This article describes how the different energy types within energy psychology naturally express themselves within specific job types. It also focuses on the seven teaching and leadership types.
By Søren Hauge and Kenneth Sørensen
Here you can receive seven free meditations , where there is a meditation that strengthens each of the seven energy types.
Read the introductory article on energy psychology and the book Energy Psychology, which is a complete introduction to the seven energy types.
Of course, there is a close connection between the energy types and the different types of work that we do and train ourselves for. This is where the special qualities of the energy types are expressed, and here we have the opportunity to develop ourselves. If our job is only about money, and perhaps imposed by external circumstances, then this is of course not the case, and there are plenty of people who do not really have any deep or warm relationship with their work.
But it doesn’t have to be that way, and by becoming more aware of your own nature, you can also gain a new relationship with the work you aim for or get. In the following, we will first give a general description of overall job types in relation to the seven main areas that the energy types open up, and then we will select three specific professions, where we take a closer look at the spectrum of possibilities or facets that they contain.
We choose two special areas, namely the fields of teaching and leadership .
“Whatever you are, be good at it.” ~ Abraham Lincoln
The seven-fold spectrum of job types
The dynamic energy type will find it easy to get leading jobs, and areas such as corporate management, chairmanships in boards of directors and responsibility in large groups and organizations are obvious, as are front-line positions in politics. Tasks in the military, work in specially trained combat units such as the frogman corps and the foreign legion, as well as work within the police, all types of rescue corps and the fire department are completely natural for the dynamic, who often thrive on tasks involving risk. Pioneering work within all job types can indicate dynamic dominance, as can a joy in extreme sports, martial arts and highly demanding, physically stressful situations and tasks. Challenges that generally require initiative and carefreeness by being in the lead or at the forefront will come naturally to most people with this energy type dominance. It is easy to find dynamic energy types as managers, spokespersons and people at the forefront in general.
In terms of jobs , sensitive energy types are typically found in work situations that have to do with people, be it in pedagogy, teaching, coaching, social work and psychology, and in general in situations where human contact and good relationships are paramount. There is a huge range of variants here, and relevant communication with human values at the center will be natural for the sensitive. In terms of studies, they will lean towards the humanities, cultural development and all conceivable areas with soft values. They are often suitable for interreligious work and tasks with human care in the form of jobs such as caregivers, nurses and disability assistants, volunteer visitors and people who have to do with healing and health. They also often find it easy to deal with metaphysical and holistic topics that combine understanding and empathy with wholeness.
In terms of work, the mental energy type is comfortable with jobs that contain elements of, for example, philosophy, history of ideas, research theory, history and communication, or theoretical physics and mathematics, as well as journalism, literary criticism, marketing, management and the advertising industry. Work in think tanks and organizations that specialize in strategic studies is obvious, as is work with communication on radio, TV, the Internet and the like. The complexity of astrology also belongs here. Other examples are work in economic and financial areas, and jobs as an architect, IT consultant or software developer, or with computer innovation, are natural, as is work in the grocery industry or within trade and industry, transport companies, shipping and logistics.
In terms of work, the creative energy type is found in areas such as art, psychology, design, fashion, dance, comedy, show business, acting and music, and they can often be attracted to jobs and tasks involving peace mediation, bridge building and cultural work, where it is about creating peace between opposing parties or creating understanding between very different cultures. Interpreting is another area where neutrality is important. In a psychological sense, obvious areas are psychotherapy, wellness and body-related disciplines, such as yoga teaching, bioenergetics and other body work, proper use of exercise and paths to body-mind balance. Art therapy is an obvious holistic method for the creative, and the use of sounds, colors, scents, vibrations, singing, dancing, etc. are tools that the creative like to use to create harmony. Health and wellness will almost always be about creating balance between mind and body through sensory methods.
The many work functions that naturally belong to the analytical energy type are specialist functions that either immerse themselves like a burning glass in knowledge niches, or that operate with technical ingenuity in concrete contexts. This can be in scientific disciplines such as archaeology and paleontology, astrophysics, genetics, biochemistry, the development of nanotechnology or molecular biology, or in forensic medicine with DNA analyses and the examination of microscopic fragments, and it can be research work in the police technical department, where detailed measurements of gunpowder residue and other small particles are made. The analyst can be a dietician, mechanic, technical expert in all conceivable areas of detail. Obvious work areas can be working as an optician, biologist, neurologist, doctor, surgeon, lawyer or perhaps a museum curator. Usually detail-oriented specialist work, where expertise with great precision is needed. It can also include various forms of craftsmanship with skill in concrete construction tasks, e.g. as a carpenter, bricklayer and joiner, or with an ability for restoration work.
