数学必修三考点:FT中文网 - LucyKellaway - Why is a Harvard teaching future leader to honk like geese?

为什么哈佛学子要学大雁

Why is a Harvard teaching future leader to honk like geese?

两周前的一个普通的一天，哈佛大学里12个未来的世界领导坐成一圈，嘴里叫着：“嘎，嘎，嘎！”

On a perfectly normal day at Harvard a couple of weeks ago, a dozen future leaders of the world sat in a circle and cried: honk! honk! honk!

大约在1小时的时间里，这12个人不再是哈佛大学肯尼迪政治学院（Kennedy School of Government）的硕士生了。他们成大雁了。

For an hour or so these 12 stopped being second-year masters students at the Kennedy School of Government. They became geese.

这种大变活人的活动是要达到两个目的。第一，这种活动要让他们增加团队团结。第二，这种活动是要教导他们，人类在很多方面可以向大雁学习，哪怕他们拥有最好教育、而且将来会统治世界。

The transformation was intended to serve two purposes. First, it was meant to get them to bond as a team. Second, it was to teach them that human beings, even ones with the finest education and who will rule the world one day, can learn a lot from geese.

老师让这12个人一一站起来，大声读一句关于鹅的句子，其他人则在边上和着发出声音。

Each of the 12 was told to stand up in turn and read out a sentence about geese, while the others made noises.

“事实！当领头雁疲惫的时候，它就退回到雁阵的一侧，另外一只大雁就会出来领头。“一个人说道。

“Fact! When the lead goose gets tired, it rotates back in the wing and another goose flies point,” said one.

“嘎，嘎，嘎！”其他11个未来领导则按照指示，发出叫声。

“Honk! Honk! Honk!” went the 11 other future leaders, as instructed.

“教训就是。”第二个人高声说道，“为了团队利益，我们每个人都需要轮流指挥。”

“Lesson!” shouted a second. “Each of us needs to take our turn in giving direction for the good of the group.”

“嘎，嘎，嘎！”众人回应道。

“Honk! Honk! Honk!” was the refrain.

在团队建设的名义下，聪明人会做出很傻的事情来。做事成熟的会计会参加培训课程，学习马戏团技巧。经验丰富的经理人在冰冷的泥地里爬行。还有烤面包的。唱歌的。打非洲鼓的。这些活动让人摸不着头脑，让人难堪，会让未来的人类学家百思不得其解。这些活动一直就十分疯狂，且由来已久，所以再出来任何团队建设课程，我都不会感到惊奇。哪怕是有人说自己要做心脏手术，作为一种团队建设练习，我都会无动于衷。

In the name of team-building, sensible people do some very silly things. Grown-up accountants go on courses to learn circus skills. Experienced managers scramble through freezing mud. They bake bread. They sing. They bang on African drums. It is all thoroughly baffling and embarrassing and will no doubt give anthropologists of the future a lot to puzzle over. In fact, it has all been so mad for so long that I’m no longer surprised at any new team-building course. If someone said they were doing open-heart surgery as a team-building exercise I wouldn’t turn a hair.

不过，哈佛的大雁故事游戏还是产生了让人震惊之效。它说明，一个人头脑再怎么聪明，教育程度再怎么高，也难以保证在管理界的愚蠢做法前刀枪不入。当美国最出色的政治学研究生院学生也在学大雁叫的时候，我们是该承认，智力已经战胜不了噱头了。

And yet the goose story at Harvard still manages to shock. It shows that a sharp brain and a huge amount of education are no protection against management stupidity. When America’s pre-eminent graduate school of politics starts honking it is time to admit that intelligence can no longer triumph over claptrap.

在这个特别的个案当中，我们甚至看不到哪里需要团队的团结。这12个人只是自愿报名当班级顾问的，即负责帮助新生安顿。（这完全是件好事，这方面美国大学的做法远甚于英国。）

In this particular case there wasn’t even any need for bonding. These 12 had simply volunteered to be class advisers, which meant they were responsible for helping the new students settle in. (Which is a thoroughly good thing to do – and something US universities do much better than UK ones.)

不过，为了扮演好这一角色，他们需要参加为期8天的团结课程。这过程当中，他们不仅要学大雁叫，还要手拉手围成一圈，分享自己对团队成就的希望。他们要是坐下来，商量好如何安顿新生，带他们去个酒吧啦，带他们走一走熟悉地形啦，这该好多少啊！这样一来，他们就可以利用8天中的剩下时间学习，还是服些兴奋的药物，或者是参加如今研究生时兴的其它娱乐活动。

However, to fit this role they had to attend an eight-day bonding course which, as well as teaching them to honk, had them holding hands in a circle and sharing their wishes for the group’s achievements. How much better if they had just sat down and agreed what to do with the newcomers – take them to a bar, arrange some guided walks etc – and then they could have spent the rest of the eight days studying, or taking recreational drugs, or whatever it is grad students do for pleasure these days.

