Efficient or effective?

I think we could all agree that God will hold us accountable for the things we accomplish or fail to accomplish while on this earth. My question that I pose today is, “Should we focus on accomplishing our work, how well we carry out the work or accomplishing our work well?”

I think we could all agree that God will hold us accountable for the things we accomplish or fail to accomplish while on this earth. My question that I pose today is, “Should we focus on accomplishing our work, how well we carry out the work or accomplishing our work well?”

If you have not read the parable of the Ten Minas recently, please take time to do so before reading on. The reference is Luke 19:11-27.

I want to focus on verses 13, 16 & 17. In these verses, the nobleman gives each slave or steward a Mina, leaves on his journey and returns to them. Upon his return, the first steward tells the nobleman his one Mina had made 10 more Minas upon which the slave was rewarded with authority over ten cities.

The real question I want to pursue is: “Should we be concerned with being effective, efficient or both?”
To begin answering this question we must set some parameters. For our purposes here, I want to distinguish between the two. “Effectiveness,” is getting the desired results. The key is completion. With “efficiency,” we’re looking more at how the results were achieved. Was the best method used in order to reach the finish line? Usually there is an element of time involved, or sometimes we can look at how other resources played into the equation. If you look at a finished project, and it’s clear that something valuable was wasted in the process—like time, energy, opportunities, or money—then you probably have a good example of inefficiency.

The slaves were rewarded or not rewarded based on their effectiveness. The servant who earned 10 additional was given charge of 10 cites, and the one who earned 5 more was given charge of 5 cities. The effectiveness of the first servant doubled that of the second servant. Jesus is instructing us to be productive with the money He allocates to us—as well as the time, talent, and opportunities he has put before us.

However, if we take a look at the minas, a few of you probably would ask, “But how long was the money invested?” Good question. That was my first thought. I calculated a few returns based on differing times. If the man of noble birth in the parable was gone for five years, the first servant’s return would be 61.54% per annum. If he were gone 10 years, 27.1%; 20 years, 12.74%; and 30 years, 8.32%. A time frame is not given, but I’m going to assume it’s ten years or less—probably much less. In the parable, the nobleman’s words and rewards to the faithful stewards seem to indicate they had done something really outstanding, and the 20- and 30-year returns, while nothing to sneeze at, are pretty close to what one would expect from an investment during normal economic times. I believe these guys did it in a much shorter time span. I believe the stewards effectiveness was definitely taken into account in their reward!

In my next post, I will explore this question a little further but how would I answer the question of “Efficient or effective?” I say both!