Never Grab the Lowest Hanging Fruit

2011 February 10

by Tyler

I overheard this a few weeks ago:

Anyone can grab the lowest hanging fruit.

I believe there’s a lot of truth to the statement. It is incredibly easy to sink to the lowest common denominator, but once you go there you become no different.

I think this show itself all over the place in life. Just because someone always tries to pick an argument with you doesn’t mean you have to join in. I see this principle come out in blogging, on cable news, and especially in politics. Going after the lowest hanging fruit will get you loads of hits on your blog, it will stir up controversy to get you ratings, and it might get you another term in office. But it doesn’t mean the lowest hanging fruit is the right thing to eat.

I have issues with this all the time. I’m extremely competitive. More than I love winning, I hate losing. So I tend to go after the lowest hanging fruit just to prove that I’m better, when in reality I often prove myself to be no different than it.

But trust me.

Anyone can grab the lowest hanging fruit.

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CYD

So if low hanging fruit is not necessarily a good thing, what does that make the fruit that’s dropped on the ground? Does the fruit being ripe or not have anything to do with your perception on this analogy?

In my opinion, The idea of low hanging fruit is high benefit at low cost. The quick wins, so to speak. If it is not right, then is it still a win?
http://www.manofdepravity.com Tyler

For me, lowest hanging fruit isn’t necessarily bad, just that anyone can grab it so a person’s goal should always be to have higher standards.

As far as the fruit on the ground, I have no idea how that fits in this.
http://www.dadlife.net kevin

We used that same terminology at my old job. When sales people would go after weak candidates to make placements (we were a staffing company), we called it going after low-hanging fruit. It was easy to do, but the best sales people avoided it…and they always had better numbers than those were willing to take the easy route and do enough to get by.

Good stuff.