of Gurus

I posted something last week about ‘guru opinions', and it gathered several responses. I thought to quickly expand on the matter.

The dictionary definition of ‘guru’ is “an influential teacher or popular expert”. Precise enough? Not even close. While the overlap is obvious, being a teacher and being an expert are completely different roles and require different skills; and while the foundation of both is knowledge of a subject matter, that in itself has many fine lines. And sure, one can be both – rarely, possible, Type 5. Why am I spending time in dissecting this issue, you may ask? And even more importantly, why should you care? Because, just as I am and just as I do, you are curious and want to learn from others. And so, let’s meet these Gurus – breaking them down by type.

The first type of guru, and in fact the type most likely to be called a guru, is THE THEORIST: smart, insightful, charismatic, highly self-confident, at times arrogant. S/he doesn’t quite do client work; rather, s/he thinks, and teaches what s/he thinks – they are trainers and professors and articlemakers/bookwriters and circuit-speakers, evangelists in a sense. Active on the talk circuit – often that’s the only venue they have and how they make their living. Their advice is logical and informed, and keeps responding to new societal and business developments. But … yes, there’s a Big But – two actually.

Big But 1: it’s theory, and when you apply theory to real life it never quite works out the way it’s supposed to – because the variables are many and everchanging, or put more sanguinely … shit has the bad habit of happening in real life.

Big But 2: when one thinks too much, well … overthinking may occur; the mind gets bored to sit on one thing and needs to escape further. Sometimes is a fair evolution, but often is simply the occupational hazard of intellectual boredom coupled with the need of saying something new: it is in this second realm that thoughts like Just Cause come from.

PROS: read them all with great interest, it’s smart thinking, have some salt grains at the ready, and some large ones, as they are often needed.

CONS: bluesky thinking, at times not quite usable in and of it itself, but you can extract the engine of it and then apply it to a given real problem.

The second type of guru is THE PRACTITIONER Type A. They have a dayjob for clients, and have for all of their careers. They don’t write a lot, not because of lack of content but because of lack of time: a demanding career with demanding clients, and the free time is devoted to family or fun – not much time left for pontificating. But, today’s e-platforms do allow for a modicum of opinion-sharing time; at any rate, The PractitionerA is not fond of sharing too much of what s/he know – why, that’s hard-earned knowledge. Are there Big Buts here? Only one: being so busy in making things work and solving real-life challenges might cause a degree of calcification of ideas – if something has worked, a) why change, and b) a bit of resistance to new ways is inevitable. Interestingly, however, the older they get, the wiser they get because experience is an irreplaceable treasure, their minds can understand ‘new’ and reject ‘spin’, and since they have more time their sharing becomes more frequent and more generous.

PROS: they know what they’re talking about, and clients have listened to them for years, and they have solved challenges in every industry and in every circumstances, and they know that their philosophy is just that – a philosophy, one that guides given solutions – does not dictate them: the same theoretical component is perfect for one client and completely wrong for another. And yes, they are goodlooking too.

CONS: none, as I see it.

The third type of guru is THE PRACTITIONER Type B. They have a dayjob for clients, and have for most or part of their careers. They are very interested in general thinking because don’t particular like slaving over a bespoke approach to a given client, but finds it easier to rely of formula setups to guide the work. They speak fluently about the philosophies of the professions and straddle, even in the same sentence, between various connected disciplines: grand view? Nah, ignorance of boundaries. Usually, they write proposals by relying too much on slides from previous proposals and adding just a few about the prospect at hand. At times, they do invent new Terms (rarely new Ways) – not out of deep thinking and conviction, but either with the objective to differentiate themselves and sell their services better or to fight the boredom to believe in one same thing. Fair warning, often PractitionerAs do the same, just not as often and for nobler reasons.

The fourth type is The Corporate Guru. That’s Jack Welch for example. I never question The Corporate Guru, not because I always agree with them (enter Marissa Mayer) but because I have no right to do so: their real-life situations were what they were and way beyond my comprehension, they lived them as they saw fit. I do read what they say, try to understand it, and then use what I wish. And of course the Steve Jobs’s of this world are part of this category – but they are a breed apart as they transcend just Business.

Finally, the rare and elusive Type 5: The EPT (Expert Practical Theorist), that’s @markritson – and that’s the only one I know of this type. Intellectual perspective plus teaching stance & ability plus real-life work experience. Not that I agree with everything he says (but I do with most of it though), but if one can successfully do all three things … respect.

Interestingly, there’s no moving between these categories – I don’t know anyone who started in one place and ended in another or that exists across types. Do you?

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