More on Leading Inwards
Are there models that help?
In April 2024, Orit Ramler and I co-wrote a story about “Leading Inwards: The Foundation of Effective Leadership”. In it, we proposed that one of the areas sometimes overlooked is the need for leaders to lead themselves. That is, to understand themselves, what makes them tick, how their internal reactions impact others, etc. We suggested various actions and that a good approach is to conduct a self and 360° assessment then, working with a coach, develop an improvement plan. The Six Domains of Leadership™ model and survey are good tools to accomplish this effort.
It is also helpful to better understand ourselves to have resources that try to explain our complex personality. There are numerous models and books so I wanted to share some of my knowledge here.
Recently, I was speaking with my son who had just completed a leadership development program in Boston. He was mentioning what he deemed the highlight of the program: a presentation by Erica Ariel Fox, lawyer, negotiation expert, workshop facilitator, and author of Winning from Within: A Breakthrough Method for Leading, Living, and Lasting Change. He was so impressed that he gave me a copy of the book which I promptly read. It is a great view at our internal psychology.
Winning from Within
Like many other models (e.g., C. Clinton Sidle’s The Leadership Wheel: Five Steps for Achieving Individual and Organizational Greatness and the Wilson Social Styles captured in the Social Styles Handbook) it breaks down the internal psychology into four quadrants, archetypes, that she labels the Big Four: the Lover, the Dreamer, the Thinker, and the Warrior. We tend to favor one or two of these Big Four in our actions, sometimes ignoring the others to our detriment.
Ms. Fox introduces the concept of an inner board of Directors, who share general oversight of the Big Four. These Directors are the Lookout, the Captain, and the Voyager.
The Lookout does what its name indicates, it looks out for situations when you may misapply your preferred Big Four. You may need to leverage another approach instead or with your preferred one(s). The Lookout only alerts you to this situation as well as to how you are reacting to the situation.
The Captain will organize and drive the internal negotiation so that your overall self uses the appropriate Big Four for the situation. It will ask the Warrior, for example, to wait while the captain brings in the Lover to the situation.
Finally, the Voyager is the one that learns from successes and mistakes. It’s the one that helps a leader navigate new situations. And it is helpful in overcoming fears that can be present in such situations. Fox’s approach leverages the Lookout and the Captain for immediate use, while the Voyager is a bit of a longer view actor.
Other models
There are many other models. The ones I’m most familiar with are the ones I’ve listed above, Sidle’s Leadership Wheel and Wilson’s Social Styles, as well as Patrick Lencioni’s 6 Working Genius.
Sidle, in The Leadership Wheel, breaks the archetypes into the Nurturer, the Visionary, the Teacher, and the Warrior. These are very similar to Ms. Fox’s Big Four.
Wilson, in the Social Styles Handbook, describes slightly different archetypes: the Amiable, the Expressive, the Analytical, and the Driver. I would match the Amiable with the Lover, the Expressive with the Dreamer, the Analytical with the Thinker, and the Driver with the Warrior. Not a perfect match but it comes close.
All of these models indicate that we have preferred style(s) that we tend to gravitate to and, sometimes, overuse. All of them propose that leaders must figure out how to leverage all styles, as we may leverage the wrong style in some situations (e.g., have you lost your cool if you leverage the Warrior and something doesn’t go the way you would like it to?)
Sidle introduces the Sage as the archetype that brings in the four other archetypes (directions in Sidle’s model), the Teacher, the Nurturer, the Visionary, and the Warrior. The Sage is the beginning and the end of the wheel that includes these four directions. There are no other “directors” as in Fox’s model, so it would take the place of all three.
Wilson uses Versatility as a tool for leaders to be flexible. It actually matches the Lookout and the Captain in Fox’s model. A leader would use Versatility to recognize which Social Style differences are operating in the relationships, determine how appropriate they are, and decide to behave differently to improve the relationships.
A slightly different view
Patrick Lencioni has a different view of these archetypes. In his The 6 Types of Working Genius he identifies Wonder, Invention, Discernment, Galvanizing, Enablement, and Tenacity (WIDGET) as the 6 “geniuses” that individuals have. Some of them, the Working Genius, are the ones that the person is good at and provides them energy. Typically an individual has two of these. Two of the other geniuses they are competent in. That is, they can be good at but they neither give nor take energy from the person. And two are frustrations. While the person may or may not be good at them, they drain the person’s energy.
Team assessment
All of these models can be, and should be, used to assess how a team fits together. Do you only have Warriors and Dreamers? Lovers and Thinkers? There may be gaps that are causing problem that as a leader you should be aware of. Missing archetypes are gaps in how a team works. These gaps could be serious, such as not having Dreamers/Wonderers or Inventors in your team, a team that is chartered with creating new products.
Lencioni has a tool that will roll up everyone’s assessment results to determine where there could be gaps.
What’s a leader to do?
Do you need to read all four of these books? Not necessarily although it would be helpful. The key is that they all help you understand yourself better (all have assessment tools that would help you understand your preferred style(s)). With this understanding then you can plan how to improve.
As Winning from Within is the one I’ve read most recently, I would recommend it before the others but I would suggest The 6 Types of Working Genius as a quick follow-on.
Books referred in this article:
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