“Examine what is said, not who is speaking.” – African proverb
“A spectre is haunting our time: the spectre of the short term. We live in a moment of accelerating crisis that is characterized by the shortage of long-term thinking. Almost every aspect of human life is plotted and judged, packaged and paid for, on time-scales of a few months or a year at most. There are few opportunities to shake those projects loose from their short-term moorings. It can hardly seem worthwhile to raise questions of the long term at all;” Jo Guldi and David Armitage wrote in their quest breaking book, “The History Manifesto.”
Developed with excessive amounts of glamour and convenience to give anyone a sensory overload of bliss so addictive, you get hooked on its agreeable taste, short-termism has found many followers, and it has become the lord of our era. Like convenient food, the taste, rather than the nutritional value is the catch twenty two.
We know it is not best, yet its scrumptiousness drives us to go back for more each time. Moreover, the overwhelming greed of leadership that continues to plague our time, has led to a major shift in societal thinking towards instant gratification.
Many amongst us would opt for short-termism, rather than anything else before the decisions we are witnessing does not seem to be future oriented. Why should anyone tighten his or her belt, when leadership is knee deep in instant gratification?
Let it not be said that the average person does not appreciate the greater benefits of long-termism. It is far from that. He or she does, but when all they see is people coming to the table with a short-term attitude, what do you expect him or her to do?
That is akin to you demanding you want to be served the fruits now, and then entreating the next person to plant the fruit tree so that he or she will constantly have a good supply of fruits in the future.
If it is good for you now, why should that other person wait till the future comes before they have what you are having now? Nobody desires to be labelled odd. And very few are brave enough to live saintly. So as long as you are pursuing short-term results now, do not expect the other person to have the patience to cultivate long-termism.
Short-termism is in vogue. And it is so because many of us think ourselves smarter than most others. We want to experience fulfilment without any sort of delay or wait.
And to achieve that we have presumed that it is more beneficial to move from one point to the other in a straight line, avoiding the winding road our traditions and the laborious principles life dictate. It is not surprising unethicality reigns in our society.
Many of us who are practicising short-termism have also conveniently forgotten the principle that as soon as a path is carved, many will follow in your footsteps and widen it into a broad road. Nobody likes to wait, and thus a ‘no-wait’ precedent is a good enough excuse for all of us to follow that road.
But short-termism is a dangerous illness. It might not send us in ambulances scurrying to see the physician in the emergency room now, but it definitely disintegrates the spirit of our humanness. We cheat ourselves of the rich and ennobling values of existential experiences which even allowed for the present opportunities to be possible.
Twisting it to gratify your ‘now’ means depriving the future of brilliant opportunities. Short-termism typically lacks the attitudes which are required for the positive growth and development of the individual and the holistic flourishing of society. Expecting everything to unfold instantly and at our convenience has major ramifications.
For starters, it erodes patience. Once we lose this value, we will lose our attention to detail and everything we do will be done casually. Which means work in general will not be done right, as hard work will become unbearable.
We will have higher expectations, which will drive for more and more instant feedbacks, and when they are not forthcoming, disappointments will become the order of the day, which will mean many of us will struggle to stay motivated. We are witnessing it on our political arena.
Many are those who have developed political apathy because we have eliminated long-term thinking in our analysis of political candidacies and their promises. The result is manifestoes becomes like mirages once the politician is in power. Sadly, instead of blaming ourselves for ourselves for buying into short-termism, we point the finger at the politician.
As a matter of fact, the packaging of short-termism is alluringly; and so deceptive it has many of us willingly infect ourselves with its virus and hope for a cure later, than prevent ourselves from being contaminated.
The glamour of short-termism is wrapping many of us in zombie shrouds. We are falling for scams and fads that beat the logic of seven year olds. The age old adage of “every glittering object not being gold,” is lost on us. Now every sparkle is a diamond. And when our polishing efforts do not generate a shine, we tear our hairs out.
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Kodwo Brumpon is an executive coach at Polygon Oval, a forward-thinking Pan African management consultancy and social impact firm driven by data analytics, with a focus on understanding the extraordinary potential and needs of organisations and businesses to help them cultivate synergies, that catapults into their strategic growth, and certifies their sustainability.
Comments, suggestions, and requests for talks and training should be sent to him at [email protected]
