Tag Archives: principles

“But we’ve always done that way, you fool!”

02 Thursday Sep 2021

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“Once we get into routines we feel comfortable. From comfort comes confidence.“ Judith E. Glaser, author of ‘Creating WE’

Nothing confines us more than an imposed requirement to comply with ‘the system’. In many ways systems serve us, keep us safe, and provide for the creation of consistent results. A properly considered system is a valuable tool. Or we could all decide, every morning, which side of the road we feel like driving on today.

But blind obedience to a system disallows creativity, stifles innovation, and doesn’t allow for the unexpected to be properly challenged. When something arises that is a bit off-the-wall, the system might not work and our slavish adherence won’t change that. A new system is needed, or at least a modification. And don’t we fight that!

Change is the greatest constant. So fighting change is pointless. On the other hand, applying Aikido to take control of change does have a point. (Eh?)

Aikido is a martial art that doesn’t resist attack like the fist- and foot-focused arts; it takes the force used by an attacker and redirects it until we can take over control. For example, as an attacker moves towards us, instead of resisting we step back and take the impetus away from the imposed force and send it where we want it to go until such time as the threat dissipates.

In the same way we can take a proactive step back when a system is challenged, and redirect our thoughts not to resisting the stimulus, but instead to re-identifying it and its likely direction, and then deciding what to do about it so as to achieve a desirable objective. In that stimulus-response gap we can identify whether the system is wholly inappropriate or just needs tweaking.

Which leads me to the repeated realisation that principles apply. They always do. They never change, and they influence the success of a tweaked system more than any other factor.

So the order of events must be:

  1. What is the system for?
  2. What has the new challenge done to affect the system’s ability to achieve that original objective?
  3. Where in the system has that happened?
  4. Can the system change in order to achieve the same result? If so – change it. If not – design a whole new system.
  5. And if a new system needs to be designed – do we have to change the way we see the problem? Because just changing what we ‘do’ might not be enough of an answer. The ‘why we do what we do’ might be what’s changed.

In any event – don’t blindly and repeatedly apply the ‘old’ system and expect it to work. Because it won’t.

(Reposted from 2015)

What are you worth? And are you willing to pay it?

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I’d be interested in your response.

I suspect there are two directions in which readers’ minds travelled when they read that question. For some, and not necessarily for bad reasons, their minds went to their financial status. Their answer may have been ‘none of your business’, but since that wasn’t my motive it doesn’t matter. Others would have proudly stated their net worth, the value of their possessions and the consequences of their life’s work, their inheritance, their future anticipated wealth. A figure, preceded by their currency of choice’s symbol, be it £, $or €.

But that’s not what I asked, even if the words implied it. What I meant is…

“What are YOU worth?”

To put it another way – what is the price of your personal integrity? What boundaries are you willing to cross, and what borders represent the spot where you will fight and die – metaphorically, perhaps even literally?

And, perhaps more to the point, just how firm are they? Which, if any, are a bit rubbery depending on the circumstances? Which values might bend in the wind? And..

Have you bent any, already?

I’m not talking about other people’s values and standards – for example, those imposed upon you since you entered a profession, association, relationship or otherwise. (For example, where the ethical standards you subscribed to have now changed with the influence of excessive political correctness, as opposed to reasonable adjustments which probably didn’t contravene your values in any case?)

I’m writing specifically about whether – or not – you follow the advice of a US politician who reportedly stated, “I have a firm set of principles by which resolutely stand, but if necessary I can change them.”

That is your true ‘value’. Whether you are willing to stand by your principles in the face of challenge, or excuse a failure to do so. Not money. Integrity.

Perhaps – and now I get truly controversial – you have another form of incongruence which I perceive (I could be wrong so I am being careful with my words) exists in the world today.

I am thoroughly bored with the virtue-signalling I see around me. People who have never given a monkey’s about ‘social justice’ now routinely reposting and liking SJW memes. Celebrating things they never celebrated before. Companies banging on about social justice, when really all they want to do is sell stuff. And, more often than not, failing to recognise that if there’s one thing people really know about their motives, based on the evidence around them, is that it is Profit, not Principles that direct their spouting.

I firmly agree that people should absolutely stand by the values in which they truly believe. I might not like Greta’s approach, and I question its psycho-sociological origins, but at least she believes in what she is doing, and is doing what she believes in.

