Being Right is not Enough!

The Wise King

     Once there ruled in the distant city of Wirani a king, who was both mighty and wise. And he was feared for his might and loved for his wisdom.

Now, in the heart of that city was a well, whose water was cool and crystalline, from which all the inhabitants drank, even the king and his courtiers; for there was no other well.

One night when all were asleep, a witch entered the city, and poured seven drops of strange liquid into the well, and said, “From this hour, he who drinks this water shall become mad.”

Next morning all the inhabitants, save the king and his lord chamberlain, drank from the well and became mad, even as the witch had foretold.

And during that day the people in the narrow streets and in the market places did naught but whisper to one another, “The king is mad. Our king and his lord chamberlain have lost their reason. Surely, we cannot be ruled by a mad king. We must dethrone him.”

That evening the king ordered a golden goblet to be filled from the well. And when it was brought to him, he drank deeply, and gave it to his lord chamberlain to drink.

And there was great rejoicing in that distant city of Wirani, because its king and its lord chamberlain had regained their reason.

- Khalil Gibran

Have you ever witnessed a heated discussion where you could not take sides because it seemed that all the participants were right? Or, have you ever been involved in an argument in which you were sure to be right, but could not get the others to follow your advice? Alternatively, as a leader (parent, boss, owner, etc.), have you been in the situation of knowing perfectly well what needs to be done, but could not get your people to do it right? 

During our 20 years of experience as change agents in all sorts of organizations, we certainly have lived through a great number of scenes like the ones described above, and chances are that you have also gone through a fair deal of these kinds of situations in your own life.

What is the use of being right if nobody listens? Or, as in the short story at the beginning of this Introduction, what is the point of being wise and powerful if the rest of the world thinks we are mad?

Questions like these have been the recurrent topic of long conversations with Owners and Top Management of many kinds of organizations, as well as parents and Spiritual Leaders, all of whom have expressed great frustration about the impossibility to make their organizations and families perform according to what they consider to be “plain common sense”.

The same complaint has been expressed constantly by members of the Academia and Young Professionals: What is the use of all the hours dedicated to study and researching the best solutions if at the end everyone ends up doing as they please?

Having listened very carefully to all the arguments presented by each of these persons, and having an external view of every particular situation, a common pattern began to emerge out of all the lamentations: All, absolutely all the persons manifesting their frustration on this matter were using as the base for their arguments the idea that: “being right should be enough for others to follow me and do as I tell them.”

This discovery gave place to a series of studies, analysis and practical work that led us to the most significant finding of our experience promoting and guiding change in many different scenarios. We call it our “golden nugget legacy”. This concept has allowed us to understand and guide improvement efforts through situations like the ones listed above and much worse.

As it always happens, once we have managed to decipher a complex problem, it turns out that the key to solving it seems to be such a simple thing, something that has been there all the time shouting out loud to be discovered. In no way our finding escapes this reality. In fact, we are absolutely sure that it is not even a discovery at all and that many people have come to this conclusion before ourselves.

Well, our golden nugget, the heart of this book and of our activities for the last ten years, is the realization, that although we have been educated, trained and conditioned to seek and defend being right, the reality is that although being right is important, BEING RIGHT IS NOT ENOUGH!

This realization is the result of our very own observations and discussions regarding improvement efforts in many different environments for which we have had first row seats: families, multinational organizations, self-owned businesses, sports teams, theater productions, universities, etc. 

Observing the world through this new perspective, we find that the testimony is all around us in our everyday experiences.