A Diligent Ant

Dedicated Ants Driving Success

In a company, every morning, a small ant would come to work on time. Without chatting with anyone, it would immediately start working. As a result, production was very high, and the company was making great profit.

The CEO of the company, a lion, was amazed to see that the ant was working so hard without any supervision! He thought, “If the ant can work this well on its own, imagine how much more productive it could be under supervision!”

So, the lion appointed a cockroach as the ant’s supervisor. The cockroach had a lot of experience in this kind of work and was well-known for writing excellent reports.

The cockroach’s first decision was to install a clocking-in attendance system. He also thought he needed a secretary to help him write and type reports. So, he hired a spider to organize the files and monitor all phone calls.

The cockroach's beautifully crafted reports, full of charts and graphs, made the lion very happy. The lion proudly presented them in board meetings to analyze productivity trends, which pleased him greatly.

To prepare even better reports, the cockroach bought a new computer and a laser printer. He also hired a fly to manage the IT department.

Meanwhile, the company’s most efficient and experienced employee—the ant—who once used to work joyfully and go home satisfied, now had to do tons of paperwork. Most of the week was wasted attending meetings and filling out documents instead of doing actual work. As a result, the company’s productivity began to decline.

Seeing this drop in productivity, the lion decided it was the right time to appoint a department head for the section where the ant worked. He hired a cricket for the role.

On his very first day, the cricket ordered a thick carpet and an ergonomic chair for his office. Then he brought in his personal assistant from his previous job to help with budgeting and strategic planning for the office.

The ant, who once worked in a peaceful environment and enjoyed full freedom, now found the office full of tension. No one laughed anymore. Everyone was stressed and annoyed by extra work.

Noticing the situation, the department head cricket convinced the CEO lion to start a study titled “Improving the Workplace Environment.” After reviewing the management of the ant’s production department, the lion found that output had significantly decreased. So, he hired a famous consultant—an owl—to audit the situation and suggest ways to improve productivity.

The owl worked hard for three months and submitted a huge multi-volume report. The conclusion stated: “There are more employees than needed in this office... Therefore, downsizing is necessary.”

The next week, several employees were laid off. Can you guess who was the first to lose their job?

Yes… it was the ant.

Because the owl’s report stated:
"This employee lacks motivation and constantly displays negative behavior, which is harming the office environment.

Our Work Tradition

Reference
Anonymous. (2022). The story of the productive ant: A corporate parable. Retrieved from https://examplewebsite.com/ant-corporate-parable