In my current job, I am the assistant director of admissions and marketing in a large substance abuse and mental health hospital. I work closely with the director, and together we manage a team of about twenty people. It is a small office and the job tends to escalate quickly due to crisis situations with our patients, so effective leadership and management can be challenging. I feel strongly that one must have certain strengths and personality traits to work with substance abusers, and dealing with the constant high stress levels of each employee can make it difficult to set a good example all of the time. One of the things that I have always found to be helpful is that the director and I have different leadership styles and personalities. At first thought, it may be automatic to think that we would not work well together because of our differences, but because the differences are not extreme, the system works well for us.
While learning about the psychodynamic approach to leadership, I found multiple parallels between the text and the personality styles of myself and my boss. While reading the text, I guessed that the director and I would likely have opposite styles on every dimension. As I mentioned before, I think this is actually why we work so well together as a team. I think our style complement each other and make us a well-rounded team. In fact, the psychodynamic approach is based on self-awareness and tolerance for the behaviors and styles of those with whom we work (Northouse, p. 339). So, I wanted my director and me to take the Psychodynamic Approach Survey to test what I learned in the reading and to see if my thoughts were correct.
After reading about how to take and score the Psychodynamic Approach Survey in the Northouse text, I took the survey myself and my director volunteered to take it as well. I scored higher as an introvert, sensor, thinker, and judger (ISTJ). My director scored higher as an extrovert, intuitor, feeler, and perceiver (ENFP). These are all the results I expected, although we were most closely related on sensor/intuitor and thinker/feeler. I’m not a real believer of “opposites attract”, however, I’ve found that together we are actually able to run the department really well by blending our two approaches. Of course this survey is demonstrated in the Northouse text, but if you would like a quick link to it to try it yourself, there is a PDF version with instructions and scoring here: http://people.uncw.edu/nottinghamj/documents/slides6/Northouse6e%20Ch13%20PsychodynamicMyers-Briggs%20Survey.pdf
As with any theory, there are criticisms to the psychodynamic approach. One of the earliest criticisms is that it’s beginning was based on work with those who were severely mentally ill, and people are critical that these findings would not be applicable to “normal” people (Northouse, p. 339). Although the psychodynamic approach to leadership has fallen out of style due to a lack of trainability as well as a lack of a way to test reliability/validity, I have found it to be a very interesting way of approaching leadership styles. I agree that our personalities are responsible for many of the decisions that we make in our personal lives as well as our professional lives. Also, being in touch with your own personality and knowing which traits are better than others can only benefit you and those with whom you work. It also helps to have an understanding of the personality traits of those with whom you work closely, because this will allow you to work together more effectively and empathetically. The psychodynamic approach and trait theory both support these notions.
I am glad to have had the opportunity to learn about the psychodynamic approach to leadership. I am also better for having taken it myself, and for being able to have my director take it so that we could review our results together. I strongly recommend taking the survey if you find yourself fin any kind of leadership position as it allows for an opportunity to grow and realize aspects of your personality and leadership style that you may not have been aware of in the past.
References:
- Northouse, P. G. (2013) Leadership: Theory and Practice. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publicaitons, Inc.