For the Want of a Nail

Salam & Good day,

"For the want of a nail" wrote Benjamin Franklin,

"the shoe was lost; for the want of a shoe, the horse was lost;
and for the want of a horse, the rider was lost,
being overtaken and slain by the enemy,
all for want of care about a horseshoe nail".

We are told that we must learn from failure. In many managerial practices, the notion that learning from failure is desirable is difficult to dispute. This fact has recalled me the past. The past when i was a part time programmer, developed a computer software with my friends, for small (but with big bucks) projects. One of the projects we had, was a project with a company that supplying fabricated components for electrical boards. The project was a failure in the beginning. My friends and i were certain that the failure was caused by something else. By stupidity of one individual. We were very sure that the individual who sparked the failure was not one of us. It might be a client, it might be the documentations. Whatever it was, it was not us.

Yep, the chain of flaming and blaming was began. We, in our side to make thing better with ours. Beyond the desire to allocate blame elsewhere, finally one of my friends did say something "no one defended the actions of some else. We are like "bangau oh bangau" thing!". Seek for a simple solution, rather than bugging with a lot of causalities, that somehow made simple things difficult. Then we started our rational reasoning, and finally got the clue. It was a very simple mistake. A silly one, but it was a mistake.

Many years later, i still never moved beyond the boundary that somehow a simple thing actually will lead into a massive ruin. I realized, that somehow many things have contributed in a problem within an organization. Exaggerating rival's weaknesses is one of them. Layers of causal-reality. Flaming and blaming, or deflecting blame to others (finger pointing stuff). One of the coping skills, but one of the worst skills ever. Like most other programmers (and people), I begin to learn that, main focal problem of the disaster in developing a software it is not just a technical incompetency, but lacking in communication, or avoiding human "touch" in every aspect of the software design. Still, sometimes i tend to look at the symptoms cause the failure, and attempt to correct them. But after all, lesson learned. I do not want "for the want of a nail" or "bangau kurus sebab hujan turun" as a reason, anymore. Probably, we could have something even better if we knew what it was. As a matter of fact, it does foster a good learning curve for all of us. Understanding self ;-). I guess that is one of the keys. Deciphering complexities, managing reality.

Pakcik said: Selamat Menyambut Hari Raya Aidiladha utk semua. Maaf Zahir dan Batin