[MBTI General] Dealing with control freak ESFJ/ESTJs

[Thalassa]

ESFJ girl:"Talk through your part in 2 minutes!"
Me: (Wow that's impossible, it's a really important part of the project, tons of information to build up for the recommendations that come later... but whatever, I don't want her to keep nit picking anymore so guess I'll do it).

...

ESFJ girl:"You rushed soooo much in your part during practice, you NEED to SLOW DOWN!"
Me: (...well DUH!)
ENTJ/ENFJ friend: "But in her defense, she did make the 2 minute mark you asked!"
Me:

Maybe it's because I'm ENFP and have tertiary Te, but I have no problem responding to people who talk to me like that. I think I must have a very developed ISTJ shadow or something, but I don't put up with it and wait for other people to back me up. I think because of the level of nastiness with which she talked to you (calling you loose and bipolar, etc.), she was trying to dominate you and once she found you could be dominated, she just kept it up.

Your withdrawal and unwillingness to cooperate was feeding her fury
This I do agree. My Ne hits overdrive under stress, picking up hints and interpreting them to be malicious (perhaps a bit too much at times), which gives me further reasons to distance myself. To be fair, I was never unwilling to cooperate. I never turned in any of my work LATE, I just waited until the deadline even if I had the work done. I did want to see her pissed even more though because..well, she is just, such an attention-seeking high-maintainance ..b*tch! She gets hysteric when she's pissed off (which seems like 70% of her being, I kid you not), it's kind of hilarious to watch.

You sound passive-aggressive. I'm VERY direct. Your methods are probably much more effective in driving a person like this crazy, so maybe you're on to something.

Ever since I grew quiet, she's the only one in the group distracting the work flow with her incessant complaints about her boyfriend (who is the nicest guy in the world!), her school work, and her other non-related "victim-talk" nonsense (omg this room is SOO COLD!).

How is complaining that the room is cold "victim talk"?

She is a self-typed ESFJ, though I do think she's more ESTJ.

• She's really into timetables and schedules (Te?)
• She insists on following a previous team's outline of the report word for word without evaluating whether the team's work is applicable to ours (Si?)

• 
  
  Sounds like an STJ.
  
  

  [*]She's an attention seeking hypochondriac (as described above)

  
  Because she complains about being cold?
  
  

  [*]She thinks she's being a good person by being "blunt" (which is often times more direct attacks on people but she justifies them)

Ha ha...I'm guilty of this too...I'm seriously thinking your friend is an ESTJ.

You do realize that Fe doms are usually more careful with what they say, right? If she were ESFJ she might be equally as controlling, but I doubt she'd openly pride herself on being blunt. Generally they achieve control with a certain level of manipulation that they may or may not be able to even be called out on. Fe would boss you around, but be a bit more smooth about it.

I hope I haven't alienated some SJ people who have seen this thread, I am also curious to know what you find annoying when working with groups.

Thanks so much everyone for such constructive advices. As much as I hit the sore spot on the ESFJ girl (because she made it personal and deserved it!), I would like to avoid conflicts like this as much as possible in the future. I probably won't confront her directly, but I will remove her from my facebook friends list haha

Well, the only way to avoid confrontations with someone like that is to avoid them. However, I think just deleting people from your facebook and not confronting them directly is passive-aggressive and may inadvertantly cause MORE drama. I'd just tell her why you don't want to be friends anymore in a short email so you don't have to deal with a face-to-face confrontation if it bothers you so much.

 

[lasdf23]

Yeah INTPness's description of the ESTJ boss fits very well. I'm starting be more convinced that she's an ESTJ instead.

You sound passive-aggressive. I'm VERY direct. Your methods are probably much more effective in driving a person like this crazy, so maybe you're on to something.

Haha I didn't realize it but yes, I do have to agree, that does make me passive-aggressive. It's never my thing to confront people directly (unless it's somebody I care about and want to make a direct impact in his/her life). If I don't like somebody, I will not deliberately hurt you but I will wait it out until you fail, and get secret guilty pleasure out of it. And if you don't fail at all, well then, you got me. I will admit that I was wrong. That's been my approach.

How is complaining that the room is cold "victim talk"?

