Of bungholes and industrial boycotts (do strikes really pay?)

There is nothing to nourish the mind like a teacher who uses metaphor and anecdotes to drive his message home. I have learnt many a lesson from the teachers who always made light of situations and enabled us to laugh at the awkward nature of things. I recall one seminar where we were learning about leadership. The facilitator wanted to ensure that we understood the importance of never underrating others in a contest because our organisation had nearly suffered a terrible fate. He gave us three management lessons, but I will keep the other two for another day.

The one, which is relevant this week, went something like this. All the body organs were having a meeting to decide who would be in charge when a disagreement broke out. “I should be in charge,” said the brain, “because I run all the body’s systems, so without me nothing would happen.” “I should be in charge,” said the blood, “because I circulate oxygen all over so without me you’d waste away.” “I should be in charge,” said the stomach,” Because I process food and give all of you energy.” “I should be in charge,” said the legs, “because I carry the body wherever it needs to go.” “I should be in charge,” said the eyes, “because I allow the body to see where it goes.” Then they heard a tiny squeaky little voice, “I should be in charge because I’m responsible for waste removal.”
Upon which all the other body organs burst into raucous laughter at the bunghole and insulted him. So in a huff, he shut down tight. Within a few days, the brain had a terrible headache, the stomach was bloated, the legs got wobbly, the eyes got watery, and the blood became toxic. As they were now in danger of dying, they all decided that the bunghole should be the boss.

The moral of the story was that we had to choose our leaders carefully, because any bunghole could become our leader. That could have disastrous consequences because even though all of us were working to build a better organisation, there was a probability that a bunghole was in charge.

This management lesson has stuck with me and I use it all the time to explain the failure of organisations. Surprisingly, the bunghole can sometimes be the very one who founded the business. It is always a question of whether the leader has been able to accumulate enough hubris to inflict damage upon the organisation and stakeholders.
Fast-forward to the 2015 presidential election campaign. Two erstwhile friends were going toe to toe when fights broke out among rival supporters. On learning that his supporters had been beaten up, one of the candidates is famously quoted as saying “if you put your hands in the anus [bunghole] of a leopard, you are in trouble.” The other fellow did not take heed and the rest is history.

And now coming on to strikes. Do strikes really pay? The evidence shows that some do and others do not. Some scholars have identified what is called a ‘boycott effect’. Success is a function of historical timing and the economic consequences. If change is happening, the strike(s) reflect the appetite for change. If there is a yearning for reform and there are related strikes, then the economic consequences can be real and need to be addressed.

There are, however, situations where strikes will not work. This is when there is an easy way to get round the boycott, or the boycott isn’t going to make a difference. If the government can find an alternative, then the boycott is ineffective. If the outrage (reported) is larger than it really is, then the boycott will not have an effect.
As with all management crises, the outcome of an ongoing industrial action can have both positive and negative outcomes. That outcome will depend on whether a bunghole is in charge or not.

Prof Sejjaaka is country team leader at Abacus Business School. [email protected]
@samuelsejjaaka