Don't Ever Take a Hostage You are Not Willing to Shoot

I tried, using Google and Wikipedia without success, to find the origin of the phrase “Don’t ever take a hostage you wouldn’t shoot”, so as I heard on radio or TV over the weekend, I will credit it to former US Senator Phil Gramm. It is a saying adhered to by most of civilization’s bad guys, and while this is not a political post, I will use the recent short-lived government shut down to make my point. Democrat Senator Schumer and Representative Pelosi allowed their Republican counterparts to paint the Democrat strategy as holding the US Military funding and paychecks hostage, leaving them no choice, as loyal Americans to release the hostage without harm, losing all leverage in the process.

I was recently faced with a situation where I believed one of my people was being held hostage.  I was given the Sophie’s Choice (the choice between two unbearable options) of being able to hire a new person, which we sorely needed and of whom I was genuinely excited about having join our team, only by jettisoning a person who in a short time had become a very valuable member of our team. I was tempted, but quickly realized it would not have been right for many reasons. I turned down the deal. I wouldn’t shoot my hostage.

What I failed to realize at the time, I was the one being held hostage, and in many respects, I did it to myself. What I now realize is that I allowed myself to be put into a Sophie’s Choice situation, took myself hostage, and ultimately shot myself. And while I thought I was doing the noble thing, what I had done was greased the skids for a mistake, not the big mistake, but a mistake never the less.

If you have found yourself in a similar situation, please share the details. I am not sure to this day what I could have, or should have done differently, so I would love to know how you, my Linked In colleagues would have handled the situation.

I discuss this mistake, and others, in my presentation “Avoiding the Big Mistake”. If you and a group of any size would like to hear the full presentation while it is in “preview” stage, please message me or call me at 717 648-9160.