Digest
Monday, November 16, 2015
Thinkers Corner: You need more than a hammer
BIG MONEY: A bank loan will not help you if you don’t have the capacity to start and manage that business.
Every problem pertaining to your personal life, career or business that has become chronic is so probably because the solution you prescribed and applied was the wrong one.
There is another dimension of that problem that you have not paid attention to. When you apply shallow solutions to deep rooted problems, after a short while, the problem resurfaces.
This reminds me of an investigative project embarked on by award winning Ghanaian investigative journalist, Anas Aremeyaw Anas to expose fake doctors in Nigeria. In the shocking video, a common practice of some of the fake doctors is to give one prescription for diverse ailments. One of the perpetrators prescribed malaria treatment for what were symptoms of a heart disease. In fact, some of the quacks even prescribed drugs for a healthy person who feigned sickness. To this particular fake doctor, every medical problem requires an anti-malarial.
There is a statement which was made popular by Abraham Marslow in 1966. He said that, “I suppose it is tempting, if the only tool you have is a hammer, to treat everything as if it were a nail”. Another variant of this statement is, “If all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail”.
This statement applies very well to the fake doctors mentioned above. The only medicines they are conversant with are anti-malarial drugs so that is what they prescribe for every medical problem.
But it’s not only these quacks who have only one solution to every problem. I have observed that there are many people who approach the problems and challenges of life in this manner. They have one key that opens every closed door in their life. For every question life puts them, they have one answer. For every problem they face, their solution is just one thing. That approach to life is a uni-dimensional way of thinking and living and it leads to frustration and failure.
Just as the fake doctors who have harmed and killed many people due to their application of one solution to every medical condition approach, so have many dreams, families, careers, businesses, projects been aborted, suppressed or killed by the uni-dimension approach to life. The high attrition rate in your company could be because of the way you communicate with your staff and not the lack of adequate logistics. In such a situation, even if you buy a new car for every department and yet disrespect them, the high attrition rate will not decrease. It could be that the low client retention rate is because of poor post-sales support rather than the competence of your sales team. Sales training will therefore not be the solution if you don’t follow it up with a system of providing after sales support.
Many people have not birthed their dreams because they believe all they need is a big amount of money to kick-start it. A bank loan will not help you if you don’t have the capacity to start and manage that business. “If all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail”.
To avoid the frustration that is associated with this approach and thinking about life and its challenges, you must understand that life is multidimensional. Life is not lived on one level but several levels. Building a successful organization requires more than one strategy and competence; you need multiple strategies and competencies. Adopt the multidisciplinary approach to solving the problems in your team or organization.
It is important therefore to expand your tool kit in life. You need a larger solutions kit to live a successful life. Firstly, believe in the existence of other alternatives to solving that problem. Then, start looking for these other solutions. The fact that you don’t know of any other solution to that problem does not mean the only solution is what you know. You are not the only person facing that challenge; find others who have been through it and look for lessons on how they overcame it. Don’t accept everything at face value. Search deeper. Broaden your horizon. Look beyond what you know and have experienced. Consult other people. Read wider. Listen to the experiences of other people. The challenges with these times we are in demand a multidisciplinary and multi-sectoral approach to dealing with challenges.
By Emmanuel Dei Tumi, Monday, November 16th, 2015