Barry:
Thanks for your reply. I had not heard of the Parker Team Player Survey. I
will check it out. It seems very similar to the kind of studies that have
been done by Human Dynamics. A number of attempts have being made and
categorizing people. One can start with the simplest categorization done
by James, which is the introvert-extrovert dynamic. It has been taken to
the extreme I think in the Myers-Brigg model where people are categorized
16 different ways. I think the Parker and Human Dynamics models are good
in that they are dealing with four or five types which can be easily
recognized. Just like in Parker, Human Dynamics sees us as having all the
Dynamics where one predominates and the others are secondary.
Human Dynamics has concluded that there are three dimensions to all of us,
which are the mental , emotional, and physical. All these the are united
by the spiritual dimension termed the Deep Capacity (Deming's "Profound
Knowledge"?). The team I described in LO8155 has the first member as
predominantly mentally centered, the second as physical-emotional, the
third as emotional-subjective, and the last as emotional-objective. Just
like Parker mentions, all these Dynamics are good. The important thing is
to recognize that they are DIFFERENT, and that people learn in different
ways and at different speeds. This brings to mind something from another
thread("Will Senior mgrs Change? LO7663 of 29 May 1996) where Michael
Erickson was saying:
"I'm tired of doing the same task wrong forty-seven times. I find myself
being rushed to slap together something that I end up having to, slap
together again two or three days (or weeks) later, and correct the errors
from the first slap together, and this goes on and on until I've spent ten
times the amount of effort and time I would have spent if I just slowed
down and did it the way I thought it should have been done the first
time."
Here I see Michael, IMHO, predominantly as a mentally-centered person who
has an anxious emotional-objective boss. There are techniques for both of
them to recognize their own Dynamics and the Dynamics of the other person
and be able to come to an agreement on WHAT is expected and HOW they are
going to go about it. It seems to me here that the boss is looking for
something approximate to be used as guidance while Michael is trying to
provide a detailed solution which requires a lot of time and thinking.
These two people need to address this openly and come to an agreement on
common expectations.
Categorizing people may seem odious to some and analogous to "labeling".
It would be reprehensible if used to discriminate against people. The HD
model has really helped me understand myself, my co-workers, my wife and
my children so we may all learn to communicate and work together better.
Roy Lyford-Pike
VP - Engineering and Development
SCM Chemicals
Baltimore, MD
71075.2421@compuserve.com
--ROY LYFORD-PIKE <71075.2421@CompuServe.COM>
Learning-org -- An Internet Dialog on Learning Organizations For info: <rkarash@karash.com> -or- <http://world.std.com/~lo/>