THE RESULTS EPIDEMIC

Invited to a major gathering of business and economics, La DdC attended Professor Paul Marcus de La Barrière’s lecture on a phenomenon still insufficiently acknowledged within organisations: the multiplying need for results.

The auditorium was almost full when La DdC took a seat in the front row.

Executives, economists, company representatives and organisational specialists had gathered for a day devoted to new forms of performance.

At 10:15 a.m., Professor Paul Marcus de La Barrière took the podium.

The professor is well known to the people of Crestignac. An acknowledged expert on the hummingbird hawk-moth, his research has notably earned him the Phacochère d’Or, presented by La DdC.

Today, he had something to say about business.

The title of his lecture was:

The professor began by recalling a principle too often overlooked.

A result is never an isolated event.

Achieving a first result generally brings a legitimate sense of satisfaction. That satisfaction, however, leads people to conclude that achieving a result is possible.

It is at this precise moment that the risk emerges.

For once a result has been achieved, someone may reasonably ask:

“And the next one?”

The professor then recalled the Fundamental Law of the Next Result, well known in Crestignac:

The Results Epidemic refers precisely to the spread of this need.

A result achieved by one department may give another department the idea of achieving one too.

Two successive results, meanwhile, may suggest that a third is conceivable.

From three onwards, the professor believes the situation requires particular vigilance.

Paul Marcus de La Barrière dwelt at length on this point.

Before the first result appears, an organisation can function for a considerable time without its absence necessarily presenting a problem.

Meetings, studies, consultations, deliberations and presentations can all sustain a vigorous level of activity.

The appearance of a result profoundly alters this balance.

What was previously considered exceptional may become repeatable.

Then expected.

Then requested.

A result thus has a characteristic rarely observed in a company’s other outputs:

it creates an expectation greater than its own existence.

The phenomenon can then spread.

An employee who has achieved a result may be asked to explain how it was achieved. A method may be identified. It may then be presented to other employees, who could be tempted to use it in turn.

The initial outbreak then becomes difficult to contain.

The professor also drew the audience’s attention to one of the principal side effects of the Results Epidemic: Prematurework.

By continually expecting results, some organisations may be led to undertake actions before all the conditions that would allow them to be deferred have been examined.

The risk then becomes systemic.

Decisions may be made.

Actions may be initiated.

And, in the most advanced cases, some work may even be completed.

Several executives in the room took notes.

Professor de La Barrière nevertheless sought to reassure his audience.

The Results Epidemic does not mean abandoning results.

It simply requires an understanding that a result achieved today may become an expectation tomorrow.

Prudence therefore dictates that a result should never be considered solely in terms of what it produces, but also in terms of the future results it might inspire people to demand.

At the end of the lecture, La DdC commended the quality of the research presented.

Professor Paul Marcus de La Barrière nodded.

He still had something to say.

But lunch was served.

La DdC — Crestignac

The situation has not changed. That is proof that we have it under control.