My post on keys led me down a rabbit-trail about key
"people," which I ended up putting off at the time. I then happened to read CS Lewis's speech
"The Inner Ring," which basically presented a similar idea to the one
I was developing. He focused primarily
on the social dynamic of an "inner ring" developing in any large
group situation, and discussed the ethics of the existence of that exclusive
group, and the desire to be in it. He also
pointed out that because of that trend, the actual leaders in an organization
may not be the ones at the top of the official hierarchy. As someone who is less conscious of the
social dynamics going on around him, the unofficial leadership part is the
aspect I most related to.
A key can also be the most significant part of a larger
whole or the foundation of something much bigger than itself. The keystone is at the top of an arch, and
the key to an idea, is the premise it is based on. A key person fills an irreplaceable role in a
group or organization. The leader of an
organization or the president of a company may not be the key person that makes it function successfully. I am usually a key person where ever I am working,
regardless of the fact that I am not usually technically the leader. Frequently I am not even officially an
employee, but my broad range of experience, understanding of logistical
processes, and passion for maximizing efficiency, lead to rapidly finding myself
in a key position, where ever I am working.
My uncle probably represents the pinnacle of the opposite
approach. He is a CEO, and therefore a technically
the leader at whatever company he is working for. But the leader of what? That changes every year or two, which means
he is technically a replaceable part. Once
he has made a few changes in direction that the board was looking for, he is on
his way to another company. Now don't get
me wrong, he is "successful" and well compensated for his work for
multi-million dollar publicly traded companies, but he does not become a
"key person" in those organizations while he is there. (Because the organization continues to function
once he leaves, although he usually makes some "key changes.")
Firmly on the other end of the spectrum, any organization I
have ever left, has taken a few tries to fill the role I has previously
assumed, usually eventually with a team of people. I do everything I can to make the transition
as seamless as possible, but even with months of training, and hundred's of
pages of documentation, no one can be expected to be able to operation and
maintain a complex system better than the one who designed and created it. I spent months transitioning out of the two
positions I held at the university, and years transitioning out of my full-time
job in Hollywood .
Similarly, my company has gone through many receptionists
over the course of my time there, but one of those individuals became the
office manager, and is still there. The
difference between her and all of the others, is that she managed to make herself
an irreplaceable part of the organization, which led to a position that she is
much happier with, and we all appreciate the role that she fills. So now we are back to having a new face by
the door every time I take a trip down south, leading me to need to introduce
myself every time I show up at my own office.
And it is always amusing to observe the process as they figure out over
the next few days, that I am a "key person" in the company, regardless of how little
time I manage to spend there.
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