Sam, The Good Servant

Sam’s scores represent what is known as “The Good Servant” Profile. He is a nice person to a fault. He is hard working, detail-oriented, upbeat, friendly, and highly sociable. He’d make a nice neighbor, but you would not want to hire him with the intent of eventually becoming the EVP. In fact, you wouldn’t even want to make him a first-line supervisor.

His limitations are seen in his leadership scores. Note the low S and high O on Direction. (The S and O are more than 3 points apart so I disregard the black bar and the narrative on this trait.) He knows that he needs to be more comfortable sizing up problems and making decisions but has trouble doing so. The O represents what he thinks is demanded of him but his S represents how he sees himself in regard to living up to the standard set by the O. I suspect that this has given him problems in his previous jobs.

The biggest issue in his Profile is the pattern presented by a low Assertive score and high Tolerance and Considerate scores. Sam is a very soft person. He avoids conflict and has a very difficult time setting direction and holding people accountable for performance. Faced with unacceptable performance, he is overly forgiving, tolerant and patient. He is so sensitive to others’ feelings that it would be very difficult for him to say or to do anything that would cause emotional upset. In addition, the excessively high Sociable score indicates that he places a very high premium on being liked and getting approval, another factor that would limit his effectiveness in a leadership position.

People with this Profile have a tendency to do things themselves rather than ask others to do them. Given his discomfort with making demands on people, his elevated Work and Detail scores will lead him in the direction of taking on work that he should delegate to other people. Good Servants take directions. They don’t give them.

Some people in the company were disappointed by Sam’s Profile results. He is such an outgoing person that people who interviewed him took a strong liking to him. Some rated him as their first choice. Nonetheless, they have been using the Profile long enough to recognize that his Assertion-Tolerance-Considerate-Sociable pattern of scores made him an inappropriate candidate for the position.


EQ Profile used with permission of Simmons Management Systems

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