The Best Enneagram Certification for the Workplace? Why I Recommend Awareness to Action

If you're interested in becoming an Enneagram facilitator, coach, or simply bringing the Enneagram into your organization, one of the first questions you may have is: 

Do I need to get certified...and if so, which Enneagram certification should I choose?

There are plenty of options.

I've completed multiple Enneagram trainings over the years, and at Enneagram MBA, we've ultimately chosen to base the majority of our workplace approach on the Awareness to Action Enneagram framework.

If your goal is specifically to use the Enneagram with workplace teams, leaders, and organizations, it's the certification I recommend most often.

Here's why.

1. It Was Built by People Who Have Actually Done This Work

This matters to me.

Awareness to Action is led by Mario Sikora and Maria José Munita (MJ), who bring decades of experience using the Enneagram with executives, leaders, coaches, and organizations around the world.

When I'm walking into a large organization to facilitate an Enneagram workshop, I want to feel confident in the methodology I'm bringing with me.

I don't just want something that sounds good in an Enneagram training.

I want a framework that has been used, challenged, refined, and tested in real workplaces, with real leaders, real teams, real conflict, and real organizational complexity.

That's one of the first things that drew me to Awareness to Action.

I had already been facilitating Enneagram workshops before completing their certification. But there were parts of traditional Enneagram theory that I found myself working very hard to explain in a corporate environment.

Sometimes I felt like I was trying to convince someone that Enneagram theory was right rather than helping them understand something useful about themselves.

That didn't feel great to me. 

When I discovered Awareness to Action, I found an approach that felt grounded, practical, and credible enough to carry into the kinds of organizations I wanted to work with.

2. They Teach You to Think Critically About the Enneagram

This was something I didn't expect to appreciate as much as I did.

In Level 1, you don't immediately jump into memorizing descriptions of the nine Enneagram types.

Awareness to Action first spends time on critical thinking, cognitive biases, and the ways our own thinking can influence how we interpret people and the Enneagram.

I'll admit: when I first went through it, part of me was thinking, Can we get to the types already?

But I came to appreciate why it matters.

If you're going to sit across from someone in a typing interview—or stand in front of a team and teach them about personality, you need to understand things like confirmation bias.

You need to be willing to question your assumptions.

And sometimes you need to question the Enneagram itself.

That mindset has made me a better practitioner.

3. The Instinctual Biases Are Incredibly Useful at Work

This may be my favorite part of the Awareness to Action framework.

Instead of using the traditional language of self-preservation, social, and sexual/one-to-one instincts, Awareness to Action teaches three Instinctual Biases:

Preserving. Navigating. Transmitting.

And this isn't just new terminology placed on top of the traditional instincts.

There's a much more developed framework underneath them.

Understanding my own Instinctual Bias was actually one of the biggest personal lightbulb moments I've had with the Enneagram.

For years, I assumed I was a “social” Seven because...well...I'm social.

Once I learned how Awareness to Action defines Navigating and Transmitting, I realized that Transmitting described my pattern much more accurately.

Suddenly, some things clicked.

That's what I've watched happen with workplace teams, too.

The Instinctual Biases give us another way to understand how people direct their attention and energy, and they can be incredibly useful for conversations around leadership, communication, collaboration, and team dynamics.

4. It Simplified What I Bring Into a Workplace

One of the biggest lessons I've learned from facilitating the Enneagram with groups is:

More Enneagram isn't necessarily better Enneagram.

There's a LOT you could teach.

Nine types. Wings. Centers of intelligence. Stances. Subtypes. Tri-types. Attachment. Conflict styles. And that's before you even get into the deeper nuances of each individual type.

All of that may be interesting.

But most organizations aren't giving you a semester to teach the Enneagram.

They may give you two hours.

Maybe a half day.

If you're lucky, you might have a full day or a series of workshops.

So the question becomes:

What will actually be most useful to this group in the time we have together?

