James Owens on Using the Ennegram at Work | GP 87

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Image of James Owens. On this therapist podcast, James Owens talks about using the enneagram at work.

What benefits can the Enneagram bring to the staff of a business? Can the Enneagram encourage effective teamwork and interpersonal compassion? How can the Enneagram be used in the workplace?

In this podcast episode, Alison Pidgeon speaks with James Owens about Using the Enneagram at Work.

Podcast Sponsor: Brighter Vision

An image of Brighter Vision Web Solutions is featured as the sponsor on The Practice of the Practice Podcast, a therapist podcast. Brighter Vision builds all in one websites for therapists.

How would you like to fall into cash this month? Every year, my friends over at Brighter Vision kick off the fall season with a month-long digital conference event they call ‘Fall Into Cash’.

For the entire month of September, they’ll be teaming up with the top brands, consultants, and coaches in the mental health industry to provide you with the best advice, tools, content, podcasts, and giveaways; all centered around one main theme – helping you grow your practice and make more money.

Plus, in celebration of the 5th anniversary of ‘Fall Into Cash’, they’re also offering a very special discount exclusively for Practice of the Practice listeners. From now until the end of the month, they’re offering new websites for only $49/month for your whole first year plus no setup fees – that’s a savings of over $200!

For more information and to take advantage of this great offer, head on over to brightervision.com/joe.

Meet James Owens

An image of James Owens is captured. James is an Enneagram teacher and a United Methodist Minister. James is featured on Grow a Group Practice, a therapist podcast.

James P. Owens is an Enneagram teacher and a United Methodist Minister. He holds Master’s degrees from Denver Seminary and Duke Divinity School. He currently serves on the staff of Wesley Monumental United Methodist Church in Savannah, Georgia. For the last several years, James has devoted himself to the study and practice of the Enneagram, a life-changing personality assessment tool, which he uses to help others in personal and professional growth.
James lives in Savannah, Georgia with his wife Whitney, who is a mental health counselor, counseling practice owner and consultant, and their two daughters, Anna and Abby.

Connect with James on Instagram and Facebook.

In This Podcast

  • What is the Enneagram?
  • Healthy and unhealthy in the Enneagram
  • A basic overview of the nine types in the Enneagram
  • Enneagram dynamics in the workplace

What is the Enneagram?

The Enneagram outlines nine basic personality types; nine ways of being, moving, and living in the world, and they are often labeled by those numbers. It’s not a ranking system … one is not better than nine, nine is not better than one. (James Owen)

The Enneagram is a tool that you can use to learn more about yourself and how you move in the world.

It helps you learn about yourself on a deeper level as it provides a multidimensional view for you to conceptualize all the aspects of who you are, and how you interact with situations and people around you.

Healthy and unhealthy in the Enneagram

An example of the multiplicity of the Enneagram is that no person is given a set category within which they fall.

Because people act differently depending on whether they feel secure and calm to insecure and stressed, the Enneagram can give guidance to both aspects: how you may act when you are “healthy” and how you may act when you are “unhealthy”.

What we find in the Enneagram is that each type has another number that they move to in stress, and you become a little more like that type, and another one, a different one, that they move to with security. (James Owens)

A basic overview of the nine types in the Enneagram

The Reformer or Perfectionist

This type wants to be a morally good person, and they seek to do what is good and right.

  • Perfectionistic streak
  • A strong inner critical voice

The Helper or Giver

They want to be needed, helpful, kind, and compassionate.

  • They enjoy meeting the needs of the community
  • But they tend to ignore their own needs

The Achiever or Performer

This type wants to be effective and successful.

  • They want to succeed against all odds
  • They value constant drive and work

The Romantic or Individualist

This type wants to be special and unique.

  • They are feeling-oriented
  • Often very creative

The Investigator or Observer

This type wants to be competent and seeks that by acquiring knowledge and skills.

  • They are usually introverts
  • They seek knowledge and are deep thinkers.

The Loyalists or Skeptic

This type seeks out authority but is also skeptical of it.

  • They are reliable, rock-solid people
  • Often they are the “glue” of society

The Enthusiast or Epicure

This type is joyful and optimistic. They enjoy being fun and spontaneous.

