What Type Of Planner Are You?

In this industry there are loads of different names given to things to keep them in their appropriate places. Planners, creatives and account people for starters. Each has their own role to play and, at many agencies, heaven forbid if they try to cross those boundaries. Within the planning discipline it seems like there are more than enough titles to confuse even the most switched on client; from the usual account planner through to communications strategist to immaginator.

Planning on Subversion has had a think about this and come to the following conclusion: there are two types of planner.

“the first are planners who are brilliant at de-construction: these are the folks who are great at telling you how the world works. Typically because they come from research and curiosity backgrounds / mindsets. The other type are the planners who are brilliant at construction. These are the ones who are into how the world ‘could’ work. The latter type don’t need a curiosity background. Sadly i was say that the latter are the rarer variety. I suppose the difference between the two is what Schopenhauer described between the talented and the genius.

“Finally, as far as planning processes go wouldn’t it be simpler to narrow down the planning cycle to two phases: Deconstruction - Reconstruction. The first is about understanding ‘how the world works?’ and the second is about ‘how it could work?’. If it is one planner who is doing both then he/she would need to swap hats somewhere in the middle but you could always have two planners the de-constructionist and the re-constructionist in charge of each phase.”