Free Article By Paul Glen of C2
Consulting
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Team-Building with Tofu and Grapefruit
(Originally published in Computerworld)
When constructing project and management teams,
I've always found that it's important to pay attention to more than just the
tasks that need to be accomplished. The personalities of the people who would
accomplish those tasks influence the success or failure of the team as much as
the skills that they bring. But in times of emotional stress, such as the
challenging times we're in today, personalities become even more important than
they are during ordinary times.
For managers just trying to get things done in this difficult
environment, it might be tempting to pay attention to skills alone, assuming
that pressures on budgets and schedules will persuade people to put their
personality differences aside and focus on completing the tasks at hand.
Unfortunately, nothing could be further from the truth. During times of stress,
most people fall back on old patterns of behavior, their comfortable, natural
styles, rather than putting all their attention on the work to be done.
So, long ago, I developed a simple but useful way of looking
at personalities to try to figure out how people will work together. I do it by
evaluating people's personalities based on a simple linear scale. At one end of
the scale is tofu, and at the other end is grapefruit. When you stop and think
about the nature of these two foods, you'll see how it works.
Tofu, while a very healthful food, doesn't bring a lot of
flavor to a dish. It adds a bit of texture, but it readily accepts the flavors
of everything around it. If you douse it with soy sauce, it will taste like
lumpy soy sauce. If you sauté it with garlic, it will taste like lumpy oil and
garlic. But if you eat it by itself, it does have a subtle flavor. In other
words, tofu is happy to be colonized by whatever surrounds it. It gets along
with everything.
So it is with the tofu people. They are good and helpful
people, hardworking and diligent, and they don't try to impose their work habits
or personalities on those around them. In fact, they're happy to accept how
others want to work, and they adapt to whomever they are working with. These are
the people we sometimes forget are there, but they are always plugging along
productively. They don't cause problems, and they don't demand attention.
Grapefruit, on the other hand, while also a very healthful
food, demands attention. It has a very strong flavor, and you either love it or
hate it. It never melds with the flavors of anything around it. In fact, quite
the opposite. It insists that everything around it start tasting like
grapefruit. If you've ever made a fruit salad, you've probably noticed that once
you add grapefruit, the entire salad starts tasting of grapefruit no matter how
little you put in. In other words, grapefruit is an imperialist fruit, insisting
that everyone around it bend to its will.
So it is with the grapefruit people. They are good and helpful
people, hardworking and diligent, but they demand that everyone around them work
in the manner that makes them -- the grapefruit people -- comfortable. They have
trouble adapting to other people's styles but work well with those who can adapt
to their own.
So when constructing a team, you need to figure
out the right blend of tofu and grapefruit. Too many varieties of grapefruit
will fight with one another, but a team with no grapefruit at all may be like a
bowl of tofu -- bland and directionless. The key is to find the right recipe of
skills and personalities that will blend well together.
© Copyright 2009 by Computerworld Inc., One Speen Street, Framingham, MA, 01701. Reprinted by permission of
Computerworld. All Rights Reserved.