Whether the dedicated energy types look inward as the romantic dreamer, or outward as the ardent activist, it will be evident in their work relationships or in their calling in life, which is often considered to be an ‘all-or-nothing’ one. It can be as a missionary, a new age religious person, or more down-to-earth as a marketer selling the “best” product, or privately expressed as intense devotion to family, children or leisure interests. It can also be work as an NGO activist, philanthropist, or, for example, a Red Cross volunteer or activist at Greenpeace. In terms of work, it can also be seen through work as a nurse, a home helper, an employee at a hospice or in service functions where one helps others, for example, as a stewardess, waiter or in a leading function for health, nursing or health, most often with a focus on care and humanity. Religious areas are often touched upon, together with social work, and as is well known, they often overlap. In the past, monasticism and missionary work were often central. Involvement in projects and campaigns, philanthropy and grassroots work are now commonplace for many dedicated idealists. Many dedicated types also find their way into highly competitive fields, including the world of sports, because they are motivated by what is best, highest or strongest.
In terms of work, we will be able to find the practitioner in a multitude of jobs, covering, for example, legislative work and the judiciary, work as a conductor or team manager, project coordinator or in administration. The practitioner is – in addition to often being the “do-it-yourself type” – a person who can focus on financial business, or it can be, for example, an air traffic controller, a film director or a financial administrator. Management work that involves coordinating, directing or directing is often the practitioner’s world. Today, lots of new job types are emerging that attract universal practitioners. These are jobs where many things are combined, job boundaries are crossed and new syntheses arise. The chaos pilots are an example of the new developments, and modern leadership with group processes in general contains much of the practitioner’s nature. At universities today, interdisciplinary experiments are being worked on, and new departments are combining different subject areas.
We can conclude with a few examples of the nature that the practitioner’s job types have acquired in recent years. An air traffic controller in an airport control tower must handle a large amount of information regarding many destinations, departures and landings. Weather conditions must be checked, pilot contacts ensured, changes adjusted, and an overall flow of landings and departures ensured with great precision. All this much information must result in exact decisions of vital importance.
Similarly, we know that in business life, work is carried out with a high degree of complexity, which includes a chosen management philosophy. Decisions, objectives, resources and timing must be integrated into a higher unity. The famous management theorist Henri Fayol spoke of seven primary functions: 1) Planning, 2) Organizing, 3) Leading, 4) Coordination, 5) Controlling, 6) Staffing and 7) Motivation.
And since then, a multitude of organizational theorists and management experts have contributed to the art of leading and creating results that benefit both the bottom line and the quality of life. If you think about what it sometimes means to be a film director/producer on a large film production, you see the complexity involved in playing with storyboards, staffing, actors, costumes, makeup, cameras, lighting, special effects, logistics, trailers, media contact, promotion and finally distribution of the film product to the audience. Truly an example of the multidimensional processes of the time, and countless other examples could be given.
The combination of energy types in connection with teaching
Let’s now take a different angle and look a little closer at another job function and how it could be solved based on seven different approaches. The example here is the teacher (the sensitive energy type). If we imagine a person who actually has a task as a teacher, and we assume that this task is in accordance with the person’s inner values and can therefore be a soul-motivated task, then we can see this spectrum of teacher types unfolding with special competencies in relation to the energy types.
We therefore imagine that the teacher has the sensitive energy type as an essence type and soul dominance and the seven other combinations either in the personality or the mental area.
The 1st is the dynamic type, the 2nd the sensitive type, the 3rd the mental type, the 4th the creative type, the 5th the analytical type, the 6th the dedicated type and the 7th the practical type.
- The life-challenging teacher (2+1)
With a strong touch of the dynamic (1), we will find here a teacher who is particularly suited to carrying out boundary-breaking activities. This is the ideal special teacher who takes care of students with major problems, takes them on trips into the wilderness with them, leaves them to themselves so that they can experience victories that give them self-esteem. This requires a special robustness and authority, and the combination 2, 1 is suitable here.
