I attended the national ACUTA conference last week and one of the speakers mentioned Philip Quigley’s quote regarding ‘farmers and building tractors’. If you are not familiar with his quote, see below:
Philip J. Quigley, former CEO of Pacific Telesis said, “If we were to go back in time 100 years and ask a farmer what he’d like if he could have anything, he’d probably tell us he wanted a horse that was twice as strong and ate half as many oats. He would not tell us he wanted a tractor. Technology changes things so fast that many people aren’t sure what the best solutions to their problems might be.”
And I after I heard the quote it hit me…at times we may all be like ‘farmers’ who are not aware of ‘tractors’ that could help us achieve better results. It may also explain why so many organizational leaders are still trying to get more out of their ‘horses’ (binders and intranets (aka digitized binders) and general training) to solve their escalating People and Process challenges.
Everyone knows that People and Processes are an organization’s weakest links, but now that budgets are limited and regulations, risks and pains are mounting, the ‘old horses’ cannot keep up.
Are your ‘old horses’ keeping up with your mounting challenges? Would a ‘tractor’ help?
