Three Bags Full

Many times at my place of work, I’m reminded of this scene from MASH:

FRANK BURNS: No, no, no, Sergeant. From now on, you will not simply slop food onto these trays. Look at this random arrangement, Major.

MARGARET HOULIHAN: I'm looking.

FRANK: The kidney beans have slopped from the bean compartment into the applesauce compartment. The dehydrated potatoes are in the every compartment. It's no wonder I never have an appetite. Sergeant, I want standardization of compartment usage. When I look down a table at trays I want to see beans, beans, beans, beans! Potatoes, potatoes, potatoes.! - Applesauce, applesauce, applesauce! Got that?

IGOR: Yes.

FRANK: Yes, what?

IGOR: Yes, sir.

FRANK: Yes, sir, what?

IGOR: Yes, sir, yes, sir, three bags full?

(Script courtesy of Springfield! Springfield!)

Frank clearly wants precision. Predictability. Order. Igor just wants to serve the food, knowing full well the order in which it’s placed won’t matter since people will either eat the food or dump it and then complain about its quality.

If the food works for his customers, Igor thinks, why fuss over compartment standardization?

Yet here I am in the compartment standardization business at work. I admit to not being as rigid and precise as others. And, generally speaking, I don’t hear many complaints about that from the people I work for.

But I’m working to improve my precision, because that’s what’s called for. I want the paychecks to keep coming, and if that’s what’s required, so be it. Because it’s impressive to show at dog and pony shows that everything is compartmentalized, just as Frank desires. And to a certain degree of precision, I agree with that.

Those fully in the Precision Camp chalk it up to laziness. And I’ve been called lazy – both rightly and incorrectly – before.  But sometimes those of us in the If it Ain’t Broke Don’t Fix It Camp point to the name of the camp we’re in.

But it’s mine to deliver a Francophone “Bof” and do what’s required. Echoing what they say at Camp Precision: “It’s not THAT hard.”