Valley Crossing Exercise Valley Crossing Exercise – Yet another exercise to understand management concepts! “Valley Crossing Exercise” is a very useful management exercise to understand the importance of teamwork. Teamwork is a mixture of action process, interpersonal process and transition period in between. Teamwork consists of leadership, team formation, team norms, outcome interdependence, competition and cooperation. Teamwork can lead to better decisions, products or services. The following image clearly depicts why teamwork is so much useful and what it can lead to: As can be seen in the above image, when multiple people work as part of a team, the overall output obtained is much higher than the one obtained by working individually. Explanation of valley crossing exercise through a picture is as below: Understanding from the exercise: · Three people who are one side of a valley have to cross the valley using a rod. The gap between the valleys is more than one step long but less than two steps. At any time, all the three people have to hold the rod and using synchronous movements, cross the valley. · Any person, while on top of the valley (the “risky” position to be in) will be supported by other two people. All the three members here have interchanging roles in the completion of task. As can be noticed in the above image, all the three members have equal distribution of risky, half-risky and safe situations. · The success of this exercise will depend upon how closely the three people work as part of a team, coordinate and communicate with each other through sound/signals and follow a synchronous movement. Management lessons learnt from this exercise: Responsibility: Everyone in an organization should feel equally responsible to achieve the objectives of the organization. Task can only be completed successfully if everyone in the team works collectively and in a responsible way. Planning: Proper planning is required to be done for initiating any task so that the task is completed on time. In the valley crossing exercise, the plan was already formulated by the team members in the way they would cross the valley (take 9 steps with alternate and synchronous movement of left and right leg). The plan should be focused on how we can leverage our strength as a team. Communication: Effective communication is very much essential for the success of the team and the organization and as it has been proven in this exercise. Synchronous movements by communicating with each other through sounds/skills were very much essential for the success of this exercise. Trust: Organizations cannot be successful if there is no element of trust in it. As in the case of valley exercise, a person was ready to cross the valley while being in a “risky” and “half-risky” state only because he/she trusted the other members in the team. Similarly, in an organization, managers and employees need to trust each other. Defined roles and responsibilities: Roles and responsibilities need to be clearly defined for each and every individual in an organization since then, they will be aware of the kind of work that is expected from them. Valley crossing exercise was successful since each member knew when to move their leg (either left or right) and that it should be in sync with the other members of the team.

Valley Crossing Exercise

Valley Crossing Exercise – Yet another exercise to understand management concepts! 

“Valley Crossing Exercise” is a very useful management exercise to understand the  importance of teamwork. Teamwork is a mixture of action process, interpersonal process and transition period in between. Teamwork consists of leadership, team formation, team norms, outcome interdependence, competition and cooperation. Teamwork can lead to better decisions, products or services.

The following image clearly depicts why teamwork is so much useful and what it can lead to:

  

As can be seen in the above image, when multiple people work as part of a team, the overall output obtained is much higher than the one obtained by working individually.

Explanation of valley crossing exercise through a picture is as below: 

Understanding from the exercise:

·         Three people who are one side of a valley have to cross the valley using a rod. The gap between the valleys is more than one step long but less than two steps. At any time, all the three people have to hold the rod and using synchronous movements, cross the valley.

·         Any person, while on top of the valley (the “risky” position to be in) will be supported by other two people. All the three members here have interchanging roles in the completion of task. As can be noticed in the above image, all the three members have equal distribution of risky, half-risky and safe situations.

·         The success of this exercise will depend upon how closely the three people work as part of a team, coordinate and communicate with each other through sound/signals and follow a synchronous movement.

Management lessons learnt from this exercise:

Responsibility:

      Everyone in an organization should feel equally responsible to achieve the objectives of the organization. Task can only be completed successfully if everyone in the team works collectively and in a responsible way.

Planning:

Proper planning is required to be done for initiating any task so that the task is completed on time. In the valley crossing exercise, the plan was already formulated by the team members in the way they would cross the valley (take 9 steps with alternate and synchronous movement of left and right leg). The plan should be focused on how we can leverage our strength as a team.

Communication:

      Effective communication is very much essential for the success of the team and the organization and as it has been proven in this exercise. Synchronous movements by communicating with each other through sounds/skills were very much essential for the success of this exercise.

Trust:

      Organizations cannot be successful if there is no element of trust in it. As in the case of valley exercise, a person was ready to cross the valley while being in a “risky” and “half-risky” state only because he/she trusted the other members in the team. Similarly, in an organization, managers and employees need to trust each other.

 Defined roles and responsibilities:

      Roles and responsibilities need to be clearly defined for each and every individual in an organization since then, they will be aware of the kind of work that is expected from them. Valley crossing exercise was successful since each member knew when to move their leg (either left or right) and that it should be in sync with the other members of the team.

