A moral story about „LIFE GOES ON AND SO SHOULD WE.“
My innovation and leadership workshops get cancelled, one by one. Keynotes are being cancelled because the events won’t take place. There are no new appointments, nor is online an option. My customers wait and see what happens next and reduce all variable costs. Who moved my cheese?
The stock market is collapsing so rapidly, that I can only hedge with massive losses. Who moved my cheese?
„Who moved my cheese?“ is a story about 2 mice and two little people in a maze. A story about change and disruption and the different reaction patterns to these changes along with the resulting consequences. This story is almost 20 years old but still up-to-date. How do you react to change when you have become very found of something?
The search for „cheese“ is a metapher. For some it meants material things like a big house, for others it is health, freedom or recognition.
Each of us has our own different idea what cheese exactly means and we follow that idea because we believe it makes us happy. When we finally get to it, we tend to be very attached and when we lose it or it gets taken away from us, it can be traumatic.
„The maze“ in the story shows, where we spend time looking for what we want. This can be the organization we work in, the community, where we live or the relationships that we have in our life.
There are four imaginary characters in this story: the mice „Sniff“ and „Scurry“ and the little people: „Hem“ and „Haw“.
Sometimes we behave like Sniff, sniffing change and chassing it, or like scurry, which goes into action without thinking twice.
Sometimes we act like Hem, who denies and opposes change because he fears that it will lead to something bad, or wee are Haw, who, after hesitating, learns to adapt in time, learns to imagine the new cheese and asks himself: „What would I do if I were not affraid?“. Helearns to laugh about themselves and his fears.
A wonderful little story from Dr. Spencer Johnson, father of the One Minute Manager book series. As a small appetizer, here is a little video.
But that video cannot replace the book or audio book. So be sure to listen to or read it!
Have fun in the maze,
Ute