But don’t pretend to stand by Values imposed upon you by others, because you’re afraid to either oppose, or at least be neutral about them. Stand by them if you believe in them, but don’t pretend you give a toss when you really don’t. Or worse, if you do so only because you fear being seen to question them.

It’s a Circle of Influence ‘thing’. If you think that reposting and liking woke posts makes you a good person, stop and take a good hard look at yourself. You’ve stood for nothing. You haven’t put yourself at risk in any capacity. You haven’t demonstrated the vulnerability that true congruence can represent. Worse still (for the particularly vociferous), the manner in which you intolerantly oppose what you perceive to be ‘intolerance’ says more about you than you think. You’ve pandered. You’re wearing a badge someone else paid for.

And people can see it. They see behind your fearful façade.

And that, readers, is how they know your true value. Your character speaks louder than your reposted memes.

Think on that.

A Kite, to be free, needs an Anchor. So do we.

06 Monday Apr 2020

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Years ago, I was on a needed holiday. I’d arrived in a bad mood – I can’t remember why – but I felt tired, depressed, unmotivated and just completely uninterested, even in the holiday itself.

On the second day of that break, I found myself lying on a warm, grassy playing field. I was basking in warm sunshine, and I held the string of one of those plastic kites you can only seem to buy at the seaside. As I twisted and pulled the string of the kite to make it go hither an’ thither up in the sky in a fashion that I decreed it should, I had a sudden flash of the blinding obvious. You know the sort of thing: that realisation that you actually know something which you already knew, had forgotten, and needed to know right then.

The kite only succeeded if it was firmly anchored at the other end of its string.

If I let go of it, the kite would plummet uncontrollably to the ground. Even if it flew in a heavy wind for a few moments, eventually gravity – a principle – would take command of the situation and force it to clumsily dive into terra firma, and the flimsy toy would probably perish in the process.

He same applies to us, psychologically. Imagine that you’re like the kite. You are capable of whatever it is you have been trained and prepared for. In an ideal world you’ve selected the profession in which you work.

Then you lose some perspective. You forget why you chose that line. Perhaps someone has changed the rules and the values you upheld last week are no longer welcomed. The impositions have increased, but neither the time available nor the compensation have increased to match the added workload. The situation and the dedication that applied yesterday – have gone.

Suddenly, like an un-anchored kite you lose direction. You float where the wind blows but now it’s with no sense of control.

Maybe that’s how you feel in this period of isolation. You can’t do what you’ve been able to do for ever. So you drift, aimlessly. Towards the fridge, like as not.

But there’s a solution.

Rediscover that anchoring point, that ‘other end’ of the piece of string that can refocus you on what was important, and always will be important. Being current, professionally. Being available to family, friends, colleagues and your community. For me, that is a set of written, defined values and a personal mission statement. It could be like that for you, but you may choose other terms or a different route.

But it’s the anchor that lets you fly. Always was, always will be.

Find it, rediscover it, renew it. Perhaps, given the current uncertainty, completely rewrite it.

Whatever you decide is important, get it down in writing (rather than trying to remember it), and then work from it.

Your kite – a metaphor for your life – will fly all the better for that fixed point.

Principles – the Greatest Lens Cleaner.

09 Monday Mar 2020

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“You never find yourself until you face the truth.” Pearl Bailey

I have probably listened to or read Stephen Covey on Paradigms a million and three times. (How specific is that?) For any new readers, a paradigm is the way we see things and this view can be easily influenced by our upbringing, and our beliefs.

Which is why, today, I announce a new learning despite all that previous study.

In the shed where I store the world’s cr4p and my spin-cycle (why do people buy Peloton when they can do it for free), I was sat astride the offending clothes-horse as part of my Private Victory and re-watching an oft-watched video in which the Good Doctor Covey was espousing about Centres. He reminded me about how we see things through our Centres – if we are spouse centred we put their needs before others, including work: if we are work-centred she can bog off. You get the idea?

To be true to ‘life’, he advised that instead of seeing life through centres such as spouse, family, work, money, church, possessions, friends, enemy and self, we should instead see life through principles. Got that? Good.

He then suggested some principles, such as truth, contribution, integrity, and so on. He opined that seeing life through principles rather than centres provides for a more holistic, objective and effective way of living. So when it’s a choice between wife and work, we don’t just plump for ‘work’ because we always do – we look at the situation and make an objective, right decision. Got it so far? Marvellous.

But today, for the first time, I heard him address his audience and say, “Right now, you are even looking at principles through the paradigm of your centres.” AHA!

