The universal perspective is the only one that matters

Donald Putnam was the keynote at Lipper’s Hedgeworld the other day. He said some very interesting things.

"It matters only what the universal perspective is, not your perspective.”

Think about it. Why does your perspective matter? It doesn't. He's right! The only thing that matters is the universal perspective. I always say that perception is reality.

A classical example is my friend, Sally works for a prestigious asset management firm, ABC. Sally recently lost four people in her group. Her boss, Joe, was very upset. She had a meeting with her team to uncover their issues. Joe wanted to attend the meeting because he’s convinced everyone wants to work for ABC and Sally must be doing a poor job because no one would ever leave ABC. Consider Joe’s perspective.

Joe has worked for ABC since he was twenty-two years old, he’s now forty-two. What’s his frame of reference? Narrow. Sally has worked for two other firms. The four people she lost in her group went to hedge funds. ABC is paying the young people $95,000 a year, and their new compensation with the hedge funds is $120,000.

However, Sally made the mistake of not inviting Joe to the meeting and asking him to speak. Sally did a poor job of managing up. Joe came to the meeting anyway. Joe asked her team what their interests were from a career development perspective and asked them to write it out on a piece of paper and to submit it to him anonymously in the meeting. Joe was shocked to discover that no one wanted to continue to work in his group.

Unfortunately Joe considers this to be Sally’s fault. It is not Sally’s fault, but a reflection of people who have different career development interests, compensation issues, and an organization in crisis, etc. It also demonstrates Joe's narrow frame of reference and recruiting issues. This was difficult for him to understand.

It was also difficult for Sally to understand that she was doing a poor job of managing up, managing down, delegating, implementing strategy, vision and leadership. Perspective is about frame of reference and it’s not yours that matters, it the universal perspective.

Thank you for being here. I am thrilled that you take time out of your schedule to come by.

Copyright 2007 Ev Nucci

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