Sunday, December 2, 2012

Not Zen 34: Proper Coordination

"You seem impatient," said the secretary to her executive vice-president.

"Of course I am!" he wailed. "All day at these meetings, we talk and talk. We plan endlessly. And for what? We hardly do anything. I wish I was like that day laborer out there."

He looked out his window to where a man was hauling bricks in a wheelbarrow.

"That's a simpler, better life," he said. "You can see the progress you make."

"We only accomplished one major task today," the secretary acknowledged. "But we did it well. If we try to do more without cooperation from the rest of our business, we'll do harm."

"But we need to accomplish more!"

"There is always more to do," she said. "But it's a mistake to assume that anything more needs done."

"That doesn't make sense."

"Think about how to do things the right way. That man down there who you're envying doesn't try to do more than he should. He wants to build a brick wall. So he's patient. If he's too slow, the mortar will dry. If he's too fast, the wall will tumble. Everything has to be done at the right speed. You say you want to be like him? Then do things when they need to be done."

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