In other words, he said we look at Principles and ask, “What would my wife think?”: “How can I make this fit work?”: “Is this a way to make money?”: “What is in this for me?”

This is a default position for most people, and that includes you and me. Now, it may not always be a default acted upon, because context also has an influence on our decision-making, but it made me think.

Do I/we often make choices based on convenience, to avoid conflict, to make a fast buck and so on, when we could make better decisions if we just gave the situation a little more thought? Of course we do. We do it all the time. We know this because now and then we regret the decision we made, and not because the situation changed but because something happened that we could have known if we’d given thought to it, or which we did know about but we ignored in the moment because we weren’t being objective.

Yesterday, The Guardian published a cartoon of an Asian politician, depicting her as a pig with horns. They probably, in the moment, thought it would be funny. They looked at the situation through their Left-Wing ideology, concluded that all things Right-Wing are evil, and printed away.

Then some other people reminded them that they were supposed to be an anti-racism publication and depicting a Moslem as a pig was highly offensive: and, given the Guardian’s claim to be accepting of all races and ardently pro-diversity – clearly racist.

Looked at through a left-wing ideological paradigm, this was ‘good’. Looked at it from another paradigm, it was ‘bad’.

Looked at from a Principled Paradigm, it was plainly unnecessary.

Look through a Principle Centre – take a moment, think about what you’re about to decide, and then commit to principled action.

Because your Paradigms are a two-way lens – people can see the real you through them, too.

Eight lies for every one. Well done, you.

20 Thursday Feb 2020

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Disingenuous. A word used by politicians when they are lying. Of course, they aren’t ‘really’ lying. They are twisting definitions and facts to fit their rhetoric. They will knowingly argue that black is white by arguing that certain words and facts underpin their case, while deliberately – sorry, unintentionally – ignoring or hiding the truth.

I wonder how many people on LinkedIn find that political method annoying? Lots of you? Most of you?

How about the ones who have been ‘nominated’ for an Award – having applied to win it? How about organisations that are ‘recommended’ or ‘endorsed’ by authoritative sounding bodies, when in fact they are truly neither and have paid for an advert. ‘Well, if the august body accepts our money for an ad, surely that is an endorsement? After all, they won’t accept money from just anybody.’ (Oh, and yes, it has an exclusivity clause so no-one else can be ‘endorsed’.)

How about the ‘I am delighted to be given this (poison chalice) as it is an opportunity to (delete as applicable)?’

A few years ago, some Police Federation reps were hauled over the coals for being ‘disingenuous’ about what a politician had just said to them in a meeting. In front of the Home Affairs Select Committee they apologised for the misunderstanding.

Personally, I think I’d have pointed out to the MPs on said committee that we’d learned about lily-guilding by watching them. But of course, politicians can be disingenuous. The rest of us are liars.

We all lie. Mainly to ourselves about food, drink, fags and exercise. Personally, I try my best not to. I pride myself on telling the truth even if it doesn’t serve me to do so. I recently underwent exactly that experience. I’m probably far from perfect but I do my best. I consider it a matter of personal integrity. (Which, unfortunately, wasn’t matched by the lauded principle of ‘forgiveness’. But that wasn’t the motive, anyway.)

Which is why, when I read some of the exaggerations and hyperbole on LinkedIn, I grieve for the days when people just told the truth. I mourn the day when our betters started receiving advice on how to avoid questions, how to twist truths to suit them, how to pee on our boots while bemoaning the weather.

But I mourn, most of all, the day when ‘we’ – or some of ‘us’ – decided that if it’s okay for them to do it, it’s okay for us to do it, too.

Research has suggested that for every lie we tell, we need to tell seven more to cover for it. Imagine that – when a politician tells one lie, there are seven more close behind that we may never even hear.

And that great ‘independent and free press’ that prides itself on holding politicians to account? They do exactly the same, every day, with their half-truth headlines designed to attract your attention, and their half-arsed apologies when they’re caught out.

Okay, I surrender. Instead of pretending your telling the truth, just lie. Just talk bull, lie to me, exaggerate and just stay dishonest. As Captain Jack Sparrow put it, “I’m dishonest, and a dishonest man you can always trust to be dishonest. Honestly. It’s the honest ones you want to watch out for, because you can never predict when they’re going to do something incredibly… stupid.”

Or you can try Gary King’s Truth Challenge.

I dare you.