To follow up on her complaints:

ESTJ girl: "omg this room is SOO COLD!! (looks around, everybody else is in t-shirts) I always get so cold, I have to wear my peacoat otherwise I'd get sick. Let me check the thermostat. What!? 76? It should be 78! I'm raising it by 2 degrees I hope you guys are ok with that!!"

Other examples of victim talk throughout the retreat:

At the restaurant,
ESTJ girl: "omg this pasta is so.. bitter! I can't eat it. Somebody else taste it for me please tell me I'm not the only one who thinks this pasta is bitter!"
ENFJ guy: (annoyed) "[girl's name], you know I ordered the same thing as you right? I'm eating it now and its tastes great. But good job ruining my appetite (half kidding but half serious)."

Other common phrases from her:
"This is so hot/cold/wet/dry/dirty/(though probably not clean) I can't deal with it!"
"Oh my stomach hurts so much, maybe cause I didn't eat today"
...


it's fine when those phrases come out occasionally, but when that's all a person talks about, (me Me ME I'm so special, I have high standards) it's sure to grow on my nerves. Maybe I got the definition of "victim-talk" wrong, but you get the gist of it..

The email idea sounds about a good compromise between confronting and letting it slip. I should definitely give that a thought.

 

[Charmed Justice]

You mentioned that this was a long-term friend of yours. Did she turn into a she devil overnight, or is this the last straw?

 

[Saslou]

:hi:

Could your friend possibly of been incredibly stressed out???

I know when i stress out i become a control freak .. It is not usually towards other people though, more towards myself (vicious circle).

I am also very proud and i don't want to tell/show people i am not handling the pressure very well .. Silly me!

Just an idea.

Good luck anyway

 

[lasdf23]

Long term as in 3 years throughout college. She's a year ahead of me so the first 2 1/2 years she was like my mentor. She helped me with applications into this business school, gave me answers to the classes that she's taken previously, etc, without me asking.

I've always realized she's a demanding nagging person who always wants her opinions heard, but that didn't bother me much because I didn't see her often enough, and she was nice to me, back then at least. Now she acts like she's back in high school doing the whole clique thing. What a disappointment.

 

[Saslou]

I've always realized she's a demanding nagging person who always wants her opinions heard, but that didn't bother me much because I didn't see her often enough, and she was nice to me, back then at least. Now she acts like she's back in high school doing the whole clique thing. What a disappointment.

That does suck .. You don't need friends like that. Break free and allow her some time to gain some life experience/wisdom and hopefully should you meet again in the future she'll be less demanding and less of a nag.

Ever the optimist

It is a shame you have that particular dynamic going .. My good friend who's an ENTP, if we got together again, i think we'd be dead or in prison. He's a good laugh. Luckily we are different islands at present, lol.

 

[ThatGirl]

Beat the shit out of them.

 

[Lethe]

As a "controller" myself, I relate to the act of being impossibly domineering (in a different way) when I desperately need to get things done. It's the sort of intensity I put myself through to complete solitary assignments, but it leaves me unprepared to deal with the tasks that involves other teammates... and a short timer!

Luckily, I believe this condition is solvable. There is also a very similar story on this: Jean, The Enneagram One

I second Saslou's opinions on both posts. Your friend is definitely stressed, and she'll need a little space to regain her balance. The easiest way to get right to the point is to figure out what is causing her to become unpleasant. Avoid playing her power games, and if you can, deliver a well-thought out solution right to her door. Once you show her how she could reach her own goals, and include other people (good or bad), she'll be less of the nag she unfortunately became to be. She may be right on one small matter, somewhere, but she doesn't have to hammer everyone down to get there. You're in a team here, and it means that everyone has a part in the project.

Long term as in 3 years throughout college. She's a year ahead of me so the first 2 1/2 years she was like my mentor. She helped me with applications into this business school, gave me answers to the classes that she's taken previously, etc, without me asking.

I've always realized she's a demanding nagging person who always wants her opinions heard, but that didn't bother me much because I didn't see her often enough, and she was nice to me, back then at least. Now she acts like she's back in high school doing the whole clique thing. What a disappointment.

In my experience, uber-stressed ESTJs are the most difficult to deal with, but I've managed to get them to calm down just by actively listening to them. For five-ten minutes at least, sympathize with selected points whenever you can, prove to them that you've understood their message/intention, and are working towards a similar end. You'll be surprised how quickly they will change at that point. I also have an ISFJ mother, and nothing fueled her wrath as quickly as silence. My INTP father, being much like you in this situation, seemed to never be in short supply of it.

