THE SPOON AND THE STRING

THE SPOON AND THE STRING

A timeless lesson on how consultants can make a difference for an
organization. Last week, we took some friends out to a new
restaurant,
and noticed that the waiter who took our order carried a spoon in
his
shirt pocket. It seemed a little strange. When the busboy brought our
water and utensils, I noticed he also had a spoon in his shirt
pocket.
Then I looked around saw that all the staff had spoons in their
pockets.

When the waiter came back to serve our soup I asked, "Why the spoon?"

"Well, "he explained, "the restaurant's owners hired Andersen
Consulting
to revamp all our processes. After several months of
analysis, hey concluded that the spoon was the most frequently
dropped
utensil. It represents a drop frequency of approximately 3 spoons per
table per hour. If our personnel are better prepared, we can reduce
the
number of trips back to the kitchen and save 15 man-hours per shift."

As luck would have it, I dropped my spoon and he was able to replace
it
with his spare. "I'll get another spoon next time I go to the kitchen
instead of making an extra trip to get it right now."

I was impressed. I also noticed that there was a string hanging out of
the waiter's fly. Looking around, I noticed that all the waiters had
the
same string hanging from their flies. So before he walked off, I asked
the waiter, "Excuse me, but can you tell me why you have that string
right there?"

"Oh, certainly!" Then he lowered his voice. "Not everyone is so
observant. That consulting firm I mentioned also found out that we can
save time in the restroom by tying this string to the tip of you know
what, we can pull it out without touching it and eliminate the need to
wash our hands, shortening the time spent in the restroom by 76.39
percent.

I asked "After you get it out, how do you put it back?"

"Well," he whispered, "I don't know about the others, but I use the
spoon."