Ready for a little trip into the memory lane? Remember the classic story of the rabbit and the turtle: 

A turtle and a rabbit were arguing over who’s faster and to prove themselves, they decided to race against each other. The rabbit whooshed past the turtle and was in the lead to he got lazy and took a little nap. The turtle’s continuous efforts led him to win the race.

And of course, who can forget the moral of this story! “Slow and steady wins the race”. This is the version of the story that we’ve all grown up with.

But there’s more to this story than its classical version:

1st modern story:

The rabbit was disappointed at losing the race and he did some soul-searching. He realized that he’d lost the race only because he had been overconfident, careless and lax. If he had not taken things for granted, there’s no way the turtle could have beaten him. So he challenged the turtle to another race. The turtle agreed. This time, the rabbit went all out and ran without stopping from start to finish. He won by several miles.

The moral of the story?
Fast and consistent will always beat the slow and steady. It’s good to be slow and steady; but it’s better to be fast and reliable.

But the story doesn’t end here. Click the button below to know what happens next…

2nd modern story:

The turtle did some introspection and realized that there’s no way he could beat the rabbit in the current format of the race. After some thinking, and then challenged the rabbit to yet another race, but on a slightly different route. The rabbit agreed.

They started off. Following his self-made commitment to being fast, the rabbit took off and ran at full speed to he reached a river. The finish line was a couple of miles on the other side of the river. The rabbit sat there wondering what to do. Meanwhile, the turtle trundled along, dived into the river, swam to the opposite bank and finished the race.

The moral of the story?
First identify your core competency and then change the playing field to suit your core competency.

Think this is all? Think again… There’s something more!

3rd modern story:

The rabbit and the turtle, by this time, became good friends and they realized that the last race could have been run much more efficiently.

So they decided to try the last race once again, but this time as a team. They started off, and the rabbit carried the turtle till the river. Then the turtle took over and swam across with the rabbit on his back. On crossing the river, the rabbit again carried the turtle and they reached the finishing line together and faster. They both felt a greater sense of satisfaction than they’d felt earlier.

The moral of the story?

It’s good to be individually brilliant and to have strong core competencies; but unless you’re able to work in a team and harness each other’s core competencies, you’ll always perform below par. There will always be situations at which you’ll do poorly and someone else does well. Teamwork is mostly about situational leadership where you let the person with the relevant core competency for a situation take charge.

The current Business context requires a blend of such innovative thinking. At Ahaan Consulting, we develop solutions by blending workshops for skill-building and mindset- shifts. We provide post-learning support to apply the new skills to specific real-life challenges. Click to know more about our Change Management Workshop. #changemenagementworkshop