The Achilles Heel of Bankers

If you have not done so already, please read the foundation post The Achilles Heel that Haunts the Best of Us before reading this one.

When bankers slip quietly out of their contribution mode into the personality driven ‘taking and getting’ mode, it is often caused by their commitment to knowledge as the most essential human energy in life. They have a drive to be an expert, to have the knowledge that is most needed in a given situation. They expect this of themselves and hope that others find this to be true most of the time.

The Achilles Heel arises when their peers or higher authorities in business do not ask for the knowledge the banker has. Or an important leader, having asked for the facts, procrastinates reading the reports until it is too late. Or, having read the information the banker’s associates do not make a different decision than they previously would have made without the information. Or, having made the right and better decision, they fail to take action and get the better result that the banker’s knowledge could have assured.

When the banker’s efforts to provide essential information for better success do not lead to greater success, the banker tends to feel anxious that the knowledge they had was not sufficient, not good enough, not thorough enough, not detailed enough. They tend to respond to the anxiety by trying harder, building a more detailed report. This anxiety works like the dimmer switch in your dining room at home.

When the dimmer switch is fully open and there is no anxiety the knowledge energy is free to flow into the room bringing light into the darkness. When the banker’s anxiety gets excited the dimmer switch begins to restrict the flow of his knowledge Core Value Energy. This restricts the free flow of knowledge into the situation causing further failure to make an optimal contribution of knowledge into the room.

This effort causes an unconscious escalation of the knowledge energy, trying to force it into strong influence and participation. The effect is usually that people begin resisting this effort. They begin to feel worn down by the knowledge person’s constant statements of ‘the obvious.” They tend to become black and white, wrong or right thinkers building resentment among others in the process.

The tendency is to continue to try to be the knowledge in the situation, long past the time when they would have benefitted from and been more effective by shifting into one of the lesser held Core Value Energies.

Note:  Learn more about how to shift from one Core Value Energy to another in my book, Choices, available in our Taylor Protocols store. I will be writing a new series on the art of shifting just following this four week series on Achilles Heels.

Having failed to listen to their anxiety, they find themselves judging others as being unworthy of ‘my’ knowledge. The banker may become very aloof and unavailable emotionally, socially and even in functional business situations. The black and white thinking causes others to quit asking for the banker’s knowledge. This causes a fear based response that is either total withdrawal and withholding of information or a pontificating of facts and information in a manner and at a time when this information is neither requested or appreciated.

The best response for a banker who finds himself in this situation is to remember one simple truth, one simple fact… The most ignorant thing a person can do is to continue to be the presence of knowledge in a situation that needs more power, love or wisdom. Shift to one of these other essential human energies and get back into a contributing mode.

The smart (awake and conscious) knowledge person shifts to one of these other essential human energies and gets back into a contributing mode. 

This series of posts includes an overview and a post for each Core Value.

• Overview of post series – The Achilles Heel that Haunts the Best of Us
• The Achilles Heel of Merchants
• The Achilles Heel of Builders
• The Achilles Heel of Innovators
• The Achilles Heel of Bankers

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