一个萝卜一个坑

一個蘿蔔一個坑
yīgeluóboyīgekēng
idiom

Meanings

  1. 1 every turnip to its hole
  2. 2 each person has their own role
  3. 3 one position per person, no slack

Examples

Wǒmen gōngsī yī ge luó bo yī ge kēng, méiyǒu duōyú de rén.
Our company has no spare manpower — one person per slot.
Zhè zhǒng gōngzuò yī ge luó bo yī ge kēng, qǐngjià dōu méi rén tì.
This kind of job has one person per slot — no one to cover if you take leave.
Tā zuòshì yī ge luó bo yī ge kēng, fēicháng tāshi.
He does things methodically, one task at a time.

Tips

memory
Imagine a farmer's turnip patch: each turnip fits in exactly one hole. No extras, no overlap. That's the image — tight, exact, no redundancy.
usage
Two flavors: (1) describing staffing with no redundancy (often complaining), (2) praising someone who does each task carefully and in order without jumping around.

Stroke Order

luó
kēng