray, he was a solid citizen in the eyes of these respondents; someone with the analytical and conceptual skills of a good strategist:

• On analytical thinking (breaking a situation down systematically, seeing multiple causes, making complex plans/analyses) the average rating was 5 on a 7-point scale (this would have been even higher, but the four lowest raters acknowledged they'd not had personal contact with Ray in several years).

• On conceptual thinking (identifying underlying patterns, seeing the larger picture, creating new concepts) the average rating was 6 on an 8-point scale (again, the raters who pulled the score down from a higher average were those whose observations were "out-dated" or "insufficient").

Ray was surprised and pleased by these scores and the written comments rang true to him: "He has a natural instinct to distill a situation down to some simple core elements that can be acted upon; he's very good on his feet, is in tune with what's going on all the time -- you can sense the gears turning; he's very intelligent, and doesn't confine his approach to 'here and now' but always looks for the implications of decisions to other areas of the organization; he's 'street wise' and usually anticipates potential roadblocks by developing 'what-if' scenarios -- he always assesses the likelihood of ideas or concepts being diverted, enhanced, or threatened by the personal traits of the individuals involved or affected; he's an excellent long-range planner who effectively orchestrates concepts into strategies for execution." Ray particularly agreed with one comment: "He should probably have a more sophisticated conceptual process, but he provides good advice based on his experience and proper investigation."

Bolstered by this new perspective on himself, Ray summoned up the courage to meet with the key faculty advisor for the local university's strategic leadership program, and discovered his work experience more than satisfied the pre-requisites. Six months after he started the course we had a follow-up conversation. "Warren told me my goals and objectives for this quarter were the best he'd ever seen," Ray said, "but his reaction wasn't as important to me as it used to be. I feel good about what I've accomplished, and I do plan to challenge him in a non-threatening way to help restore my credibility with other senior managers. But whatever happens to my career, I'm comfortable with myself in a way I've never been before."