Out of
the Box Coaching and
Breakthroughs with the Enneagram,
Mary R. Bast, Ph.D.
Copyright © 1999.
All rights reserved. Revised:
July 21, 2010
Case Description: Style Six
Gary Schwab, Director of Operations, had been a loyal supporter of his company through many years of industry changes. A great defender of his people, Gary held himself to high management standards and saw himself as "the glue that holds people together" through times of stressful change. With his team of peers he was often the one to point to problems in their process, and often to the group's benefit, though some of them would prefer to stick to the business side of things.The people who worked for him admired the fact that he encouraged them to challenge him, but his own manager wasn't quite so open. It drove Gary crazy that his peers would agree when something was a problem, but in senior staff meetings everyone else just "nodded and smiled." Gary couldn't stand it -- suddenly he'd blurt out his concerns.
He saw himself as practical and honest (and a good contingency planner) -- his boss saw him as negative, complaining, and resistant to change! Gary's development work included some skills in positive reframing, but the primary shift for him was in recognizing his pattern of focusing primarily on the negative. As he learned to balance that focus of attention, his whole perspective shifted.