No Ruler Needed

(432 words, 2-minute read)

“What gets measured gets managed.” Peter Drucker

I hate that quote. I have never seen how it applies to dealing with emotions or the creative process….Yet, it is a quote that rattles around in my head every time I set a goal and then don’t achieve it, like this month when I set out to finish the first draft of my latest novel.

If you don’t know who Peter Drucker was, here is a very short description of him - old white dead dude (1909-2005). A business consultant of likes of Dale Carnegie and Napoleon Hill, also white, old dead dudes. All considered granddaddies of modern business. The quote, still used today, is dragged out whenever some business guru needs to make a point about achieving SMART goals.

Timelines, deadlines, carrot, carrot, carrot.

As much as I don’t think it applies to my work, it is still a soloist in a choir of inner voices taunting me. So yesterday, I started the day by damning the quote. I was so annoyed that I wrote five pages about how it doesn’t apply to a creative project. I felt vindicated after I finished. I was right, and he was wrong. I liked the rant so much that I thought it would be the blog post I am writing now.

But then I stopped, slowed down, and did some fact-checking. I wanted to know what year Drucker stated it (1954). I discovered 1: it might not have been original to him. 2: it was only part of the original quote. Worse yet, 3: the complete quote supported my rant rather than opposed it.

Well, didn’t that pop my bubble? Or at least it destroyed my argument and blog post. And all that energy was wasted on something that wasn’t what I first thought it was.

It reminded me of an SNL skit with Gilda Radner when she called into a radio talk show and went off on “racehorses” when the topic was “natural resources.” Here is a link to the skit. https://youtu.be/qatwRUt2RoA?si=pCVy97bN-veuWcz0

I felt depleted, and my head swirled around the world’s woes related to this latest failure, both goal and post: Intrinsic vs extrinsic motivation, drinking the Kool-Aid of some old dead dude, and blindly spreading misinformation. I let myself fall down a rabbit hole trying to reconcile, regroup, and come to some resolution.

I like ending with a lesson I have learned from my experience, but the only thing I came up with is the book will get done in its own time. Now, I have to get back to work.