并非真的需要

尹玉生／譯

其實愛美的人，只是與自己談戀愛罷了。

不論多高大的偉人，他的背影里都缺少光明。

里卡多·塞姆勒是巴西著名企業家和暢銷企管書作家。在他的著作《標新立異的人》一書中，塞姆勒講述了他在塞氏企業集團管理實踐中總結出來的一條經驗：

我們專門召開了一次會議，會議的主題是：究竟應不應該購買總金額達到5萬美元的一批文件柜。在此之前，已經有多個部門屢次提出了購買文件柜的申請。他們在焦急中等待了幾個月，但一直沒能得到滿足。他們將希望寄托在這次會議上。

然而，會議的最終決定使得他們的愿望徹底化成了泡影。會議決定：一個文件柜也不買。取而代之的是，公司停止運營半天，開始了首度一年兩次的清理工作，要求將所有的文件柜進行徹底的清理和歸攏。我們對各部門的要求很簡單：檢查每一份文件夾，對于過期的、沒用的文檔，哪怕僅僅是一張小紙片，也要堅決清理掉。

我是整個集團中擁有文件柜最多的人之一，我擁有四個大型的文件柜，還向有關部門提交了再增加兩個大型文件柜的申請。在清理過程中，我驚訝地發現，我居然完全騰空了一個文件柜！其他人的情況也是如此。最后整個集團居然騰出了數十個文件柜，我們全部拍賣掉了這些多余的文件柜。在此后的很長時間里，再也沒有一個部門和個人提出購買文件柜的申請。

這件事情，讓我認識到，有時候，我們迫切想要的東西，其實并非我們真正需要的東西。因此，我們必須要將需要和想要區分開來。

（王寶華摘 圖/李衛）

Ricardo Semler is the famous writer and enterpriser in Brazil.In his book “Maverick”, Ricardo Semler tells of a lesson he learned working at Semco:

“We were in yet another meeting... when we came to the purchase of $50,000 worth of file cabinets. Several departments had been waiting months for the cabinets and in desperation had decided to pool their Requests. They hoped the meeting can meet their needs.

“However, they were disappointed. We didn't buy a single new file cabinet that day. Instead, we decided to stop the company for half a day and hold the First Biannual Semco File Inspection and Clean-out. Our instructions were simple: We told everyone to look inside every overdue or trashy file folder and purge every nonessential piece of paper.

“I was one of Semco's biggest file hogs, with four large cabinets and a request for two more. After our cleanup, I trimmed down to a single cabinet, and that was pretty much how it went throughout the company.The cleanup went so well that when everyone had finished, Semco auctioned off dozens of unneeded file cabinets. A long time after this clean-out, no department or no one had ever requested for cabinets again.

“I know from this experience that sometimes what we think we need isn't what we really need. So, we should learn to distinguish between needs and wants.”