What, and Where, Is Power?
A Look at Leadership through the Temperament Lens

Power and authority are loaded words, and we find in our personal coaching and group consulting that discussing someone’s authority and personal power can cause anxiety and confusion. One of the principal reasons for the confusion is that the different personality types see power very differently, and rooted in vastly different places. The lens of Temperament gives us tremendous insight into how each of us tends to view power itself: where it is and how we are most likely to use it.

NF Leaders: The People People

To Intuitive Feelers (NFs), power resides in personal relationships. Personal and interpersonal connections and values are what hold the most sway over this group: to win someone’s commitment requires that a leader relate to him or her personally. This is the NF’s strength, and the NF leader brings to the job an arsenal of potent power tools: a pat on the back, compliments, a warm smile, eye contact, stated feelings of warmth or appreciation, affirmation, respect, personal attention and interest, and an acknowledgment of others’ values.

Effective leaders win an NF employee’s commitment by making a point of caring whether he or she likes the leader in return. All of these efforts are for naught if insincere, for an NF highly values the genuine expression of warmth and connection but is quick to see through and resent veiled attempts at manipulation.

Simple compliance with the wishes of an NF leader is not enough for that NF. The NF leader will continue to “sell” the idea or action until you are not only doing it, but are grateful for the opportunity and experience. NF leaders – whether in sales positions or not – rarely stop selling. Harmony, connection, inclusion, and group cohesion are of the utmost importance. Drawing on their ability to make inspirational pleas, the NF leader will be tirelessly persuasive–and take it personally if people don’t follow.

NT Leaders: Competence Above All

Intuitive Thinkers (NTs) see power residing in competence. NTs neither need nor want – and at times even actively work against – organizational or institutional structures, procedures, traditions, and hierarchy. They are not necessarily being contrary, but are merely seeking clarity and, above all else, competence. When logic, clarity, and competence–as defined by each individual NT–is not present within an organization, then the organization, its conventions, rules, and, above all, its leaders, compromise the NT’s willingness to be led.

When it comes to interacting with their leaders, the NTs’ scorecards are always activated and the performance bar that their leaders must clear is always on the rise. If we do a competent job leading you today, then the bar goes up overnight. Therefore, leading an NT means proving against his or her standards that you are fully competent. If you do that, you will have that NT on board–at least until the end of the day.

This drive for competence plays an important role when the NT is the leader. Because NTs are so focused on objective clarity, they tend to be quick to criticize. It is through criticism that we learn what is wrong, what could be better and how to become more competent. One of the greatest gifts, therefore, that an NT leader can give is criticism of your performance. An NT leader, if he or she puts any stock in you, will continue to develop you through argument, critique of your performance and ideas, and eventually by freeing you from their scrutiny.

SJ Leaders: The Company People

Sensing Judgers (SJs) see power in the structure, hierarchy, and traditions of their organizations and work teams. The power tools of an SJ are titles, salaries, tenure, official citations and commendations, managerial mandates, medals and all of the myriad other things that make success official.

To motivate an SJ subordinate, you must first understand his or her place in the system relative to yours. SJ’s rely upon the system–through its leadership–to provide them with the data and structures they need to accomplish their goals. Even when an SJ loses faith or confidence in a leader, the SJ will tend to follow the proper procedure to transfer jobs or to file a complaint against the leader. Their faith resides in the system and its rules, not in a given individual. To SJ leaders, power is rooted in authority, and though commitment is expected, compliance is demanded.

As leaders, SJs tend to emphasize the importance of detail and practicality in order to make people effective, efficient, and capable of completing projects on time and under budget. If procedures, rules, and regulations do not exist, SJ leaders will first establish parameters and then work within them. In fact, many SJ leaders would identify this as their primary duty–to impose order over chaos. This is the SJ leader’s gift.

SP Leaders: The Troubleshooters

Sensing Perceivers (SPs) live for the moment. They are driven to stay open to new sensory data and to use action and tangible tools to produce some result with immediate impact or benefit. Unlike NFs and SJs, SPs don’t put considerable weight on personal relationships or organizational procedures; both are seen as overly confining. Unlike NTs, SPs don’t score competency with an abstract scorecard, but against the practical demands of the moment and the situation in which they find themselves.

SP employees look to their leaders–when they do at all–to provide them with the materials and resources needed to perform the task and with the freedom to work without managerial meddling or excessive procedural control. SPs want to be free to flex and move with the demands of the day–even those of the moment.

As leaders, SPs exercise power by solving problems and acting to address the needs and concerns of the moment even if so doing violates policy, procedure, organizational hierarchy, an agreed-upon project plan or the individual needs of any given person or group. The needs of the moment trump all of these. This focus on the here-and-now tends to make SP leaders good troubleshooters, with particularly good skills at crisis management–which, in some companies, is a way of life.

This essay is a copyrighted work excerpted from Type Talk At Work by Otto Kroeger, Janet M. Thuesen and Hile Rutledge.

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• Temperament Training Exercises and Handouts
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