| Brand Fable: |
The Uncounted Number |
There was place.
A Counting Place.
A Measuring Place.
In this place they made…well…things. Actually, I’m not really sure what they made. Or what they processed. Or if they made anything at all. Maybe they provided a service. It’s really not that important. Because in the Counting Place what was important was the counting. The numbers. And the numbers were very important.
In fact, in the Counting Place
Numbers were so important
They weren’t even called numbers.
They were called Metrics.
In the Counting Place, they counted Time.
But in the Counting Place, they didn’t need clocks.
They could tell you the time of day,
Time of week,
Time of month,
Time of year
-- At any given time.
Not with a clock
But with a Spreadsheet.
In the Counting Place, they counted their money.
In the counting place, they could tell you
Dollars per second.
Dollars per unit.
Dollars per square foot.
All with a Spreadsheet.
They counted their customers.
They counted their customers’ choices.
Did customers choose this one?
Did customers choose that one?
Did customers choose this one more than that one?
All with a Spreadsheet.
They especially counted their customers’ satisfaction.
98% -- that was the number they counted!
It was clear – or so it seemed –
Their customers were satisfied.
In fact, they were very satisfied.
98% -- Now there’s a number you can count on!
If you were looking for a customer who was satisfied,
This was the place to look,
At least 98% of the time.
And of course that “98%” number went on to a Spreadsheet
100% of the time!
But all was not well in the Counting Place.
There was a number
A Metric
That the Spreadsheets couldn’t tell you.
They couldn’t tell you that number
Because the number just wasn’t there.
Because it was an uncounted number.
An invisible Metric.
Unnoticed,
Undiscovered,
Not discounted.
Simply Uncounted.
But it was real.
And it was real important.
It was the dog that didn’t bark.
It was the canary that didn’t survive.
It was the symptom that became the disease.
And it was infectious.
At first it only infected other uncounted numbers.
But soon it was detected
That the counted numbers were also infected.
“How could this be?!”
The Counting Place panicked.
And when you’re a Counting Place and you’re panicked
You need a number you can count on.
So they counted the customers’ satisfaction again.
Whew! -- 98% -- there it was for all to see!
And there it went right on to the Spreadsheet
100% of the time.
No one seemed to ask why
Some Counted Numbers were so infected
While the “98%” number stayed the same.
No one asked.
No one wanted to know…
…As long as “98%” was “98%”…
But the infection that started with
The Uncounted Number
Continue to grow.
And grow.
And grow.
And it grew so large that even the 98% had to shrink.
And shrink it did.
And it shrank so small that it was very difficult to count.
In fact, it shrank so small it couldn’t even be entered
On a Spreadsheet.
But it didn’t really matter
Because by that time there weren’t any Spreadsheets.
There was nothing left to enter.
There was nothing left to count.
There was nothing left to measure.
Only Uncounted Numbers.
(Click to get the moral of the story)