  • They avoid conflict and pain
  • They try to maximize pleasure

The Challenger or Commander

This type thinks along the lines of “survival of the fittest”.

  • They want to protect everyone around them
  • They depend on conflict to communicate

The Peacemaker or Mediator

This type is easy-going and easy to get along with.

  • They run the risk of putting their own wants and needs last
  • They concern themselves with the needs of others

That’s one of the cool things about the Enneagram is that it doesn’t force you into any particular career or … vocational path. I like to think that at its best the Enneagram can help you be better at whatever job you already are doing. (James Owens)

Enneagram dynamics in the workplace

Certain Enneagram numbers could be more suited to different tasks. Apart from learning how to show more compassion towards your staff, employees, and colleagues, the Enneagram can reveal which people in your staff may be well-suited to different tasks that need doing.

For example:

  • An Enneagram type one could write the employee handbook because they are good with details, rules, rights, and wrongs.
  • An Enneagram type three could work well in an outward-facing role such as in marketing or working in branding because they are good at presenting themselves and the business in a good light.

Withdrawn stance: type four, five, and nine. These types generally move away from people.

Compliant stance: type one, two, and six. These types move towards people.

Assertive stance: type three, seven, and eight. These types move independently of people.

Books mentioned in this episode:

Useful links mentioned in this episode:

Check out these additional resources:

Meet Alison Pidgeon, Group Practice Owner

An image of Alison Pidgeon is displayed. She is a successful group practice owner and offers private practice consultation for private practice owners to assist in how to grow a group practice. She is the host of Grow A Group Practice Podcast and one of the founders of Group Practice Boss.Alison Pidgeon, LPC is the owner of Move Forward Counseling, a group practice in Lancaster, PA and she runs a virtual assistant company, Move Forward Virtual Assistants.

Alison has been working with Practice of the Practice since 2016.  She has helped over 70 therapist entrepreneurs start and grow their businesses, through mastermind groups and individual consulting.

Transformation From A Private Practice To Group Practice

In addition, she is a private practice consultant for Practice of the Practice. Allison’s private practice ‘grew up.’ What started out as a solo private practice in early 2015 quickly grew into a group practice and has been expanding ever since.

Visit Alison’s website, listen to her podcast, or consult with Alison. Email Alison at [email protected]

Thanks For Listening!

Feel free to leave a comment below or share this podcast on social media by clicking on one of the social media links below! Alternatively, leave a review on iTunes and subscribe!

Podcast Transcription

[ALISON PIDGEON]
You are listening to the Grow a Group Practice podcast. Whether you were thinking about starting a group practice or in the beginning stages, or want to learn how to scale up your already existing group practice, you are in the right place. I’m Alison Pidgeon, your host, a serial entrepreneur with four businesses, one of which is a large group practice that I started in 2015. Each week, I feature a guest or topic that is relevant to group practice owners. Let’s get started.

Hi, I’m so glad you decided to join me today. I’m Alison Pidgeon your host. Today. I have an interview with James P. Owens. He is the husband of my colleague Whitney Owens here at Practice of the Practice and he is an Enneagram teacher. He’s going to explain to you in a minute what that is, and he’s also a United Methodist minister. He is currently on staff of the Wesley monumental United Methodist church in Savannah, Georgia. He got really interested in learning about the Enneagram and has spent the last several years studying it. The Enneagram being a life changing personality assessment tool, which he uses to help others in personal and professional growth. James actually came and did a presentation for my staff about the Enneagram and how they can use it to help understand themselves better help their clients, and also help us to understand each other better as a team and as coworkers. So I am excited for you to hear this interview with me and James Owens.

