Gung Ho

Quite a few years ago I was part of a team-building workshop put on by the company I was working for at the time. The workshop was based on a book by Ken Blanchard called, "Gung Ho! Turn On The People In Any Organization." The premise of the book was that by learning to work as a team, supporting each other and playing to each other's strengths, we could accomplish anything. Oddly enough, all of the examples of these ideas came not from the desks of experts, but from Mother Nature herself and her non-human children.

For example, we normally hear a flock of geese going by overhead before we see them. That's because of all the ruckus they make. Bird experts tell us that the reason for all the noise is because the geese are encouraging each other to keep going - after all, it's a heck of a long trip from Canada and the frigid northeast of the US to warmer climates for the winter and then back again. Looking at their V-formation, there is always one goose leading the flock. When that one gets tired, they fall back and another will move up to take its place. If one has to land because it is sick, tired, or injured, one or more will land with it and stay by its side until it can resume the trip. In essence, they encourage each other to keep moving forward and support them when they can't.

Ever watch some beavers build a home? I was blessed to be able to do just that when I first moved to the town of Marathon in upstate New York almost 30 years ago. What I witnessed was exactly what I would read later on in the book. Each beaver has a job to do. Some collect the wood and branches, some slap on and work the mud to hold things together, some are the engineers and builders. Together they get the job done. Each one has their particular talent and no one covets the job of another. Gee, bet that would play out well in the human world.

Ever watch ants carrying things ten times their size in order to get it to their nest? Talk about your team work. When everyone pitches in, we can do anything.

Sometimes when I look at how divided we humans are, and how competitive we are, it's a miracle that we've survived at all or accomplished so much. Yet there are places in the story of humanity that are still sorely lacking. Perhaps if we stopped arguing and pushing, and took some time to see what has been going on successfully for centuries all around us, we just might learn something the animal kingdom has known all along: when you work together instead of against each other, you can do anything. Gung Ho, everybody!

And so it is.