Digging in the Dirt - Walking the Rows (Part Deux)

Digging in the Dirt - Walking the Rows (Part Deux)

IF YOU ARE a manager, either of a home or a workplace, walking your rows is critical to solving short-term and long-term challenges. You must understand intimately and care deeply about the issues your team faces and be the first to celebrate their victories.

But walking the rows also offers a key benefit to you: you will determine who your “what” people are and who your “how” people are. Let me explain. I realized a few years ago that every person is either a “what” person or a “how” person. The “what” people at my company are those who easily identify what we need to do for our customers, our firm, and our suppliers. By spending just one day a year strategizing with this team, I discover three to five new services we can offer.

Two weeks after the “what” team meets, it presents its ideas to my how team, which is made up of excellent operators. It is the how team’s job to brainstorm and determine how we will implement the plan, when it can be launched, and what resources (people and budget) it will require to pull off. Most importantly, the people who are doing the work and dealing with the problems are developing the solutions . . . not me. This simple shift in our strategizing has made a huge difference in revenue, profit, productivity, and morale.

The same principle applies at home. The what people are the idea generators. Let’s say you are a “what” person who points out to your husband that you’re not staying as connected with your college-aged children as you’d like. Perhaps your husband is gifted at figuring out the how. After consulting with you, he might take the initiative in setting up a family Facebook page, teaching you to “text” on your phone, or arranging to spend a weekend at a hotel near your child’s dorm.

But our bodies have many parts, and God has put each part just where he wants it. (1 Corinthians 12:18)

To do this well, either in your home or business, you must recognize who are your “what” people and who are your “how” people. And you do this by walking your rows.