Stone Soup

Monday, Jan. 11, 2010 | 10:17 a.m.

I made a pot of soup the other day with my youngest son. He asked what kind of soup we were making and for some reason, I responded, “Stone Soup.” He remembered the fable from his 1st grade class.

You probably remember the story. I first heard it on a record narrated by Danny Kaye when I was a child.

Once upon a time, somewhere in post war Eastern Europe, there was a great famine in which people jealously hoarded whatever food they could find, hiding it even from their friends and neighbors. One day a wandering soldier came into a village began asking questions as if he planned to spend the night.

“There’s not a bite to eat in the whole province,” he was told. “Better keep moving on.”

“Oh, I have everything that I need,” he said. “In fact, I was thinking of making some stone soup to share with all of you.” He pulled an iron cauldron from his wagon, filled it with water and built a fire under it. Then, with great ceremony, he drew an ordinary-looking stone from a velvet bag and dropped it into the water.

By now, hearing the rumor of food, most of the villagers had come to the square or watched from their windows. As the soldier sniffed the broth, and licked his lips with anticipation, hunger began to overcome their skepticism.

“Ahh,” the soldier said to himself rather loudly, “I do like a tasty stone soup. Of course, stone soup with cabbage--that’s hard to beat.”

Soon a villager approached hesitantly, holding a cabbage he’d retrieved from its hiding place, and added it to the pot. “Excellent!” cried the soldier. “You know, I once had stone soup with cabbage and a bit of salt beef as well, and it was fit for a king.”

The village butcher managed to find some salt beef...and so it went, through potatoes, onions, carrots, mushrooms, and so on, until there was indeed a delicious meal for all. The villagers offered the soldier a great deal of money for the the magic stone, but he refused to sell and traveled on the next day. The moral is that by working together, with everyone contributing what they can, a greater good is achieved.

I was taken by the power of this story. The soldier demonstrated a great quality, that of a facilitator with the ability to bring a group together for a greater cause. In this case, the greater cause was feeding the larger group during a time of famine. In the story, each person brought what they could to the group, and in turn everyone benefits from the whole.

Isn’t this what business is all about? Our companies have people with varied talent and skills. The magic occurs when each of them brings their talent and skill to the soup. Together something is created that is better than any one person could create individually.

In the fable, each ingredient was important to creating the soup. Do we treat each individual’s contribution in our company as equal and important? Do we encourage collaboration and the exchange of ideas or do we let ego and pride get in the way of creating the best soup?

There are solutions to everything we face in business--we just need to involve the greater community in the dialogue to get to the best decisions. It is as unrealistic to think that one person can have all the answers as it is to think that a stone and water can make a nourishing and tasty pot of soup.

Think about it. I challenge you to become the facilitator and cook some delicious soup.

Until next time…

Craig

Authors Note: This version of “The Story of Stone Soup” was found at www.extremelinux.info/stonesoup/stonesoup.html