Awareness to Action gave me a much clearer answer.

We primarily work with two dimensions:

Instinctual Bias + Enneagram Type.

There is an enormous amount you can explore inside those two dimensions without constantly introducing another Enneagram concept participants need to learn.

For the people in the room, that's easier to understand.

For me as the facilitator, it has made curriculum development much clearer.

And instead of spending all of our time teaching more Enneagram theory, we can spend more time using it.

That's ultimately what matters to me.

5. The Certification Focuses on Making You a Better Practitioner

This is something I've come to appreciate even more over time.

The coaching and certification industries can sometimes blur the line between:

“I'm going to teach you this methodology.”

and

“I'm going to teach you this methodology and you're going to build a wildly successful business because of it.”

Those are two different things.

Awareness to Action stays focused on the first.

They teach you their Enneagram methodology.

They don't promise that getting certified will automatically result in a six-figure coaching or facilitation business.

And I appreciate that.

A strong certification should help you become a more knowledgeable, competent, credible practitioner.

Building a business around that expertise requires an entirely different set of skills.

In fact, I recorded an entire companion episode/article about what it really takes to make six figures as an Enneagram facilitator, because I think we need more transparency around that distinction.

6. The Support Doesn't End With Certification

This may be one of the most underrated parts of choosing a certification program.

You're not only choosing the curriculum.

You're choosing the people you're learning from and, potentially, the professional community you're entering.

I've completed Awareness to Action Levels 1, 2, and 3, attended their Train-the-Trainer program, participated in post-certification calls, and continued learning from Mario and MJ long after my original certification.

I've also met Enneagram professionals from around the world through the ATA community.

Those relationships have been a wonderful benefit I didn't think about initially. I'm grateful for everyone I've had the opportunity to meet and learn from through ATA

When someone brings a question to one of the ongoing calls, you don't only learn from Mario or MJ's answer. You hear how other practitioners have encountered that issue in different industries, countries, and contexts.

That kind of continued learning is difficult to put a value on.

So, Is Awareness to Action the Best Enneagram Certification?

I don't think there is one Enneagram certification that's “best” for every person or every application.

If you're primarily interested in the Enneagram for personal growth, spirituality, therapy, mindfulness, or another particular application, you may find a different school or certification that aligns more closely with how you want to use it.

But if you asked me:

“Sarah, I want to bring the Enneagram into companies. I want to work with leaders, teams, HR departments, or large organizations. Where should I start?”

Awareness to Action is where I'd send you.

It's the framework that helped me feel more confident in the material I was bringing into organizations, and it's now the foundation underneath much of the work we do at Enneagram MBA.

Register for the next cohort: https://awarenesstoaction.com/enneagram-training-certification/

Learning the Enneagram Is One Step. Building the Workshop Is Another.

One thing I discovered after certification was that having all this knowledge didn't automatically answer another question:

How do I turn it into a workshop?

What goes on the slides?

What do I leave out?

How do I explain each concept?

Where do I add discussion?

What activities work?

What do I give participants afterward?

It took me a long time (and a lot of workshops!) to develop the experience we use today.

That's why I eventually created the Enneagram MBA DIY Workshop Kit Commercial License for facilitators and coaches who don't want to build all of those materials from scratch.

It includes the customizable workshop deck, facilitator talking points, activities, field guide, sample agenda, pre- and post-workshop questions, additional resources, and an example of me facilitating the workshop.

You still bring your training, your perspective, and your facilitation skills.

You just don't have to start with a blank PowerPoint.

Get Access -> https://www.enneagrammba.com/enneagram-facilitator-kit

If you complete Awareness to Action Level 1, use code ATA300 to save $300 on the Commercial License Kit. Email me at [email protected] when you sign up and we'll send you access to the code! 

*** This article is not sponsored by Awareness to Action, and at the time of publication, I do not receive an affiliate commission for recommending their certification.***