The-Accountant-Jul-Aug-2016

MANAGEMENT
By CPA Joseph N. Nyanchama, nyanchamajoseph@gmail.com
TRANSCENDING
THE LIMITS OF
COMFORT
I
watched a movie a while ago called
‘Boy in a Bubble’, starring a young
John Travolta. The movie was based
on a true story about a kid who
had to live in a totally sterilized
environment because his immune system
stopped working. Doctors built a 10 foot
square, clear plastic sterilized bubble for
the boy to live in. Everything that entered
had to be germ¬free. People would see him
and talk to him through the plastic bubble
but they could never enter his world for
fear of passing along a fatal virus.
At the end of the movie, the boy is
faced with an agonizing choice. He can
either remain in the bubble and stay alive
for years alone or he can choose to leave
and not conform to the bubble and live
his life, no matter how brief, to the fullest.
What do you think the boy chose to do? As
you ponder that question, many leaders too
find themselves in various organizations in
a bubble kind of environment. They have
been held hostage by a clique of individuals
who make sure that anybody who does
not toe the line of thinking of the leader
is labelled anti-¬establishment. They
convince the leader that such a person’s
thinking is not conforming to those of the
leader and should be ignored at all times.
These people surrounding the leader wear
those beautiful tailored suits with the latest
“power” ties. They look energetic, vivid,
illuminant and affectionate, but looks can
be deceiving. For what appears to be gentle
friends of the leader are just men full of
malice in their hearts with no ideas in their
minds for the leader to use and grow the
organization. They agree with everything
the leader says and cannot help him to
grow. They have no idea about Zig Ziglar’s
advice which goes, “If you and your boss
reason the same, one of you is redundant”.
In other words, they are all redundant save
for the leader.
I say so because they lie to the leader
that there can only be one sun (leader) at
a time and therefore no one should rival
the sun’s brilliance in the name of new
ideas. To reverse this kind of thinking so
that growth can be realized, we need to
borrow a leaf from Abraham Lincoln, the
sixteenth president of The United States.
President Lincoln came to power when
the nation was in trouble and he had the
intelligence and self ¬confidence to know
that he needed independent and creative
6 JULY - AUGUST 2016