About me: I'm an unrepentant generalist finding my way in a world of specialists. I started this blog to review books, but I now talk about topics ranging from management to cognition to social software.
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I was having a conversation with a friend the other day about what we thrived on in a job, and it was interesting to see how our perspectives differed. She talked about the thrill of fixing a problem, of figuring out what was happening, and designing a process or system to solve the problem forever. I talked about how I love the challenge of understanding how all the different parts of a system fit together and figuring out what actually matters. The conversation was a good reminder for me of how important it is to have the right mix of people to get things done in an organization.
I’ve been thinking about this recently as I start a new role at Google where I am trying to articulate to my new team the value that I bring. My strength is as a systems analyst – understanding all of the different parts of a complex system, seeing how they inter-relate, and being able to describe the levers that drive the whole system. This applies whether the system is conversation, corporate culture, or the intricacies of Google’s revenue. I believe that my ability to both understand the big picture as well as the details allows me to extract insights that other people could not from just one level. And I am driven to keep on poking at the system until I feel I understand which stimuli will provoke which responses. The collection of observations on this blog over the years is a reflection of my drive to understand.
However, I struggle in taking the understanding I develop and doing something about it. I can understand how the system is put together and where the friction in the system is, but not how to fix those things. Part of understanding the whole system is understanding why different design decisions were made in the construction of that system, and that understanding sometimes makes it difficult for me to envision a different way of doing things that would solve the issues I identify.
My friend is more pragmatic as she is more interested in fixing important things that are broken. She has worked in a couple different industries, and in each case, it was more about identifying the systemic things wrong with her company, and figuring out how to make them work better by instituting a new process or a new system element. She also has a good understanding of systems, as she wouldn’t be able to fix things effectively if she didn’t. But for her, it’s the fixing that matters, not the understanding.
I think both roles have value to an organization. And a particularly good combination is to pair an understander with a fixer so that the system insights that the understander develops can be fed to the fixer. An understander without a fixer identifies problems but those problems linger since nothing is being put in place to counter them. A fixer without an understander is sometimes fixing symptoms rather than the underlying problems that are driving problems in the system. Together, though, they can be a truly powerful force.
P.S. There are a few other themes inspired here that I’m going to set aside for a future post:
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Nice insight. I have come to a similar conclusion in the process of figuring out why I am so frustrated with my job. I too am an understander, but my group’s responsiblities include fixing things, and I am happiest when I’m working on projects where I can find a fixer and work with them, but that doesn’t happen often enough. I think that is the reason it was particularly frustrating when they decided they couldn’t hire my friend as a fixer into our group. I was really looking forward to having a very effective team.
So I’m moving on to an independent engineering company, where I’ll get paid for understanding. I hope I don’t feel too frustrated not being part of a team with a fixer. I do like to see problems get solved. I am just bad at implementing solutions that I can come up with.
I’m not convinced I buy this as a real distinction. I’m willing to agree that understanding and fixing are different skills, but not really different mindsets. In the context of my work [software engineering and research], the people who are best at understanding are also extremely likely to be the best at fixing. There is also some room for people who are less good at both these things, but in that case the usual situation is that an understander/fixer will essentially “direct” their work — they end up working as fixers. You don’t see a lot of understanders who are not also fixers.
I don’t completely agree with you Rif. Understanding vs. fixing is a real distinction regardless of whether a single person can possess both. Some people have the ability to understand and then propose fixes to problems large and small. People like Eric (and me too) prize the pursuit over understanding why something happen and how it came to be that way over what to do about it.
My favorite roles at the wealth management firm I’ve worked at for a decade are those that allow me room to understand. Understand the communication going on in a meeting room, how different applications interact with each other…the kind of stuff that makes someone a subject matter expert. I can’t really fix anything (at work or around the house) but I can sure understand why and determine how. So if you want to think of it a different way you can think of people who value “why” and “how” vs. those that value “what” and “when”. Some people care about everything and are good at everything but most of us are not.
There is indeed a Myers-Briggs axis this pertains to. The understander/fixer dichotomy is how the J/P axis plays out among NT types. INTJs and ENTJs are classically fixers; it’s not that they don’t like understanding things, it’s jut that attempting to tolerate brokenness in systems drives them up a wall, and more generally, they find the urge to use the knowledge of systems they accumulate incredibly seductive. INTPs and ENTPs are classically understanders; loving learning for learning’s sake and adventure for adventure’s sake, happy to answer anyone’s questions, but with no particular yen to do anything with the products of their investigation.
Chuck, I’ve been fortunate that I’ve worked side-by-side with a good fixer for the past couple years at Google. I think that’s part of why I’ve been happier here – having somebody to break down my insights and use them to make things better is satisfying.
Rif, I agree the two are related, and the best fixers are those who also understand the whole system. But I’m thinking of situations like where I have debugged some software, and figured out a workaround, and just use that workaround because that lets me get what I want done, rather than fixing the system such that nobody needs a workaround. Meanwhile, a fixer who isn’t an understander might apply a quick hack that deals with the immediate problem, but doesn’t think through what the implications are for the code long-term. I agree that the best software architects can both understand the system and fix it in a way that stays fixed, but I think that’s relatively rare.
Joel, thanks for the comment – interesting that you see the same patterns at the wealth management firm.
Siderea, thanks for the pointer to the Myers-Briggs axis – I like the description that fixers can’t tolerate brokenness in systems, as I think that’s very apt.
Yeah, I’m a recovering fixer (INTJ). I’m an understander now, (INTP), learning to better go with the flow and work with reality, rather than against it. It takes me a lot of effort to sit back and observe, so that I can really understand the whole system. But it’s so much better for my health than constantly needing to fix everything.
And I do hope that I can team up with a fixer, so that I can get some of my newfound understanding out into the world as policy.
Good read. I think to be a good fixer you have to understand as well. I think some people fix things by accident (blind squirrel finding the nut) by diving right in and trying to address every issue. I’m having that issue right now with my new boss. He came in from the outside, and immediately wants to find out what out biggest issues are and address them head on. A noble goal, but fixing is often a compromise, that involves trade-offs. Want to get more done with the same staff? Then somethings got to give somewhere. Of course they never see it that way. They get short sighted and only see the problems they fix, never the new ones they create.
http://www.thinkbody.co.uk/papers/autonomic-nervous-system.htm
This is a very interesting article which I believe applies directly to what you’re talking about. An “understander” would indicate an active parasympathetic nervous system (divergent, receptive, scope, process-orientation), while a “fixer” would indicate an active sympathetic nervous system (convergent, active, focus, goal-orientation).
I believe that a truly effective problem solver is one that can activate either part of their brain (sympathetic-parasympathetic, convergent-divergent) as necessary to understand and overcome a problem.
This exact ability is the focus of this scholarly article (linked below), which calls this ability “breaking frame”, and categorizes this as a separate cognitive ability from either convergent or divergent thinking.
http://www.psych.utoronto.ca/users/peterson/pdf/63%202008%20DeYoung%20Peterson%20insight%20CRJ.pdf
However, you could be right as well – this complementary dichotomy could be “fixed” by employing multiple people who have strengths in a single thought domain. See – you are a “fixer” after all. Regards.