Spineless Bosses - NF Personality Type in Employee Management

You may be wondering how to deal with a bad boss—one that was quite a good boss, at first, but then a dark side came out. It was like something suddenly snapped, and he or she 'broke.' Should something like this be the case, there is a good chance your boss is an "NF"—those who favor the iNtuition and Feeling preferences, as described by the Myers-Briggs^® concepts of personality type and is the instrument used in career tests. The reason I mention the "NF" has a dark side is because it is the "NF" bosses who usually have a lot going for them. They are:

• encouraging
• insightful
• imaginative
• creatively inclined
• intuitive
• idealistic
• passionate
• nurturing

It is not expected they can become disheartened and even critical of the seeming "insult." Neither would one guess they can become quite adversarial, because they are 'people-people.'

You iNtuition-Feeling, or NF bosses bring many gifts and natural talents to the role of managing and leading. You are natural nurturers. You groove to empowering others. You are 'people-people' who tend to have a good understanding of what makes people tick. Were this the sum of it, every organization in the country would be fighting to hire you! You come closer than any other personality type to pulling off making everything alright in the organization and everyone happy.

Instead of nice bosses, though, I call these "NF" bosses 'spineless' because of their limited toughness for the inevitable butting-of-heads that is so common in work teams of diverse make-up.

If you are reading this, you could well be one of the "NF" personality types—ENFJ, ENFP, INFJ or INFP—and hopefully one with a sense of humor who can be kidded. Otherwise, I can just hear you denying the fact that, like me, you are adverse to conflict. Yes, I too am an "NF" and have met my enemy, the NF's huge discomfort with conflict!

The "NF" (ENFJ, ENFP, INFJ or INFP) boss can see potential in everyone, and nurturing it in themselves is not excluded. They expect cooperation from everyone and their goal is to build a strong team and good morale, and they hope you will have the same amount of interest in your professional development as they do. They aim to provide you a warm and nurturing environment and expect you to join in the fostering of open communication.

The natural leadership gifts of "NF" bosses are incredible. They see the issues along the way as more personalized and so direct their passion into bringing harmony and understanding between people. When they can hang in there and make the hard calls, those gifts are powerful and very appreciated.

The "NF" manager can make people happy, but it is quite another thing to actually increase the team's production—especially when 'push comes to shove' and interactions get tough.

They can set a comfortable tone for discussions, but just watch when conflict comes. They are conflict adverse and when an "NF" boss does not realize this and faces any failure in keeping the harmony, it gets unnerving for the "NF." They then need someone with a stiff spine to prop them up—maybe even pull them out of hiding!

When you're working for the "NF," they expect all to navigate the decision-making process carefully and avoid stepping on any toes. Don’t offend anyone’s feelings! The creation of winners and losers is not fair, as they define it. What should be a straightforward process for making clear decisions becomes one that is convoluted and glacier in pace.

The “NFs” have the gift for incredible natural leadership. However, the NFs’ team members tend to feel befuddled—particularly the Thinking-types on the team. Their ever present concern to avoid conflict can drive "NF" bosses to try to force harmony, to the point that they may create a 'jury rigged' organizational structure—one built on interpersonal dynamics. They then attempt to dress it up for the Thinking-types with over-engineered logical terms to make it appear to be business outcomes, but that does not fool anyone!

Here are the special challenges of each of the four iNtuitive-Feeling personality types as bosses.

Gifted facilitators and negotiators, the ENFJs are quite skillful team builders, able to bring widely disparate groups to agreement.

However, they lean too much on their interpersonal gifting. They will bore the crap out of you—seeming so, at least to some—with long-winded stories that meander and finally come to a conclusion only tangentially related to the topic at hand...Phew!

Be watchful of the ENFJ boss when conflict comes, for they can over-personalize it. Some objective input providing him or her an alternate view on the situation may help.

Widely found in HR organizations and in the fellowship of personality type communities, ENFP bosses are at their best as agents of change. They are charismatic, and outstanding communicators who are often the visionary. However, one wonders, can they focus? Are they capable to stop the spinning of new options to choose just one, or even two of them?

After any time with an ENFP boss, while he or she is clearly charismatic, the question comes to mind, "Can you please take the focus off yourself ... just for a moment?"

This is my type. Frequently drawn to anything that facilitates the development of individuals from the inside out, INFJs normally do not intend to be bosses in the first place. They are usually more interested in counseling. When INFJs do take on the boss role, they lend to the job their visionary insight that is often strategic, intellectually oriented and thoughtful.

However, one will often wonder, "Is anyone in there?" The INFJ can be so reserved that they are quite difficult to get to know. They may be tempted to hide when conflict comes!

The team members of an INFJ boss or leader may not know who he or she is, and may need to step out and help this boss learn how to socially connect. Here are five tips:

Of the four NF personality types, the INFP boss is the most technologically able. INFPs are also often drawn to any occupation that involves human development and improvement of the human condition. However, are they ever hard to pin down!

The team of the INFP boss can have lengthy and charming conversations with him or her, but afterwards will still wonder what the boss' decision will be and when it will come. Once the INFP boss does announce his or her decision, the team members will still not be confident this that this decision is final and will not change...once the boss gets around to acting on it! The INFP boss may need help with positive accountability.

A strategic challenge for any of the "NF" bosses is that, by their spineless aversion to conflict, they can become co-conspirators in creating for themselves a "glass ceiling." While they ably build a strong team, develop the team members and guide the culture, they often fail to demonstrate to the thicker-skinned Thinking-type in senior management that he or she is tough enough to get the job done. When all of their best efforts seem unsuccessful, they can even snap and break. They become 'unhinged.' Suddenly, they cannot stand the very presence of the person they have seemingly failed to 'help develop' and any objectivity goes right out the window!

The trick to avoid becoming unhinged is for the "NF" boss to

• stay true to his or her values and
• frame them in Thinking-language at the same time—presenting the rationale behind them.

When they do not, they run smack into that glass ceiling and never achieve their full leadership potential. The "NF" boss who can lean just a bit over to objective views on the issues may rise above their glass ceiling and make their great leadership gifts a powerful asset to the organization.

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