Hi James. Welcome to the podcast.
[JAMES OWENS]
Hey, Alison, I’m really glad to be here with you today and excited to be able to talk about the Enneagram.
[ALISON]
So I obviously talk to your wife, Whitney Owens all of the time. So in it’s nice to finally get a chance to talk to you.
[JAMES]
Yes, that’s awesome. Very often do I overhear you and Whitney talking about all things Practice of the Practice and Group Practice Boss related. So yes, it’s good to be able to connect with you and I could see why you and Whitney have formed such a great working partnership.
[ALISON]
Yes, yes, we definitely have. So I know some people may not be familiar with you. So do you want to just take a minute to introduce yourself?
[JAMES]
Yes, sure. I’ll say a little bit about me. Well, my name is James P. Owens, as I always like to say whenever I introduce myself. My friends call me James P. Owens I like to throw that middle initial in there. I am a United Methodist minister and a teacher of the Enneagram, certified Enneagram teacher. I live down here in Savannah, Georgia, where I am with my wife, Whitney, who you mentioned, who’s a counseling practice owner and consultant. We also have two daughters, Anna and Abby, and I work for a church and also on the side, I do some work with folks on the Enneagram, working with business owners, counselors, churches, and others to discover the ways that the Enneagram can help them work together as a team, maximize their personal potential and just use all of the great ways the Enneagram could help us to grow both personally and professionally.
[ALISON]
Very cool. So the reason that I asked you to come on the podcast is because you had recently done a training for my staff all about the Enneagram. So we were going to kind of talk about how that was for me and my staff I learned that I am number five, which I thought before I was number three because I had taken a test that I think maybe was less accurate before. So that was really interesting to sort of see all the different numbers. You did a very nice job, so like kind of presenting all the different numbers and examples. And I think I do fit into being a five.
[JAMES]
That’s awesome. That’s really good to hear. So folks don’t know the Enneagram outlines nine basic personality types, nine ways of being, moving, living in the world and they are often labeled by those numbers. You know, it’s not a ranking system, as I always say. One is not better than nine, nine is not better than one, but you discovered Alison that you’re a type five which is called the investigator or observer. And the interesting about that is that is also my type. I’m also dominant in type five. So I don’t know about you, but for me when I discovered that it really helped me a lot.

If I can make a quick digression into a little bit of my story which I know I told to your staff, I was finishing up seminary. I mentioned that I’m a pastor and I was working with a local church at where I was living in at the time, which was in Colorado and a group of folks at this church told me, “You know what, James, you’re a nice guy and all, but we just really don’t think you have the right personality to be a pastor. We don’t think you’re going to be very good at this.” And they gave a lot of different reasons and obviously this was really hard for me to hear, but my wife, Whitney was meeting with a mentor of hers. It’s not long after that and she kind of told the mentor all this and the mentor thought for a minute and said, “Oh, wait a minute. Is he a five on the Enneagram?” We of course didn’t know what Enneagram was or what a five was so we didn’t know at the time, but as I began to research it eventually after that, I discovered, wow, I am a five.

That helped me to understand myself better and in light of this really difficult experience that I’ve had, it helped me to accept myself for who I was, to have compassion for myself, but also to understand the ways that I did come across to people and how I could make that better, how I could maximize my strengths and round out some of my weaknesses. So learning that I was a type five really helped me to begin that process of growth as the Enneagram can help us do. I’ve discovered that I’m someone that loves to learn, loves to gain knowledge and information and then often I do that as a way to gain a sense of security.

