The story
of three Monks!
An epitome to learn true teamwork!
How can a
teacher, a professor or for that matter a mentor teach you what team work
really is? I supposed myself in Dr. Mandi’s place, and then I imagined that if I
have to teach this concept of team work. Actually speaking that my mind was in
a baffled state that how can this simple concept or rather a concept which
appears to be simple be taught! But since I always believe that Dr. Mandi is
like a magic man, who comes out with something extremely bohemian at times and
like always he didn’t let me down even this timeJ.
The concept and
insight of team work was explained to us thru this video. I recommend that
anyone who is going to read this entire article must watch this video first and
then proceed.
Now let’s get
into the individual cases shown in this video.
There are three
monks that are shown in this video, which are as follows:
·
The little monk (M1): inherently naughty, not lethargic towards work but avoids excess
work.
·
The Taller monk (M2): again not lethargic but dominating and wants everyone must
work.
·
The Fat monk (M1): A team member that would work properly but at the end wants
the bigger share of pie.
So the story goes
something like this:
Scene 1:
A monastery is located on a
cliff top, below the cliff there flows a river which is by far the only source
of water available and if anyone needs water, that person must take the vessel
to the river, fill it and then quench his/her need. In the beginning it is
shown that M1 is sitting in the monastery and doing his daily activities,
therein he suddenly realises that the flower pot which is kept in front of
GOD’s image is falling short of water. M1 immediately recognizes it and go and
collect the water. This shows that he doesn’t only care about himself but also
about the monastery on the whole. Then as per his daily way of living, he
continues with his prayers and then goes to sleep.
Lessons from Scene 1:
1.
Everyone has inherent ability to work.
2.
Whenever there is a need in the
system, then people in the system always tend to work for the need.
Scene 2:
Then enters M2,
the guys who is portrayed to be a little matured and can take good decisions at
times. We see that as he reaches the monastery, he drinks water to quench his
thirst. But as soon as he realises that there no more water left in the
container, he immediately takes M1 along to arrange for water. But like we all
know that the system must be designed in such a way that work would be done
irrespective of the height or weight or body structure of the persons doing it.
But here when two of them are trying to bring filled buckets back, they enter
into an altercation as the weight was not evenly distributed among the two.
They just stop in the middle of the way and sit down. M1 tried to show the midpoint
thru his yard length, then immediately M2 showed him his yard length and gave
another midpoint. The altercation was finally terminated by M1 when he showed a
stick and thru that stick they could find a better point to be called as
midpoint in coherence.
Lessons from Scene 2:
1)
Whenever there is a new entrant in the
existing system, there got to be some degree of turbulence in the system.
2)
There would be solutions from every
end, but there would also be counter questions from other ends.
3)
But the best thing is that there is
always a positive and optimum solution available and that is generally
universally accepted.
Scene 3:
The entry of a
little lethargic M3, the team member who will definitely work equivalent to
everyone else in the group, but wants a bigger share of the pie. That is his
desire and needs are on higher side compared to others. As he reaches the monastery,
he finishes all the water available. When he goes to fill another lot, he
finishes it again due to tiredness!
This leaves everyone’s
mind in a confused state that how work would be done? At this point there is confusion
about finding the way to do the work!
Lessons from Scene 3:
1)
There are instances of highest turbulence
in the system at times wherein there are no option gates available.
2)
In those cases even the most
innovative and complex solutions turns out meaning less.
3)
The need to solve this complex problem
is not a complex solution but a simple one. We need to bring the team together.
How will this be done, let’s find out further!
Scene 4:
All three are
sitting alone, angry with each other no signal that they are going to come
together. Then the thing that is really worth a watch that everyone is keeping
a stock for themselves without worrying about others. This is a very dangerous
situation for a team when team members are not thinking about other team
members. In the middle of all this what really is another point of concern that
M1 takes the small left over water that was otherwise getting used for a very
important reason. When it starts to rain, all three thought of taking a short
cut of using rain water, but as they set up the system, the rain stopped. The
team work is still not established and the biggest concern.
Lessons from Scene 4:
1)
The entire system breaks without
proper coherence among the team members.
2)
There is no short cut in achieving any
target.
3)
There is a basic requirement of
coherence among the group in case the members wish to attain a team status.
Final Scene:
In the final
scene we get to know that how GOD (as per my understanding the manager here!)
creates the situation in which all the 3 monks comes together and portrays only
their positives and leaves behind all the negativity associated with the
situation. It also portrays that in case of emergency situation which happens
to be fire in this case, plays a vital role in bringing all the 3 monks
together and work in harmony and coherence. They even get to set a full-fledged
system in the end in the system which is:
a)
Simple to understand.
b)
Imbibed all three monks with equal efforts.
c)
Independent of size, shape or
structure of the monks.
d)
Crisp and juicy.
Learning from Final Scene:
1)
Teamwork if not there can be built by
making situation in such a way that it attracts a common interest for everyone!
2)
Work should be backed with a vision
which must be juicy, rosy, inspirational and unachievable.
3)
Final structure’s efficiency can be
achieved only when there is 100% team effort involved.
So
all in all team effort has following traits:
1.
Effective team has both values and
norms.
2.
Have members that both respect and
trust each other.
3.
Effective team has tried and true
method of problem solving.
4.
Agrees on each member’s role in the
team.
5.
Members have complementary skill sets.
6.
Celebrate success together, and share
both praise and blames.
7.
Members are other oriented rather than
self-oriented.
8.
Members have sense of belonging
towards work.
9.
Members embrace need when they need
to.
