Work personalities!

In my short yet eventful career, i have seen many types of personalities which you are sure to come across in your workplace as well. Some typical one's that mar the team/organisation are listed below.

Switch Manager: These are the 'electric' people who operate only through a 'switch'. Until the switch is on, they will continue to sit on issues, problems and impending work. The switch in most cases is a communication (in more stronger terms, a stinker) by their boss or someone who is fairly senior and in a position to create 'trouble'. So when the switch is put on, everything else takes a backseat and all they focus on is diffusing that particular situation. And when that situation is solved, another problem is brought to their notice through a switch and the cycle starts again. And they live their professional life like this (and with them their team does too), always in a fire fighting mode!

Courier: Very simple, these people simply get something and pass it on to somebody else. Or in another way, they get an idea from somebody and just pass it on to somebody in their team, without even bothering to read it once, forget adding any value. How could an organisation such amounts of money to someone who simply does nothing apart from forwarding stuff from one table to another?

Follow-up manager: These are the most irritating of the lot. They will follow-up with you for some work as if their life depends on it (and they will actually say that!). They will send a mail, then call you to tell that they have sent a mail, then send a mail to enquire about the progress and then call about the mail they sent, then message you that it's urgent. You could expect calls from them at odd hours, or on your personal numbers. Sometimes, they will be quicker than the mail- so their mail will come after they have come to your desk enquiring about whether you got the mail or not. Tip- add them to the spam. And when they enquire about the work, innocently tell them you never got the mail :-)

Mail junkies- These people live their life off the mailbox. They will send mails about work, marking a copy to your boss, his/her boss, the CEO, the chairman, even God sometimes! They are so conscious about what to write in their e-mails (it ought to be not too strict but firm!) that 90% of their time is spent thinking what to write in a mail to make their point. They are most likely to send long lists and pointers in their mails and address multiple people and issues in the same mail. And if some work is not done and you please you don not know about it, they will have one answer always- why don't you read your mails properly?

Hyper creative creatures- Although you will find them very smart and full of ideas, the first few times they meet you and splurge you with their creativity; after sometime you will just wish that you don't have to work with them. They usually don't have a life and will sit till midnight so as to polish the creative/idea/presentation..., lugging you with them. These people would want to make 5 options for all work that they have to do (whether a creative, presentation or concept note) and get a feedback for all 5. And then start work on a sixth one based on the feedback! Their favorite dialogue- i want more time so as to make it better!

Vellas- Found usually in the higher end of the hierarchy, these people will have a cabin, where they sit and play solitaire or Facebook, while their team, works their guts out. The only work they do is to forward the work that comes their way, to their juniors and ask them to adhere to the deadline. God forbid, if anybody misses the deadline, they will have to bear a nerve wrecking lecture by these perverts on work ethics, business needs, time management, efficiency, industry best practices and what not. They will leave at exactly 6 PM everyday instructing their team to complete the work without fail, so they could take a look next morning.

Corporate Beauties- Usually females (although there are males as well), these people will spend a major part of their time in office facebooking (checking pics mostly), going through fashion blogs, online shopping, planning their holidays, reading movie reviews etc. And the great point is they make everyone believe that they don't have time for any additional work. Sitting continuously on their machines for hours and hours together, if they are given some new work, they will rant about it for hours and always try to negotiate on the deadline.

Keep a look, you are bound to find these in your workplace too. And yes, do add categories of your own and share...