According to CliftonStrengths, my #1 strength is Strategy, so it’s no surprise that 1) I’m writing this series on author strategy, and 2) I love the Enneagram.

If you want to know how to work with a person, you need to know what motivates them at that core level. What are they running toward, and what are they running away from, essentially? And the Enneagram is all about motivation.

So let’s talk about what motivates an Enneagram Type Three and how to build a comprehensive and compatible author strategy around it.

Although I’m a Type One, I’m often mistyped as a Three because I love the feeling of getting shit done, and Threes are the reigning kings and queens of that.

Type Three, the Achiever, can seem to be everywhere at once in the indie world — podcasts, anthologies, speaking gigs, and, of course, books galore. You like your success, but more importantly, you like for others to recognize and value your contribution.

But that need has led to some spectacular flame outs in this industry, too, because there are so many things you could be doing to help your visibility, and it’s easy for the ones that get you noticed quickest to take priority over the ones that build a stable foundation for your career.

Take writing books, for example. Many (not all) Threes I know want to have written books, but they don’t especially want to spend 100+ hours writing and revising each. Amassing the behemoth list of accomplishments that make a Three feel good takes a lot of time, and many Threes don’t have the patience for that. Achievers are the kings and queens of the “hack” that can get them to that place of High Accomplishment they dream of without taking so much time to get there. Unfortunately, that desire, if poorly executed, can come back to haunt the Achiever when someone with a big platform or a microphone calls them out as a fraud.

Whether the target is a fraud or not, this type of accusation is a huge emotional blow to any Achiever, and the public challenge can really deflate a Three, who’s already prone to imposter syndrome to begin with.

So let’s talk about how to avoid this so that you Threes can remain your fast-paced, charismatic, checklist-dominating selves with confidence.

Let’s revisit what a Type Three looks like:

Type Three: The Achiever

Indie publishing is chock full of Threes. Their core motivations are jet fuel for the exhausting and fast-paced industry, but they can also flame out in a spectacular fashion. Achievers are an externally focused type and their core motivation is being valued by others. Their greatest fear: being seen as unworthy or worthless to others. And the way a lot of Threes measure their worth is numerically (and they’re not afraid to show the favorable numbers to others).

Some things Threes will care about:

Bestsellers lists (NYT, USA Today, Amazon)
Making six or seven figures
Being seen as an expert in their field
List size/# of followers

Listen, Threes, I can already hear you justifying why you care about the things listed above. You really don’t have to do that. It’s great for you to know what you care about and own it, because your not-so-healthy inclination is to forget about what you value and instead chase after what other people value. All of what others value. And that will run you ragged.

So, no, not everyone cares about bestseller lists and the size of their Facebook groups. But you see the benefit in having a broad reach and a large audience, and of all the types, you know best how to use it to your advantage. You’re highly attuned to figuring out what others want or need you to be, and so long as you don’t let this take over your life, you can truly wield it as a great weapon for success and achieving your goals.

Let’s take a look at some of the likely reasons an Achiever might get into indie publishing in the first place:

“I can do this better than others.”
“I like the idea of people reading and enjoying my stories.”
“I want to be a famous author.”
“Publishing is a great stepping stone to getting my name out there for my ultimate goals.”

There’s this strange phenomenon I’ve encountered where Threes don’t want to admit that their reason for publishing is to get noticed or become famous. There’s some shame wrapped up in admitting that, which is crazy to me, as the U.S. as a whole is a Type Three. We value achievements, and it’s totally fine to admit you want to be the best or that you’re doing it for reasons other than the art itself. There are no wrong answers for why you’re doing it, Threes.

I want to point out that none of the above reasons is “I love writing, and this is just what I want to do.” If you’re a 3w4 (meaning a Three with a strong Four wing), that might be the case, but I would argue that that statement alone says you’re probably more of a 4w3.

