The dead horse theory: 13 tips to deal with dead horses

We are living crazy times, aren’t we?

Almost every company seems to agree that they should focus on customer satisfaction, attract and keep the best talents (given there is a clear definition of what a “talent” should be). At the same time, the same companies, and I mean all of them, are really good at implementing what is known as the Dead Horse theory.

Many might ignore what the Dead Horse theory is, or have never heard of it. Me neither, until recently.

I’m convinced most of you will smile when learning about the dead horse theory, and you will love sharing with colleagues and friends. I’m also sure you will certainly find many areas in your company where dead horse theory is actually in action.

 There you go:

Sioux were very wise in their time, and among the many basic principles they were following, was this statement:

“If you find out you are riding a dead horse, the best strategy is to dismount and get a new horse”

Nonetheless, companies, but also governments have elaborated much more complex and efficient strategies to deal with dead horses. Below a list of the main strategies nowadays organizations implement when they are in the situation where their horse is dead:

1. Get a better whip.
2. Change the riders.
3. Set up a special committee to analyze the dead horse, or even better, hire an army of consultants and perform an in-depth analysis of the dead horse.
4. Organize visits to other organizations and countries, and understand how foreign cultures manage to ride dead horses.
5. Lower the standards at a level where dead horses become competitive.
6. Reclassify dead horses into “life-disabled resources”
7. Hire external staff to ride the dead horses. 
8. Harness dead horses together, to increase overall speed. 
9. Allow additional budget to boost performance of dead horses
10. Conduct a study on productivity and find out if lighter riders could improve a dead horse’s performance. 
11. State that ? it is crystal clear: since dead horses don’t need to be fed, they are less costly and thus contribute more to profit than live horses. ? 
12. Redefine the standards to include all horses’ categories.

And, of course:

 13. Promote dead horses to management positions