Three monks - A movie to teach productivity and team work

Three monks - A movie which teaches productivity and team work

In the next class, Dr. Mandi taught us a management lesson by showing a Chinese animated short film. Three monks is a famous 20 minute animated short film by famous director in 1980. Movie is based on a proverb , “One monk will shoulder two buckets of water, two monks will share the load, but add a third and no one will want to fetch water". This short film has won many awards as listed below.

·         Won the outstanding film award at China's Ministry of Culture.

·         Won the Best animated film prize at the first Golden Rooster Awards in 1981.

·         Won four international awards including a Silver Bear for Short Film at the 32nd Berlin Film Festival in 1982.

Here I am narrating the story briefly.

Monk 1

Story starts in a monastery on top of a hill. There is only water source(Lake) in the bottom of the hill. He fetches two buckets of water daily from the lake. He uses a stick to balance the buckets in his shoulder by fastening them in two ends of stick. He performs his routine work of bringing water from the lake to the hilltop and fills the water in a bottle with a small plant near god. He chants mantras daily and a rat comes in the night to steal food and disturbs him.’

Monk 2

Second monk came to monastery, first monk offers him water. The second monk consumes the whole water. Now he realised that it’s his duty to bring the water again and continued it for some days. Second monk now realised that first monk has taken advantage of him and didn’t fetch the water. Now they both felt the work should be equally divided. Hence they decided to bring single bucket of water by single stick. As the second monk is tall, the weight of the bucket is not balanced. They both suggested methods which are favour to themselves but both didn’t agree. They come up with a standard solution of measuring the centre of the stick to tie the rope of bucket which allowed the equal distribution of load to both of them.

Monk 3

The third monk has come to monastery and drank all the water. Other two insisted him to bring the water from lake. After bringing water from lake to hilltop, third monk drinks the whole water again. All three monks starts telling the others to bring and fill the water but nobody fetch water. Hence they had no water. They chanted mantras and slept.

That night a rat came out and hit the candle which resulted in fire in monastery. In chaos, they started bringing water randomly and confused about how to reduce the fire. Finally they come up with an innovative idea of using the pulley in hilltop to bring the water down from the lake directly. One monk stands near the lake to fill water in bucket. Other pulls up the bucket to the hilltop. Third one takes the water from pulley to monastery.

Management lessons learnt from three monk story.

Productivity = output / input

Single monk carried two buckets of water with much energy than two monks carrying single bucket. This implies that if the team work increase the productivity of work will increase. Following table brings out the  productivity measurement of team work by three monks.

Practical thinking

When two monks carried a single bucket of water, weight distribution to them was not correct because of height of monks. Tall monk came with a solution to measure the distance of rope by palm. But short monk didn’t agree because it’s a subjective solution. Finally they agreed to find the centre of stick by an object. Practical and pragmatic thinking is necessary to achieve solution for any problem.

Innovation

When the third monk entered, there was a chaos of fetching the water by monks. After the fire in monastery , monks find out the importance of team work and came up with an innovative idea to use the pulley to bring the water in hilltop. All three monks had respective roles to them in fetching water. Their satisfaction was achieved by teamwork and innovation. Efforts needed was brought down drastically by this idea.

Dr. Mandi has made us to realise the importance of teamwork, innovation, pragmatic thinking in an organisation with his unique teaching skills.

Theory “ X” and Theory “Y” managers.

            This lecture focused mainly on the types of managers and their behavior based on various situations. Douglas McGregor Managers created and developed two type of theories for managers.

Theory “X” Managers

These managers think that employees are lazy and avoid work. They also think employees will work only under close supervision and control over them. Managerial hierarchy will narrow down in each level by a single point of control above them. This theory x managers,  not only create counter -productive environment within the organisation but also create a undesirable situation in the work place for the employees. This lack of positive thinking in managers will not produce the final product and lead to the dis-satisfactory performance of the entire team including manager.

Theory “Y” Managers

In this type, managers believe that employees are ambitious and self-motivated. They also think that employees will learn to work with responsibility, self-control, and passion to accomplish the goal. This creates a friendly work condition in workplace and leads to the self-satisfaction among the employees. Employees are awarded and recognised for their performance which results in the achievement of common objective in the organisation. Here employees growth and trust built among the team will create good work environment.

Employees are classified into two categories. Those are lazy employees and good employees. This results in four situations in a workplace.

Situation one:

Employees and managers are type “X”. This means employees are lazy and manager thinks that they are lazy. Here they possibility of motivating the employees to accomplish the task will not be possible because of the theory x manager. This is a failure of a manager which will lead to very little scope for growth of an organization

Situation two:

Employees are good but they manager think that they are lazy. This situation might have happened to many of the employees in the work place. Lack of communication between employees and manager will create delay to perform the task. Employees will not be recognized for their performance and this will demotivate them which ultimately force the employees to search various other opportunities for a better workplace.

Situation three:

                In this situation, managers are “Y” category but they employees are lazy.  Here managers regularly motivate employees to complete the task and he believes in every one of the employees that they have hidden potential in them which needs to be identified and motivated. This situation has high probability of putting the team in right track to achieve the goal. And it also motivates many less productive employees which ultimately results in the improvement of workforce in the organisation.

