Obliquity – Why Our Goals are Best Achieved Indirectly

In business as in science, it seems that you are often most successful in achieving something when you are trying to do something else. I think of it as the principle of ‘obliquity’.

James Black

The Boss’s Lie

“What I want is someone who will do what I tell them to.”
“What I want is someone who works cheap.”
“What I want is someone who shows up on time and doesn’t give me a hard time.”

So if this is what the boss really wants, how come the stars in the company don’t follow these three rules?

From Seth Godin’s Linchpin