The hardest 100% Pass Mark you’ll ever achieve.*

22 Wednesday Jan 2020

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In his book ‘The Success Principles’, coach Jack Canfield wrote about a principle he called ‘99% is a Bitch, 100% is a Breeze’. The idea was that once you make a self-growth (denial or discipline) decision you act on it 100% of the time. This is because acting in accordance with your decision 100% is easier than doing so for 99% of the time for a simple reason that is both philosophical, and surprisingly logical.

With 100% there is no need to apply any further mental or emotional effort to the decision and its subsequent consequence. There is no reconsideration, doubt, angst or time wasted. With 99% you have to reconsider that decision every time you have to decide whether or not you should apply your standards/discipline/denial/values/principles ‘this time’.

For example, if I decide I will write 500 words a day (like Ernest Hemingway, apparently), then if I am taking the 100% route, that’s it– I will write 500 words a day, come what may. I’ll make sure I have my laptop with me, or I will write longhand on paper and transcribe it tomorrow, along with the 500 words for that day, too. If I go ‘99%’, then I have to decide, each day, if I am going to bother. That’s when the easy excuse will be ‘I have to go shopping, instead’. Or ‘I don’t have a pen’. Or ‘my laptop’s battery is a bit low and I’ll never make it’. Or ‘just one packet of crisps/pie/cigarette won’t hurt’.

(As I it here considering if/when/how/where to ride my bike I feel that pain.)

The same applies to not doing something (self-denial). If I decide that I will no longer eat chocolate eclairs, then application of the 100% principle means just that – never.

You can set your own rules for applying this principle. You can, if you wish, go ‘never’ – or you can include justified exceptions to ‘never’. You can decide not to eat chocolate eclairs ever again, or you can add an exception – but it must be a specific exception, and it must be observed. In the case of the eclairs you may elect to eat one on a new moon, your birthday, the 1st of the month, or whatever exclusionary rule suits you provided that it does not excuse you. That’s the material distinction. If you have a rule it must be specific and it must not undermine the original intention, nor can it allow for or provide excuses for non-compliance. 99% or less doesn’t cut it.

99% doesn’t work because it allows for mistakes, errors and, most of all, excuses. 100% not only disallows excuse or failure but it also demands creativity, imagination and discipline. If you ‘cannot’ execute on your disciplined objective for some external reason, the 100% rule demands of you that you find a way to overcome that temporary barrier/obstruction. Wayne Dyer, famed writer on metaphysics and life philosophies, overcame a ‘cannot go for a daily run’ when flying by running up and down an aircraft’s aisles. (BTW – not recommended!)

This concept, when fully applied 100% (see what I did there?), covers the appropriate application of both self-discipline AND self-denial. The only caveat I have to add here is this – don’t commit to 100% compliance until you are absolutely certain that you want to. This is because without that commitment you will make excuses the first time you are required to make decision whether to comply or not. And as soon as you make the decision not to comply that ‘one time’, you are already on the path to failure and guilt. It’s already 99%, or even less. And the next time that decision arises it will be even harder to make the right choice and the downward spiral speeds up. Momentum works both ways.

My final piece of advice? If you want to try the 100% Rule – only commit when you are truly ready. If necessary, prepare your environment (fridge and kitchen cupboards?) before you commit.

Then go for it.

 

(*An excerpt from The Three Resolutions book.)

 

48 years. Same tune, different words. Still true.

05 Tuesday Nov 2019

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As an enthusiastic student of The Seven Habits® , and having shaken the hand of the great man himself, one of my pastimes has been to explore Stephen R. Covey’s earlier works and compare them to those with which many leaders and businesspeople will be more familiar.

I’d gamble most of you would be aware of the first Habit, ‘Be Proactive’, which uses the ‘you are the programmer’ computer metaphor to describe how individuals have control over how they live their lives – to a greater extent than they may otherwise have thought – because they have the ability to choose their response to what happens to them.

In 1971, I suggest, ‘proactivity’ the term was yet to be invented by Stephen Covey. But the idea of humans having ‘choice’ was not, and although the terminology has changed and become part of the business lexicon (like ‘journey’, which is now grossly over-used, so stop it), the concept remains valid.

In his work ‘How to Succeed with People’ (Deseret Books, 1971), a 2½ page chapter referred to how there is a gap between our knowledge about things, and our ability to act on that knowledge. He calls the chapter “Three Processes – Knowing, Choosing and Doing”.

