Nobody else is likely to notice this, so I’ll just go ahead and tell it on myself.
I realized that in my Sunday column, I was referring to an anecdote I had used once before, so I boiled it down to as brief a reference as possible:
I was once told that someday I would have to decide whether I wanted to be right or effective. There is no doubt which paths these two have chosen.
Only after the page was gone on Friday did I realize I had told this story twice before, once toward the bottom of a column on July 6, 2003 …
One of the many long-suffering bosses I’ve had in my career, thoroughly exasperated with the bullheaded way I tended to play with others, said that if I wanted to be successful, I would have to make up my mind: Did I want to be right, or be effective?
This was at least a decade ago, so I don’t recall exactly how I responded. But I remember being torn between saying either, "Both, of course," or "If I have to choose, I’d rather go down in flames being right."
… and, in an expanded form that actually led the column, I wrote about it again on April 4, 2004:
I ONCE HAD a boss who, in the throes of frustration with me (not an uncommon state among bosses I have known), told me that one of these days, "You’re going to have to make up your mind whether you want to be right, or you want to be effective."
Of course, I wanted to be both. But if absolutely forced to choose, I would dig in and choose the former, and go down in flames if necessary. Hence his frustration.
He was definitely on to something. I’ve had a number of setbacks in my career based on that very propensity. Still, I tend to want politicians to exhibit a similar trait. I keep wanting politics to be about honestly advocating what you believe at all times, and stoically accepting the consequences if your ideas prove to be insufficiently popular to have the effect you desire.
Both references were to make a point about Gov. Mark Sanford, by the way.
You know, the former boss in question — Gil Thelen, who ran The State‘s newsroom back in the long-ago days (more than 12 years ago, now) when I was a part of that department — would probably feel gratified that his point comes to my mind so frequently. Maybe that’s because I still struggle over which one I want more. My answer still tends to be, "both."
Sure, I could just not have mentioned it at all in the first place, but it seemed the
quickest way to introduce the whole organizing dichotomy of the column. And it was in that context that the idea struck me.
And I didn’t think it was worth the wasted money of redoing the page, when I found out I had done it twice. If I had realized what I was doing sooner, I might have introduced the idea another way. I could have said,
I’ve written more than once that Gov. Mark Sanford must choose whether he wants to be right or be effective.
… and so forth. Then I would have felt a little less like a bore. Too late now, though. And here I’ve gone and bored you again with this pointless explaining. Oh, well. You didn’t have to read it.
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We don’t need any more people who are wrong but effective and implementing their flawed agenda.