CHAPTER 12
Set policy without rules
“Nobody, but nobody, reads policy manuals except for the person who wrote them, and then only because they get paid to do it. But there are a percentage of your employees who will read a good story.”
—DAVID ARMSTRONG, author of Once Told, They’re Gold
IMAGINE CONDUCTING this experiment. Put five monkeys in a cage with a bunch of bananas hanging from the ceiling. Underneath the bananas, place a ladder just tall enough to reach them. Then any time one of the monkeys tries to climb the ladder, spray the entire cage with cold water. Quickly, the monkeys will learn to avoid the ladder and abandon their quest for the bananas.
Then take one of the monkeys out of the cage and replace it with another monkey—monkey number ...
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