I’m still utterly intrigued by these “information hoarders” that exist out in the world. These are people that find little nuts of information and go hide it for themselves, or have expertise in something and won’t share…they’re unwilling to pass it on for fear that the information would somehow help others surpass them. Guess what? If that’s how you operate in life or business you’re doomed to fail anyways.
My experience has led me to the conclusion that passing valuable pieces of information on to your community, and yes even your competitors, makes YOU more valuable. It sets you apart from the rest of the pack. There is often a subconscious human transfer that happens (and obviously conscious as well) in which others will now always attach “value” to you and your name.
When I say information this includes the information you come across in your daily life, your knowledge, wisdom, and expertise; all of which SHOULD BE passed on in order to nurture your community, help people, and will allow for conversation and evolution of the information/ ideas.
Be part of the community, join in the conversations by helping, mentoring and sharing your knowledge. The other option is to go sit in the corner and hold on to the “information” that you have, which will do absolutely nothing for you other then isolate you from your own community.
I have to go, I have more information to share!! Cheers!!
In my area of the country (which in my working world includes Ohio, Indiana, Kentucky and Pennsylvania)the stores work pretty closely together to make sure all of the customers in our region get the product or information they want as quickly as possible from whichever location happens to have it. But as my dad use to say, “Back in the day…” But back in the day we had a store manager amongst us who refused to get involved with the team. He said he was paid to worry about his location and his customers and if the rest of us needed help (i.e. product transfer, vendor rep info, etc.)then we could take care of it the way he did…solo. Normally (back in the day)I would have told such an individual to get over himself and go… But I liked the guy. We were hired together. Our personalities meshed, you know? As the years passed and we all lived out our aspirations, he was promoted and became our boss. But by the time this occurred our small but national privately owned company had been bought out by a big Fortune 500 company with an entirely new culture. Teams and team work were encouraged by our leaders (still is). It became less and less about what was good for the stores and staff and more about the customers and going the extra mile to retain them (what a concept). The very first assignment the new boss dispensed to us store managers involved…OMG…working as a team to meet a specific target. As he explained this on a conference call I sent him a text message that read in part: “Welcome to our world Team Leader. It will be cool trading information with you to reach our goal.” His text back to me (still conducting the call) was “Touche smart a*%”
I tell you this story Matt because I try to hold out hope that hoarders learn in the end. I watched my boss have to work extra hard to gain everyone’s trust in his new role. If he had been part of our “team” prior, he could have gotten our target plan in play much sooner. (And he acknowledges that now too…but only to me…lol)
That’s a great real life situation, and goes to show what can happen with the lack of “participation”. These “information hoarders” don’t piss me off or anything, but they are certainly an intriguing group to watch. They simply have a different methodology to accomplishing what we all want, but as you point out, it may take considerable amount of “extra effort” to do so if you’re a hoarder.
Cheers Cheri, and love the addition to this post!!