Management Lessons from a Bedtime Story- The Elves and the Shoemaker

A few days back, while looking for a term on Google, the link to a specific search result caught my attention. It was the German fairy tale of the Elves and The Shoemaker. I was tempted to read this bed time story again and while as a kid I had lessons to learn from it many years ago, I could still draw quite a few analogies from the workplace as well. 

For a quick refresh of the story, it’s about a poor shoemaker who ends up in a dire state of being left with just enough money to buy leather for one pair of shoes. He lays the leather on the table, leaves it to God to help him out and goes off to sleep with plans to make the shoes the next day. When he wakes up the next morning, he finds a fine pair of shoes already made. Soon he gets a customer whose feet fit the shoes perfectly and the customer is happy to pay more than their price. The shoe maker then buys leather for 2 pairs of shoes with that money and goes of to sleep. The next morning, he sees two fine pair of shoes created. This keeps happening every night and the shoe maker’s wealth grows. One night he wants to see who makes these shoes for him, so he and his wife hide behind the curtains. They see two naked elves come in and diligently make the pairs of shoes with the leather kept there. The wife feels sorry for the elves and makes them clothes, shoes and hats which they keep on the table the next day. At night the elves come in and are delighted to see the clothes and accessories. They wear, them, dance around and say:

                                                 "Now we are boys so fine to see,

                                                 Why should we longer cobblers be?"

The elves then go away and never return. The shoemaker keeps making shoes and he and his wife live a happy and content life ever after.

Now that we know the story, here is a take on it from the management lens.

Just like the shoemaker, the organization has a product and needs skilled people to make that product. However, at times the senior leaders may lack visibility to the needs of the people who make the products and that at times may lead to employee dissatisfaction. In this case the shoemaker and his wife made a conscious attempt to hide and watch else, they would not have known of the elves’ need for clothes. The elves would have diligently kept making the shoes day by day and remained disadvantaged while the shoe maker’s wealth grew. It is important for leaders to do a dipstick and be aware of the needs of their key talent/high performers for mutual growth.

One may debate that by addressing the needs the shoemaker lost the elves. This is why some leaders refrain from addressing the aspirations to move to other roles as they fear losing their key talent. One should be cognizant that every role has a shelf life. The elves came from somewhere and eventually would have gone somewhere whether their needs were addressed or not. However, if the shoemaker had not addressed their needs, they may have either gone away by surprise one night leaving the shoemaker bewildered and unprepared the next morning or could have possibly felt unrewarded and stopped making such fine pair of shoes which would have also impacted the shoemaker’s brand. Employees also outgrow their roles and need to be allowed to grow into other roles. Hoarding talent under the garb of criticality to the business may have adverse impact of either losing them to another organization or having them in the team yet be demotivated to put in their best. To keep the skill available in their team’s continuous development of a talent pipeline is critical for leaders as much as being open to be a talent exporter. Good talent is an organizational resource and should be shared.

Additionally, if the shoemaker had only depended on the elves continuing to make the shoes, he would have not been able to sustain himself and his family after the elves left. It is important for leaders to continuously hone their leadership skills and be relevant and grounded. The elves were only making shoes out of the leather that the shoemaker cut. The onus on determining the size and design was still on the shoemaker similar to the leaders who need to have a vision and set goals for their teams. Since the elves could not see a larger vision for the work they were doing, they lost interest in the work as soon as they got the shiney new clothes.

However, was this only the shoemaker’s responsibility to find out the elves’ needs and provide to them? If he and his wife hadn’t hidden and noticed their condition then they would have continued making shoes without clothes and moved from one place to another doing the same thing and still continue to be deprived. This is similar to employees moving from one organization to the other doing the same thing not seeing growth in their work. It is important for employees to have a goal, a view into where they want to be, and work on the path they need to get there. Leaving it to someone to notice them or pre-empt their requirements is like waiting in the dark for someone to walk in with a candle by chance. 

The elves made shoes as per their skills without making efforts to engage in dialogue, understand the requirements and to up level their creation to address those requirements. They would just stitch the leather that the shoemaker cut for them. It suited the shoemaker’s needs for a certain time and yet did not impact him once they left as he could make shoes without them too. In organizations if employees focus only on doing as told they could easily be replaced by someone else who would follow instructions. There may be short term gratification like getting all clothes and accessories together for the elves, however, in the longer run, they would just be a great tool in someone’s toolkit similar to the elves making beautiful shoes in oblivion at night on behalf of the shoemaker . So the choice is ours:

                                                “Should we longer cobblers be

                                               Or be the artists in our minds we see”

  Sometimes all it takes is a simple bed time story…