"LOOKING FOR THE WIZARD"

By using the characters in the movie "The Wizard of Oz," the audience travels down the yellow brick road of trial and error taking a new insight into how they must deal with their own personal problems of growth and development. The story also helps to obtain a better understanding of how our organizations tend to drift apart even when all members claim to be traveling the same yellow brick road. Each of the characters represents a part of both ourselves and our organizations. Through laughter and the use of their imaginations, the audience leaves with a visual reminder of the need for both self and organizational review and improvement.

Introduction 

We're here to have a good time and then you spoil it by having a speaker. I mean, I can't help but feel a little bit, just a little bit like Elizabeth Taylor's eighth husband on the honeymoon. I know what I'm going to do, but I'm not sure you're going to get excited about it.

I'm here to talk about how great it is to have opportunity. How great it is to be involved in the public sectors...how great it is to be involved in community action programs and how great it is to help people.

Everybody always says, you know, that's all I want out of life. A chance. An opportunity. Just let me have the opportunity to do things...let me be in charge for a little while...let me control the budget. You know, everything will be great!

The Missionary

And when I hear people talk that way, my all time favorite story is the missionary going through the jungle. He comes down the path and a ferocious lion jumps out. The hairs on the back of the lion's neck bristle and he lets out a mighty roar. He's ready to pounce and the missionary falls to his knees and says, "My God, my God, please make a Christian out of this lion."

Well, lo and behold, a miracle: The lion lays down, the hair goes down on the back of his neck, he puts his head down on his front paws and the missionary hears a very small voice that says, "Dear Lord, please bless this food I'm about to partake."

Well, the missionary got what he wanted, and the dog-gone thing ate him up. And that's kind of like what happens to us. You know every time we think that we're in charge of something, every time we think we're close to solving a problem, every time we think we're really going on the right track and things are going to go our way, something seems to go wrong and we seem like we're getting eaten alive. And we say, "Why in the world are we doing all this stuff?"

Well, one of the things that we're always trying to do is the right thing, but we're never sure exactly what that is. We're always striving to make the right decision, but we don't always know what the right decision is.

The Big Game

I think the best example I can give to you is that a good friend of mine from the State of Arkansas told me a long time ago. He talked about a big high school rivalry in football, and I think we can relate to that. Arkansas is a little more football-oriented than it is toward basketball in high school. But I think we can all understand how it is when a game involves the home team and their big rival.

It turns out in this one game he was telling me about, there were three minutes left in the ball game. The home team had the ball on their own fifteen yard line and were on the short end of a 12 to 7 score. So the home team had to score a touchdown in order to win, but they didn't have any timeouts and there was a long way to go. You feel it in the crowd; everybody was kind of nervous. They weren't sure whether or not they could really make it and so everything was kind of tense. On the very first play, the quarterback takes the ball, he turns and fakes the handoff to the halfback, he rolls out to his right, stops, plants his foot, throws a screen pass, and the halfback that the quarterback had faked to catches the pass and snakes his way all the way to the other team's forty-five yard line. Well, the place is going wild! They're out of the hole. They got a shot at it. Everybody thinks, "Gee, maybe it'll work, you know." They're not really noticing everything because they're all watching the guy run with the ball. But the defensive team's linebacker had blindsided the quarterback and knocked him out. The trainers come and try to get their quarterback together, but they had to take him off the field.

So the coach goes to the second string quarterback. The coach says, "Son I realize you haven't played a lot. I realize this is the big game, that you've worked hard, you've practiced hard, you've been trained well and you know what to do if you go in. You go in, run play eight and we can win this game. So the young man goes in and he calls play eight. He gets the ball and he goes down the line. It's a quarterback option. He fakes the pitchout, keeps the ball, goes all the way down the right sideline and gets downed at the one yard line.

The place is going wild. They're all yelling and screaming, "Only a yard to go!" Still there's almost two minutes left in the game. Surely they can make it across the goal line. All they need is that one more yard.

When lo and behold, what do they discover but that the second string quarterback has dislocated his shoulder on the previous play.

