The Crisis/Opportunity Meme
- or -
Sometimes
a Problem is Just a Problem
I've noticed this a lot lately. While listening
to someone speak they get to the point
where you would think the next word out of their
mouth is going to have to be "problem" or
"disaster" or "fiasco" and you can see
them start to form such a negatively
connotated
word. But then - slight
pause - mental gears
grinding furiously - and the word which actually
emerges is "opportunity".
It could be some CEO quoted on
the business news with a gem like this:
"We view the fact we have spent 70 million
dollars of venture capital and managed, thus
far, to bring in $27.50 in revenue as a
huge prob... er opportunity which will
strengthen our resolve to dominate in this
market."
Behind all of this is a meme which goes
as follows:
The Chinese word for "crisis" is composed of
two symbols: "danger" and "opportunity".
I went searching for some evidence to prove
or disprove the correctness of this
linguistic analysis1.
In the course of doing
this I found many examples of this quote
(or something very much like it) used in
the context of a motivational speech. It
seems to be a great line to use when one's
crew is about ready to mutiny and one
is grasping for some way to prevent the
inevitable. Then again, there are cases
where a crisis can lead to thinking
out of the box and cause a change in
direction with good consequences.
Regardless of what you think about the wisdom
of the Chinese, this fact remains: Sometimes
a problem is just a problem. If you just
locked your keys in the car, what you have
is a problem. If you failed to make
your house payment for three months
in a row, what you have is a problem.
If you jump out of an airplane and then
remember you
left your parachute in the overhead bin,
what you have is a problem (but at least
it's one which will be resolved fairly
quickly).
1. I hate citing URLs on E2 because
they are so brittle. A google search
for "crisis opportunity" will render
a ton of results. There is a nice writeup
on www.straightdope.com.