But I think it’s important to admit it to yourself if you want to have writtenbooks but don’t want to write them. Otherwise the strategy you build will be totally flawed and made for someone who is not you. And that defeats the whole purpose of this post.

Let’s talk about people pleasing for a moment, Threes. I don’t have to tell you that you’re especially talented at it. You can project whatever image you want into the world flawlessly. But that leaves a lot of options, doesn’t it? How do you decide who to be? What if projecting one personality alienates possible fans who want another personality?

Without a clear strategy of what YOU want, you can turn into a full-time chameleon, and people will notice before long, and they’ll stop trusting you, thinking you’re being inauthentic. Or, worse, you’ll burn out from all the shape-shifting and the 50 businesses and pen names you’ve started to fill every niche where you might find a dopamine pop of success and approval.

You need to anchor yourself somehow, and a clear strategy is the way to do it.

So, let’s return to the question. What do you want to accomplish with your books? What’s your goal?

Here are a few likely possibilities:

Build a backlist of 100 novels
Publish a book that establishes me as an expert in my field
Gain an email list of 10,000 subscribers
Earn six figures in royalties in the next year

Notice that none of these goals require you to write the books yourself.

And, in fact, if you look at that first goal, it may be best if you don’t write the books yourself. One hundred books is a lot of work. I published a book a month for a while, and the high volume output is just not that fun. Wasn’t worth it for me. Because besides writing and revising and editing the book, you have to do all the promotions and marketing alongside it.

As an Achiever, the marketing and promotion is your strength. You likely get charged up from anything having to do with visibility, so why not commit yourself to that and let someone else write the books?

Yes, I’m talking about ghostwriters, which I know are a controversial subject, but I’ve found that the sooner many Threes get on this bandwagon, the better for their mental health. It’s not that Achievers aren’t creative. Many Threes enjoy coming up with the plots for books, even writing out the beats in detail. But drafting and revising can be too much of an energy suck. Most end up with ghostwriters eventually once they align their business with their goals.

Achievers also like being the expert in their fields, and a non-fiction book can establish them as just that. But writing it might not be your cup o’ tea. Working closely with a ghostwriter or even hiring someone to put together a book from your blog posts and notes is a perfectly acceptable thing to do, and it frees you up to make the PR rounds and be the figurehead and performer you’re born to be.

So now that we know these things about the Three, we can look at how you might break it down into a cohesive strategy.

Example:

I got into this business because: I want to build a publishing empire like James Patterson so I become a household name.

Things I care about: Making a ton of money, becoming a NYT Bestselling Author, growing a tribe of 100,000 superfans.

Goal: Becoming a seven-figure author and having 100 books to my name by the end of 2025.

While many enneagram types will include money in their goals somehow, it’s usually a means to an end. But for Type Threes, it’s okay if your goal is the money. For the Achiever, money can buy happiness in that it’s a measure of how many people approve of the work you’re doing. Nobody appreciates external validation like Threes — so soak it up!

So, this might be the strategy that goes with the above information:

Develop a strong story brand in a viable genre, and create a stable of ghostwriters who can begin fulfilling my vision for the story world. I want my brand to appeal the widest audience possible and have iconic characters that become part of the cultural zeitgeist like Alex Cross or James Bond. I want my books to be indistinguishable from traditional publishing novels in every way so I’m not sidelined in the mainstream as an indie author but rather viewed as a “real” author.

One of the most difficult things for a Three in coming up with a strategy can be admitting how big you dream. Don’t be ashamed to admit that you want to be the next James Patterson or Ian Fleming (but maybe don’t say it all the time or you’ll annoy the other enneagram types). Someone has to be BIG, so why not you?

If you want to build your strategy for your Enneagram Type, be sure to start small, with the things you care about (awards, numerical benchmarks, catalogue and list size) and don’t let every shiny new opportunity for instant recognition throw you off course. You can’t make everyone happy, and as soon as you realize that, you’ll free yourself up to make the maximum number of people happy by providing value to the world in your own way.