- The Appreciative Teacher (2+2)
Here we naturally get a very special touch from the sensitive, and since it rarely happens that both soul and personality are dominated by 2, a secondary dominance of 2 in the emotional life could reinforce the tendency. In any case, with a particularly pronounced touch of 2, we get the appreciative educator or the teacher who is loved for his ability to empathize with and appreciate the efforts and nature of his students.
- Den emnefokuserede underviser (2+3)
Visse undervisere er usædvanligt dygtige til at formidle deres fag i dybden og bredden. Ofte vil det indikere, at 3 støtter 2, og ikke sjældent er det den eminente faglærer, som i den grad kan sætte fokus på at kommunikere klart og vise relevansen af et tema eller emne. Stimuleringen af ideer og mange forståelsesvinkler er her udpræget, kombineret med evnen til at sætte sig ind i forskellige synspunkter og skabe utraditionelle løsningsforslag på givne udfordringer og problemer.
- Den legende underviser (2+4)
Der er undervisere, som har en udpræget evne til at aktivere elevernes kreative muligheder, eksempelvis gennem brug af musik, farver, illustrationer, collager, dekorationer, udsmykninger, teater, brug af grafik og IT, konkurrencer, udklædning og andre humoristiske måder at illustrere problemer og deres løsning på. De har ofte en stærk prægning fra netop den kreative 4’er og bringer det legende og spontane element ind i undervisningen
- Den faktuelle forskningsunderviser (2+5)
Visse undervisere er fuldstændig på hjemmebase med naturvidenskabelige fag, som de gør attraktive og relevante. Det kan være fag som biologi, kemi, matematik og fysik, eller det kan være samfundsfag som historie. Psykologi kan også komme på tale, men i så fald er den videnskabeligt baseret. Den særlige force her er at gå dybt ind i afgrænsede områder og lade eleverne erhverve sig eksakt viden, der er interessant – og desuden også brugbar uden for klasselokalet.
- Den engagerende underviser (2+6)
Der findes undervisere, som har en særlig evne til at begejstre; en smittende egenskab, som vækker lyst til at engagere sig i stort set alt muligt. Disse undervisere har ofte et betragteligt stænk af den dedikerede 6’er. De brænder ofte for en sag, som de på en relevant måde kan involvere eleverne i med faglig relevans. Der vil være glød og smitsomt nærvær i alt, hvad de gør, og med godt forhold til 4’eren vil den humoristiske sans også sætte sit præg.
- Den gruppedynamiske projektunderviser (2+7)
Endelig har vi de undervisere, som forstår at aktivere multitalenter hos deres elever. De forstår i særdeleshed at bruge alle til rådighed stående midler til at frembringe konkrete resultater, som er praktiske. Ofte sker det gennem projekter, der kun kan lykkes ved fælles indsats og ved brug af en bred vifte af kompetencer. De praktiske resultater kan have en direkte virkning til gavn for mange, evt. ved at frembringe et produkt eller skabe en konkret forandring i lokalsamfundet.
Det siger sig selv, at en underviser vil være særligt egnet og kompetent, hvis alle energitypers vinkler til en vis grad er aktiverede. Men de færreste – hvis overhovedet nogen – vil føle sig nøjagtig lige meget hjemme i alle syv tilgange. Ikke desto mindre kan de syv vinkler minde enhver underviser om at blive så afrundet og dygtig som muligt inden for sit fagområde. Energityperne hjælper til at minde os om det større perspektiv og de mange nuancer.
”Den ultimative autoritet må altid hvile i individets egen fornuft og kritiske analyse”. ~ Dalai Lama
Energityper og ledelse
Lad os nu give endnu et kort eksempel på, hvorledes at arbejdet med energityperne kan kombineres med diverse fagområder, og denne gang inden for ledelse.
Der findes ikke bare én type leder, for ledere er først og fremmest mennesker, som udfylder en bestemt rolle, og derfor vil alle ledere naturligvis være forskellige. Men det giver alligevel mening at kategorisere forskellige typer af ledere ud fra den overordnede kvalitet, som de udstråler igennem lederskabet og den motivation, de går ind i lederskabet med.
