Who Moved My Cheese, By Spencer Johnson

This report is being written for the Leadership Development Program, instructed by Jean Hanna. Who Moved My Cheese was written by Spencer Johnson in 1998 and was a #1 New York Times bestseller. The book was published by Putnam Adult and has 64 pages, not including the introduction. The book’s author, Spencer Johnson, has also authored many short stories for children called The Value Tales and co-authored The One Minute Manager, which has won great renown in most professional lives. While this book was on the required reading list for the LDP, I have wanted to read it for some time to see why the book has received so much recognition. The main characters for the book are Sniff, Scurry, Hem, and Haw. Sniff and Scurry are simple minded mice
Michael tells his friends about a little story that changed his life and his professional direction. He tells the story of a foreign world where the main characters are trapped within a maze. They do not know how long they have been in the maze, nor how they found themselves to live in it, but they do not question their existence within the book’s text. The mice are always prepared to go on the move and find more cheese once a supply is exhausted. Even if they find a large supply of cheese, they will continue to keep their running shoes over their shoulders until it is either time to go home or a supply is exhausted. The little people grew comfortable once they found a large supply and then became arrogant that they would never again go hungry or tired from finding their cheese. When the cheese supply finally ran out at Cheese Station C, Sniff and Scurry ran on to find a new hoard while Hem and Haw stayed waiting for the cheese to come back or find out where it was being hidden. Hem could not process the fact that the cheese is gone and sits woefully in the empty station, while Haw realizes that the cheese will never come back and goes on an adventure alone to find the New Cheese. While on his adventure, Haw discovers portions of himself that he either forgotten or never new and began enjoying the discovery within the maze. The adventure ends with Haw finding
The second portion goes, “…But we so often look so long and regretfully upon the closed door, that we do not see the ones which open for us.” This quote succinctly and nicely takes the entire book and places it into a single sentence. After Haw realizes that there will be no more cheese at Cheese Station C, he laughs at himself for forgetting the endless possibilities that the maze may provide and puts his running shoes back on to explore the unknown. I believe in the past I resembled Sniff the most; I would look for a topic that seemed beneficial or on the cutting edge and pursue it relentlessly until I found my “cheese”. In my professional life, the Sub-Assembly department has completely changed. We no longer run the same processes we ran a year ago and the type of work we are doing is completely different. After a few weeks of all Team Leaders and Supervisors trying to stay hemmed in on what they used to do, we shouldered down and came to peace with our new cheese. This book would have been very appropriate for me 8 months ago when we were beginning to test the changes and implement new ideas, I believe it should be read by any person getting ready to go through a transitional phase. Perhaps this will be my daughter’s new nighttime story before her little sibling