If you've ever watched a group of 6 year old kids playing football (or soccer if you're North American), you will understand what I mean straight away. They all crowd around the ball, screaming incoherently, all trying to play. Frankly, they're rubbish. They are like a swarm of angry wasps, except that they're slightly less intelligent.
Sometimes you will see, standing off at the side, a clever one. They are 'in space' as the football pundit parlance goes. Give them the ball, and they'll have time to do something constructive. They don't get the ball often, because the angry wasps are keeping it to themselves.
This is the perfect analogy for many organisations. So often, a new initiative is launched, and all the dimwits crowd round it, screaming incoherently. They kick, shove, scream - and are normally ineffective. Sometimes, you have to get yourselves into 'space'. In football parlance, what you need is someone who can 'put their foot on the ball'. These are guys who stop the madness (normally only for short periods), look around, and then pass the ball to someone in space. The greatest footballers are normally those who can put their foot on the ball, look around, and then do something constructive with it.
We security types often behave like 6 year old children. We follow the latest edict or trend, crowd round the ball and scream. It's not just technical issues that get treated like this. It could be something like sales. The cry goes up - 'We need to improve our pipeline' - and we all drop everything. This is where the problem starts. We can't sell without products, and so often, all our effort goes into sales. We can't get better products or services without helping our people improve. Training and education is so often the first item to be struck off the budget - especially when 'we need to improve our pipeline'. We have to deliver our Business As Usual (BAU ) services. This can be forgotten. If you're BAU is rubbish, people find out about it pretty quickly. Then they go and tell other people. This makes your sales effort harder.
In the short term, by concentrating solely on sales, we may have successes - improving the pipeline. We will not have improved our products our people. You cannot sustain sales without improving your people and products. The three pillars of BAU delivery, service/people (or product) improvement and increasing your revenue cannot exist in isolation. They are totally symbiotic. There are other such magic triangles, such as Good, Quick and Cheap. You can only get two of the three at any one time. If it's cheap and quick, it won't be any good. If it's good and quick, it won't be cheap.
In my triangle, you need all three. If you fail to manage one element, in time, you will fail. Remember, sometimes you should put your foot on the ball. My favourite footballers were such men. Graeme Souness was famous for taking the time to stop, look up, and then do something devastating with the ball. The late, great Billy Bremner was another of the same type. What is also notable about the two of them is the fact that they were amongst the most aggressive, no-nonsense players you could imagine. Bremner in particular took no prisoners.
Don't act like a 6 year old kid. Act like a midfield maestro but remember to deliver the occasional kicking when required.
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