Characteristics of General and Specific Individuals

People with a more “specific” orientation succeed when it comes to managing smaller and detailed projects. They see specific details separately and tend to have a difficult time processing the complete picture. They find it hard to make priorities. Once they have started something, its hard to interrupt them. Individuals with this kind of orientation can often be overwhelmed and get lost in the details and deviate from the general objective

People with “general” orientation can excel in making overviews and generalized observations. They can easily see the links between different pictures. They can find detailed accounts irrelevant or repulsive. The disadvantage for this perspective is they tend to over-generalize things. They jump into premature conclusions which causes them to miss certain details.

One perspective is not necessarily better than the other, and a combination of the two enhances the results. This can be accomplished by teaming up individuals with different orientation for a certain project. In the same way, there is a need for the church of God to work with the Kingdom of God. The church cannot function independently. However, some local churches usually do. Hebrews said, “Through faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that things which are seen were not made of things which do appear.”

When individuals with different perspectives work together, they can do great things and combine their strengths. For example, specific-oriented people can focus on ensuring the veracity of details, while the general-oriented people can contribute more by making sure that the objectives are met.