Great White – "Once Bitten, Twice Shy" (1989)

My, my, my

I’m once bitten, twice shy, baby

The current edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders – “DSM-5” for short – defines obsessive-compulsive personality disorder as “a persistent pattern of preoccupation with order; perfectionism; and control of self, others, and situations.”

One of the specific indications for OCPD that’s listed in the DSM-5 is “reluctance to delegate or work with other people unless those people agree to do things exactly as the patient wants.”

Before retiring a few years ago, I was a partner at a large law firm in Washington, DC.  I was never entirely comfortable delegating tasks to other lawyers at my firm – whenever possible, I preferred to do the job personally.

I remember one particular instance when I assigned one part of a large project to a younger lawyer.  I wasn’t happy about doing that, but I was afraid that I wouldn’t be able to get the work done on time if I tried to do everything by myself.

The young associate came to me a few days before the deadline and said that wasn’t going to be able to finish his assignment on a timely basis because of other work commitments.  (Needless to say, I never used that associate again.)

My reluctance to delegate tasks is partly explained by experiences like that one.  When you put someone else in charge of doing something, you take a risk.  If they drop the ball, you can get burned – or bitten (in the words of today’s featured song).

Of course, even if that young lawyer had completed his part of the assignment on time, I probably would have felt the need to rewrite his part of the document we were preparing – not necessarily because what he had written was wrong, but because it wouldn’t have been written in the same way that I would have written it. 

In other words, my reluctance to delegate work to other lawyers resulted not only from my fear of not having control over whether a deadline would be met, but also from my perfectionism – the only person I really trusted to do the job right was me. 

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My need to control “self, others, and situations” wasn’t limited to my work life – it sometimes reared its ugly head during my leisure-time activities . . . like my weekly trivia competitions.

When I started playing trivia, my teammates were the three bartenders at the brewery where the game took place.  Because they were kept pretty busy pouring beer and running credit cards, it made sense for me to write down the answers and take them up to the host.  I always asked for my teammates’ input before deciding how to respond to a question, but it usually fell to me to make the final decision concerning what our answer would be. 

I’ve played on a number of different teams since then.  Most of the time, I’m the guy on the team who writes down the answers and turns them in to the host.  But that doesn’t mean I have control over how we answer – the process of deciding on an answer is a democratic one.  

Not being in control takes a lot of pressure off me.  If an answer turns out to be wrong, it’s not my fault – it’s the team’s mistake.  

And who would want to be on a team with a control freak who insists on making all the decisions?  Even if that person is the smartest player in the room, everyone on the team wants to feel like they are contributing.

The bottom line is that you can’t win at trivia by yourself – you need a diverse group of teammates with complementary expertise.  I have teammates who know a lot more about certain subjects than I do.  If I’m not willing to trust their answers when we have questions concerning those subjects, the team is not going to be successful.

   

One person I used to play with didn’t get that.  He was a very good player, and knew a lot that I didn’t – so we complemented each other well.  But whenever our team members had a difference of opinion concerning what our answer should be, he would get upset if I didn’t turn in the answer he preferred – he took that as a lack of respect for his knowledge.  

I found myself going with his answer more often than not when the team was split on how to respond – not because I necessarily trusted him to know an answer, but because I knew he would get all pissy if we didn’t use his answer and it turned out he was right.  In other words, I was letting my judgment be influenced by the desire to avoid having to deal with his bullsh*t.

He blew up a couple of times when we didn’t go with his answer, and that was that.  I really enjoyed that team, which consisted of an eclectic group of individuals who had come together more or less accidentally.  But he was toxic – he took the fun out of playing.  

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It took a while, but I finally cured myself of the need to be in control at trivia – not only because having one person make all the decisions isn’t the best winning strategy, but also because being part of a successful team is much more enjoyable than being a lone wolf.

But there is one aspect of trivia that I think is best handled by an enlightened despot – at least if that enlightened despot is me.

I’ll explain in the next 2 or 3 lines. 

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Click here to read my 2015 post featuring Great White’s 1989 cover of Ian Hunter’s “Once Bitten, Twice Shy.”  (You’ll give thanks if you do!)

Click here to watch the official music video for “Once Bitten, Twice Shy” – which richly deserves its place on the New York Times “15 Essential Hair Metal Videos” list.

Click here to buy “Once Bitten, Twice Shy” from Amazon.