A shepherd was herding his flock in a remote pasture
when suddenly a brand-new BMW X5 advanced out of a
dust cloud towards him. The driver, a young man in a
Broni suit, Gucci shoes, Ray Ban sunglasses and YSL
tie, leans out the window and asks the shepherd, "If I
tell you exactly how many sheep you have in your
flock, will you give me one?"
The shepherd looks at the man, obviously a yuppie,
then looks at his peacefully grazing flock and calmly
answers: "Sure. Why not?"
The yuppie parks his car, whips out his Dell notebook
computer. He connects it to his AT cell phone, surfs
to a NASA page on the Internet, where he calls up a
GPS satellite navigation system to get an exact fix on
his location. He feeds it to another NASA satellite
that scans the area in an ultra-high-resolution photo.
Then the young man opens the digital photo in Adobe
Photoshop and exports it to an image processing
facility in Hamburg, Germany. Within seconds, he
receives an email on his Palm Pilot that the image
has been processed and the data stored. He then
accesses a MS-SQL database through an ODBC connected
Excel spreadsheet with hundreds of complex formulas.
He uploads all of this data via an email on his
Blackberry and, after a few minutes, receives a
response.
Finally, he prints out a full-color, 150-page report
on his hi-tech, miniaturized HP LaserJet printer and
turns to the shepherd and says, "You have exactly 1586
sheep."
"That's right. Well, I guess you can take one of my
sheep," says the shepherd. He watches the young man
select one of the animals and looks on amused as the
young man begins to stuff it into the trunk of
his car.
Then the shepherd says to the young man: "Hey, if I
can tell you exactly what your business is, will you
give me back my sheep?" The young man thinks for a
second and then says, "Okay, why not?"
"You're a consultant," says the shepherd.
"Wow! That's correct," says the yuppie, "but how did
you guess that?"
"No guessing required," answered the shepherd. "You
showed up here even though nobody called you; you want
to get paid for an answer I already knew; to a
question I never asked; and you know nothing about my
business. Now give me back my dog."
when suddenly a brand-new BMW X5 advanced out of a
dust cloud towards him. The driver, a young man in a
Broni suit, Gucci shoes, Ray Ban sunglasses and YSL
tie, leans out the window and asks the shepherd, "If I
tell you exactly how many sheep you have in your
flock, will you give me one?"
The shepherd looks at the man, obviously a yuppie,
then looks at his peacefully grazing flock and calmly
answers: "Sure. Why not?"
The yuppie parks his car, whips out his Dell notebook
computer. He connects it to his AT cell phone, surfs
to a NASA page on the Internet, where he calls up a
GPS satellite navigation system to get an exact fix on
his location. He feeds it to another NASA satellite
that scans the area in an ultra-high-resolution photo.
Then the young man opens the digital photo in Adobe
Photoshop and exports it to an image processing
facility in Hamburg, Germany. Within seconds, he
receives an email on his Palm Pilot that the image
has been processed and the data stored. He then
accesses a MS-SQL database through an ODBC connected
Excel spreadsheet with hundreds of complex formulas.
He uploads all of this data via an email on his
Blackberry and, after a few minutes, receives a
response.
Finally, he prints out a full-color, 150-page report
on his hi-tech, miniaturized HP LaserJet printer and
turns to the shepherd and says, "You have exactly 1586
sheep."
"That's right. Well, I guess you can take one of my
sheep," says the shepherd. He watches the young man
select one of the animals and looks on amused as the
young man begins to stuff it into the trunk of
his car.
Then the shepherd says to the young man: "Hey, if I
can tell you exactly what your business is, will you
give me back my sheep?" The young man thinks for a
second and then says, "Okay, why not?"
"You're a consultant," says the shepherd.
"Wow! That's correct," says the yuppie, "but how did
you guess that?"
"No guessing required," answered the shepherd. "You
showed up here even though nobody called you; you want
to get paid for an answer I already knew; to a
question I never asked; and you know nothing about my
business. Now give me back my dog."
