The Trouble with Innovation in Asia

There is a children's story told in Cambodia that extrapolates the innovative culture in Asia nicely. It goes something like this:

A coconut collector is taking shade from the mid-day sun in a palm tree. He looks over to his neighbor's land and thinks to himself, "If I hire a worker to help me to collect coconuts, together we can collect twice as many coconuts, and with the extra money, I can hire more workers to collect from my other neighbors' land. Then, I can hire even more workers, and eventually I could sit in the shade and would not have to work; I would only have to manage the other workers."

The entrepreneur then thinks to himself, "What will I do if I my workers become lazy?" He thinks to himself, "I know I will kick them!"

Just then, being so deep in thought, he kicks the air pretending to kick his imaginary worker, and he falls from the tree. On his way down, he grabs hold of a branch.

Dangling from the tree, he yells to his four brothers. The brothers run fast and see their brother in distress. They tell him to let go and fall into a pile of rice husks below.

"No, that will hurt," says the coconut collector, "Tie the four corners of your kromas [FN1] together and hold it tight to make a net to catch me."

So the four brothers follow his orders, and their lone brother drops from the tree. When he falls into the kromas, his weight brings all five of the brothers heads together and they all die.

The moral of the story is: "Don't think for yourself; Just do your job."

~ J-Dub

[FN1] A kroma is a multi-purpose piece of fabric used in Cambodia.