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Falling off a Hang Glider, on to Fool’s Perch
by Tricia Jack, CPPA
When a recent assignment gave me the opportunity to read
Gordon MacKenzie’s book “Orbiting the Giant Hairball,”[1]
I found myself chuckling at the following story:
At a beach cliff in San Diego, a man decides he wants to go
down to the ocean to swim. He sees a variety of signs that warn of the danger
of the cliffs and thinks that he probably should not go down there. Just as he
starts to walk away, he hears laughter from below the cliffs, indicating that someone is down there. He decides there
must be a way. He thinks: “they made it down there. I must be able to get down there,too.”
He goes on: “I
scanned the face of the cliff. Safe descent seemed reasonably achievable…I
began the climb down.” The explorer continues to relate the tale of his
descent, describing his ensuing excitement as he made his way down the cliff,
ready to take a dip in the ocean. However, the climb was not as easy as he
thought. As the footholds gave way, he found himself stuck in a trough with no
way of knowing how far the drop was to the ocean. That’s when he realized why
the danger signs were there. And what did he do when he was in this precarious
position? He waited on his “fool’s perch,” thinking about what to do next.
Eventually, “three men puttering about in the dry sand above
the high-tide mark happened to look up and spy [him] on [his] unlikely perch.” Knowing
that most people who landed on the cliffs were hang gliders, they asked him,
“Did you fall off a hang glider?” The explorer describes how he almost choked
on the words “No, I’m stuck,” as if the very act of admitting that he needed
help was way more than he was willing to do.
You’ll be glad to know that our explorer was rescued by the
San Diego lifeguard. The twist to the tale: as they rescued him, they pointed
out the “safe way,” the rugged stairs that were less than 100 yards from the
maroon incident - the stairs that he
couldn’t see from where he was standing when he looked down at the beach from
the cliff. Imagine how foolish he felt at that point! Then imagine what a fun
story and learning experience he would have missed if he’d taken the stairs.
MacKenzie’s point is this: to be creative in organizations
and to get around the sometimes-beneficial, sometimes-detrimental lines of
authority, we sometimes need to go exploring. This takes courage: “Courage to
admit idiocy. Courage to acknowledge impasse. Courage to open up to being
rescued.”
At work, I have had similar experiences as the explorer; times
where I have been enthusiastic and excited about a project and then found
myself stuck so badly that I can’t see a way out; times where I have sat on my
figurative “fool’s perch,” hoping for some inspiration, or wishing that it
would just go away; times when I have completely missed the “easy way down”
because I have been focused on what is right in front of me instead of looking
around for alternatives. The problem is that sometimes we have to try the climb
and risk landing on “fool’s perch” so that we can see what we are capable of.
Under pressure, we often come up with our best ideas. Find
your own hang glider or “fool’s perch” and see what you can do.
[1] MacKenzie,
Gordon. 1996. “Orbiting the Giant Hairball.” New York: Viking Penguin. This
story is found in chapter 8, pp. 71-80. All quotes are from within these pages.
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