There’s a mistake almost everyone makes and hardly anyone notices: we convince others with the arguments that would convince us.
That works wonderfully — with people who tick like we do. With everyone else we talk past the point and wonder why someone won’t come along, even though the arguments are surely obvious.
The bait has to taste good to the fish, not to the angler.
The Meeting Where the Titanic Was Born
In workshops I sometimes act out a brainstorm attended only by great thinkers. It goes roughly like this:
“Thursday morning, let’s brainstorm again.” — “Let’s do something completely new.” — “Cool, like what?” — “We’ll build a ship.” — “And since we’re innovative: the biggest in the world.” — “Even better: one that can’t sink at all.” — “I’ve already got the name too.”
Into this group someone walks in and says: “I’ve seen the blueprints. There aren’t enough lifeboats on board.”
The answer: “You haven’t grasped the principle. The ship can’t go down. The lifeboats are just for the design.”
1,500 dead later, we know they should have listened to the one with the blueprints.
The story is over a hundred years old and still happens every week. Only rarely with this much at stake.
Two Questions That Explain a Lot
I work with two distinctions that go back to Carl Gustav Jung and that everyone today knows under the name 16 Personalities. They’re not pigeonholes. They’re preferences — the way you have a favorite hand for writing and can still use the other one.
Where Does Your Attention Go?
Imagine you buy a cabinet. You don’t get a cabinet, you get a box. At home the box lies on the floor, and now there are two paths.
One type unpacks everything, sorts the screws, counts them, reads the instructions and checks once more that everything’s there. In that time the other type has already built the cabinet. It stands a little crooked, three screws are left over, and the back panel is on backwards.
Both paths lead to a cabinet. One sees things as they are. The other sees them as they could be.
How Do You Decide?
At the Otto mail-order company I once experienced two executives in the same position, one after the other. The first was French. Charming, ultra-fashionable, fresh flowers for the secretary every Monday. In the office, pictures from France and family photos on the desk. Every conversation began with: How are you? How was your weekend?
His successor: an older gentleman, a gray suit every day, his few hairs strictly combed from one side to the other. No flowers. Bare nails on the wall where the pictures used to hang. Not a single personal object on the desk. First sentence: What do we have to get done today?
The secretary had culture shock. Neither of them was wrong. They just decided in completely different ways — one through people and relationships, the other through logic and results.
Four Groups, Four Sentences
Combine the two and four groups emerge. I always let participants find out for themselves what works for them, and over the years the answers are astonishingly stable:
- The visionary analysts want to know where the whole thing leads. Tie the task to a bigger goal, argue logically, leave them free to find the way. Micromanagement drives them off.
- The inspiring idealists want to see meaning and impact on people. Tell them what it means for others. Pure numbers don’t reach them.
- The practical logicians want a clearly defined, solvable problem with concrete steps and measurable benefit. Abstract visions bore them.
- The supportive doers want to know what it means for the team, and need structure and backing. Confrontation shuts them down.
The same request, four different sentences. Not four different truths — just four different doors.
Whoever Knows Themselves Brings the Opposite On Board
At the same company, a Mr. Bock led HR development. It was so innovative that people came from all over the country to see it. Everyone would have bet he was a visionary.
He was a pronounced detail person. And he knew it. That’s why he had deliberately brought in a deputy who was exactly the opposite of him.
The two were unbeatable. Not despite being different, but because of it.
For me that’s the real core of diversity: not just different backgrounds, but different thinking. A team of nothing but idea people finishes nothing. A team of nothing but detail people starts nothing.
What You Can Try Tomorrow
Think of a person you’ll soon have to discuss something important with. And then answer two questions: does she tend to see things as they are, or as they could be? And does she tend to decide through logic or through people?
Reframe your request accordingly. Not the content — just the first sentence.
And then watch what happens. Usually it takes astonishingly little.
If you want to know where you stand yourself: the questionnaire at 16personalities.com is free and takes about twenty minutes. You can then give the result to our free Growth Coach — so it knows you better from the start.
