Is being efficient same as being effective?

Stories have always captivated our curiosity. For kids, they have been used as a medium to help them understand moral values, compassion, love, friendship, etc., and for adults, they act as a medium to convey complex things in simpler terms. More importantly, stories are also used to capture audience attention while delivering a speech, presentation, and even technical lectures. Phew!! They never get boring, do they?

A recent incident that I came across further emphasized the fact that stories play a greater role in making our lives simpler. This article would delineate the events as it occurred with me lately.

On a chilly evening, while sipping over a cup of tea, I was talking to my dad about my day-to-day work-related stuff. I happened to mention something like “We look at whether the internal controls are efficient and effective”. A few seconds later, my dad asked, “Does efficient and effective convey the same meaning?”. I was sure that they don’t convey the same meaning and hence I replied no. My dad was quick to ask me if I could explain to him the difference between ‘Efficient’ and ‘Effective’.

I took some time to articulate my thoughts before answering. As I tried explaining, I felt I ended up conveying the same meaning for both words. After a couple of follow-up questions by my dad, I was totally perplexed as I was unable to express/put forth my viewpoint. The more I tried, the more I got confused. After many attempts, I sincerely asked my dad if he could explain the answer in simple language.

Then my dad replied, “Sure, let me tell you a story to illustrate the same so that you can remember it for long”. The word “story” was enough to keep me engaged and attentive about the things I was about to hear.

The story goes like this as he narrated :

Once upon a time, there was a coffee plantation company in a remote village. The company employed three people to perform three different tasks for a period of 30 days. The three people were Arun, Bala and Chiru and they were assigned the below task for 30 days.

Arun  -  Was responsible for digging a pit for tea sampling

Bala   -  Was responsible for planting the sampling in the pit

Charu -  Was responsible for closing the pit and watering the sampling

Every day, Arun had to dig a pit followed by Bala who would plant the sampling in the pit and finally Charu would close the pit and water the sampling.

On a particular day, Bala did not go to work but Arun as usual dug the pit and Charu also closed the pit and watered it. Similarly, when any one of them was on leave, the other two continued their work diligently.

Suddenly my dad told that the story would end here. This abrupt ending left me in splits but then he started to explain. He told me that all the three people employed by the company were efficient in the work they carried out. They were hardworking, diligent and committed. However, when we look objectively, they were not effective because when Bala was on leave, Charu kept closing the pit that was dug by Arun making the entire process meaningless. Similar things kept happening when any one of the three folks were on leave.

So, it is very important to understand the objective of the entire process so that our work can be effective. The above story conveys that efficiency is about "doing things right" but effective is all about "doing right things".

After hearing the story, I was now at peace with myself having understood how simple things could be narrated through stories. Hope you liked the story!!

"Stories have the power to create social change and inspire community" 

-Terry Tempest