Working Up

by Dwayne Phillips

Sometimes people decide simply on what washes in and out with the tide. It works sometimes, but I don’t recommend it.

The tide comes in. It carries things, deposits them on the beach, and it goes out.

The tide comes in. It picks up what is on the beach, and carries it out to sea.

We walk on the beach. Oh, look what came in with the tide. This could be interesting. Let’s do something with this thing carried in by the tide.

In my decades of work with technical systems and the persons who work on those systems, I have seen the tides come in and out, in and out. I have seen the decision makers base their decisions on the tide.

Look at what the tide carried in. Maybe, oh, wait, I’m busy with a vacation or something. When I come back, something else is on the beach carried in by the tide. Oh, I have some time on my hands. Let’s do something with this tide-transported thingy. Here we go.

The tide decision process works sometimes. Its randomness helps us maintain a status quo. Perhaps half the things carried by the tide are good, half are bad, so we end up about where we started. This is especially good in government where moving from the status quo is usually considered bad.

Want to do something better? Avoid the tides. Think. Use your brain. Notice the tide as sometimes better just washes in. That, however, is rare.

Choose, instead.