Besides those people who tend to choose the ineffective means, who want to learn skiing or English in three days without practicing, there have always been the effective people, the implementers, the realizers, the performers…

Effectiveness per se, however, is invisible, just as the function “management” is generally not visible. We can only recognize it by its results. This alone explains many widespread misunderstandings in the teaching and learning of the function of management.

For one can indeed see those who are managers, as well as factories, offices and computers. We can also see the results of proper management, but not the function of effectiveness itself, which is needed to turn resources into effective results.

Effectiveness can be compared with those substances that make the metabolism in the organism effective as catalysts. If they are missing, everything else is there in the organism, but nothing happens or happens poorly.

One example is vitamin C, which is important for the functioning of muscles. Between the 15th and 18th centuries, at the height of sailing, the strongest sailors were drowning like flies and dying because the trace element vitamin C was not yet known. Fresh fruit and cabbage were needed to keep the sailors healthy.

When the “trace elements” of effectiveness are missing in people and in organizations, they become inefficient, are ineffective and remain unsuccessful.

The “vital elements” for effectiveness must be supplied through qualification and training. One has to know the right principles of acting, and one needs the right tasks and tools.

Some people accomplish great works and are visibly effective in doing so. Whatever they do, they do the right thing, and they do it right. It is not necessarily the same people who had the right ideas.

For example, it was not James Watt who invented the steam engine, as is generally assumed, but Watt made the steam engine effective, and only then was it possible for it to find industrial use.

Ideas are one thing and their implementation is something else. It is not primarily ideas that are lacking, but far more often their implementation.

For every idea that is implemented, there are thousands that are never realized. So the great and creative ideas are important, as are the so-called “great people” who interested me early on.

But then I learned to see the difference between creative and effective. From that point on, I became far more interested in the effective people, the “ordinary” people who created extraordinary things, and the way they worked.

———————————————

INSTITUTE FOR STRATEGIC LEADERSHIP DEVELOPMENT RESEARCH

The right path, a bright future

🏢Address: 266 Lac Long Quan, Tay Ho Ward, Ha Noi

🌐Website: sleader.vn

📧Email: [email protected]

📞Hotline: 0965 965 368 / 0969 753 688

📱Zalo: Sleader/ 0969 753 688