"Quality Reasons" for not looking into Weaknesses

The most usual reason that I hear on why certain tasks never gets done is lack of staff....This reason is quite common in most organizations, especially in the government sector. Should we with such weakness do only what we can and forget the rest of it....?

Let's look into a scenario, a government agency staff has to conduct a number of programs every year in his district on Quit Smoking Campaign. Over time these types of programs should reduce the number of smokers among the youth....that is of course one of the many outcomes that would be expected. However when u question the staff on whether we have achieved the outcome(s), the possible reason that would be given is that to quantify such things we don't have enough man power.....

This is where one must "think outside the box"...in such lacking we should be able to create a system that make us achieve what we suppose to & not give "Quality reasons" for not doing so. If your service provider, for example water supply service were to tell you that there will be a cut in your area for the next 5 days, what would be your actions towards the failure in the current system? Are you going stop taking bath for the next 5 days? Are you going reduce water intake in your cooking? Are you going stop cleaning at home?......Most likely the answer to those questions would be "NO"....what you would have done is, create a system within the weakness (which is certainly beyond your control) by storing water with whatever means in order to reduce the variation of how things have been before the water cut....

"Quality thinking" will always take us through........NOT "Quality Reasons"