I discovered that I can come across as a little bit withdrawn or even aloof to people sometimes. So I’ve worked hard on trying to be more warm or friendly. I’ve discovered that I tend to hold back rather than engage. I’ve tried to learn to engage more. I’ve also discovered a lot of great strengths, the ability to learn a lot of things really fast, to be competent, professional, the ability to put emotions to the side when I need to, to get things done. What about you, Alison? What what aspects of Enneagram type five connected most with you?
[ALISON]
I think the part where you talked about there’s a tendency for fives to like want to become an expert in an area. They want to learn everything they possibly can about something and I feel like I’ve done that my whole life. I think sometimes other people look at that and they’re like, why are you obsessed with this thing? Like they sort of see it as a negative thing, but now I see it as such a positive because even with like the business consulting, I basically did my sort of own version of an MBA because I was just so interested in everything and just read a ton of books and did all of this research and talked to people. So I feel like I can speak very knowledgeably on that subject even though I didn’t actually go to school and get an MBA. But yes, I loved it so much. I just got obsessed with reading and learning about it.
[JAMES]
That sounds about right. I know when I was working on my ordination or working towards commissioning in the United Methodist Church here, I had to go back to school and do a program at, divinity because I hadn’t taken like courses on United Methodist history and theology and quality and things like that in my previous seminary experience. So I got to these courses and of course I found that like I had already read like half the books that they assigned and already knew a lot of things just because I had wanted to research it on my own and because I was interested in it for my own edification before I even started that process. So yes, I can definitely relate to that and I think about the way that you’ve kind of started and run all the different businesses that you have, you probably just got interested in something learned about it and you’re like, wait a minute, maybe I make some money of this too and you’re on the road.
[ALISON]
That is exactly how it happened. Sometimes that was a naive thought, but it worked out well in the end.
[JAMES]
Yes. It’s gone well for you. So if there’s any fives listening, I think you can look to Alison as a good example of someone who put their thought into action. I know for me as a five sometimes I want to think, think, think, think, and I never do anything with it. So it’s good to hear that you’ve done so much practically with all the things that you’ve learned.
[ALISON]
Yes. Thank you. So just in reference to the presentation you came and gave to the staff, I think that gave them a really good kind of overview of the Enneagram and then also I thought it was really interesting getting into the details about like when you’re sort of healthy as a five, how you tend to be, and then how when you’re kind of unhealthy or maybe not in a good place, how you tend to be and like you lean towards like another number. I don’t need know if I can explain it a well, maybe I should just let you explain.
[JAMES]
Well, that’s one of the cool things about the Enneagram I think your listeners, even if you’re not familiar with Enneagram you might know other personality typing systems like the Myers Briggs or something like that. But I think one of the things that makes the Enneagram unique and why I think it’s so helpful is that it has a little bit more dynamism than other typing systems. Enneagram teaching acknowledges that we look different based on how we’re doing, based on what’s going on in our lives that yes, we do have these personality types that describe us all very well, but no one’s personality is totally static. So one of the things you’ll hear about a lot in Enneagram teaching is these directions of stress and insecurity. And basically just all that means is each type behaves differently, thinks differently, acts differently when they’re under conditions of stress versus conditions of security or feeling good, feeling healthy, feeling secure as opposed to insecure and stress. And what we find with the Enneagram is that each type has another number that they move to in stress. You sort of become a little bit like that type and another one, a different one that they move to insecurity. You sort of become a little bit like that type, but maybe before we go any further, we should go through what the basic nine types are.
[ALISON]
Yes. That would be great.
[JAMES]
So like I said before, there’s nine basic personality types with the Enneagram and they are numbered one through nine. If you’ve seen the Enneagram symbol before you’ve seen this, or you can just do a quick Google search and find one. The Enneagram is a nine-pointed figure. It sort of looks like a nine-pointed star and it’s inscribed inside of a circle on the Enneagram symbol and the numbers are usually outside of that circle. So they go one through nine. Type one is called the reformer or perfectionist, a type that says, I want to be a morally good person above all else and seeks to do what is good and right. They do tend to have a little bit of perfectionistic streak, a strong, inner, critical voice telling them what is right and wrong.

Type two is called the giver. That’s a type that wants to be needed, wants to be helpful, kind, compassionate towards others, great building community and meeting the needs of other people, tend to ignore their own needs a little bit.

Type three is called the achiever or the performer. This is a type that wants to be effective and successful.

Type four is the romantic or the individualist type that wants to be special, unique, someone that’s feelings oriented or oriented towards their own feelings often. And also often very creative.

Type five, which we talked about a good bit already the investigator or the observer, the type that wants to be competent and seeks that through acquiring knowledge and skills. They are usually introverts and definitely thinking sort of people.

Type six is called the loyalist or the skeptic. This is a type that seeks out authority, but is also at the same time, skeptical of authority. Usually sixes are reliable, rock solid sort of people. Often they’re kind of like the glue of society. You’ll find a lot of sixes in the fire department or the hospital working or the public school system.

Type seven is the enthusiast or the epicure. Type seven is a type that is joyful and someone that says, I want to be fun, I want to be spontaneous and seek to avoid pain through maximizing pleasure.