He suggests that many of us fail in our efforts to be better despite the fact that we know what we should do, because there is a disconnect between that knowledge and our ability, or perhaps our willingness, to act on that knowledge. Put simply, our failures lie in how we choose, or fail to choose, to act.

Here’s a direct lift.

“Choosing means to pause and stand back for perspective, to think deeply, and then decide our own actions and reactions. Choosing means to accept responsibility for ourselves and our attitudes, to refuse to blame others or circumstances.

Choosing, then, means to commit ourselves strongly to that which we decide to do. This committing process often involves a real internal struggle, ultimately between competing motives or between conflicting concepts of ourselves.”

He goes on to suggest that making the better choice can break the binding power of habit, and it is habit that tends to keep us where we already are, and away from where we want to be. Moreover, habit teaches us ‘you’ve failed before, you’ll fail again’. As Covey also put it – ‘Private Defeats precede Public Defeats. Choice can over come the pull of habit.

Choice, therefore, creates an important link between the engine of knowing and the gearbox of drive.

The best leaders have the ability to choose well. Their better choices overcome the largesse and stasis created by habit, and habit is the enemy of change for the better. (While a great servant, habit is a poor master. Occasionally.)

Stephen Covey said that principles endure. The principle of choice – whether you use the expression ‘Knowing, Choosing, Doing’ or ‘Be Proactive’ – endures.

It’s fun finding that out by reading older works. Makes me feel all scholarly.

We don’t ‘live’ in years – why do we goal-set in that unit?

11 Wednesday Apr 2018

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This is a Rant.

Most goal-setting advice tends to focus on the setting of 1-, 3-, 5- and 10-year goal plans. Best Year Yet and YB12 go for a 1-year plan as their core idea while business-related goal-setting advice tends to go to the max. In general, all goal-setting programmes promote the setting of a long-term goal supported by medium- and short-term ‘goalettes’ that result in the longer-term goal being achieved bit by bit.

There is nothing wrong with any goals programme I have ever seen, in that regard.

What I DO find difficult is this: life has a tendency to bu66er up those plans. I think that there are two reasons for that.

Of late, I have committed to the provision of various services – speaking club, professional Institute, driver mentoring. Those services are over and above my proper job, which takes up three days a week. Those additional services take up half-days at a time of what’s left – and that’s just execution and exclusive of any preparation time.

To a large extent, ‘D: None of the above’ is the answer I would give to the question ‘Which of the following represents action taken in pursuit of your personal goals?’ The time I spend on planning and executing those activities impacts on any time I have available to focus on new ‘stuff’.

The obvious response will be that I should stop doing them and focus on my own objectives, but that is too easy an answer. The reason for my ‘future failure’ is plain, though: Those commitments represent my success with earlier goals and compliance with my values/unifying principles. In other words, my inability to be goals-focused now is a direct result of my success in the past. It’s my own damn fault!

How annoying is that?

But another thing about setting 1-year (etc.) goals is the fact that goal achievement is a rolling programme, not something ‘done’ by year end while no new goals are set, no new roles and responsibilities are discovered, and nothing happens to stop you.

Life gets in the way, and a completed goal almost automatically results in the creation of a new one that crosses that ‘1-year’ deadline date, which in turn establishes a new start-date for that goal while the others still rely on their own start-date. We don’t goal-achieve Jan 1st to Dec 31st and then start again. School years, the financial year, the Resolutions year, our new job, sports and social seasons – they start their ‘year’ all over the place, so the rationale for specific goals set in the currency of ‘years’ is flawed.

To paraphrase Orwell : Deadline dates Good – units of time Bad.

The answer? I suppose it is to stop thinking in terms of the year as a unit of time within which to achieve things. If we consider Parkinson’s Law (which states “Work expands to fit the time available for its completion”), then it is self-defeating to spend a year doing something which could be done in 4 months if we just worked better.

Abandon ‘year-long goal setting’ and  work more effectively. But be aware that in accordance with the philosophy in my book The Three Resolutions , any completed goal – particularly a professional goal – will result in new, welcome and occasionally unwelcome impositions on your time.

100-Day Challenge, Day 66. Truth Hurts. A lot.

04 Monday Sep 2017

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I have long been an advocate of integrity excellence, a fundamental (but not exclusive) element of which is honesty. The principle of truth, spoken loud. The valued exercise of telling it like it is, even when doing so discloses, as Al Gore would put it, an inconvenient truth.

And the inconvenient truth on Day 66 is this: while I maintain that the Principles of Excellence in the physical and mental spheres always work, I have failed to work the Principles. I have known what to do, but I have failed to do it.

