Observations on accomplishment

[Fitzy]

I am on the peripheral of a situation that is fascinating me. There are two people with extremely similar education and age, working in the same relatively high end department. Where they differ is in their post-education rise to where she is now. The paths are divergent in the extreme, I think. Maybe she is two sides of the same coin. Or two faces of a die. I don’t know which idiom to use.

Sorry this is long, but it really fascinates me.

Arya has a list of accomplishments a mile long, but relatively minor titles. She is well respected within their field and may very well be the subject matter expert on a niche within a broader field. She has reached this place through hard work and not an inconsiderable amount of self-sacrifice. She shows contempt for the political games necessary for advancement and therefore has given up on the idea of advancing to a higher office. Whether this is due to having found a field she loves and feels she is doing important work in or because a stubborn refusal to play the game, I’m not sure.

Arya’s work style is to blow through a large amount of material, relax for a bit and jump back in. When observed over a short period of time, this leads to the false belief that she is wasting time or goofing off. Yet, give Arya an assignment, it will get done, it will get done with excellent results, and on time or early. If Arya thinks she cannot get the work done, she will flat out tell the person assigning the work no and “this is why”, or she will explain to the person what other work will have to be pushed back. This has led to a reputation of simultaneously; if you need something done, get Arya to do it and that she is somehow lazy for refusing work or pushing back. Arya has few close work friends and compartmentalizes them to work as far as I can tell. She goes home at the end of the day and unless it is work related, doesn’t talk to people from work.

Arya’s leadership style is consensus building, however she holds everyone to her own high standard and if someone is not pulling their weight, there will be a blunt discussion . If consensus cannot be reached and it becomes obvious there will not be one, Arya will make the decision. When assigning work, Arya says this is what I need, tell me what you need to get it done. She seldom tells someone how to do something, just what needs to get done. The holding people to a high standard and expecting results has led to a reputation of being hard to work with, except by those who meet those standards or are willing to work to meet the standards, in the later case, Arya becomes a great mentor and has facilitated the careers of a handful of people into some of the best performing employees. Within the department there is a small group of people who hold Arya in high esteem and a larger number who warn new employees to avoid Arya because she is hard to work with. Arya insists people balance work and life and won’t allow people to burn out or even add hours unless absolutely necessary, in which case Arya will jump in the pool with the team.

Sansa has a list of titles and former titles nearly as long as Arya’s accomplishments, and Sansa has a list of failed or handed off projects as long as Arya’s list of successful projects. Sansa is constantly being sent to leadership trainings and placed in temporary leadership positions. In addition, Sansa is placed on nearly all new projects even when the project leader says straight out that there is no place for her. Usually she is placed on the teams in an assistant or other leadership position.

Sansa’s work style is to accept everything asked of her no matter if she has the experience, knowledge or ability to accomplish it. She is friends with all managers above and to the side of her. And by friends I mean she will spend time outside of work with these people, she is on Facebook with them, she goes drinking with them, literally friends. They even look after each other’s kids. Sansa almost never completes a project. The project either lingers in limbo or gets assigned to someone else (sometimes even Arya). She spends a good portion of the day chatting with upper management.

Sansa’s leadership style is authoritarian. This is your assignment, this is when it’s due, this is how you will you do it, this is step one, step two... As stated, these projects seldom get done. Sansa is often elevated over another person with more experience, accomplishments and education. Failure is generally dismissed as the teams fault or that the assignment was poorly defined to begin with. Sansa never pushes back against upper management. Never says this can’t be done. Sansa is vastly over-assigned and puts in long hours accomplishing...nothing. Sansa insists everyone who works with her should be working just as “hard”. People burn out from her teams and leave the department or leave the field all together. Yet she’s personable and friendly so people will fall down that hole and walk away thinking it was their own fault.

Briefly glancing at Sansa and Arya, based entirely on introductions and early chats with other employees around the two, you quickly get the impression that Sansa is an up and coming leader who one day will be in charge of it all. Arya, is just drifting along.

But observing for any amount of time, interacting with the two, working with both on projects or committees they lead and it becomes apparent that Sansa gets by on who she knows and charisma while Arya is brilliant and simply gets the job done. But where Sansa is charming and friendly, Arya is brutally honest and assertive, but never mean. Though of course, she can come off that way to people used to only praise without useful constructive feedback.

I know I felt… pain the first time Arya critiqued some of my work. It took me a day or two to step back and realize everything she said was right. She said it honestly, respectfully, but with no sugarcoating to make it go down nicely. She’s improved my work in the time I’ve known her.

I don’t really have any questions about this. And I suspect few people read this far, it just has been fascinating to watch. I suspect within a few years Sansa will be in senior leadership while Arya will remain where she is. Highly respected by her outside peers, but dismissed within the organization because her type of competence just isn’t as good a fit as Sansa’s.

Now these are just my observations and I am not integrated within their department, so there is probably more to the story than I know. I use brown-noser for Sansa, but is that fair? I’m not sure. Maybe she has competencies I simply don’t see due to not interacting all the time. Maybe Arya’s brusqueness and refusal to play internal political games means she is a mean person. I don’t see it and it seems like the cliques within the department have fallen into two camps, competent or political. With competent being much smaller, but much more effective and political being bigger and with much more promotion potential. The competent side loves Arya and defends her to death, the political side fears her and thinks she makes them look bad. While the competent side is utterly contemptuous of Sansa, the political side is fawning.

It also amused me that halfway through I realized I could change the names to Sansa and Arya and it would almost work as a metaphor. At least for the books, I haven’t seen the TV show.

[LordMortis]

I've seen mixes and matches of your characters quite a bit but the guts here:

But observing for any amount of time, interacting with the two, working with both on projects or committees they lead and it becomes apparent that Sansa gets by on who she knows and charisma while Arya is brilliant and simply gets the job done.

It all comes down to the arrangements you make for your employment. Sansa made one arrangement and Arya made one arrangement. From there, it is what it is.

The speculations on failed projects is interesting to me right now, if only because my company is at least paying lip service to the idea that fearing failed projects leads to better successes later to expand a business model, so long as failed projects do not affect the customer.

[gameoverman]

I've seen people who can do it all. They are top notch at their work, and are also excellent at office politics. These are rare people. Usually it's one or the other in my experience. Some are really good at what they do, and they rise as far as that takes them. Some are just really good at office politics and they rise as far as that takes them. The office politics people can rise farther and/or faster, that's because people can be manipulated. Everyone who works at a place, from the lowliest employees to the CEO, are subject to manipulation. You have to be good at it though, and a lot of people aren't or they just aren't interested in doing it.

I see nothing wrong with it as long as the person is happy with what they are getting out of it. If Arya is satisfied with the results her approach gets her then what's the problem? None that I see.

[Lorini]

The problem with the office politics people is that office politics can change like the wind (ask me how I know) and then you go from being at the top of the heap to the bottom. People who are truly good at their work can be good anywhere not just in that particular space.