A choice of instructors

October 13, 2013

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*Life has given us 2 effective teachers. Wisdom and Consequences. If consequences has a back-end price, wisdom has a front-end price.

Many years ago, I started a small food business. Buildings with call center tenants (graveyard shift) would allow us set up pre-cooked food for their people. Our food stall was very convenient because their employees just bought from us rather than buying food outside the building.

When we started, I didn’t consult anyone. I just got a a cook and a handful of people to run it. One day, a call center ordered 500 pack meals for breakfast. We have never even delivered 100 packs before, but when I got the order, my initial response to them was — No problem, we will have it delivered tomorrow. I later discovered that cooking for 500 people is easy. Packing 500 meals is another story. Our small cooking area was insufficient to cook and pack at the same time.

We made the delivery all right, but we were two hours late. Needless to say, the call center company never ordered from us again. This incident bears examples of consequences: The call center company was very angry, word of out spread that we are not a reliable supplier, call center never ordered from us again, etc.

Consequences

On the other hand, here is an example of using wisdom as a teacher:

A few months after that incident, we started delivering pack meals. Initially, we took orders of less than 100 packs. When we got the hang of it, we took more orders. We would then average 3,000 packs every week from different companies.

One day, I got an order for a church anniversary. It was a big gathering, so they needed 3,500 pack meals, to be delivered on three different intervals (breakfast, lunch, and dinner) in just one day.

It was our average of 3,000 pack meals a week vs. 3,500 pack meals a day. What did I do? I consulted wisdom.

wisdom

a) We prepared two weeks before the event.

b) We started cooking at 1am for the first delivery at 8am. (I didn’t sleep)

c) We got three times more than my usual crew.

d) We got a bigger space to pack meals.

and so on…

What’s the biggest difference between the two? Wisdom teaches you the lesson before you make the mistake. Consequences demand that you make the mistake first. Now, who do you want to be your teacher?

 

*Source: Divine Mentor by Wayne Cordeiro

 

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