Every so often I come across a people person. Someone who is more interested in who than what or how or even why.
You can recognize them pretty easily, they say things like
“Oh yes that’s Marks project” and “Yes yes, I know Kerry is interested in that”
and you think “why did they say that ? It’s irrelevant to the discussion which manager’s manager is in charge of it.”
People people are the opposite of technical people. People people see the world in terms of power, people and status. They have almost no interest in the substance of the work they are supposed to be doing.
People people are very demotivating to deal with because the message they keep broadcasting is “Success is not dependent on things you can control such as quality and attention to detail, success is dependent on who thinks what of whom”.
You could probably describe the people I am talking about as status sycophants.
Not all people people are terrible though, there are obviously degrees.
Jason Calacanis is a people person. Listen to him talk about startups, how long does it take him to move from the product to the ‘Who’. He is a pretty good kind of people person though.
Kara Swisher strikes me as a people person, I get the impression she isn’t actually interested in technology, she is interested in who is doing what with (or to) whom.
Perhaps the best way to deal with people people is to treat them as though they are specialists in some technology that is required for your project but not the central theme.
Consult them when their area of expertise is important but otherwise ignore them.