Mangers See Resources When Leaders See People

Earlier this week, as I sat in the waiting room at my doctor’s office, I was looking for anything to occupy my time with.  I had already browsed through the well-worn golf and wellness magazines and had moved on to reading my admittance paperwork.  While it was far less exciting than reading yet another article on how to correct my slice (none so far have helped), I found myself intrigued by the language on the form.  In particular, I found one field interesting.  It was labeled “Resource” and next to it was the name of the physician’s assistant I was about to see.  It conjured up images of a world in which people are just cogs in a system where one can simply be replaced by another.  It also reminded me of the importance of language and how we overlook some very simple leadership principles every day in our business dealings.  In this case, the use of the word “resource” was viewed by some form designer as the simplest way to label field and ignored the fact that a person’s name is going to be filled in there.

Too often, people use the word “resource” when they really mean “person”.  It may seem like a small thing but leadership is made up of many “small things” that are brought together to create something great.  As a leader, I simply cannot afford to ignore the person that is represented by that name.  I can’t simply relabel them as “resources” and pretend that they are interchangeable commodities. While that form designer likely thought that using the word “resource” was an efficient way of handling the form entry, I would argue that we will be better off if we avoid the use of overly generic terms like that for people.  Save those non-human descriptions for things that really are not human.  Here are a three reasons why we should always refrain from using the term “resources” when talking about people.

People don’t like being treated like numbers

It has been shown that people respond better to relationship-based experiences than to purely contractual arrangements.  In fact, the most important characteristics of leaders, according to those being led, are things like authenticity, trust and respect.  When people’s names are replaced by “Resource A” and “Resource B” the personalities that underlie those names will respond accordingly.  Those “resources” will still show up for work and they may even accomplish the amount of work defined by your project plan.  However, they are less likely to be driven by loyalty or any kind of shared vision.  What happens when your project encounters challenges that require that extra bit of effort or when that “resource” has a choice between doing something that is easy or something that is right?  By treating these people as replaceable things, we degrade our ability to motivate without resorting to coercion or formal authority.  We reduce our ability to rely on the trust and respect that is so important for leaders.

People are not interchangeable

If we are staffing for success, we cannot simply move people around expecting one person to perform the same as the next.  We recognize this fact when we hire, promote and reduce staff but somehow this fact is lost when some project plans are created.  By using terms like “resource” to mean a person, we risk losing sight of the fact that each team member comes with a set of skills, raw talent and personality that is unique to them.  All of those things that make up a person make them well qualified in some roles and not as much for others. If we lose sight of that uniqueness we are putting the success of projects and the firm at risk.

Your career advancement could be slowed

The first two reasons above focus on the success of your work streams and the organization but this last one is really based on our own desire for growth and advancement.  If we accept the idea that good leadership skills will help drive our career forward and we also accept that leadership is based on people and relationships then it stands to reason that reducing people to numbers and things will not be great for your career. 

Above we discussed the impact on the people on the team.  The impact on your career is a natural result of that impact and it works on two levels.  On one level your career will be impacted by the success or failure of the various efforts you lead.  If your language negatively impacts the team and the work they are doing, it is likely that it will create drag on your career.

Secondly, there is a less tangible component in your career advancement that involves relationships you maintain with those around you.  Positive personalities that foster strong relationships will typically be more successful than others.  (I know you are thinking of all the negative jerks that you’ve seen succeed but keep in mind that we are focused on the typical and not the exceptions.)  Using language that classifies people as “resources” does not inspire the type of relationships that lead to success.  It does not inspire the respect and trust that is crucial to good leadership.  People will reciprocate with the same formality and you will develop transactional relationships that lack in personal connections.   

Words matter

It may seem trivial but words matter.  Unfortunately, too many project and process management methodologies have tried to reduce our language down to a dry scientific subset of terms in an effort to create a common language.  The problem with this is that this, too often, ignores the people involved in the methodology.  By taking small steps such as using better words to describe people we will be reminded of the human nature of what we all do, and show, in a small way, that we respect the people on our teams.