Harmonize the immediate long-range future
A manager must, so to speak, keep his nose to the grindstone while lifting his eyes to the hills-quite an acrobat feat.
A manager has two specific tasks. The first is creation of a true whole that is larger than the sum of its parts, a productive a more than the sum of the resources put into it. The second specific task of the manager is to harmonize in every decision and actions the requirements of the immediate and of the long-range future. A manager cannot sacrifice either without endangering the enterprise.
If a manager does not take care of the next hundred days, there will be no next hundred years. Whatever the manager does should be sound in expediency as well as in basic long-range objective and principle. And where he cannot harmonize the two time dimensions, he must at least balance hem. He must calculate the sacrifice he imposes on the long-range future of the enterprise to protect its immediate interests, or the sacrifice he makes today for he sake of tomorrow. He must limit either sacrifice as much as possible. And he must repair as soon as possible the damage it inflicts He lives and acts in two time dimensions, and is responsible for the performance of the whole enterprise and of his own component in it.
Misdirection by specialization
“I am building a cathedral.”
An old story tells of three stonecutters who were asked what they were doing. The first replied, “I am making a living.” The second kept on hammering while he said, “I am doing the best job of stonecutting in the entire country.” The third one looked up with a visionary gleam in his eyes and said, “I am building a cathedral.” The third man is, of course, the true manager. The first man knows what he wants to get out of the work and manages to do so. He is likely to give a “fair day’s work for a fair day’s pay. But he is not a manager and will never be one. It is the second man who is a problem. Workmanship is essential: in fact, an organization demoralizes if it does not demand of its members the highest workmanship they are capable of. But there is always a danger that the true workman, the true professional, will believe that he is accomplishing something when m effect he is just polishing stones or collecting footnotes. Workmanship must be encouraged in the business enterprise. But it must always be related to the needs of the whole.
Role of the bystander
…the bystander sees things neither actor nor audience notices.
Bystanders have no history of their own. They are on the stage but are not part of the action. They are not even audience. The fortunes of the play and every actor in it depend on the audience, whereas the reaction of the bystander has no effect except on himself. But standing in the wings – much like the fireman in the theater – the bystander sees things neither actor nor audience notices. Above all, he sees differently from the way actors or audiences see. Bystanders reflect, and reflection is a prism rather than a mirror; it refracts.
To watch and think for yourself is highly commendable. But “to shock people by shouting strange views from the rooftops is not.” The admonition is well taken. But I have rarely heeded it.
The nature of freedom
Freedom is never a release and always a responsibility.
Freedom is not fun. It is not the same as individual happiness, nor is it security or peace or progress. It is a responsible choice. Freedom is not so much a right as a duty. Real freedom is not freedom from something; that would be license. It is freedom to choose between doing or not doing something, to act one way or another, to hold on one belief or the opposite. It is not “fun” but he heaviest burden laid on man: to decide his own individual conduct as well as the conduct of society and to be responsible for both decisions.