Valley Crossing

Scenario:

There are three people trying to cross a valley. The gap of the valley is in the range of one to two feet.They have a rod of a convenient size and they have to cross the valley using the rod as a support.

Assumptions : 

Each of them has the same footstep.
Direct jumping over the valley is not allowed.

Look at this you will get the idea:

 STEP BY STEP ANALYSIS OF WHOLE PROCESS:

Persons	First Person	Second Person	Third person
Step
1	Safe	Safe	Safe
2	Half Risky,
3	Full Risky,
4	Half Risky,	Half Risky,
5		Full Risky,
6		Half Risky,	Half Risky,
7			Full Risky,
8			Half Risky,
9	Safe	Safe	Safe

• Initially, the first person puts his leg forward and hid first foot remains in air and so he is only half safe. The remaining are fully safe. 
• The next step, the first person is totally unsafe and he has hang from the rod, which is being supported by the other two with their weight. 
• The next step, the first person puts its first foot on the other side of the valley and hence half safe again. The second person now puts his first foot in air and hence even he is half safe. 
• At the end of next step, the first person totally reaches the other end of the valley and hence is totally safe again. The second person is totally unsafe hanging in the air with the support of the rod weighted by the first and third persons. 
• Next step, the second person puts his first step on the other side of the valley and the third person puts his first step in the air and hence both are half safe.
• At the end of next step, the third person reaches the other end of the valley and hence totally safe again. The third person remains hanging in the air supported by the first two persons who have reached the other end of the valley. 
• After two more steps, even the third person reaches the other end of the valley and the mission has been accomplished.

Lessons Learned:

Role Designing: 

In role designing manager has to think of specified roles for every team member.Roles which are connected one to the other is interlocked and the success of the whole task is dependent on this success of this concept. Here in this exercise, member roles for crossing the valley are interlocked. It is the ability of the management to think the roles in such  a way. 

 Watch how every player has a specific role in  a football match:

 

 WORK PLANNING

It emphasizes the fact that staff clearly have a crucial understanding of the work that needs to be done, and how their individual or group effort contributes to the system.

 

 In Valley crossing process every member must know the instructions for them so that the assigned task can be completed without any confusion and hindrance.

Team work:

Valley crossing explicitly explains the concept of team work i.e. cooperation, coordination etc. The members have to match their steps, walk in tandem to achieve the desired result. If there had been slight deviation in the synchronization then it would have led to some hiccups.

Name : Mohit Sharma

Roll No : 218

                                      TOWER BUILDING : LEARNING WITH A DIFFERENCE

“Our greatest weakness lies in giving up. The most certain way to succeed is always to try just one more time.”   Thomas Edison

Tower building exercise is a very unique and effective way to learn various Principles of Management if you look at it from the right perspective.

WHAT IS TOWER BUILDING EXERCISE ??

According to me it is a Team Building exercise which gives the participants first hand experience of how Management styles effects the performance of the Team.

Check out this video here and you will get some insight into Tower Building. Here in this video the tower building exercise is been performed in a class.


TAKE AWAY FROM TOWER BUILDING EXERCISE....

 It gives you a chance to see different managerial styles in action

I ll explain this point with the example from our class.Our Professor Dr. Prasad, full of exuberance and a very different style, comes to a student in class and say..."Oh I love this guy, great smile and very enthusiastic" and then ask him "chal jaa mere sher samne jaa ke blocks bana le"(go my boy build the blocks in front of the class).
The guy will leap on the opportunity as he has already been filled with all the confidence he requires and will put more than 20 block on one another in a flash.

This shows that  if provided with right motivation and perspective one can achieve more than he or she is capable of.

If you are still not able to get it then watch this , this video will present a different view of motivation in management.

It generates live, behavioral data that you and your group can really work on.

 "You there boy come in front and perform this tower building exercise"


 When you do it in front of your class where 70 to 80 people are staring at you consistently and someone is saying to the person sitting next to him  "arrey assan hai yaar , ek ke upar ek lagana hee to hai"(its quite easy all you have to do put one block on another)  on top of it  your professor who is putting all the efforts to try and teach you something out of it comes and stand right behind you to see what you are conjuring up on that podium.Suddenly you will start seeing those steady hands of yours trembling and the blocks slipping on one another.