Lederskabet er naturligt farvet af den dynamiske energitype, fordi selve rollen indebærer, at man kan træffe beslutninger, hvilket hører ind under viljens domæne. Derfor det væsentligt, at enhver leder har en naturlig adgang til den dynamiske energitype i et eller andet omfang; i modsat fald vil der opstå store problemer med at træffe valg og udstikke klare retningslinjer for omgivelserne.
- Den dynamiske leder (1+1)
Den dynamiske leder er den klassiske ledertype, der er fokusholder og indpisker i forhold til at nå de mål, som gruppen har. Denne ledertype er god til at skære igennem og holde fokus på essensen, samt ikke mindst gå foran som et godt eksempel. Det kræver stort mod at træffe upopulære beslutninger, og det har denne type til overflod. Typen er ofte motiveret af magten til at få tingene til at ske, og til at være det styrende og dirigerende center, hvor andre kan hente inspiration og styrke.
- Den sensitive leder (1+2)
Den sensitive leder er typisk teamplayeren og fællesskabsholderen, der f.eks. kunne lede en HR-afdeling, og som har fokus på udvikling af medarbejdernes ressourcer. Denne ledertype ved, at det er samspillet mellem individerne, fællesskabet og holdånden, som skaber de bedste resultater. Derfor har vedkommende et stærkt fokus på, at alle individer har deres rette påskønnede funktion og relaterer godt til helheden. Typen er ofte motiveret af fællesskab og er den, der har indsigt i gruppens psykologiske miljø og kan vejlede alle til at bringe det bedste frem arbejdet.
- Den innovative leder (1+3)
Den innovative leder er ofte gruppens idémager og strateg, den der elsker at tænke tingene igennem, således at alle muligheder står åbne og kan aktiveres, efterhånden som idéerne skal udføres i praksis. Typen sidder ofte i den afdeling, der planlægger hvorledes salg, ekspansion og ekstern samarbejde skal iværksættes, og har derfor ofte overblikket over hele det netværk, som gruppen indgår i. Typen er meget motiveret af at se fremtidens muligheder, baseret på de trends, som typen opdager i netværket og sit innovative sind.
- Den kreative leder (1+4)
Den kreative leder har fokus på at skabe en så helstøbt gruppe eller produkt som muligt. Typen er motiveret af harmoni og skønhed, og derfor ser man ofte personen som hoveddesigner eller gruppens konfliktløser, der formår at forene modsætninger mellem mennesker. Dette er lederen, der forstår værdien af mangfoldighed og variation og derfor sammensætter mennesker og elementer på nye måder, som skaber skønhed og ny energi. Typen er ofte en mester i at agere i konflikter, hvor energien i dramaet kan kanaliseres over i nye spændende udviklingsmuligheder.
- Den faglige leder (1+5)
Den faglige leder er ofte gruppens vidensekspert og den, der har styr på alle de specialiserede fakta og elementer, der knytter sig til et særligt område af gruppens arbejde. Typen leder måske en forskningsafdeling eller er den, der har styr på alle de eksakte kvaliteter ved gruppens produkter. Typen er en mester i at teste, om kvaliteten i gruppens output er i orden og er den perfekte rationaliseringsekspert. Typen motiveres af eksakt viden, at få noget, der ikke virker i praksis, til at fungere optimalt. Typens motto kunne være: ”Succes ligger i detaljen”.
- Den motiverende leder (1+6)
Den motiverende leder er gruppens brændende flamme og den, der gennem sin dedikation og commitment for gruppens produkt eller sag opildner alle til at gøre deres bedste. Typen fungerer godt som leder af PR, salg eller som den, der har ansvar for at skabe engagement omkring gruppens værdier og mål. Typen motiveres af at nå det perfekte udtryk ved at mobilisere alle kræfter omkring et entydigt mål. Den motiverende leder arbejder ofte med værdibaseret ledelse, der aktiverer medarbejdernes identifikation med gruppens ”brand”. Derigennem skabes det maksimale commitment i gruppen.
- The Organizing Leader (1+7)
The Organizing Leader understands the ‘magic of manifestation’ and has an incredible ability to gather all forces behind an organized and organic process that leads to the most effective result. This type understands that the best results are founded in the mind based on careful planning, a thorough knowledge of people and an ability to go for the best possible. The type is a perfect administrator and manager, motivated by the efficiency and synthesis that occurs when all the talents of the group merge into a higher unity.
If you want to know more, we recommend reading the article about Energy Types and Psychotherapy .
