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If you’re going through hell, keep going.

– Winston Churchill

It’s go time, time to get to action.  In Enneagram Change Management Step 8, the team gets to work implementing the solution.  Step 8 is when the team actually solves the problem! It may not be easy, but when the going gets tough, the tough get going.  As things rarely go as planned, Step 8 requires flexibility and persistence to get to the goal.

Excerpt from Teamwork 9.0

Talk, talk, talk, talk, talk. That is all your team has been doing for the first seven steps. Enneagram Type 8s are not particularly fond of talking without taking action. Well, now is the time for action. Step 8 harnesses the dynamic of Enneagram Type 8. The team now has a plan in place and the project has the resources it needs, so this is the moment to move into action and execute the plan.

Get Busy!

Having gone through the process of developing and promoting the plan, most team members are eager to get into action by Step 8. The team now has envisioned a clear path to a successful outcome, and they will want to start down that path with enthusiasm and vigor.

The actual implementation will vary depending on the plan developed in Step 6. It could take weeks, months, or even years. Of all the steps in problem solving, Step 8 usually takes the longest. Successful implementation will take determination by your team, moving forward daily towards the goal.

Referring back to the Enneagram diagram, Type 8 is connected to both Type 2 and Type 5. The Type 2 dynamic draws the team forward, keeping in mind the benefit that the stakeholders will enjoy upon successful completion of the project. On the other hand, Type 5 is the analytical type, prone to paralysis by analysis. When the team encounters obstacles, there will be a tendency to fall back to Step 5, which is completely natural. The trick is to recognize this, move quickly through Steps 5, 6, and 7, and then back to action in Step 8. While the Type 8 dynamic dominates Step 8, the dynamics of the other types—particularly 5, 6, and 7—will be critical to keep the team moving forward and to prevent the project from stalling.

Start Small, End Big

I have worked with teams that simply do not have a lot of natural Type 8 energy. If this happens with your team, try starting small and building on short-term successes; this is a great recipe for building and keeping up momentum towards the goal.

For instance, when implementing solutions that will affect a company’s product development process, I advise my team to pick one smaller product development project and prototype the solutions with that development team.

Engaging with that one smaller team, you can learn what works and what doesn’t. You can develop the materials you will need to communicate the solutions to other teams. And you can demonstrate the positive effects that the solutions have on outcomes. All of this makes it that much easier for each successive team to adopt the new solution. After a while, all the teams are using your new solution, mitigating the problems and accomplishing the goals of your initiative.

How do you kick off the implementation phase of your initiatives? How do you keep up momentum and energy in this phase?  What approach do you take to overcome obstacles?

[Video Transcript]

In Steps 1 through 7, what have you done? Talk, talk, talk. Step 8 is the time for action. Enneagram Type 8s love to get the action. They will be the type that is most frustrated as the team works through the first seven steps. You will want to coach the Type 8s on your team to have patience during these early steps. But in Step 8, the team gets to action. With the approved plan in hand, your team’s now ready to march ahead, solve the problem, and achieve the goals.

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You were born to be a player. You were meant to be here. This moment is yours.

– Herb Brooks

Woohoo—it’s time to kick off the project! Your team has developed a plan to get to the goal and is chomping at the bit to get started.  In Enneagram Change Management Step 7, the team spreads their excitement to all stakeholders and enthusiastically promotes the plan to get the resources — people, tools, money and time — to embark on their mission.  Put your best cheerleaders forward and get the buy-in to proceed.

Excerpt from Teamwork 9.0

Now that your team has identified the best path to the goal, your problem-solving team should be revved up and ready to charge down that path. However, the broader group of stakeholders will not be at the same excitement level yet. Now is the time to inspire that wider group—including the executive sponsors—to the same level of enthusiasm as the team. It is time for the team to sell the plan to all the stakeholders. It is time to tap the dynamic of Enneagram Type 7.

People in sales or political roles will understand this phase of problem solving well. A salesperson or politician must present a story with a bright future and receive permission to proceed and create that future for their customers or constituents. Step 7 of problem solving is similar.

When I facilitate problem-solving groups during Step 7, I recommend that the team create a presentation that tells a story. The first part of that story sets the stage: you remind your stakeholders of the pain they are experiencing because of their daunting problem. To make this more dramatic, let’s call the problem the dragon. Then, you introduce your heroes, the team of highly credible and talented folks ready to face the dragon. You may want to share some examples of havoc wreaked by the dragon, and some stories of early, unsuccessful attempts to slay the dragon. Then, you will want to share your heroes’ insight that exposed an alternative path to addressing the dragon problem. Finally, your story will explain the careful preparation the heroes have made to tame the dragon, thereby eliminating the problem once and for all. And, there you stop.

