Other People's Work

Work hard at whatever you do, because there will be no action, no thought, no knowledge, no wisdom in the world of the dead- and that is where you are going Ecclesiastes 9:10

Anything worth doing is worth doing poorly until you can learn to don't well. ~ Zig Ziglar.

Charlie Jones once told a young contractor who married a contractor's daughter and had to learn the hard way. The father-in-law wanted to give a boost ton is new son-in-law.

Son, he said. I don't want you to start at the bottom where I did. So, I want you to go out and build the most tremendous house this town has ever seen, put the best of everything in it, make it a palace, and turn it over to me. Well, this was an opportunity to make a killing. He hurried out to slap together a building that would survive two fairly stiff glades. In short order he was back to dear old dad. Well, dad it's finished.

Is it tremendous, is it a place like I asked? Yes- siree, Dad. Is it really the finest house ever built, son? Yes-siree, Dad. All right, where is the bill? Is there a good profit in it for you? Yes sire, Dad. Very good, here is your check, and where is the deed? As he looked at the deed, the father said, I didn't tell you why I wanted that house to be the best house ever built. I wanted to do something special for you and my daughter to show you how much I love you...here, take the deed, go line in the house- you built it for yourself.

The young gold cricket crept out a shattered, frustrated man. He thought he was making a fortune at his father-in-law's expense by saving money on inferior materials and shortcuts but he cheated only himself.

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The tendency not to do other people's work as our own is the reason many will never taste real success in life. Everytime I look at the part of the world where I hailed from, I marvelled seeing that millions have gotten it wrong. They cheat on employers time, they convert work materials for private use, they inflate figures, arrive late at work, spend employers time doing personal stuff and so on. Attitude like this leads to mass failure and poverty.

There are certain beliefs that have been embedded in the mind of people that I think are responsible for mass failure and poverty that one cannot but acknowledge across Africa. Based on such beliefs, destructive mindsets have been formed by many. Tow of such negative beliefs include:

1. When you are working for the government or in other people's employment you should not sweat.

2. Whether the boss (company) makes profit or loss, they employees must be paid.

With the kind of mindset mentioned above many just go to work not to make any meaningful contributions or create significant value. In my country, cases have been reported where employees will absent from work for days, without official permission to go and run their own business and will receive lay at the end of the month. Many will go to work and all they do is be on social media half of the hours and will still get paid at the end of the month.

Many of the people in this category usually think to themselves, "I am smart". But soon, the reward of their evil practices begins to manifest.

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