The first string quarterback still doesn't know whether it's night or day. So the coach goes to the third string quarterback. He says, "Son, I realize you've never played. I realize this is the big game, but you've trained hard and you've practiced well. You know what to do. If you will go in and execute we can win this game. Go in and run play three."

The young man goes in, he grabs the ball, he turns, he fakes to the right halfback, fakes to the fullback, gives the ball to the left halfback. Pretty execution! He turns, he looks. Bam! He hits the line. It doesn't move an inch.

Out goes the first string guard, in comes the second string guard: "Coach said play five." The quarterback runs up, he grabs the ball, he turns around, he fakes to the left halfback, fakes to the fullback, and gives the ball to the right fullback. Pretty execution! Bam! He hits the line; nothing happens.

They're all running up to the huddle. There's just a couple of seconds left. The third string quarterback looks in. The coach is holding his head. He doesn't know want to do. He's just about ready to send the play in, but the huddle's already broke.

The young man's up to the line. The center hikes the ball. It comes into the quarterback's hands. He turns. The gun goes off. Time's expired. This is it. Everything is on the line. It's a "student-body-to-the-left." Everybody's going that way. The young man puts it in the stomach of that last halfback. No! He pulls it back, tucks the ball under his arm and makes a reverse around the outside of the field. Score!

I tell you, the place goes wild. Everybody is yelling and screaming, "Fantastic! Fantastic!" The coach runs down to him and he says, "Son, that's it. Play eleven, play eleven." He says, "We needed some misdirection. I didn't know if you knew play eleven." He said, "That was a great call. How come you called play eleven?"

The young man said, "Well, Coach, there I was. We needed to do something. I am the quarterback. Everybody's looking at me. You didn't send a play." And so he says, "Tim was next to me and I turned and I looked at Tim. Tim was a senior, and you know how the guys like Tim. I said, 'Guys, this is Tim. He's a senior. Let's do it for Tim!' I looked at Tim's number; it was 84, so I added eight and four and called play eleven."

Now they have some of the same problems in Arkansas that we've got in Kentucky. So the coach takes off his coaching hat and says, "Wait a minute, son, wait a minute. Let me explain something to you." He says, "Eight and four is not eleven. Eight and four is twelve."

And the young man looked at him and said, "Coach, if I was as smart as you we'd have lost the football game."

Sometimes we try to be so smart that we lose the game because we're trying to find the perfect answer. We try to find the perfect solution and we never really go out and run the play that we think is best.

 Wizard of Oz/Looking for Wizards 

I think that's the reason why I'd like to share with you what I think is the greatest leadership training story in the world: The greatest story ever written about you and I and our constant struggle to be the very best we can be. It's the story that you all know. The one that you've seen on television every year for the last thirty or forty years. You all know the story, but you may not have thought of it quite the same way. So I'd like for you to take a moment with me and think back about that movie called "The Wonderful Wizard of Oz."

It all starts off with Dorothy. And one thing we've got to remember is that Dorothy's got a problem, and nobody cares. Now, how many of you've ever had that particular feeling. I've got a problem. Nobody cares.

And Dorothy was much like you and me in that she was trying to do something. Then what we've got to remember is that this whole movie is about her dog called Toto. The whole story is about the dog!

So she had this problem and nobody cared. What did they do? Why did other people not care about Dorothy's problems? It was simple. They had problems of their own. I mean there were eggs to gather, chickens to feed, hogs to slop, wagons to be fixed. Everybody had their own problems and there was poor ol' Dorothy saying, "Well, nobody cares about me."

So, what does she do? She goes out behind the barn and looks up and says, "Somewhere over the rainbow bluebirds fly. How come I never get my chance? How come nothing ever goes my way? How come nobody ever pays any attention to me? How come I never get any help?" There she was, beginning to feel sorry for herself. So often what happens to us when the problems pull up and everything seems to be against us and nobody seems to care, we begin to feel sorry for ourselves.

Well, we know that Dorothy did the same thing that oftentimes other people try to do when there is a problem: She tried to get away. She tried to find someplace else to go. And when she tried to find that place to go, lo and behold she got frightened. As we know the story goes, she tried to get back home and then along came the tornado. She tried to get in the cellar, but couldn't and the tornado took the house away.