What do you think that your executive sponsors/decision-makers will do at this point? In my experience, having facilitated this process many times, the response is unequivocally “Go Get That Dragon!” I have found that all reasonable requests for resources—people, equipment, and cash—are made available for the Dragon Taming Quest. Also, there is a strong sense of empathy about the shared problem and anticipation of the beautiful world in which the dragon no longer terrorizes the citizens. That anticipation is infectious, and the executive sponsors will feel it. The broader organization will eagerly support your heroes in their quest, too. That widespread support is important since taming this dragon will not be easy and will require everyone’s cooperation.

I may have stretched the dragon metaphor to the limits here, but I think it does highlight the important step of having the team get explicit permission from the executive sponsors in order to proceed. This is similar to a sales process. I recommend that the team enlist the help of an enthusiastic, people-oriented salesperson-type to assist them in creating and telling a compelling story. Once your team has received permission to move forward, you arrive at Step 8, in which you act to solve the problem.

How do you promote a project to get buy-in from stakeholders?  Do you put together a compelling story that excites your audience?  Do you put your most enthusiastic team members forward to tell the story? Do you instill excitement into all stakeholders before moving to action?

[Video Transcript]

Now that you have your plan, the team needs to take it back to the broader set of stakeholders for buy-in. Enneagram Type 7 is often called the enthusiast. They’re the ones who get people excited to try something new. In Step 7, you socialize the plan with your organization. You remind everyone of the problems they face, and show how the plan will solve those problems. Done well, this socialization will lower barriers and resistance during implementation.

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If you fail to plan, you are planning to fail!

— Benjamin Franklin

Once you have verified that you have a viable solution, you can  plot the path that takes you to your goal. In Step 6 of Enneagram Change Management you develop the plan that solves the problem. You optimize the path considering all important metrics — time, cost, quality, resource availability, etc. You anticipate risks and work to minimize and mitigate them.  In Step 6 you are looking into the future, into your crystal ball, envisioning the successful solution to the problem and all the steps that will get you there.

Excerpt from Teamwork 9.0

Enneagram Type 6 is at the core of the Head-Thinking-Anxiety center; as such, 6s will actively pursue minimizing their anxiety. Uncertainty and risk increase anxiety the most for Type 6s. Therefore, they naturally prepare for the future by planning ahead and seeking to minimize risk.

Type 6s can look at a number of scenarios and, using their anxiety level as a guide, instinctively spot the one with the fewest unknowns, the fewest pitfalls, and the highest likelihood of success. Using the pro/con analysis generated in Step 5, the 6 can assess each scenario and plot a path into the future to foresee likely outcomes. They can predict which ideas have the clearest path to the goal, because those ideas cause the 6 the least amount of anxiety. This Type 6 dynamic comes into play in Step 6 of problem solving.

The Path of Least Danger

Having worked through the logical analysis of Step 5, the team will have reached a general consensus as to which ideas are the most viable and favorable for getting to the goal. This is the indication that your team has naturally arrived at Step 6, the Planning step. You can treat these favorable ideas as the framework for your solution—the skeleton, as it were. Now it is time to add the meat.

If you fail to plan, you are planning to fail!

In this step, the meat includes all the details associated with associated with following the plan to achieve the goal. What resources are needed? How much do those resources cost? Who needs to be involved, and when? What is the schedule for implementation? All these details need to be mapped out for presentation to the stakeholders responsible for allocating those resources. Enlisting the help of a team member with project management skills makes sense at this point in the process. It is exactly this skill set that comes into play in Step 6.

Plan A/Plan B

At this point, you still may have a couple of viable paths to get to the goal. You may want to split your problem-solving team into smaller groups of advocates for each viable idea and let each group build a plan. As the details are fleshed out, you will see which idea has the shorter schedule, which has the lower cost, which requires the fewest people, and which has the fewest uncertainties and risks. With that knowledge, the team can develop a Plan A and a backup Plan B.

In Step 6, you will have decided the one or two ideas or sets of ideas that get you to the goal and solve the problem. You will have put together a detailed plan to implement the ideas. The team is now prepared to present the plan to the stakeholders and sponsors, especially those who can allocate the resources necessary to make the plan come true. Now is the time to promote the plan!

Does your team take the time to plan the path to your goal?  Do you anticipate and mitigate risks? Do you have a fallback plan, a Plan B?

[Video Transcript]

Step 6 is where your team takes the most promising idea and builds a project plan that gets you all the way to the goal. Who does what and when? Type 6 is often called the questioner. Their brain is constantly asking questions. What if this happens? What if that happens? They’re constantly on the lookout for pitfalls and developing strategies to avoid them. In Step 6 of problem solving, you’ll want the team to build a low-risk plan that gets it to the goal. The plan can include risk mitigation strategies and contingency plans.

Thanks for watching. If you found this helpful, click on the thumbs-up button, subscribe to the channel, and get notifications of future episodes. If you have a question, please leave it in the comment section, and I’ll get to it as soon as possible. Thanks again.