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Welcome back to another episode here on the Enneagram at Work Podcast. I'm your host, Sarah Wallace, founder and managing director over here at Enneagram MBA, a team training company. And today, uh I think this is gonna be a pretty short and sweet one, but I wanted to share this story with you, this experience with you, because um it was such an awesome uh situation that happened, both for myself and for the leadership of this particular team to get the feedback that they did from this particular uh individual. So I'm gonna I'm gonna give you the backstory here. So a couple weeks ago, um I was down in Nashville. And if you are somebody from that workshop that happens to be listening, please reach out later and say hi. Um, you know, it I wish the podcast was more of a dialogue. It it it's it's it's a monologue. So I don't know who's listening or when you're listening. Um but if you happen to be from that workshop, I would love to uh hear from you and and any other interesting takeaways you had. But um there was a workshop that I did down in Nashville, and um it was we were meeting for a half day. So this particular team had met the day before. They were gonna um continue on that afternoon, and then they had um some activities the next day. So they were they had some long days together, and uh I think they were fun, but you know, it's a lot of time spent, and and then to have this half day, you know, workshop thing where some stranger is gonna come in and tell me who I am and all the ways that I'm wrong, and all the ways, all the reasons why I need therapy, like that does not sound fun at all. So um I know that sometimes people have that perception walking into a workshop, and I think a gentleman in the audience had a similar uh had had a similar viewpoint of what he thought was going to happen. And I know that there are always skeptics, and I try to address the skeptics in the room when we when we do have workshops because I know they're there and I'm not here to, you know, say, oh, you shouldn't be skeptical. This is going to be the most amazing thing of your life. I mean, I hope so. For many people it is, but you know, I get it. Sometimes it if your life isn't changed, that's okay too. Um, you know, just grab yourself a coffee and relax for however long you are here. And if you don't want to think about yourself, um, maybe you can think about somebody on your team or somebody at home that you might see in something that we talk about today. So I really do my best to, and all of our facilitators do their best to really um you know address that it from the beginning because of course they're they're always gonna be there. Um and most of the time they end up coming around. Sometimes they don't, and that's okay, but most of the time they do. And this particular uh person had that experience where um there was an opportunity after we went through all the types to um after we went through each type to share uh something specific to them, what was resonating, if they had tested high on that, if they saw themselves in that, why, if there was anything about it that didn't resonate, even though they tested high, what was that? If they saw a funny story, a specific example. Um, so there's always some opportunity to participate throughout the the initial introduction. And when we got to the type eight, there was somebody who had said who raised their hand and said, you know, I really didn't want to come to this thing. I really didn't want to be here. But everything that you said is so on point about me as a type eight, and I did not want to take the assessment that you originally sent. It seemed really long. I just I didn't think it was, I thought it was gonna be a waste of time, but I got my results back and the description like blew me away. I became a believer, became a believer after that initial assessment and and just continued to be through this workshop. I it is he said, it's wild how well the Enneagram and then my specific type has nailed who I am, the the things that I think I'm good at, but also the things that I know that I struggle with. It's uh it's almost a little scary. So I thought, you know, that is a good lesson and a good reminder for those of you who have ever um purchased our DIY kit and are worried about skeptics in the audience. Um, for any, you know, host or manager that is worried about there being skeptics in the audience, there there will be, there most likely will be. Um, but skepticism isn't necessarily, it doesn't have to be, you know, the enemy of a good of a good workshop. Um, you don't necessarily need everyone to arrive excited about the Enneagram initially. Um, you just need the material to be credible, um, relevant, useful, I would even say fun and engaging in order to earn their participation. And so if you are somebody who is thinking, you know, I'd like to bring this to my group, but I know, you know, we have a couple of uh doctors. I was talking to somebody uh um last week who has a group of therapists who have been through, you know, years of training and and and different modalities, very much backed by, you know, research and that sort of thing. And so, you know, one of her concerns was I don't know, I'm I I bet there's gonna be some skeptics in the room. And and I would just say, if you have ever thought something similar, probably, but just like this gentleman in this particular workshop, most of the time, if they're willing to actually go through that assessment, if they're willing to um go through a typing interview with one of us, if they're willing to um, you know, just be open to what it might say, be open to the workshop experience. Most of the time, people will come up to me after a workshop and say, I was really skeptical, I didn't like you, I didn't like the Enneagram. I did, I thought, what is this, you know, woo-woo? What is this astrology uh thing that that somebody's gonna, you know, take four hours of my life explaining. Um, and turns out it was accurate and I could see how it could be useful, and it is giving me some wonderful prompts to take home, to have with my manager, to have with a teammate that I have struggled with. And so uh I wanted to share that because I can say that all day long, right? Um, I can I can tell you that in theory, I can tell you that from you know what I see, but I always love when there is a very specific example of this. And so this was an awesome one. Um, of course, you know, as somebody who teaches the Enneagram, who talks about, who believes in the Enneagram all the time. Um, I always, you know, love it when that sort of thing happens. But this situation was also really um, I think meaningful and interesting to um the managers, the management team as well, just to see, yeah, we knew that he was going to be a little skeptical and wasn't sure, you know, how he was gonna show up in this meeting, and um loved to see that he was actually ended up being one of the most engaged uh people of the whole workshop, participated one of, you know, the most uh or or close to the most out of anybody. And uh that was, you know, uh as that person's manager and the the leadership team, they were just saying, that was really cool to see too. And he ended up bringing so many great questions, great insight, interesting takes. And so uh I'm happy that he came around uh because he really added to that workshop. And that is something that is not uncommon though, right? We have there's there's always things like this um situations uh that will happen. But this is just a recent one that I wanted to pass along. Uh, for anybody who is thinking about running their own workshop. Um, maybe you are in human resources or the learning and development team and are looking at this but are worried about, oh, you know, what I don't know about the Enneagram, what are people gonna say? Um, I hope this offers you some encouragement to to put it out there to see what what those skeptics might end up actually experiencing after after they go through um some pieces of the Enneagram. So um I will offer this if you happen to have shared the Enneagram inside your organization and there you were worried about skeptics, or maybe there was one, and turns out they were one of the the most engaged people by the end of it. Um you have a success story, you have a lesson learned from dealing with a skeptic. Um please reach out. I would love to pass along any tips, examples, success stories that you have over at EnneagramMba.com forward slash contact, or um maybe uh maybe you would be willing to share your story on the podcast uh in an interview. So I would also love to for you to consider that. Um, but these are the sort of things that uh happen during an Enneagram workshop during some of our programming. And I'm gonna invite you to check out those options over at Enneagramba.com where you'll have an opportunity to tell us a little bit about your team. Um, and then based on that, based on um our experience and observations as what's worked for uh teams like yours, we'll kind of come together um and pull together a uh curated experience for you and your specific team. But it starts over at EnneagramMBA.com on the website there to tell us a little bit about your team. So, with that, as always, thank you for being here and uh hope to see you in the next one.