Situation four:

                This is the ideal situation of both employees and managers are hardworking, motivated and responsible to achieve the common goal set by the organisation. This situation seldom exists, but journey of an every organisation should be towards this ideal work environment. Here people will be more productive with job satisfaction.

                These categories of managers and employees also teach us a lesson in our life …..that is “Be positive”……..

Tower building – An exercise to understand team management

Second lecture of POM started with an exercise to understand the goal setting and execution of a task in an effective and efficient way. For a manager goal setting is the important parameter when he motivates and judges his team members and to perform the task with them.  Tower building activity was conducted in the class to understand major designations in a team with the relationship between supervisory, planning and execution. Entire class was asked to participate in the activity. Highest bidder got the opportunity to build the tower whereas the next volunteer got the supervision role. Other 7 odd members were supposed to guide the supervisor in the building activity with the various analyses to build the tower as high as possible.

Step 1:

All the students in the class were asked to quote the number of cubes to be mounted in a single base tower and the range varied from 15 to 25 blocks. Task was not an easy one as we need to build it blindfolded.  Situation here explained that fact where interested people invest money to accomplish common goal by setting up an entity with sheer determination. Bidding money to build the tower shows the risk taking ability has to be shown to involve in any business.

Step 2:

Now the group of students were ready to perform the task. Here comes the important concept of goal setting as it needs a clear objective, limitations, knowing the resources available and external factors. Goal setting also helps to decide the structure of the organisation before the execution
1.       Work force  - Blind folded student has to perform the activity of building the tower
2.       Midlevel Management – student who helps to blindfolded guy to help building thetower.he is responsible to give the direction, short term goals, explain the objective, maintain the timeline, and optimum use of resources.
3.       Top management – group of people who plan the strategies , stream line the thought process, understand the competition, analysing external factors, reorganizing the objectives based on time, and evaluate the performance of workforce.

Step 3:

At the end of activity, everybody learnt the importance of team work, communication, analysis of situation, estimate of resources, and supervision. Most importantly sense of achievement, association of people, share of appreciation within team and  feedbacks help the team and organization to grow in a healthy and focused manner.

Lessons from the activity:

1.       Top management is responsible to show the direction of the company to accomplish the task. Hence they should be clear about the goal and various factors associated with it and they should be ready to enhance the mission and vision of company based on time.
2.       Middle management should be approachable and understand the difficulties faced by the workforce. They need to bridge gap between workforce and top management.
3.       Workforce is the people who perform the real work with the sense of responsibility towards the organisation by following the instructions from mid-level management.
    

My first blog about the first class in NITIE !!!!!!

God's own campus “NITIE” welcomed me with a mesmerising weather. I relaxed and settled in hostel .Met many batch mates and enjoyed an outing in Mumbai roads in the heavy rain.In the first day, Lots of questions in mind about the classmates, professors, exams, and how will we cope up with the college environment after three years.

Then, Checked the timetable and started the journey up above the 96 steps with lots of hope, lots of dreams and with the curiosity about how the life at NITIE would be….. First day, it was a 1st lecture by Dr.T.Prasad (who is famously known us Dr.Mandi) ,came to the class with a charm, opened his bag. He gave two balls and two toys to the students and asked us to play. Reason behind that activity was revealed later.

In his lecture, I learnt two important lessons to remember throughout the life in NITIE,

1. I believe all the students agree that it’s a high time to go to parents asking for financial support except emergency. My responsibility is to earn the total expenditure of the two years while studying. I agree with this idea, all the students had left a good job or had a good job offer before coming to NITIE. Now also We have the potential to earn then why not now…..Two years of MBA is not only about the classroom then why not to explore the world with immense opportunities outside!!!! He made me to realize the fact of “Aaj ki roti aaj hi kamaana” (earn on daily basis for livelihood). If not we are nothing less than a beggar who spends the money which is not ours.

2. Dr. Mandi’s mantra :- "Socho Becho, Becho Seekho, Seekho Socho!! "

These words inspires us to
Socho - innovate and think with the open mind to identify, explore the abundant opportunities.
Becho – Develop the ideas and equip them to earn
Seekho – Continuous learning by the experience gained by thinking and earning.

And there was one activity for two students to sell the toys given by professor to each other which made us to realize the importance of being informed about what we do and how we do it. We are told about the science and maths principles in those toys.

For example, Butterfly toy had a circular hole using which it can be mounted on a tip of pen. This explained the center of gravity principle.

This concept is used in “Mandi” event where students sell products in local markets. This created a huge enthusiasm and response from the students and professors across the b schools.
All the students were asked to share our everyday experiences and learning of POM class in blogs. If all the students write blogs, then we can educate millions of deprived students. Thanks to Dr.Mandi who made me to write blogs and I admire his unique way to teaching with passion. This is just the first day one experience. Stay tuned for regular updates on principles of organisation and management.