I participated in an interesting exercise with the head of a university mathematics department once Grad students were brought in and asked what things they would like changed in the department. They made many thoughtful observations Afterward, the Head complained extensively that these problems were rather trivial. Indeed, they were - for him. But not for the students He then spent much of the next two days complaining about things that would have been easy for his Dean or other superiors to change, but which were difficult or impossible for him Related: I once talked to the leading Anglican Archbishop in Australian, who said that from the level of parish priest on up, he always thought the solution to his problems was a promotion. And so it was... except he'd eventually realized that his old problems were always replaced by something far more difficult