Over 90% of us in IT are high detail people. That’s a good thing.
However, being a high detail person comes with some drawbacks that you need to be aware of.
One challenge is that high detail people tend to be perfectionists.
Now, when you are a Systems Administrator, a DBA, a Programmer, or some other type of technical resource, , , this high detail aspect is not only desired, , , it is necessary to a great extent. What happens if your Systems Administrator updates one of the servers and selects an inappropriate parameter setting? You got it, , , he or she can crash the server, , , so being precise is important in our technical roles.
As a manager, being precise can be a tremendous disadvantage.
Being precise means it may take too long to make a decision.
Being precise may mean no decision will be made until we have enough information, , , which may or may not ever be obtained.
Being precise may mean we do things right but fail to do the right thing, , , a big problem for an IT manager.
Be aware that if you are a high detail person, it may be appropriate and necessary for you to “pull it back” to a level when you become the manager. Now is the time to depend on others to wade into the detail and understand all the technical issues of a situation. Now is the time to manage and delegate, not to try to do everything yourself.
It’s difficult to back off your innate desire to get to the bottom of an issue and to be the problem solver like you have been for so many years, , , but if you don’t, your team and you will suffer.
Take a hard look at yourself and ask yourself the question, “Am I a perfectionist?” If so, make a conscious effort to let go of some of the detail and rely on the expertise of others you work with to be the experts. Your role as manager is to focus at an issue level, not necessarily the detail level.
ITLever™ 