January 13; Knowledge Can Save A Business
MANAGEMENT BY THE BOOK:
365 Daily Bible Verse &
One-Minute Management Lessons For The Busy Faithful

13 January

my people are destroyed for a lack of knowledge.

Hosea 4:6

Need to Know

Your Business Professor served in combat arms in the Armored Cavalry where our mission was to be the eyes and ears forward of the main fighting unit.

It was my job to supply information to my boss of where the enemy was and where he was going.   We were a dashing group. Imagining ourselves to be like the horse-cavalry riding to the rescue.

But the cavalry does not always show up in time. Sometimes they get lost.

Confederate General Robert E. Lee was desperate for knowledge at the beginning of the Battle of Gettysburg in the summer of 1863. He was concerned about the location of the slow-moving General George Meade who commanded the Union forces as they marched though Northern Maryland and southern Pennsylvania.

J. E. B. Stuart, Lee’s dashing Cavalry officer was aggressive and impulsive – and was valued as an officer who could command troops. But, as we might say today, he was a Free Spirit.

Lee sent Stuart to find Meade and the location of the main body of the Union Army. Stuart’s responsibility with his mounted soldiers was to provide the critical intelligence on Meade’s movements. But the Confederate Cavalry leader did not. Stuart got distracted by capturing a wagon train of supplies in the countryside. He failed to keep Lee informed on Meade’s position. Absent this knowledge General Lee was blind on the battlefield.

This enabled Meade to occupy a sound defensive position – the good ground – forcing Lee to attack. The Confederate army was defeated at Gettysburg.

General Lee’s Army was on a path to defeat for a lack of information—he could not see his way to victory.

Hosea 4:6 says that my people are destroyed for a lack of knowledge. 

An army, a people, a company can be lost without information. A CEO can only make a decision with actionable intelligence.

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