Taking a quick guess, I'd say she might be afraid of losing the friendship she had prior to the project. Since you're taking less and less of her advice, she feels no long valuable to you in the way she once was. And because you're doing so well, she was unready to deal with that, as a friend and a business student (there's still competition). When the frustration tempers down, I'd really try to see if reassuring that she's an invaluable person to you, and you appreciate her good contributions, would help. Business can be one cutthroat industry, but I'd try explaining that it's not worth loosing friends over, and more than one person can be good at it.

At the restaurant,
ESTJ girl: "omg this pasta is so.. bitter! I can't eat it. Somebody else taste it for me please tell me I'm not the only one who thinks this pasta is bitter!"
ENFJ guy: (annoyed) "[girl's name], you know I ordered the same thing as you right? I'm eating it now and its tastes great. But good job ruining my appetite (half kidding but half serious)."

Other common phrases from her:
"This is so hot/cold/wet/dry/dirty/(though probably not clean) I can't deal with it!"
"Oh my stomach hurts so much, maybe cause I didn't eat today"

Ouch! That girl has a long way to go on living with imperfect standards. Best lesson? Ask, "Well, what are you going to do about it?" Let the child cry until they start dealing with the problem on their own, instead of expecting the forces of nature to bend to her will.

The most hilarious, recurring Te/Ti argument that I've had with ESTJ supervisors/co-workers in the past is some version of the following:

ESTJ (Monday): You're doing X wrong.
INTP: Oh OK. What's the correct way of doing it?

ESTJ (Tuesday): You're doing Y wrong.
INTP (always striving for competence): Darn it! I'll get the hang of that soon. You just watch. Sorry about that.

ESTJ (Wednesday): You're doing Z wrong.
INTP (beginning to see a pattern and knowing that it's not all wrong): Hmmm. Man, I keep messing up. Do people usually get the hang of this faster than me or is it normal for it to take a while?

ESTJ (Thursday): You're doing Q wrong.
INTP (pressure beginning to build, but trying to remain respectful): Grrr! It seems like I'm doing a lot of things wrong around here. Am I working out OK as an employee? I'm just wondering because every job I've ever had I've been really good at, but I don't seem to be getting the hang of this quite as quickly.

ESTJ (Friday): You're doing F wrong.
INTP: Dude, I've been watching and listening to you for 6 months now and every single thing that anyone does is wrong. Everything is wrong to you. Do you watch your wife cook at night and tell her she's using the wrong knife? Do you tell your dog that he's barking wrong? It must be pure hell to go out to dinner with you or to go on vacation with you. How does anyone do anything right around you? You think you're such a brilliant "numbers guy" - here's some probability for you: Just by pure chance or pure luck, one of these days I'm going to walk into this place and do something right for a change. Do you think that's in the cards for me? Do you think that's something that might happen one of these days? Are the chances in my favor or should I just quit now? Let me know as soon as you figure it out because if you think the answer is no, then there's really no point in me being here anymore, but if you think things might start to turn around for me, maybe I can stick around and be trusted to do my work competently. Ball is in your court. Excuse me while I get back to work.

ESTJ:

On Wednesday, I'd tell the supervisors the importance of allowing me to learn on the job, and I'll ask them for the kinds of things they look for in a worker. Fulfill that part (in your own way), and you should fly right through. People are only like this because they can't articulate their demands well enough, so they don't have to bother their workers every micro-second and drain their energy in the process.

 

[proximo]

You mentioned that this was a long-term friend of yours. Did she turn into a she devil overnight, or is this the last straw?

This is a good question that ENxP's do well to ask themselves with integrity in situations like this. Because we do have a tendendy to put people on pedestals based on what good points we've seen in them that we like, coupled with the "connections" between them our own intuition (fallible!) has made to build a picture of who they are entirely, to a sort of infatuation. Then it only takes them to do something we don't like, to break the spell as it were, and suddenly we're doing the same thing with the bad points... infatuation in reverse?

 

[Violator]

Hi,

I'm a college student majoring in business (ah why did I do that I regret it so much), which, as I learned later (ironically in my organization management class), is predominantly consisting of SJs, especially ESFJ/ESTJs.

