Riding Dead Horses: A Common Pastime
The tribal wisdom of the Dakota people, passed on from generation to generation, states that when you discover you’re riding a dead horse, the best thing you can do is dismount. However, in modern corporate North America, a vast range of far more advanced strategies are generally encouraged:
- Buy a stronger whip
- Change riders
- Threaten the horse with termination
- Appoint a committee to study the horse
- Send a delegation to see how other countries ride dead horses
- Reclassify the dead horse as “living impaired”
- Hire outside contractors to ride the dead horse
- Harness several dead horses together to increase the speed
- Provide additional funding and/or training to increase the dead horse’s performance
- Conduct a productivity study to see if lighter riders would improve the dead horse’s performance
- Declare that because the dead horse does not have to be fed, it is less costly and therefore contributes substantially more to the bottom line than other, more active horses
- Rewrite the minimum performance requirement for all horses
- Promote the dead horse to a supervisory position
- Reassess the horse until it rises from the dead
What dead horses are you still trying to ride? What difference would it make, in your business and your life, if you simply got off the living-impaired nag and found yourself a new, more progressive specimen to further your goals and aspirations?
As you plan your next move, consider your horse before you saddle up.
