The impact on our community was AMAZING then... and I get the feeling that an even GREATER impact is about to be felt once again.
I was considering an alternative title for this piece - 'Why Stirring The Pot Is Better Than Boiling The Frog'... so you can choose which best suits this dual analogy below.
Quite simply, I believe that the syndrome of the boiling frog crept up on certain individuals responsible for ensuring service delivery and leadership within our LRA project over the past +- 18 months. In my opinion, with the temperature in the water never having been ratcheted too much above 'tepid', the LRA 'frog' became too fat, comfortable and glazy-eyed to notice what was beginning to happen around it.
The 2006 LRA AGM debacle then resulted in the heat being raised instantly under the pot which has made things extremely uncomfortable for the 'frog'... and the 'frog' doesn't like it.
So onto my second little analogy of the heat now being turned up under a pot of cooking stew. The more one turns the heat up, the more one needs to stir the pot to avoid two possible disasters in order to ensure that it becomes a GREAT stew:
1. The burning of the stew at the bottom of the pot - in which case, you may as well throw the stew away, and
2. In many recipes for great stews you will notice that - scum floats - and the accomplished cook tends to stir the pot to infuse the flavours or to remove the scum.
Mrs Beeton's Book of Household Management - www.mrsbeeton.com
Stew gently for about 1/2 hour, and serve garnished with sippets of toasted bread. ... and as fast as the scum rises to the surface of the water, remove it. ...
www.mrsbeeton.com/17-chapter17.html - 105k - Cached - Similar pages
Point 2. seems to have been taken up by some some of the world's leading life masters to state these quotes:
"Society is like a stew. If you don’t keep it stirred up, you get a lot of scum on top." — Ed Abbey
'Life is like a stew, you have to stir it frequently, or all the scum rises to the top.' - Tom Robbins
So, I am more than comfortable that a little stirring of the pot will result in a much better stew that will be even tastier than we have ever had in Lonehill.
Just listening to the new, fresh inputs last night, I got to wondering if they had all been reading the "Seven Essential Skills for Teamwork" :
Listening to each others' ideas.
- Asking each other questions both to clarify and challenge ideas.
- Seeking to persuade others that your ideas are sound.
- Respecting each other's role in the discussion.
- Helping each team member to express and understand ideas.
- Sharing one's insights and information with other team members.
- Participating fully and equally in the task at hand.
Now, therein lies a great recipe for cooking up an LRA stew to benefit our community.
Regards
Trevor Nel
Lonehill Resident - 705-2790
