Laughing All the Way to Efficiency: A Guide to Smarter Processes

Comedy is a study in timing, but also efficiency. Good comedians make sure they have no wasted words. Every syllable must add something to the joke, otherwise it is a distraction.

Like a good shepherd, a comedian is taking their audience on a journey and any wasted information is going to take them in the wrong direction. 

So it makes sense that comedian Mitch Hedberg would understand the joy of a simple process.

There is a story of Hedberg going to a hotel and trying to check in, but the person at the counter asks for a credit card. At this point, Hedberg is very successful and also a little reclusive so he doesn’t have a credit card, but he does have a lot of cash on him.

He offers the hotel clerk the cash but they say no, they need a credit card.

Hedberg tells him that the cash, which is more than the cost of the hotel room, is what the credit card represents.

The hotel clerk said he had to have a credit card. Hedberg, in his usual deadpan delivery, told him that it is like hiring a Frank Sinatra impersonator to sing and then Frank Sinatra turns up and you tell him no, we want the impersonator to sing.

So what does a comedian having issues paying for a hotel tell us about working smarter?

It is for Something, Not to do Something

Any process should be to achieve a certain goal, this is the purpose that the process was created for.

The point of the process is to refine the amount of effort so you get the most outcome for the least effort.

In this situation the idea for Hedberg was to exchange money for a room, the complication was when the hotel only offered a credit card as payment. (More common now, but back when this happened credit cards weren’t nearly as ubiquitous).

The crux of the issue was getting payment, this is what is needed. Hedberg offered more than the cost of the room so that the hotel would feel comfortable if anything happened, damage etc. 

The trouble is that the hotel clerk thought they had to follow the process rather than the purpose of the process, They didn’t have the option of some freedom to work towards the purpose, they were constricted by the process.

Free At Last

The purpose of the process is what is important. What happened with the Hotel Clerk is that they weren’t able to fulfil the purpose by improvising on the process.

A process is a way to increase consistency and efficiency in effort. If everyone is doing their only thing it becomes very difficult to figure out where improvements can be made.

However, there needs to be enough flexibility so that the users of the process are empowered to freestyle when required to achieve the purpose of the process.

It is more important for your people to know why you do something than specifically how to do it. The why is more important than the how and needs to be re-emphasized and re-stated many times while explaining how the process works.

There should be points along the process for choices to be made and you need to trust in your staff to make the best choice when it comes up. You want to be teaching your team to think, rather than do.

A process can be a beautiful thing, but it also can be like stepping on a rake and hitting yourself in the face, funny that.