Color Coding Leadership
By Ian Gooding
Scores of business women showed up for the Institute of Business “Women in Leadership” workshop at the Hilton Trinidad on Monday to hear the secrets of Hungarian-American writer Shoya Zichy, president of the Myers Briggs Association of New York.
Zichy, an obvious extrovert, is the creator of the Color Q personality model, used for leadership and team development.
According to published information this system of analysis can be used to provide “highly accurate information” on how people’s personalities affect their leadership styles, career choices, management and sales styles, coaching approaches and interaction on a team and in a family.
Zichy is the author of the book Women and the Leadership Q, for which she interviewed 37 prominent women, including Hilary Clinton and ABC anchorwoman Diane Sawyer.
The Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, based on the work of Carl Jung—which incidentally does not measure intelligence, stress, mental and physical health, education or special skills and talents—helps a person to decide on his/her level of preferences as regards to extroversion or introversion, sensing or intuition, thinking or feeling and judgment or perception.
“You need to have a bit of both to maintain some balance,” said Zichy. “You need to find your true type. You can only be successful when you find it.”
There are 16 types to suit all personalities.
The Color Q personality model is a derivative of the Myers-Briggs model and combines personal preferences to create four major groups: Golds (46 per cent of the population), Blues (10 per cent), Reds (27 per cent) and Greens (17 per cent).
Persons in the Gold group are “grounded, responsible, realistic and accountable.”
They are the backbone of corporate and public institutions of all kinds: banks, hospitals, government, military and religious.
They are polite, always on time, dress in a co-ordinated and appropriate fashion, use short sentences and concrete vocabulary.
Famous names in this group include George and Barbara Bush Sr, Colin Powell, Queen Elizabeth and Barbara Walters.
People in the Red group are bold, spontaneous and focused on “now.” They need freedom to follow their own trusted impulses; cool-headed and courageous, proud of their daring and ability to handle crisis. They excel as negotiators and troubleshooters.
Famous Reds include President George W Bush, Donald Trump, Winston Churchill, Michael Jordan, John F Kennedy and Barbara Streisand.
The Blue group consists of persons who are theoretical, competitive and ever driven to acquire more knowledge and competence. They have little interest in routine and established procedure. Visionaries, they seem always on the edge, always searching for new solutions.
Famous Blues include Bill Gates, Vice president Cheney, Hillary Clinton and Cybill Shepherd.
Greens are emphatic, humanistic and expressive. They are most productive in an environment that is supportive, idea-oriented and egalitarian.
They are informal and warm, usually interested in the big picture and not the details, ask personal questions and study people intently. They are the most expressive of all types, with a profound need to develop close relationships.
Famous Greens include Oprah, Diane Sawyer, Gandhi, and Martin Luther King.
Zichy, who had to flee Hungary for Cairo as a child with her parents, and then fled to America, told the businesswomen that true knowledge of themselves, their strengths and weaknesses, could lead to self management by focusing on their core strengths, create their own personal plan for success and by actively using the strengths of others.
“The majority of people rise to responsibility,” she affirmed. “Too much focus on weaknesses is a waste of time.”