So which one of these are you?

This post was written by Scott Adams of the Dilbert Blog...enjoy!

Rounders Vs. Accumulators

Most people have at least a few big problems in their life. But the vast majority of life’s problems are the little kind. There are two ways to deal with the little problems.

ROUNDERS: This group rounds things off. A problem that’s a two on a scale of one to ten gets rounded to zero. If a rounder has five problems that are all about a two on a scale of one to ten, he’ll tell you he has no problems.

ACCUMULATORS: Accumulators add up all the little problems until they equal one big problem. If an accumulator has five problems that are each a two on a scale of one to ten, that feels like having one problem that’s a ten.

Rounders are generally happy, because they perceive their lives to be mostly problem-free. Accumulators are often miserable because “nothing is going right.”

Readers of this blog will recognize this as closely related to the 80-20 rule about a job well done. Rounders are pleased with a job that’s 80% right because that rounds to 100%. Accumulators take the 20% that’s wrong and add it to the other things that are wrong and suddenly their world is falling apart.

Experts say there are many forms of intelligence: verbal, spatial, musical, kinesthetic, artistic, emotional, etc. I don’t know if there’s a separate category for rounding versus accumulating, but there should be. Or maybe it is part of the larger category of simply knowing what is important and what isn’t.


Eduardo

"Unless your house burned down with the dog in it, and your spouse ran off with the mailman, your problems are probably not that big. And even then you could turn it into a country song."