Funny. Today a long lost friend of mine called up, and we had a nice delectable chit-chat on whatnots and the like. So here we were yapping like retarded monkeys on meth when she started to elaborate upon her frustrated views on a certain situation she was caught up in.
In her predicament, she and a bunch of people were given a group assignment. HENCE, diverse as the human race is, in the multitude of personalities it encompasses, there were several fallouts within the group itself.
Basically, some people were doing all the work, some people were self-elected dictators, while others sat nilly-willying their time till Kingdom come.
Which got me thinking.
There's two kinds of people in the world. Planners and Executors.
Now, almost anybody you encounter will fall into either one of the two groups. Some can safely blend both while others are strictly monogamous.
Planners are, as obvious as the name implies, planners. They plan. They look at the long term goal, and lay out the path ahead. Before each project, they run a headcount. They build departments and divide cubicles. They set heirachies and the pyramid workload. In short, they compartmentalize. The present and the future.
Executors are those that keep the project running. Executors are known for their determination, single-mindedness and diligence. They work within the rules, and are substantially good at what they do. If executors are the cogs, planners provide the blueprint and oil.
Obviously in a team, a good leader would be a Planner/Executor hybrid. One that takes charge with groundrules set to counter future obstacles yet able to shoulder the hard work in stride, efficiently.
However, not everyone is born a HYBRID, and problems WILL arise when these two groups start to take roles that contradict their personality.
As different as apples and oranges are, Planners cannot be efficient Executors and vice-versa.
You see, Executors lack the vision and eye to detail, while Planners are.... sad to say... poor workers. They break everything down into the smallest, most minute particle, while ignoring the big picture, which is GETTING THE JOB DONE. Basically, they live too far in the future.
Executors, on the other hand, strive too much in the present to be able to glimpse the culminative effect of their actions.
THEREFORE, having an Executor on the top running everything is detrimental to the project. He/She will focus too much on what the work at hand is, they forget what they are working towards. This is equivalent to building a monument without ever taking a step back to look at your progress until the last brick is laid. By then it will be too late.
MEANWHILE, having a bunch of Planners under you is a just reason for suicide. They will bicker and scream and wail about the long-term goal, the future prospects, what we should be doing tomorrow, the day after, how the project will be capped off... Without ever doing any actual work.
So, in a team, for a project to be done in an organized, well-oiled manner, a balance between the two must be set.
An ideal team would obviously consist of a 1:3:7 (Hybrid: Planner: Executor) ratio (In hindsight though, Hybrids are domineering, controlling and rather hard-headed, if not ill-tempered and take great pride in being bossy. Hence it is always advisable to have only ONE Hybrid per team) per team of ten, which will give it a 10 to 30 to 70 % composition, which can then be applied to any amount of team members.
PLUS, TO BE HONEST, anybody with the right information can run a team. The person need not necessarily be a Hybrid, rather someone who knows the composition of the team and is able to relegate the tasks early beforehand.
**Remember, a leader is someone who does a job by getting others to do it for him. The more efficient the process is, the better the leader.
So there, these are my views on some human characteristics, and I hope that they prove useful, be it now or in the impending future. And always, always keep this with you:
When in a team, the WORST unjust you can do is to WASTE MANPOWER.
Everyone can be utilized to their full potential which will contribute positively to the end product, no matter how "irrelevant" you think that person is.
The only reason why YOU think a person IRRELEVANT under your direction is that YOU yourself is being IRRESPONSIBLE towards your RESOURCES, which shows your lacking.
Think about it.
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