People Greater Than Ideas

People Greater Than Ideas

John Paul Derryberry 

I had an idea when I was 23. It was a grand idea. Jump in a car with some friends and drive to the Pacific Ocean. The destination was the beaches of San Diego with stops in the Rocky Mountains, and Phoenix to visit a college buddy. I know, I know, a road trip with friends isn’t some new take on life or a grand idea. It’s more of a right of passage of the transition from youth to adult and an idea as old as the invention of roads. The trip was a trip of a lifetime but it had nothing to do with my idea. It had everything to do with the people I asked to come with me.

That’s the rub with ideas. The world is full of them. A bunch of them are just recycled, stolen, or adjusted from someone else. But, for some reason, we have moved to putting more stock in our own ideas than we do people. I have been thinking about this concept for a while after listening to a podcast where billionaire Mark Cuban was interviewed. During the interview, he stated that people matter more than ideas. It was the first time I floated back to the road trip and thought about how different that trip would have been with different people. Take the same idea of a road trip and sub in three different people and the trip completely changes. It was never the idea of the road that made my trip amazing. It was convincing my three best friends from college to tag along that made the trip drama-free and memorable. In the future, I will beg them to make the trip again, maybe when we are 70.

When I start to think about people over ideas, I begin to examine workplaces where the idea of job descriptions  is used in an attempt to make every employee the same. But we all know the idea of employee success being equal because of a job descriptions is laughable. Most people can’t even list off their job duties but they can list off the best people they have ever worked with. Putting faith in ideas is less scary and easier than putting faith in humanity. It allows us to say that the idea was bad instead of that we picked the wrong person to marry, to employ, to befriend, to bet on, or to promote.

The reality is that the world is full of ideas that will only grow into grand successes because of the people you choose to execute them. Whether it’s a road trip, a job description, or the next technology breakthrough, do yourself a favor. Invest in the right people. The beautiful sunset on the Pacific Ocean I witnessed at 23 was made all the more sweeter because I was surrounded by the right people.  I’ll admit I stole the idea for a road trip from the sands of time and the idea for this blog from Mark Cuban but he was right, people will always matter more.