Type eight is called the challenger or the boss or the commander. It’s a powerful person, someones that only the strong survive and so they decide they are going to be so and protect everyone else.

And finally type nine at the top of the circle is the peacemaker or the mediator. It’s often said that nines are the sweethearts of the Enneagram. Everybody loves type nines, because they’re easygoing, they go along to get along, but nines do run the risk of falling asleep to their own wants and needs and merging those with others. That’s a little bit about the basic Enneagram types.
[ALISON]
I thought it was so interesting when you came to talk to my staff that, I just kind of assumed like therapists would all fall onto like sort of one number or another. Like aren’t we all twos or something like that, but it was really quite varied across the board with the different numbers and I was kind of surprised to learn what people’s numbers were.
[JAMES]
Yes. You would certainly think a lot of type twos would go into a field like therapy. And no doubt there are all on the type two therapists. I did a similar training for my wife, Whitney’s staff and she has a few twos on her staff, but one of the other cool things about the Enneagram is that it’s not necessarily intended to put you into a specific career or path of life. The Enneagram doesn’t say, okay, hey here’s your type and here’s this box you’ve got to fit in or here’s the five jobs that you could do. I know like so many personality tests that I’ve taken over the years have said like, oh, you have this kind of personality. So you have to be a scientist or an engineer or a mathematician or some kind of thing I have no interest or inner ability to do at all.

There’s one of the cool things about the Enneagram is that it doesn’t force you into any one particular career path or vocational path. I like to think that at its best, the Enneagram could help you be better at whatever job you are doing or help you get to whatever career you want to be in. And we should find all Enneagram types and all kinds of professions, you know, each time could be excellent as a counselor or therapist, each type could be excellent as a business owner. So learning the Enneagram can only help you to maximize your strengths in whatever you know you’re going to want to do.
[BRIGHTER VISION PROMO]
How would you like to fall into cash this month? Every year, my friends over at Brighter Vision kick off the fall season with a month long digital event they call Fall Into Cash. For the entire month of September, they’ll be teaming up with the top brands, consultants and coaches in the mental health industry to provide you with the best advice, tools, content, podcasts, and giveaways, all centered around one main theme, helping you grow your practice and make more money. Plus in celebrate of the fifth anniversary of Fall Into Cash, they’re also offering a very special discount exclusively for Practice of the Practice listeners. From now until the end of the month, they’re offering new websites for only $49 a month for your whole first year plus no setup fees. That’s a savings of over $200. For more information and to take it advantage of this great offer, head on over to brightervision.com/joe. That’s brighter vision.com/joe. Yes.
[ALISON]
So what would be some examples of how you’ve seen it help other people when they learn about what their type is?
[JAMES]
Yes. Good question. So I work with a couple of wonderful nines on my church staff here, actually three now. I have seen them become more aware of who they are after learning about the Enneagram. So nine, of course I mentioned is a peace making, a mediator sort of type. Nines, often struggle to express what they want because they think that if they voice their needs a little bit too much, that’s going to maybe cause conflict or that no one’s going to like them or something like that. So nines run this risk of kind of not being in touch with what they really want or need. So I’ve seen some of a couple of the nines that I work with here after kind of becoming aware of this becoming more aware of all the ways that they avoid conflict throughout their days. I know there’s one person that I work with who kind of had this realization of, oh my gosh, like I’m always doing something, but I’m always doing different things to avoid doing the thing I don’t want to do, the thing that might cause conflict, that hard conversation I might have to have, or that email that I don’t want to send or whatever it might be.
[ALISON]
I think it’s interesting because I think for me, I found that it allowed me to just sort of accept like, oh, this is who I am and it’s not, I think sometimes we obviously get down on ourselves or criticize ourselves like, why do I do this or how come I always do that or whatever. And it’s like, oh, okay. This is just my personality. I should be kinder to myself about these things.
[JAMES]
Absolutely. I think that having compassion for yourself is just so important and the Enneagram helps us do that. I certainly hope it does for everybody that encounters this teaching that this should make you more compassionate towards yourself and more compassionate towards others. You’re more accepting of yourself and more accepting of others. We all have a personality, I think it’s Ian Krons, an Enneagram teacher said, if you didn’t have a personality, no one would want to talk to you. So we’ve all got a personality. You’re going to develop one as you grow up. And everybody’s personality has strengths and everybody’s personality has things they would love to maximize and things they’d like to forget about? So for all of us, we should just have more compassion for ourselves. We should accept ourselves. And I would like to say, I would hope the Enneagram help us do that.
[ALISON]
One thing I’m really interested to ask you about as well is kind of the combinations of different types maybe working or being in relationships together. So obviously fives and ones get along really well because Whitney is a one. I work with her all the time and you’re married to her. So obviously it’s working out pretty well.
[JAMES]
Yes. The Enneagram has some really cool things to say out helping us work together. We realize that as teams work together that the different personalities can sort of balance one another out, compliment each other, but also there might be some sources of conflict. So you mentioned five and one, obviously Whitney, my wife, you’re sort of a partner in business yes, five and one is actually a great combination because both types are pretty observant. Ones are kind of noticing the details, noticing what’s wrong, noticing things that might need to be fixed whereas fives are just sort of observing more in general. Ones tend to move towards people whereas fives tend to move away from people. So you kind of have a good energy there of like five, we guess five might need someone who moves towards people to sort of draw us out and bring us out, bring out our knowledge, bring out our gifts, bring out our whatever. So ones and twos can be really good at that.