Cool. I'm studying business too.

It's called the pecking order. She is establishing dominance over you in front of the others and you are letting her. Her goal is to make you her second in command.

Typically the people who are competitive with each other have similar personality types, not opposing types- hence the pecking order. But you probably know her type since you took the test together, right?

Find out what her type is, then go for the jugular. The goal is to make her seem like your assistant, not vice versa.

 

[Lethe]

Find out what her type is, then go for the jugular. The goal is to make her seem like your assistant, not vice versa.

You might find yourself a sheep, but not a team player and possible companion. Reversing the negative behavior only reasserts the fear that only one person can be good, and everyone else, no matter how skilled, can't be anything more than a slave. Power-hogging doesn't do much for team innovation, creativity, and productivity.

 

[Violator]

You might find yourself a sheep, but not a team player and possible companion. Reversing the negative behavior only reasserts the fear that only one person can be good, and everyone else, no matter how skilled, can't be anything more than a slave. Power-hogging doesn't do much for team innovation, creativity, and productivity.

You have to weed out the dead weight first. I've made mistakes in the past where I gave someone on my team the benefit of the doubt, and he messed up big time. He had a problem with playing for a team- tried to do everything himself, take all the credit etc.

My first instincts about him was that he was a bad egg- then I gave him the benefit of the doubt, and later I was right by looking at his later actions, he proved that he is someone who couldn't be trusted.

 

[Lethe]

You have to weed out the dead weight first. I've made mistakes in the past where I gave someone on my team the benefit of the doubt, and he messed up big time. He had a problem with playing for a team- tried to do everything himself, take all the credit etc.

My first instincts about him was that he was a bad egg- then I gave him the benefit of the doubt, and later I was right by looking at his later actions, he proved that he is someone who couldn't be trusted.

I agree that unfortunate events happen all the time to good people, though it doesn't look like a dead end for the OP (unless he gives up for good). When the stressful events are gone, people can go back to analyze the situation, and determine what is worth changing or keeping. It seems like such a waste of two-three years in friendship to stop early on.

For your situation, it would be a good choice to let him sit out for the term, and rethink how he's impacting the team. However, the OP's team was strong enough to handle his problematic friend without loosing balance, so throwing out the source of trouble isn't absolutely necessary.

Having worked with many dramatic individuals before, once you find/resolve the root-cause of their actions, they will start to participate and contribute more. I think what also makes a strong team is how they face the issues that arises -- either from the inside or out. The more positive groups will be proactive and solution-minded, aiming to move pass the obstacles while keeping everyone focused on cooperation instead mudslinging each other. Sometimes, an environment can make a huge difference in someone's behavior. Of course, there's the concern of limited resources, and that's why I think you were right in the second post.

 

[capricorn009]

that stinks. I know some ESFJs that assume EVERYBODY feels the way they do, and if not, they try to match up their feelings to a few particular people to the point where everybody else has to do it too. They will encourage you, but it often turns out they were convincing you to want something to make up for skills they couldn't own up to themselves, they will be your 'best friends' or 'confidants' but show any independence of thought, and they will make fun of what you want for yourself or try to plant doubt in your mind about other relationships. But I'm sure healthy ESFJs would be very nice people because they'd be more aware of where themselves end and others begin, I try to keep my mouth shut about other types unless I've met a healthy version but I haven't there. they can be what my dad would refer to as real users of people, didn't believe people that would use others actually existed until I ran into
some. They can also be overprotective to the point where it backfires and makes the people they over protect targets for people that like to talk about
everybody then they wonder why everyone thinks those people are strange when they can't do anything or get a word in without someone saying something,
including being targets for bullies and taunting in social situations. Best way to deal with them is to not be offhanded, bc u will be blamed, but avoid too much
interaction with them and try to work with others if possible, they are real manipulators.

 

[Violator]

Having worked with many dramatic individuals before, once you find/resolve the root-cause of their actions, they will start to participate and contribute more. I think what also makes a strong team is how they face the issues that arises -- either from the inside or out. The more positive groups will be proactive and solution-minded, aiming to move pass the obstacles while keeping everyone focused on cooperation instead mudslinging each other. Sometimes, an environment can make a huge difference in someone's behavior. Of course, there's the concern of limited resources, and that's why I think you were right in the second post.

