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[NF] Help! My ENFJ Boss is Driving Me (ENFP) Crazy.

Esoteric Wench

Professional Trickster
Joined
Dec 20, 2009
Messages
945
MBTI Type
ENFP
Enneagram
7w8
I have a good boss (ENFJ) who is a genuinely nice person. That being said, she totally doesn't know how to deal with or appreciate people with a P preference like me (ENFP). Because of this we've been clashing off and on for the past several months. Overall, I'd say our relationship is good, but she just can't handle it when I try to renegotiate a deadline (which I rarely, but occasionally do). And, when I'm under extreme stress, there have been a handful of times I've missed a deadline by what seems to me like a minimal amount of time (a few hours). (BTW, I can count these times on one hand over a two-year period).

I'm a marketing project manager who makes my deadlines 99% of the time, which means I've met hundreds of deadlines over the past two years. I take my deadlines very seriously and throw my heart and soul into meeting them. However, as a P, this can sometimes be a real struggle for me (especially when I'm under stress) which explains the 1% of the time I don't hit my deadlines exactly.

Frankly, I feel like 99% is the best this ENFP is going to ever do, so my goal is to help my boss appreciate the unique skill set I bring to her team as a P. I'm flexible and spontaneous. If a project changes mid-stream, I can drop everything and address it no problemo. Because I tend to be process oriented (P) vs. goal oriented (J), I tend to develop very creative solutions to problems that truly benefit her department.

So my question is this? How can I educate/convince my ENFJ boss that if she can show a little flexibility on deadlines, I'm well worth the effort?

Thanks, in advance, for your advice. :)
 

Lia_kat

New member
Joined
Jan 6, 2016
Messages
750
MBTI Type
ISFP
Enneagram
9w8
Instinctual Variant
sp/so
Just tell her. In my experience (I tend to get along well with xNFJs), they are willing to help anyone in need. I think if you just explain in words what you wrote on here, she'll be able to see your point of view. Maybe have a private chat with her?
 

Virtual ghost

Complex paradigm
Joined
Jun 6, 2008
Messages
19,723
I have a good boss (ENFJ) who is a genuinely nice person. That being said, she totally doesn't know how to deal with or appreciate people with a P preference like me (ENFP). Because of this we've been clashing off and on for the past several months. Overall, I'd say our relationship is good, but she just can't handle it when I try to renegotiate a deadline (which I rarely, but occasionally do). And, when I'm under extreme stress, there have been a handful of times I've missed a deadline by what seems to me like a minimal amount of time (a few hours). (BTW, I can count these times on one hand over a two-year period).

I'm a marketing project manager who makes my deadlines 99% of the time, which means I've met hundreds of deadlines over the past two years. I take my deadlines very seriously and throw my heart and soul into meeting them. However, as a P, this can sometimes be a real struggle for me (especially when I'm under stress) which explains the 1% of the time I don't hit my deadlines exactly.

Frankly, I feel like 99% is the best this ENFP is going to ever do, so my goal is to help my boss appreciate the unique skill set I bring to her team as a P. I'm flexible and spontaneous. If a project changes mid-stream, I can drop everything and address it no problemo. Because I tend to be process oriented (P) vs. goal oriented (J), I tend to develop very creative solutions to problems that truly benefit her department.

So my question is this? How can I educate/convince my ENFJ boss that if she can show a little flexibility on deadlines, I'm well worth the effort?

Thanks, in advance, for your advice. :)


Isn't this really up to the client to decide in most cases ?


From personal experience with P people is that even if they respect the deadlines they often tend to make the ending very close to the deadline. What is stressful to a real J, especially if this could have been prevented/avoided. Also I remember that back in college they had a trap for P people. First they give you plenty of time and then in very short time you have a number of deadlines. However if you don't start working seriously from the start you will go "through the wall", since the problem(s) were more complicated than it seems at first. In other words typical J wants to go as far as possible from "the red zone". Therefore coming close to the red is mistake on it's own, even if it isn't "formal mistake".
 

highlander

Administrator
Staff member
Joined
Dec 23, 2009
Messages
26,559
MBTI Type
INTJ
Enneagram
6w5
Instinctual Variant
sx/sp
I have a good boss (ENFJ) who is a genuinely nice person. That being said, she totally doesn't know how to deal with or appreciate people with a P preference like me (ENFP). Because of this we've been clashing off and on for the past several months. Overall, I'd say our relationship is good, but she just can't handle it when I try to renegotiate a deadline (which I rarely, but occasionally do). And, when I'm under extreme stress, there have been a handful of times I've missed a deadline by what seems to me like a minimal amount of time (a few hours). (BTW, I can count these times on one hand over a two-year period).

I'm a marketing project manager who makes my deadlines 99% of the time, which means I've met hundreds of deadlines over the past two years. I take my deadlines very seriously and throw my heart and soul into meeting them. However, as a P, this can sometimes be a real struggle for me (especially when I'm under stress) which explains the 1% of the time I don't hit my deadlines exactly.

Frankly, I feel like 99% is the best this ENFP is going to ever do, so my goal is to help my boss appreciate the unique skill set I bring to her team as a P. I'm flexible and spontaneous. If a project changes mid-stream, I can drop everything and address it no problemo. Because I tend to be process oriented (P) vs. goal oriented (J), I tend to develop very creative solutions to problems that truly benefit her department.

So my question is this? How can I educate/convince my ENFJ boss that if she can show a little flexibility on deadlines, I'm well worth the effort?

Thanks, in advance, for your advice. :)

Nice to see you again. You do a better job with deadlines than I do so your performance for that sounds excellent. I have worked with people who do what you do and in my mind, any deadlines are very much between you and the client. My question is why is the ENFJ even in the loop? What reason would she be micromanaging things like that? She sounds like a poor or inexperienced leader. I have occasionally seen people who are really nice but just inexperienced bosses that don't know what to do with their time and think this is what they should be doing as a manager. Maybe a shift more towards actually leading vs. managing. You could also share your statistics for on time performance. You're probably not the only person who has this issue with her. She could take a class at the center of creative leadership or read the Leadership Challenge by Kautzes and Posner. The other thing is you could sit down with her and tell her how her way of interacting with you is making you feel. At one time, I had taken over a group at a new company and thought the chemistry and dynamic was weird. I helped to organize a session on MBTI where everyone took the assessment and could see where they were. You might think it strange, but in this technology centric consulting group of about 30 people there were almost no intuitives. 70% of the group were ESTJs, reflecting the personality type of the previous leader who apparently hired and promoted people like himself who hired more of the same. This created some difficulties for me personally because so many of these people didn't think like me (there were two INTPs, one ENFP and no other INTJs or intuitives of any kind). Over time, we got a much more balanced group but it took a few years.
 

tony_goth

Pseudo-delusional Rebel
Joined
Sep 18, 2018
Messages
225
MBTI Type
ENFJ
Enneagram
487
Instinctual Variant
sx
How can I educate/convince my ENFJ boss that if she can show a little flexibility on deadlines, I'm well worth the effort?

You probably can't. She's... your boss. And she probably has the pressure of clients, other partners, and her bosses, who have to be pushy with her for some reasons. She's not essentially annoying, her work is.

You may try to tell her why you disagree with her. Talk to her in a brief and simple way, 3 arguments will be enough.

But I think if she was more flexible with deadlines, you would not have met 99% of your deadlines.
 
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