Work smarter, not harder

Once upon a time there was this quaint little village.

It was a great place to live except for one problem.

The village had no water unless it rained.

To solve this problem once and for all, the village

elders decided to put out to bid the contract to have

water delivered to the village on a daily basis.



Two people volunteered to take on the task and the

elders awarded the contract to both of them. They felt

that a little competition would keep prices low and

ensure a backup supply of water.



Self-employed thinking

The first of the two people, Ed, immediately ran out,

bought two galvanized steel buckets and began running

back and forth along the trail to the lake which was a

mile away.



He immediately began making money as he labored

morning to dusk hauling water from the lake with his

two buckets. He would empty them into the large

concrete holding tank the village had built.



Each morning he had to get up before the rest of the

village awoke to make sure there was enough water for

the village when it wanted it. It was hard work, but

he was very happy to be making money and for having

one of the two exclusive contracts for this business.





Business owner thinking

The second winning contractor, Bill, disappeared for a

while. He was not seen for months, which made Ed very

happy since he had no competition. Ed was making all

the money.



Instead of buying two buckets to compete with Ed, Bill

had written a business plan, created a corporation,

found four investors, employed a president to do the

work, and returned six months later with a

construction crew.



Within a year his team had built a large volume

stainless steel pipeline, which connected the village

to the lake.



At the grand opening celebration, Bill announced that

his water was cleaner than Ed's water. Bill knew that

there had been complaints about dirt in Ed's water.



Bill also announced that he could supply the village

with water 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Ed could

only deliver water on the weekdays. He did not work on

weekends.



Then Bill announced that he would charge 75% less than

Ed did for this higher quality and more reliable

source of water. The village cheered and ran

immediately for the faucet at the end of Bill's

pipeline.



In order to compete, Ed immediately lowered his rates

by 75%, bought two more buckets, added covers to his

buckets, and began hauling four buckets each trip. In

order to provide better service, he hired his two sons

to give him a hand for the night shift and on

weekends.



When his boys went off to college, he said to them,

"Hurry back because someday this business will belong

to you." For some reason, after college, his two sons

never returned. Eventually Ed had employees and union

problems. The union was demanding higher wages, better

benefits, and wanted its members to only haul one

bucket at a time.


Bill, on the other hand, realized that if this village

needed water, then other villages must need water too.

He rewrote his business plan and went off to sell his

high speed, high volume, and low cost, clean water

delivery system to villages throughout the world.



He only makes a penny per bucket of water delivered,

but he delivers billions of buckets of water, and all

that money pours into his bank account. Bill had

developed a pipeline to deliver money to himself as

well as water to the villages.



Bill lived happily ever after, and Ed worked hard for

the rest of his life and had financial problems

forever after. The end.



That story about Bill and Ed has guided me for years.

It has assisted me in my life's decision-making

process. I often ask myself, "Am I building a pipeline

or hauling buckets?" Am I working hard or am I working

smart?"


And the answers to those questions have made me

financially free. (Roberrt Kiyosaki)