Theory of Constraints Handbook - James Cox Iii [548]
5. Ask the class what they learned from this exercise assuming that:
Container = our life
Potatoes = our needs (sized in order of importance)
Rice and Water = our wants
Lesson of the Story
Our lives, like the container, have a limited capacity so we have to choose carefully what to include. Even when we start with a very clear focus and sense of priority as to what are our “biggest potatoes” or most important needs in our life such as love, family, freedom, we are often distracted by the “rice” and “water” or non-essential wants such as pride, popularity, and easy money which can take over our lives before we realize it.
As a result, we must constantly prioritize what we choose to put into our lives and protect our underlying needs. Over time if we are not careful, our needs can easily become dislodged by our wants, which grow in false importance and impact on our thoughts, words, and actions. We need to clearly define our needs and make sure they are well grounded in our life to prevent being overshadowed by non-essential yet competing wants.
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Identifying Underlying Needs Once the audience was able to differentiate clearly between the concepts of wants and needs, the next step was to enable them to understand the relationship between a want and its underlying need by asking the question “why?” While this step was relatively easy for our inmate audience, who had already internalized the practice of questioning and asking “why” during the first few sessions of buy-in, the main difference now was teaching them to evaluate the logic of their answer by using the TOC terminology and framework “In order to . . . I must . . .”
A typical illustration is a smoker’s desire for a cigarette (want) whenever he needs to relax (need). If the need for relaxation is validated, the next question is whether there is any other way to satisfy that need. Unless he can find another way to satisfy this need through other relaxation techniques (for example, to exercise, chew gum, or listen to music), smoking remains his default action. When we opt for one action over another, the implication is that this is the only way to meet this need at that point of time; that is, In order to relax, I must smoke.
To many, the absoluteness of this wording is difficult to accept. The usual response will be a retraction or a disclaimer that no better options were available at that time. Once again, we need to question whether this is true. The irony is that while we have the freedom of choice to exercise actions that are more appropriate, we simply choose that which is familiar. By default, we do not question our actions because our responses have become automatic after years of practice. From our experience, this is a sure way to meet our need, regardless of whether it is the optimal action to take.
In the classroom, there are numerous opportunities for the trainer to let the audience practice this skill. Focusing on actions, enables the audience to practice necessity logic in a far wider range of situations than conflicts. Most people only have a limited number of conflicts at any one time, while desired actions are plentiful and easy to identify (e.g., why buy a new hand phone, why eat an extra doughnut, or why go on vacation). Even if nothing else is learned for the remainder of the course, the benefits of learning to question one’s actions by challenging one’s belief system before acting is immeasurable.
Validating the Need One of the most