I. Basket
I'd thought all the week Big Boss was gone about how to reply to his contention that God wants me to stay on the Store Committee.
BB had said we'd talk when he got back from vacation. All this week I waited for him to ask to meet . . . and I thought some more about what to say.
Only a couple days ago did I ditch my theological, political, and autobiographical explanations.
Big Boss never asked to talk, so yesterday I did.
It's like basketball, I said.
The store workers are like players: they follow a leader, but they improvise on the spot, on the floor.
The store managers and board members are like coaches:
they have to plan the larger picture, develop strategic goals, coordinate with other organizations.
"I have always never wanted to be a coach," I said. "I'm better as a player."
It worked! Big Boss told me, sympathetically, that Magic Johnson had just quit management because he didn't like what the job entailed.
"Call me Magic," I said. "Not all players are cut out to be good managers."
Here's where I learned everything I know about basketball:
I'd thought all the week Big Boss was gone about how to reply to his contention that God wants me to stay on the Store Committee.
BB had said we'd talk when he got back from vacation. All this week I waited for him to ask to meet . . . and I thought some more about what to say.
Only a couple days ago did I ditch my theological, political, and autobiographical explanations.
Big Boss never asked to talk, so yesterday I did.
It's like basketball, I said.
The store workers are like players: they follow a leader, but they improvise on the spot, on the floor.
The store managers and board members are like coaches:
they have to plan the larger picture, develop strategic goals, coordinate with other organizations.
"I have always never wanted to be a coach," I said. "I'm better as a player."
It worked! Big Boss told me, sympathetically, that Magic Johnson had just quit management because he didn't like what the job entailed.
"Call me Magic," I said. "Not all players are cut out to be good managers."
Here's where I learned everything I know about basketball:
II. Spring Is Reading Weather
We've had a snow storm over the past couple days, but it's a spring snow---heavy, wet, and soon to melt, taking with it the remaining winter's sludge of salt and sand.
Time to put out the new season's bookmark by Art Sparker (Susan Sanford)!
4 comments:
It’s good to be heard.
Yes, I'm so glad I hit on a workable simile:
I'd worried the miscommunication had the potential to cause problems in the future.
That movie! I took my kids to see it so many years ago. We had a big Whoopi Goldberg influence in their childhood (because of Sister Act, I think).
There are so many ways in which it’s important to be able to say no, whatever anyone thinks is appropriate for you. Peter Drucker’s little book Managing Oneself has a lot to say about this kind of thing as it applies to work — that we have to be who we are.
MICHAEL: Thanks for telling me about that book! I looked it up and was delighted he agrees with me:
don't waste your time trying to improve parts of yourself that will only ever be mediocre, at best...
HA!
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