So while you are feeling like that cloth which is been beaten constantly on a rock of Dhobi Ghat , observers of this activity are learning something very important. A simple task like putting a block on one another turned out to be a crucifying experience for you because of the environmental settings you have been put into leading towards the fact that when expectations are set and they are set high that is when pressure gets on to your nerves.


Learning From this example:
This exercise  helped me to understand that setting of goal prior to any task is a very tricky business if done properly it can lead you to perform better than you thought and if not then you will find yourselves struggling to put  blocks on one another with your trembling hands.



One more thing to learn out of this exercise as a whole is that when you start looking at  things differently you can squeeze a lot of juice out of it . Example here is the Tower building exercise in itself which is nothing more than block building but if looked out from the perspective of management learning it has a lot of fundas hidden in it.

"You can not turn a bathroom singer into a music maestro but then you can always get a radio channel where they play songs from bathroom singers only"

Name : Mohit Sharma

Roll No : 218

KHAN ACADEMY and Principles

"Cynicism will eat at your energy and potential, and to fight it, you should smile with every atom in your body” by Salman Khan founder of Khan Academy.

 WHAT IS KHAN ACADEMY ?

TAG LINE : A free world-class education for anyone anywhere.

The Khan Academy is an organization on a mission. They are a not-for-profit with the goal of changing education for the better by providing a free world-class education to anyone anywhere.
All of the site's resources are available to anyone. It doesn't matter if you are a student, teacher, home-schooler, principal, adult returning to the classroom after 20 years, or a friendly alien just trying to get a leg up in earthly biology. The Khan Academy's materials and resources are available to you completely free of charge.

Here is the insight into what khan academy is doing.

FROM THE PERSPECTIVE OF MANAGEMENT PRINCIPLES WHAT WE HAVE LEARNED FROM ABOVE INTRODUCTION ?

First : Goal setting is the key to portray your Idea to the world effectively.

Khan academy is clear that they are looking to change the education for the better  by providing a free world-class education to anyone anywhere and they are stating that unabashedly.

Principle of management says about Importance of Goal Setting that:

          

             Goal Setting forms an integral part of all the practices carried out in organizations in today's world. Goals represent in a quantitative/qualitative form the various expectations managers have of their subordinates. It's an effective tool for making progress within the organization as well as helping the organization itself to grow.

 Using the similar strategy Khan academy has set for itself a goal which is providing propellant for this organization and helped the organization to reach the you tube video count from 800 to over 11760 videos.

 Here is a video which tells the growth story of Khan Academy.

 "There is an iron law of responsibility which states that in long run those who do not use power in a manner that society considers responsible will tend to lose" by Keith Davis


Second : Social responsibility and Business ethics can provide a company leverage to grow beyond its imagination.


Khan academy is growing day by day and  increasing its customer base because all of the khan academy site resources are available to anyone.Its course content is being accessed by a student, teacher, home-schooler , principal or anyone who is inquisitive.

 Principle of management says about Social responsibility and Business ethics that:

          A company will be seen as socially responsible if it operates in an open and accountable manner, uses its resources for productive ends, complies with regulatory environment and acknowledges and take responsibility for its actions.

           In view of concept of Enlightened self interest which states that "It is in the enlightened self interest of organizations to be socially responsible - or at least responsible to social forces.

Khan academy is funded by donations.Khan Academy is a not-for-profit organization, now with significant backing from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and Google.

Facts about finances-

• Several people have made US$10,000 contributions; 
•  Ann and John Doerr gave $100,000; 
•  Khan academy's total revenue is about $150,000 in donations. 
• Additionally, it also earned $2,000 a month from ads on the Web site in 2010, until Khan Academy ceased to accept advertising. 
• In 2010, Google announced it would give the Khan Academy $2 million for creating more courses and for translating the core library into the world’s most widely spoken languages, as part of their Project .

Name : Mohit Sharma

Roll No : 218