In my defence, the ‘excellence’ I have sought to perform in the competencies I look to possess has resulted in my being appointed a ‘Masters Mentor’ with the Institute of Advanced Motorists, and I look to produce high-quality work on a professional level. I still do my funky thing for all those I seek to serve.

But physically I am a wreck. I am no further forward in terms of weight loss from Day 1. Exercise-wise I have the genuine reason of a knee injury which, as much as I tried to compensate through different approaches to exercise, just got too painful to move. Even walking was challenging. Where I failed most of all was to not adapt my eating habits (a) to lose weight ‘at all’ and (b) to compensate for the inability to work out.

The ultimate weight-loss principle is and always will be ‘eat less, move more’. I started this Challenge by using the ‘move more’ approach and that worked. But when the injury kicked in I did not then apply the ‘eat less’ approach and that has meant, well, failure. There are 34 days left so I can still do something, but I am not going to hit my original target unless Montezuma seeks terrible revenge, and as far as I know I have not offended any Mexican gods.

Of course, as a personal development writer this has to reflect on my reputation – a bit. I occasionally feel like the clown who is sad inside: the clown, promoting laughter and entertainment while forever crying inside. But part of my challenge might be that I eventually face the possibility that I am comparing my situation, and potential, to that of the truly great writers, performers and coaches in this field, and looking to play like Ronaldo while only having the talent of a (insert name of good, non-International football player here).

I am reluctant to settle for less than ‘perfection’. Nobody should do that. But even perfection is subjective, because as soon as it is achieved someone will always come up with an even better version of it. And even if I did approach an ideal version of me, that very approach would inevitably identify an even better ‘better’. That ‘even higher standard’ could be identified because one of the giants in my field found it, even if I didn’t. And then I would think ‘here I go again’.

Anyway, I will carry on moving ever forward, seeking to finally achieve those elusive, higher levels of personal congruence that will enable me to truly walk my talk and be the individual I would dearly love to be.

Perhaps, as I write that last sentence, I realise that I have to ask myself some sobering questions:

“Am I willing to work hard enough to be the man I want to be? Exactly how dearly do I want to be the best ‘me’ I can be? Do I want it enough? And – finally – do I actually have a clear idea of what that best ‘me’ will look like when I finally get to ‘be’ that person?”

I guess we’ll find out. But one thing must apply. I won’t blindly adopt other peoples’ standards and measure the final ’me’ against those. They have their values, beliefs and behaviours and they are not necessarily mine.

The ultimate identifier and judge of my congruence with my values and unifying principles will be – me. Eventually.

Purpose or Process? I know which I need to know first – and better.

09 Sunday Oct 2016

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“Principles are the simplicity on the far side of complexity.” Stephen R Covey

Are your working practices dictated in a seemingly endless collection of Codes of Practice, Memoranda of Understanding, Process Documents and Manuals of Guidance? Unless you are the employer rather than the employee, or you work alone, I’d gamble that they are.

I would also expect that many of those procedural guidelines are based on best practices, born of years of experience and the making and discovery of errors. They are created out of a desire to do and be better, or to prevent ‘worse’.

Unfortunately, there is a tendency among managers to look upon these documents as The Holy Bible, compliance with which is expected and deviation from which must be punished.

And the funny thing is that they were created to replace the earlier practices that had equally been the Bible until found to be wrong or incomplete. In other words, for some, the fact that errors can be made in all manner of ways and circumstances, including compliance with current practice, does not stop them absolutely insisting on compliance.

Practices change with discovery, experience and greater learning. Remember that, boss.

On the other hand, and looking at Covey’s quote (above), Principles never change. The purpose behind a Manual of Guidance, which is usually clearly stated on page 1, gets lost in the millions of procedural absolutes that follow. Which is stupid.

Clayton Christensen describes how someone goes to a shop to buy a ½” drill bit. The sales staff discuss whether the client wants a steel one, tungsten tipped, twist-bit or step-bit, brad-point or spade, Forstner or Auger, or Installer.

The client says, “I want to make a ½-inch hole.”

That’s the difference between a practice document, and the ‘job to be done’ stated on Page 1. That’s the simplicity on the far side of complexity – the purpose of the work.

When you know what the job is, the Manual contains guidance and practices that will help get that job done. But life and learning may just provide you with some new information that might make the job get done quicker and better.

And, ironically, it also helps to create the next ‘Holy Bible’……..