Did you ever wonder if there really is a place like Oz. I kind of wondered that back in 1974. We lost our house to a tornado, and I've often wondered if it went to Oz. You know, I'm happy to tell you that I wasn't in that house when it left.

I always hoped that somewhere there is that wonderful Land of Oz, a place where magic seems to happen. When Dorothy got there and landed in the Land of Oz, before her was the door of opportunity. You know a lot of people say, "I'm waiting for the knock at the door of opportunity," but what they fail to do is to read the sign on the door. It says, "Push." Somebody has to push to open the door in order for opportunity to have an advantage.

And so all at once Dorothy pushed open the door. Do you remember what happened in the movie? Technicolor.

Up till then it was all black and white, ugly Kansas. She pushed open the door to the Audubon Area Community Services organization, you know. There it was. Sunshine. Technicolored. Everything that she ever wanted. And there it was giving her the opportunity to do the things she wanted.

Here were all these folks running around with little hats and vests, singing crazy songs, making her feel good, doing everything she wanted to do. I thought for a moment she had landed in one of those national political conventions. I mean, here she was asking everybody for their help, asking everything that she ever wanted, and it was given to her. You know, it's kind of like the first day you came to work, to help, at Audubon Area Community Services, Inc. "See, we told you how wonderful it was, how great it was, how much we needed your help. We didn't know what you could do, we just knew we needed help."

So everything was great and everything was wonderful. And there was Dorothy saying "Gee, everything's wonderful. How can I be so happy in this particular place?" When lo and behold they said to her, "Dorothy, we can't help you anymore if you really want to go home." Dorothy says, "Gee, I really do need to get back to Kansas." They said, "We don't have anything like Kansas." She said, "Well, there's got to be somebody who can help me. Can anybody help me get back to Kansas?" Lo and behold, nobody there knew anything about Kansas. Then they said, "But we do have this wizard who knows all, sees all, tells all. If anyone can help you get back to Kansas, well, I'm sure the Wizard can."

How many times in our lives as individuals have we looked to wizards? Sometimes we call them parents. Sometimes we call them teachers. Sometimes we call them counselors. Sometimes we call them friends. But in our lives a lot of people are looking for wizards who can solve our problems. One thing that Dorothy says is, "If I could just get back and find the magic wizard then maybe I can find the answers to my problems."

She asked, "Well, how do you get there?" And they said, "Well, just follow the yellow brick road."

How many people have you seen that follow their yellow brick road? Some will call it drugs, some will call it alcohol, others will call it fame, some will call it success, some will call it power, some will call it education; but a lot of people on their "yellow brick roads" think that if they could just get to the end, then everything's going to be wonderful. So what we find is a lot of people on "yellow brick roads" today trying to find the magic of the wizard.

Dorothy says, "How do we do that?" "Just follow this way and go down the road," they said. So she went with her dog, Toto.

As she went down the road she ran into her first "volunteer." Remember what the volunteer was? A scarecrow. Remember what he needed? A brain. Was there anybody who ever worked with you who fit that description? I mean, have you ever worked close to somebody who didn't have a brain? How many people think you're the one that doesn't have a brain?

How many times has it happened that time and time again we find out that somebody shows they "don't have a brain?" They're like the Scarecrow. All they knew was not the fact that they didn't have a brain but that they lacked experience. Like the Scarecrow, all they knew was "corn and crows;" they spent their whole life yelling at crows, yelling at corn. They didn't know anything else.

So you go to someone and you say, "We really need help;" and they'll say, "Well, we can't do that. That's the dumbest thing I ever heard of. That's going to take up too much time. I don't have enough help to do that. That's going to cost too much money. That's too big; that's too little. We tried that five years ago." So they carry on and on and on. And what do we do about those people? The same thing that happened to the Scarecrow. They get ignored.

What we have to realize is that in life there are red birds, blue birds, yellow birds and there's rye and there's wheat, and there's oats, and there's barley. There's all these wonderful things in life and it's only when we begin to share with one another and bring together the talents of the group when we share ideas and we share beliefs C and we're strong enough in our beliefs that things can be better, that we're really able to accomplish something. And so it's the experience of loving and caring that brings people together and makes things worthwhile.