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03/07/2016

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THIS is 'SUPERETH!!!!' It makes the score "Humor 100 and copying what others do zero". "Stinketh" is the ideal word for organizations that blindly follow 'competitive practice'. But your GREAT writing and humor trumps it all. (Yikes, I am not implying that your got your writing training at Trump University).

The words 'Best Practice' are often used to give credibility for ignoring the realities of what is going on in your organization with your goals and talent and copying whatever the 'average' practice might be. It is easy, but wrong, to CYA by saying, "We participate in the annual survey conducted by 'Ugabooboo' and it suggests that a workforce that wears straw hats outperforms one wearing flowers in their nose so that is what we are going to do.

This poetic version of the Mushroom School of Management's prime principles was very nicely stated. Shoulds rarely survive to become goods, I'm sorry to say.

This was such fun to write.

As to your "Ugabooboo" survey results cited above --- here is an example of "correlation" passed off as "causation" according to a 2001 Towers Watson survey of more than 400 companies:

"There is a clear relationship between the effectiveness of a company’s human capital and shareholder value creation. This relationship we found is so clear that a significant improvement in 30 key HR practices is associated with a 30 percent increase in market value."

And here is one that we all need to watch out for:

"Number of people who died by getting tangled up in their bedsheets is correlated with total revenues generated by skiing facilities."

So much for "best practices".


This is great!

Very well done, Jacque. A thoughtful, fun read that made a powerful point. Your creative juices were really flowing.

Thanks Chuck. Maybe I ought to visit Colorado more often! Just kidding!

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