Favoured : 44

The Conservative Party and the New Democratic Party decided to have a
canoe race on the South Saskatchewan River.

Both teams practiced long and hard to reach their peak performance
before the race. On the big day, the Conservative Party won by a mile.

The New Democratic Party, very discouraged and depressed, decided to
investigate the reason for the crushing defeat.

A management team made up of senior management was formed to
investigate and recommend appropriate action.

Their conclusion was the Conservative Party had eight people rowing and one
person steering, while the New Democratic Party had eight people steering
and one person rowing.

Feeling a deeper study was in order, the New Democratic Party management hired a
consulting company and paid them an amount of money for a second
opinion.

They advised, of course, that too many people were steering the
boat, while not enough were rowing.

Not sure how to utilize that information, but wanting to prevent
another loss to the Conservative Party, the rowing team's management structure
was reorganized to four steering supervisors, three area steering
superintendents and one assistant superintendent steering manager.
They also implemented a new performance system that would give the
one person rowing the boat a greater incentive to work harder. It
was called the "Rowing Team Quality First Program," with meetings,
dinners, and free pens for the rower.

There was discussion of getting new paddles, canoes, and other
equipment, extra vacation days for practice and bonuses.

The next year the Conservative Party won by two miles.

Humiliated, the New Democratic Party management paid off the rower, topped up his pension plan contributions, and put him into early retirement with full pension, halted development of a new canoe, sold the paddles for pennies on the dollar, and quadrupled all capital investments for new equipment. Additional resources were diverted to administration via order in council and redistributed to municipalities as 'seed money' and the next year's racing team was tendered via in-house patronage appointment.