And the other type combinations make for really interesting work dynamics. If you have a lot of type ones or if you have a type one on your staff, maybe that’s the person you want to have write the employee handbook, because they’re really good with details and really good with rules and rights and wrongs and knowing what the ethical and moral things are going to be. You know, whereas maybe if you’ve got say like a type three, for example, on your staff that’s the achiever, performer type. Three’s a type that’s very concerned with self-image or the image that their company or brand might project. So maybe you want to put that person in an outward facing role, marketing or branding, something like public relations and give them an opportunity to get out in the community with folks.

Another thing about Enneagram types that I think is really, when thinking about teams and how they work together is something called the stances. I mentioned this a minute ago, but there’s three stances. So of course the Enneagram is nine types. So there’s all different kind of ways to divide them up into three groups of three and one of those is the stance. So there’s the withdrawn stance, the compliance stance and the, I call it the assertive stance usually. You might hear it called the aggressive stance as well. What that means is each type, either moves away from people, moves towards people or moves independently of people. So I already mentioned fives like you and me along with fours and nines move away from people. That’s the withdrawn stance, withdrawing stance move away from people. It doesn’t mean we always are running away from people, but just generally speaking if we’re all getting in a car to go somewhere you and I might just want to drive separate ourselves.

We don’t want to necessarily have anybody ride with us. That’s the withdrawn stance. The compliance stance just means you move towards people or want them, move with other people generally more collaborative. And that’s one, two and six. One’s, two’s and sixes moved towards people. That leaves three, seven and eight. They move independently. It’s the assertive stance or aggressive stance, move independently. They’re going to do something and you can come along if you want. They don’t care if you do or not. You can kind of see like in working environments, if you have a lot of people that are moving independently maybe as the leader, you need to kind of get them together, get them on the same page.

If you’ve got a lot of people that are moving with others, one’s, two’s, and sixes there’s naturally going to be a little more collaboration and maybe you need to direct them to be more independent at times when it’s time to go work independently to not need that handhold, to not necessarily need someone all the time. And then if you’ve got a bunch of people who are five’s, four’s, and nine’s and are withdrawing you kind of need to draw them out, ask them questions, get them to contribute to the discussion, draw out some of that knowledge and skill that the withdrawn type do have. But then respect the boundary and give a little privacy too.
[ALISON]
Yes, that’s really cool. It is very dynamic. There’s a lot of moving parts to it and I can see how like, depending on the people that you’re working with or who you have just with and their certain type, how things could change with one person versus being in a group or on a team. I know you had mentioned a book during our training that was more about relationships and the Enneagram. Can you tell us what that the title of that book is?
[JAMES]
Oh, sure. There’s lots of great Enneagram resources, but one in particular is The Enneagram in Love and Work by Helen Palmer. It goes way back as an Enneagram teacher and that book in particular, The Enneagram in Love and Work would be a great place to look for some pretty in-depth stuff about the different types and how they are in relationships, romantic type relationships, but also in working relationships. She’s got a great sort of compending in the back about all the different type combination and how they work together or how they exist together in relationships.
[ALISON]
Nice. And for folks who maybe have never taken the Enneagram test and they want to do so, what would be a good resource for that?
[JAMES]
There’s a few different tests you can find. I’ll say a quick caveat about tests is that the tests are never perfect. You are the best person to determine what your dominant Enneagram type is. So do take the test, yes, absolutely go for it, but then also read up on each type and kind of do some personal reflection and decide for yourself, which one is best. You can find free tests all over the internet. You could Google for free Enneagram assessment, free Enneagram test and find multiple ones to try. But if you’re willing to put just a little bit of money into it, there’s a couple of tests that cost a little bit that I think are a lot more effective. So my favorite, one of those is the Wagner Enneagram Assessment. It’s abbreviated with the acronym WEPSS, W-E-P-S-S I believe.

