Yellow Hair Bites The Dust, And Other Cautionary Tales

In the days of the American Old West, a class of experienced guidesto the new territories emerged.  The good ones could be identified by their ability to pull arrows out of their backs and live to tell the story.  It became customary for settlers, wagon trains, and military units to employ these experience-scarred aides on treks and sorties.

A Civil War officer seeking glory on a new front  cut a dashing figure and was the beau of whatever ball was on the social calendar.  He also finished last in his class at West Point.  Perhaps his guide was deficient, in that only victorious native Americans survived Custer's Last Stand at the Little Bighorn.

Later in our military history, WWII hero Douglas Macarthur decided that his intelligence was better than the USArmy's, and denied the presence of Chinese troops in North Korea.  Surprise!  We very nearly got run off the peninsula and into the ocean.  Today, historians remember the military brilliance that landed a counter-invasion at Inchon.  Of course, MacArthur had the advantages of reinforcements and finishing considerably better than the bottom of his West Point class going for him.

I have often promoted going for the gold and grabbing for the brass ring in supply chain projects, but it has been dismaying at how often major projects fail spectacularly in our field.  I'll sugggest a couple of things. 

The first is to understand one's own limitations, and enlist help - an experienced guide - for help in crossing over hostile territory.  The other is to be savvy about assessing the competence of the selected guide.  Hubris is not a companion on the road to success, in the long haul.