不过，如果我们说大雁游戏一无是处也不对。这游戏确实把12个人带得很近。不过这不是因为他们发现大雁和自己有什么离奇的相似性，而是因为他们发现这游戏太难堪，太幼稚，太无聊，所以他们在这敌人面前，联合了起来。这游戏结果或许非常成功：再过15年，这伙人在白宫的权力走廊碰面，可以轻轻带讽刺意味地学声雁叫，其效果或许会强过共济会的秘密握手（masonic handshake）。

Yet it isn’t true to say that the geese exercise achieved nothing: it did bring the 12 very close indeed. But that wasn’t because they had spotted the uncanny parallels between geese and themselves. It was because they found the exercise so embarrassing, so puerile and so utterly pointless that they united against a common enemy. Indeed, the team-building experience may have proved so successful that when they meet each other in the corridors of power at the White House in 15 years’ time they may whisper an ironic honk at each other, a signal that could be more powerful than a masonic handshake.

把人团结起来的一个最强大因素，就是有共同的敌人。不过对企业员工来说，这却不是一条可取之道，不论这课程傻到了什么程度。可是，一些非常聪明，分寸得当的经理，一去上什么团队建设课程，就会发生一些怪事。

To be united against a shared enemy is one of the strongest bonding forces there is. Yet for company employees this is not an option, no matter how staggeringly daft the course. Indeed, a strange thing seems to happen to perfectly bright and otherwise well-balanced managers when they are sent on team-building courses.

有人叫你在泥巴里匍匐，玩魔术抛球，或是站起来唱歌的时候，一个自然的反应就是：我不干！不过最后越来越多的人却选择不质问、不抱怨、也不怪叫，一个个乖乖就范。这些活动成了管理中的准宗教。按照这种准宗教的教条，你要是有所异议，那就成了异端邪说。人们不允许再有讽刺、怀疑和挖苦。国王身上几乎一丝不挂，但是你要是把实情说破，哪怕是说得很委婉，也是有危险的。如果你不按照课程的套路来，那就说明你不善于团队工作，也就是说，你在公司里没有归属。课程反馈表发下来的时候，你已经没有了选择，你只好在“非常相关”、“有启发”、“有很多重要收获”这些条目的边上打勾。

A normal response to being asked to scramble through mud/juggle/get up and sing would be: no way. Yet in ever growing numbers they succumb without heckling or moaning or honking ironically. These activities have become part of the quasi religious side of management. Under this doctrine, dissent is heresy. Irony, doubt and cynicism are no longer allowed. The emperor wears very few clothes so mentioning his state of undress, however obliquely, is dangerous. If you don’t go along with the course, the implication is you are not a team player and therefore do not belong in the company. When the feedback form comes along you have no choice. You tick the boxes that say the course was “highly relevant”, “inspirational”, “provided many key learnings”.

哈佛的年轻学子们在这些问题上当然还有自己的独立见解。但是他们如果想在大型机构里取得成功，恐怕只能抛弃这些独立见解了。

At Harvard the young students evidently still think independently on these matters. I fear that if they plan to be successful in big organisations in the future they will have that knocked out of them in time.

现在剩一个问题。根据哈佛的练习，大雁到底要教领导者什么呢？可以学习到5种东西。其中之一就是我在本文一开始说的。另外一个规则解释说，振动翅膀会提振落在后面的大雁，所以V字形的雁阵意味着他们可以飞行得更远：“其教训是：如果人们的方向统一… …就可以更快更方便地达到目标，因为他们在旅途中彼此互信。”

One question remains. What do geese have to teach leaders, according to the Harvard exercise? There are five lessons – one of which I quoted at the top of this column. Another rule explains that the flapping of the wings makes an uplift for the bird behind, so flying in the V formation means they can go further. “Lesson: People who share a common direction . . . can get where they are going quicker and easier because they are travelling on the trust of one another.”

信任式旅途究竟为何物我一无所知。不过我确实对空气有所了解。大雁排成V字形队列，是因为空气阻力。经理人也是用空气团结在一起的：空话连篇，与热空气无异。另外，大雁和嘎嘎叫的经理还有一个类似之处，二者在很多方面，都是呆头鹅一个。

I don’t know anything about travelling on trust. But I do know about air: geese fly in a V because of air resistance. Managers are held together by air, too: hot air. There is another similarity between the bird and the manager who likes to honk. He is a goose in more ways than one.

译者/方柏林