Thursday, October 16, 2008

One Trick Pony

There I was teaching at our mid-week service last night and I was describing how Satan pretty much comes across as a one trick pony in the scriptures. While he does have powers and a number of them are described, he tends to stick to the one that works best against us humans.

Sometimes, certainly not very often, I wish that the evolutionists were right and that we humans could evolve to be a little smarter than we seem to be right now. You see, Satan worked Adam and Eve over in the Garden of Eden using only a lie. He sowed doubt and discord into the first man and his wife by questioning the word of God and using a few "fake but accurate" statements.

Satan is still using the same trick because it has worked so well for most of history. He still lies and many of us still believe him, despite no history of truth on his part. This is distressing to me as I keep hoping for better from my fellow humans.

Naturally, in the more enlightened environs of Corporate America, no such thing could ever take place. Right? I mean, with all those managers with MBAs, it must surely be an impossible thing for a lie to last 5 minutes in the full glare of an analytical management team? That's what I used to think. Then I observed our current contractor group in action.

The leaders of our primary onsite contractors have exactly one line that they use again and again and again. They do have another one, but the first one works so often, that they nearly always forget to use the second one.

When we, the customer (you know, the folks who are in charge), ask for something and specify any detail that they don't like, they come right back with "That will mean we miss the deadline." and our management fold like a limp rag. It's an amazing (and frustrating) sight. It's like watching the strings being cut on a puppet. One minute they're standing tall, laying out requirements and specifying how things should be done and the next minute they're backpedaling and saying words to the effect of "Oh! Really? However you need to do it then. That'll be fine."

While the pony may have only one trick, it's quite effective! Unfortunately, the same trick doesn't seem to work when we employees try it. Oh well.

No comments: