COLD FEET

There was a sensitive issue; it was more like catch 22 situation. If you do, you are damned; if you don’t, you are damned. All of us were hesitating to go ahead with the newly formulated policy. One of my friend who  is known for putting forward his ideas with courage and without fear was irritated with the hesitation shown by many, and said,” we show cold feet when it comes to implementation, we do not have the courage to bite the bullet”.

Hearing that statement some of us started justifying and explaining the hesitation. Quite few were apologetic and covering it up with words like that it is not hesitation but self reflection. But I was rather uncomfortable.

We are having cold feet at the last minute, because the decision is going to affect quite many people. And there is no doubt on that. According to me, having cold feet at this point of time is not a sign of weakness, it is a sign sensibility. Only machines do not suffer from cold feet syndrome. Among human beings, likes of Jake Welch and Hitler did not show cold feet. The former dismissed more than 100000 employees as soon as he took over as CEO of GE, and the latter killed more than 6 million Jews. If you ask their wives they would say without any hesitation that both were monsters.

Having cold feet because it affects people is a good sign; there is no need to be apologetic for our strength. Hesitation is the warning signal that we need to reflect more and we are acting against some of our cherished values. Too much of a certainty is a result of fanaticism and the inability to look at the whole picture. As for as biting the bullet is concerned; why to bite a bullet when there are chicken legs and mutton chops are available? Why do you encourage suicidal tendencies?

Some said we need to be consistent, but what they forget is that consistency is the virtue of donkeys; human beings think dynamically and constantly evaluate their actions.

Then, how did we solve the problem? As usual, we appointed a committee to look into the matter deeply.