Eating the Elephant

…wc

Large project and changes reach the edges of Impossibility.  New business systems, mergers, reorganizations all contain too many tasks and too few hands.  There are Too many Policy / Procedure changes and too little time.  We must be able to organize, manage, communicate and control these changes.

So how do we eat this elephant???

A prevalent school of Business Management believes the best approach is “The Banquet”.  Teams of consultants, specialists and other outsourced professionals or, in terms of this analogy, caterers, planners, chefs, firepits diggers, restaurant supply managers, limousine services, florists, set makers and costume designers converge (swoop in) to prepare the feast.  This approach has been perfected for trade shows, weddings, circuses, The Rose Parade, publishing and countless wars. 

Well executed Banquets require Big Budgets and a cast of thousands.  THERE ARE NO EXCEPTIONS!  Do not believe you can pull this off by cutting corners.  Appreciate the logistical nightmare.  If not executed perfectly, the firepits are burning before the elephant is butchered.  The deserts are ready before the soup.  Your guests (victims) are beset by indigestion, uncooked fare and at worst, poisoning.  Often they wander in the turmoil asking, “Why are we eating elephant?”

If your resources are limited and obstacles overwhelming, perhaps the “Snack & Dash” approach is best.  Rather than feast, the elephant is nibbled out of existence.  Buy a big freezer and then thaw and eat what you can handle based on available resources and guests on hand.  This allows you the luxury of convincing your guests that elephant “tastes like chicken” and the nutritional benefits exceed the effort involved.  You can tease and please with them with elephant delicacies (there must be some, somewhere) and slowly they will be clamoring for the main course.  This is the point where you no longer inflicting change on others and the momentum improves.

Let me give you a personal example.  I live in an older two story house.  When we removed the carpeting from the stairs, we discovered beautiful hardwood steps.  They were too nice to cover with new carpet.  But I had overwhelming obstacles: 1- The master bedroom, bath and my office are on the second floor; 2- We have grandchildren and dogs (both groups are logically challenged) and 3- Refinishing takes a minimum of 1 week.  Conclusion:  There was No Way – No How to move my family or stop living on the second floor while the work was done.  Results: No work was done for 1-1/2 years.  And my quality of life was slowly not. The bare wood absorbed dirt and spills.  The stairs were disgusting and the results were UNACCEPTABLE.

My eventual solution was creative and absurd.  I would refinish One Step At A Time.  This required a contraption allowing access to the stairs and a dedication to the project.  The contraption was built.  A false step was built distributing weight on the step above and below.  It provided a covered ¾” gap above the in-process stair for curing the finish.  I spruced it up with blinking red LEDs to prevent tripping over the contraption during midnight refrigerator raids.

I began in late September.  I prepared each step (sanded, filled & stained) on Saturday.  With luck, I could also apply the first coat of urethane.  I placed the contraption over the stair and resumed my normal Saturday activities.  Sunday morning I removed the contraption and sanded and applied coat #2.  Monday night I could sand and apply the final coat.  The contraption was positioned for three days to allow proper curing.  The following weekend another step was attacked.

Now you must understand that I have 14 steps in my stairway.  My son insists I have 15 but I refuse to count the top landing.  This 15 week project provided numerous opportunities for friends and family to stop by to heckle and laugh.  Luckily, I possessed the “Vision” and ignored the humiliation.

By the end of January, I completed my project.  (For those of you calculating weeks in your head, I did take a couple of weekends off for my wife’s birthday and a business trip).  In retrospect, the project did take longer (4 months vs. 1 week), cost more (more brushes and thinner) and required more effort (lost efficiencies of setup and cleanup).  But, my project is now complete (as opposed to no action at all), no one moved out, the dogs could sleep upstairs, and now I have twelve blinking LEDs to play with.  How much better can life get???

In summary, both approaches to eating elephants work.  Both approaches can fail.  Both have Pros & Cons.  The strategy must balance the Objective, the available Resources and the Impact to others.  Remember, the first question to answer is “Do I really want to eat this elephant?”