Forgotten Wedges

I was recently reminded of a story told by Samuel T. Whitman. In this account he acquaints us with a story that began when he was just boy.

Once on his family’s homestead there was a saw mill. The saw mill had left the valley in which they resided, but it left behind random pieces of equipment. One day as Samuel was exploring the property he came across a fallers wedge. A faller’s wedge is used to help fell a tree; it is inserted in a cut made by a saw and then struck with a sledge hammer to widen the cut. Samuel happened to be late for dinner, so he leaned the fallers wedge against a young walnut tree. He figured he would take it to the shed after dinner or perhaps the next time he walked by. Unfortunately, this merely became a good intention. The fallers wedge was never moved and eventually it grew into the tree and healed over.

Many years later when Samuel was now the owner of the homestead a fierce winter storm came across this valley. Typically this type of storm would not have hurt the now large walnut tree, but to Samuel’s dismay he went out that night to find that one of the three major limbs had split away from the trunk and had crashed to the ground. This so unbalanced the remainder of the top that it, too, split apart and went down.

The next morning Samuel went out to mourn the loss of his tree. What he found magnified his loss. In the clear morning hours he could now see why he lost the magnificent tree; the forgotten fallers wedge.

The wedge that had grown into the tree had prevented the tree’s fibers from growing together completely, leaving the tree weak and vulnerable.

There are two valuable lessons we can learn from this story. First, what we may put off today can have serious consequences in the future. Secondly, forgotten wedges may seem to heal, but left to fester they can be fatal.

Good intentions we may have include security enhancements, product upgrades, bettering relationships with our clients, the list could go on and on. Putting any of these off can have serious consequences on the success of your business.

What about forgotten wedges? Do you have anything that may be slowly festering? Could it be customer complaints that have gone unresolved or just plain ignored? What about hiring non marketing asset employees? It may be those seemingly innocent white lies that are told to seal a deal. Again, the list could go on and on.

So, before your storm hits, take stock and turn those good intentions into actions and extract any forgotten wedges before it is too late. Or, you may be saying TIMBER to your falling business!

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