Dramatic individuals don't belong in business school. We've had a talk with him, about his lack of vision, and his necessity to take credit for work that wasn't his own, and basically he couldn't take any criticism at all. His type ISFP- points to the fact that he can't hack it working with others in a team. Another member told me that he was some unappreciated pencil pusher in a large organization and his entire motivation was driven by trying to get all the glory himself. We all dumped him, so he's not in any project groups at the moment and has been blacklisted by all our investors.

Last I heard, he is trying to program some iphone apps by himself. I think dead weights like him have to be identified immediately. They really have to be taught a lesson, like a bug to be stepped on.

 

[INTPness]

They really have to be taught a lesson, like a bug to be stepped on.

Spoken like a true ENTJ.

 

[JHBowden]

How in the future can I best deal with these control freak people?

Say what's on your mind. We're dealing with just words, right?

And don't take Violator's advice. Isn't this business? Then pursue your own interests, and never take events personally-- if we're going out of our way to teach other people moral lessons, then we're taking our eyes off the ball.

 

[lasdf23]

I see benefits to both sides of the argument. I know when I'm by myself in the shower I imagine myself calling out that girl, being tough and all, and saying what's on my mind ("You're just making a fool of yourself if you keep acting mean to me that way!").

But where I went wrong was to be discouraged by these setbacks and withdrew my enthusiasm for the class. I had ungodly amount of work compared to others on the team, and with this ES(F/T)J girl bullying me like that, I had no desire to contribute more than what's asked of me. I basically became like an order-taking worker, doing what people told me to do and didn't want to do any more of it. I knew some people other than the girl were dissatisfied with how much contribution I had to the project. The EN(F/T)J guy was probably my only ally in the team.

The peer evaluations were turned in to the teacher a few days ago, I ended up with a B- in the course (I'm not too surprised, it's true that others took a lot more responsibilities and busy work of compiling the report/putting together the powerpoint, etc., so in retrospect, I do perhaps deserve a lower grade. But more or so I'm just relieved that it's over.)

Maybe my silent attempt to not bring out the issue backfired. Maybe it was simply because I physically stretched myself too thin this semester. I don't know. But as many of you here have suggested, I really wanted to address the underlying issue that girl had with me, whether it's her thinking I didn't do a good job, or it was something more personal, I don't know.

But where I went wrong was feeling discouraged and sweeping the problem under the rug. I thought it was a noble way to keep myself out of trouble. I didn't have the capacity to deal with any drama at the time (I was getting by with 4-5 hr sleep every day for an entire month), so I guess it was a lose-lose situation for me either way. But in the future, I will make sure to learn from this and speak up before I let her turn the majority of the team against me (and me feeling guilty/discouraged, thus contributing even less... hence, the vicious cycle).

********************************************************************************************************************

On a slightly different but related note, I learned through this project that business is probably 1/3 of innovation/creativity/original thinking, and 2/3 of paperwork filling, making pretty power point, creating outlines/timetables, make things presentable and package them nice. It seemed like we arrived at our conclusion/recommendations within minutes of looking at the collected data. The remaining 70% of the time was spent discussing in what order we present our findings (the 5C's, 4P's, and any other business frameworks/jargon) in our final powerpoint deck.

I've always thought those latter 2/3 of the work was boring. What I'm naturally good at is the first 1/3, finding relevant data, extracting useful information, performing different "analyses" and making suggestions. I get scared if people volunteered me to write the executive summary, to write this, write that....ahhh :-(

But it's the latter 2/3 that takes up the most time, and I think that's also part of the reasons why people underestimated (I think) my portion of the contribution. I pulled up many documents and reports that other people based their research on, but when it was time to write out outlines/executive summaries/final report, I didn't take an active role to go above and beyond. For one thing, I couldn't because of other academic requirements, but even if I did, I probably wouldn't do a good job at it as the ES(T/F)J girl did.

I know my strengths are in data analysis and coming up with proper recommendations. And the personal attacks aside, I do admire her ability to keep things on track and organized. But it seems like her strengths are a lot more readily visible and appreciated in a group work setting often found in business. What can people like me do to make sure we don't get our efforts bogged down by people with other sets of strengths?