RE: Sheep & data collection . . . and Rule 4

["Alan Meekings" <alan@landmarkconsulting.co.uk>]

This seems to me to illustrate, quintessentially, the prevalent tendency of
managers to copy from previous examples from their experience . . .
otherwise known as Rule 4 of the Funnel Experiment (where, in pursuit of
minimising variation between successive attempts to hit the target, the
funnel is aimed over the position where the previous marble ended-up). 

The young monk's tale goes like this:

"A new young monk arrives at the monastery. He's assigned to help the other
monks in copying the old canons and laws of the church by hand. He notices,
however, that all the monks are copying from copies, not from the original
manuscript. 
 
The new monk goes to the Abbot and points out that if someone made even a
small error in the first copy, it would never be picked-up. In fact, that
error would be continued in all sthe subsequent copies.
 
The Abbot says, "We've been copying from the copies for centuries, but you
make a good point, my Son."

So, the Abbot goes down into the dark caves underneath the monastery where
the original manuscript is held in a locked vault that hasn't been opened
for hundreds of years.
 
Hours go by and nobody sees the old Abbot.  
 
Eventually, the young monk gets worried and goes downstairs to look for him.
He sees the Abbot banging his head against the wall, crying uncontrollably.
 
"Father, what's wrong?" asks the young monk.
 
With a choking voice, the old Abbot replies . . .  "The word is celebrate."

Regards,

Alan