When You Come to a Fork in the Road....Wisdom from Yogi Brerra

Yogi Berra was known for is “Yogi-isms” – things he said that seem to make little sense. One of the favorites: “If you don’t go to someone’s funeral, he won’t go to yours.”

I happen like one of his Yogi-isms. He said: “When you reach a fork in the road, take it.”

Yogi was an 18-time All-Star and won 10 World Series championships as a player – more than any other player in history. His lifetime batting average was .285. To give you a sense of how good that is, the batting average of all major league baseball players in 2024 was .243. 

It takes a 90-mph fastball 400 milliseconds, about the length of a blink of an eye to reach home plate. Thus, when Yogi came to the fork in the road of whether to swing at a pitch or let it pass, he was ready.  His training, his experience, and his strategic insights prepared him. 

When our organization reaches a fork in the road, when the environment in which our organization operates changes dramatically or when local, national, or world event, changes our realities in an instant, will be able to determine the best fork in the road to follow or will we be checking off items on our task list?

When we’re doing our job, there’s a checklist. Instructions. Deniability. Sooner or later, we have to do our jobs, but it probably pays to focus on our work.

Our work makes change happen.

Our work is our responsibility and our opportunity.

Our job requires answering questions. Our works give us a chance to ask them.

(Grodin, Seth, This is Strategy: Making Better Plans, Authors Equity, New York, NY, 2024, #89)

DIRaphael Consulting©2025