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[ENFJ] ENFJ and Career -- Doctor or CEO

stasheffe

New member
Joined
Feb 25, 2010
Messages
1
MBTI Type
ENFJ
Dear members of the forum:

I just joined because I am desperate to hear from older, mature ENFJs about a career decision I now need to make.

Since I was young, I wanted to be the CEO of a company I started. I aligned everything in my life for this -- courses I took, what I studied, and then I started a company in the food products industry. It has now built up and expanded, done well, and it's now time for me to consider what I'm going to do next. I'm in an ideal position to start another company, but I have doubts about doing this.

ENFJ as a Leader of an Organization: I have desperately looked for information on what an ENFJ is like as a leader. While I've had this role, I've felt conflicted about it throughout.

I've excelled and done well at networking, building relationships, working as a team, presenting and teaching about the company. But I've been uncomfortable with other aspects of the role -- always being looked to for the answers, introvertedly thinking through strategic decisions, fear of disrupting harmony in communications with employees and shareholders, delay in action because I fear acting without bringing everyone along.

I am definitely a J, and can think strategically about relationships easily, but about other kinds of strategic decisions, I feel like I am smoked by TJs. But I wonder if this is because I spent so much time trying to think like a T that I haven't developed my F side to form judgements about things other than morals and relationships.

ENFJ as a Doctor: The only other career option I believe I'd be happy in is being a doctor. I feel that being in a position where I can DIRECTLY serve people who both need help AND want help would make me very happy, just by how my personality is automatically structured.

I have longed to speak with doctors who are ENFJs to see if this "ideal" is true, but it's so hard to find them. If any of you are ENFJs and doctors, your advice would be golden to me.

My biggest question is this:

What do you ENFJs wind up doing in career, once you've found who you really are later in life, and have matured? Where do we fit in this world?

Would we be unhappy leading organizations (though we might be capable of it)? And do many of us become doctors, and are we happy there?
 

syndatha

New member
Joined
Aug 12, 2009
Messages
255
MBTI Type
ENFJ
Enneagram
3w2
I'm currently the leader of a spiritual organization, and quite happy with it. I sometimes get a little numb if there's too much stress/conflicts, and then I isolate myself for some days. It helps that I believe in what I do, it couldn't have been just any organization.
I've taken on a lot more than I planned, lots of cleaning up to do. But I plan to be re-elected, and hopefully things will run smoother when all the problems from before have been sorted out :)

I could see myself as a doctor, but I tend to find medical professions a bit narrow minded. I study psychotherapy at the moment, and plan to combine counselling/teaching/leading the organization/leading holistic rituals. I think I need to do several different things to have the ideal career.
 

BlueFlame

New member
Joined
Feb 8, 2010
Messages
181
MBTI Type
ENFJ
Enneagram
3w2
I'm not very old, nor very mature, but I'll give you my opinion anyway. :cheese:

I have a pretty high-ranking position in a small oil and gas company, but I can't imagine being a CEO. I'm pretty good with doing mundane things that no one else will willingly do because I have an unhealthy love of lists and graphs and spreadsheets and filing and organization, and harmony is my thing. I can HR like none-other. Add in the intuitive ability, and I'm a pretty good go-to gal, in general. But I don't like being alone on the top. I don't like making the *hard* decisions without support, back-up, and really some sort of mentor above me. I *can* lead, but I prefer to do it quietly behind the scenes, and defer when I feel uncomfortable or afraid to make the wrong decisions

As far as being a doctor goes, that was always my dream growing up. I did great in college and blew the MCAT out of the water, but something about the life that the people in my family lead (mostly doctors and lawyers) didn't settle right with me. They love people, but they're isolated from really digging into them by their very job, and they've sacrificed a lot of time with their own loved ones. I do have one ENFJ uncle who's an endocrinologist, and he's known for running hours behind schedule at the office because he spends an incredible amount of time with his patients and he LOVES what he does, the patients love him (I've never seen people so content to wait for ungodly amounts of time in a waiting room) and I admire that, but he STILL has sacrificed so much time with his family...I just couldn't do that. And, once again, making the tough calls would be really hard on me emotionally, I think. But if you could do it, and structure your life to really feel fulfilled by it (ie, not popping in the room for 2 minutes to sign the prescription and head off), I think it could be a phenomenal career for an ENFJ.

Anyway, I'm planning on quitting my job and going back to school to be a Nurse Practitioner next year. Less pay, obviously, but the independence I need, less liability, and more flexibility, and still in the medical field where I've always wanted to be.

Good luck on your journey :)
 

Arinn

New member
Joined
Sep 15, 2010
Messages
23
MBTI Type
eNFJ
Enneagram
5w4
Methinks i ain't so old either, although i would love to be very soon. I think that it should depend whether you're up to handle the stress and the amount of responsibility you'll be taking. If you take a look closer to MBTI, you can find your preferred functions. However i do know that many 'ENTJ's are great CEO's because they like to direct, manager, and control things. A lot of Te i see there, sorry if this didn't help but i think you should have other Intuitive's with high positions help you out. They should be able to see your potential to some extent :yes:
 

Lily flower

New member
Joined
Jun 28, 2010
Messages
930
MBTI Type
INFJ
Enneagram
2
My husband is an ENFJ and a doctor and he really, really enjoys it. He gets to delve deeply into people's issues, be a resource, etc. He did find residency to be very difficult, because there is some sort of military mind set among physicians that they have to be extremely mean and rude to you during residency, and then if you survive you can be a doctor. So you have to be willing to take being ridiculed constantly during residency. But once you make it through that, it's a very good career for an ENFJ. I would recommend steering away from surgery and some of the specialties. The doctors that do well in those areas tend to be more the ISTJ kind of personalities. But ENFJ's make excellent primary care physicians, and do well in areas, such as hospice. You get to help people and make recommendations and find resources that will dramatically improve people's lives. And the world could use more doctors with the ENFJ's personality skills.
 

skylights

i love
Joined
Jul 6, 2010
Messages
7,756
MBTI Type
INFP
Enneagram
6w7
Instinctual Variant
so/sx
fwiw, i know an excellent, very effective ENFJ organization leader who LOVES what she does, but at the same time, it gives her a lot of stress.

i actually would probably prefer to have an ENFJ top leader over a TJ because they generally make people feel more comfortable and are very good at drawing everyone together. TJs are amazing in leadership roles in terms of what they can get done, but i think they're better suited to being project leaders while ENFJs make better group leaders, if that makes sense. if you do decide to take the CEO route, maybe you can find yourself some TJ help, that might be ideal.

good luck with your decision. :yes:
 
Joined
Feb 5, 2011
Messages
81
MBTI Type
ENFJ
Enneagram
4w3
I'm a teacher and I absolutely love it...and I know that my students like me a lot and often ask to have more lessons with me :)
 

ceecee

Coolatta® Enjoyer
Joined
Apr 22, 2008
Messages
15,908
MBTI Type
INTJ
Enneagram
8w9
I'm a teacher and I absolutely love it...and I know that my students like me a lot and often ask to have more lessons with me :)


You guys are SO good at it, I envy the way ENFJ's can tailor teaching so well to their students. My ENFJ husband is a in a senior position with his company, he also trains and teaches classes internally and eternally as well as a lot of mentoring/guiding for people in more entry level positions. His presentations and classes are always to capacity because he's a natural teacher. He could be a CEO, I am positive but I don't know that he would be willing to give up that much time with the family for it. A doctor, I could see him as one very easily too.
 
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