Once a father took his son and donkey on a trip. They started all on foot. Seeing this, a guy said "What a waste of resource." Hearing this, father put his son on donkey.
Then a woman came " What a shame, a son rides in comfort, while the father's on foot."
Now father got on to donkey, son stepped down.
Down the road, seeing this, an elder said " What's wrong with this world? A father letting his son walk!"
Exasperated, both the father and son got on top of donkey, and they continued, until they heard this.
"Oh my, how unkind humans can be? Look at this poor creature."
Ashamed, both father and son got down, back to where they started.
Morale #1 : There's no morale !
Extension to old story:
Father and son went back to their village after the trip. They found almost everybody talking about them. Lot of them bugged father and his son, individually.
It was getting acute. Son started hating his father. Father ended up in guilt.
Morale #2: Rumours spread fast. Best to ignore them. BUT make sure the team have a common message to deliver. Eg: Father and son should have talked over the incident and agreed on one message. When both of them give the same message, rumours run dry, with no drama.
Precaution: You should talk to donkey too. You may never know when donkey starts talking!
Wisdom: Plan your trip in advance. Know where you are going. Be mindful of the journey. Anticipate bumps. Complete the trip and review. Communicate one message.
2 comments:
If you are exploring the first part of the story interms of organsiational behaviour then there is a morale - for me it is that one should always be aware of varying interest - resource maximisation, organisational experience, making way for youth ( succession planning), and take in to consideration equality to name a few - each aspect of the organisation is equaly important and even the most menial of jobs (donky work) should be valued equally lest they become the proverbial spanner in the works! Chaos theory springs to mind!
And these varied interests should be appeased through open and trasparent communication before undertaking any serious projects -I think you rightly extrapolate this in to mean that if communication is open the rumour mill will not survive - only secrecy makes for creative speculation.
Looking at the metaphor and its application to an individual - before making decisions we should be aware of various competing desires - some may be high minded, repecting our experience, identifying our naivety and playfulness, but not forgetting our more mudane desires - in this repect we need to be tranparent to ourselves about which aspect or spects are being satisfied/not satisfied given any action - as you will judge yourself according society that you belong and ultimately socialised into!
Consensus through respectful communication could perhaps be a useful aphorism.
I think a visual of a donkey riding on the back of both the son and the man would be powerful image ...Thanks Isura
Hi Sanjaya,
I like your take on the 'fable'. A different perspective.
I wrote this, taking things in general. You can apply the 'fable' to any place in life. The donkey is not just an image of menial jobs, rather it represents stakeholders we do not involve in our decision making processes. Sometimes we do this intentionally or out of ignorance. But the effect is universal : chaos.
It happens at all levels. One word to study wholeheartedly is " communication".
It saves many days from disaster.
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