It is developed by Jerome Wagner, who is one of my teachers on the Enneagram. So if you search for Jerome Wagner or WEPSS Enneagram assessment, that was a great one to find. It costs only about $10, I think. And then also the Enneagram Institute, a very reputable Enneagram organization founded by Don Richard Rizzo and Russ Hudson. Those are also well known Enneagram teachers. They have a test as well. So the Enneagram Institute, you could get to their website enneagraminstitute.com. I think their test costs like 12 or something like that. So those pay tests give you a lot more information and can maybe be a little more helpful in determining your type if you’re having trouble figuring that out.
[ALISON]
Thank you. So can you tell us a little bit more about how you’re using the Enneagram in your business? I know a lot of what you’re doing is teaching obviously, but kind of what is the kind of the lens or the niche that you’ve developed with teaching people the Enneagram.
[JAMES]
So I think of course there’s lots of Enneagram books and resources and teachers out there, but I think one thing that is a little bit underutilized is the way that the Enneagram can really be super helpful for teams working together. So that’s what I hope to do with this working the Enneagram, to help whether it’s business owners and their staffs, counseling practices, church staffs, pastors, other kinds of teams whatever it might be to learn the Enneagram together. So that is a team sort of building activity, learning it together, acquiring its knowledge as a group, and then turn around and use that in their own daily work environment to help us grow personally, but also to work better together to understand the people you work with and to have compassion for them and to hopefully work better together.

I’ve seen staffs and teams go really well and I’ve seen staffs and teams go really bad. So often there’s those personality conflicts that lead to teams not working well together, or people eventually leaving or getting fired or whatever. So I think the Enneagram can really help us to alleviate a lot of that, to ameliorate a lot of those problems that might arise. So folks can find me on Instagram at Working the Enneagram, where I post things about the Enneagram and teams and working together and all sorts of different stuff, and also workingtheenneagram.com.
[ALISON]
That was actually my next question. So thank you for answering before I even asked. So it’s been so great to talk with you, and I just really appreciate you sharing your knowledge with my staff. I think they really enjoyed it both on a personal level, but I think also some of them started to think about, “Ooh, I could maybe use this with some of my clients.” So yes, very cool and I really appreciate your time.
[JAMES]
Awesome. I’m so glad the training for your staff was good and I hope that the Enneagram continues to be something that you all will revisit from time to time when you’re on your Zoom meetings together or get back in the office together, that you continue to remember the things you learned and yes, hopefully your folks will kind of die deep into it and continue to grow.
[ALISON]
Thanks, James.
[JAMES]
All right. Thanks so much.
[ALISON]
Thank so much again to Brighter Vision for being our sponsor this week. They are having their special fall into cash event. Definitely check that out over at their website, brightervision.com. And if you want to get the promotional offer they’re running right now to get a new website for only $49 a month for the whole first year, go to the special link they’ve set up for us, brightervision.com/joe.

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This podcast is designed to provide accurate and authoritative information in regards to the subject matter covered. This is given with the understanding that neither the host, Practice of the Practice, or the guests are providing legal, mental health, or other professional information. If you need a professional, you should find one.