Diversions Manifold

There is an intriguing little phrase I came across in a trombone technique book that hovers in a limbo between right and wrong: "It's not what you play but how you play it" There is a lot to be said for giving your best at all times, no matter what music you have been asked to play. It is a matter of pride, of professionalism, of maturity - of character, too. I can certainly say that I gave my best to (and received a lot back from) playing in a Shropshire brass band, even though I really do not like much of the music we played. However, one cannot really be expected to be able to find one's best when playing the wrong sort of music for you. The talent isn't there, the fluency goes, the "Selbstverständlichkeit" is lost. Asking a striker to play in defence can work, but, if it goes on for too long, his motivation will drop to the extent that he becomes a liability, or he will ask to leave the team. And so I come to PPAPs. PPAPs are the scourge of th

The other night I was reading my 3 year-old a bed-time story from one of our favourite series of childrens' stories, Arnold Lobel's "Frog and Toad" collection, when this little exchange between the two got me thinking: {Frog's List has blown away in the wind} "Hurry!" said Frog. "We will run and catch it." "No!" shouted Toad. "I cannot do that.! "Why not?" asked Frog. "Because," wailed Toad, "running after my list is not one of the things that I wrote on my list of things to do!" This resonates with so much of business life; procedures, workflows, instructions, audits, filling out forms. We all have lists of things to do, from our (largely ignored and occasionally conscious-pricking) task lists, to those procedures.  We need to realise that we can make the choice between "merely" following the procedures to the letter, and rehumanising them. Naturally, this all applies to the bur