Three Monks No Water

The film is based on the ancient Chinese 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.

Few things about the film:

The story of the three Monks is an anime film directed by A Da. The film has got many recognitions including:

i>             outstanding film award at China's Ministry of Culture.

ii>            Best animated film prize at the first Golden Rooster Awards in 1981.

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

Plot:

A young monk lives a simple life in a temple on top of a hill. He has one daily task of hauling two buckets of water up the hill. He tries to share the job with another monk, but the carry pole is only long enough for one bucket. The arrival of a third monk prompts everyone to expect that someone else will take on the chore. Consequently, no one fetches water though everybody is thirsty. At night, a rat comes to scrounge and then knocks the candleholder, leading to a devastating fire in the temple. The three monks finally unite together and make a concerted effort to put out the fire. Since then they understand the old saying "unity is strength" and begin to live a harmonious life. The temple never lacks water again.

Lets discuss and analyze the various situations that arises in the film and also relate to real life situation.

The one

We find that in this case there is only one monk and he carries two bucket of water. It may be sufficient for the monastery as consumer is also one. Here innovative ideas are not being implemented as there is one person so demand being very less and it is getting fulfilled by the resources bought by the same person. In organization this self sufficiency attitude is required for example there is only one member in a team and he is responsible for all the deliverables, then he had to take care of all the requirements and necessary activities to be done without depending on other person.

Twosome

Two monks share the load of a single bucket of water. Still they find it difficult because there is no coordination between them. Both of them wants to be in the easy state and wants that other person to do all the work. This situation is very common in any organization. Every team member hardly put equal efforts, here dependency arises and sometimes team work is hampered.

Threesome

The work comes to a still as third monk enters the monastery the other two force him to go and fetch water. This particular case is a perfect example of social loafing in an organization where people start exerting less effort to achieve a goal when they work in a group than when they work alone. Moreover the lack of proper coordination between the members in the team results in complete organizational failure.

Crunch situation

But we see that in the face of crunch situation, all the three members forget their internal differences and work in a synchronized manner to improve the situation. This results in work being properly distributed in which results in highest efficiency when compared to all other previous cases.

This particular instance highlights that the manager must have a strategy for crisis management. This situation is also very common especially with IT industry as I have been there, during the time of deadline the pressure increases in numerously and at that time everyone realizes and meet the deadlines with team effort. The role of manager is very critical in the crunch situation as at that time employees do their job properly but there must be someone who can steer the ship and give proper direction.

Use of Innovative ideas

We saw that after the crunch situation is over, the monks went for innovative ideas due to which work-load is reduced with the help implementation of those innovative methods and proper coordination. Thus the management of any company should focus on technological advancement and innovative ideas so as to increase efficiency

Valley Crossing

We have been discussing about the valley crossing in our lecture classes for quite some time. There are organizational lessons to be learned from the valley crossing. The first thing which comes to my mind is team work.A team of 3 members had to switch over from left side of the valley to the right side of the valley by taking the support of the pole, this exercise wasn’t exactly done in the way as shown in the cartoon but the most important managerial concept was explained with the help of this exercise.

Teamwork has been defined in the Merriam-Webster dictionary as "work done by several associates with each doing a part but all subordinating personal prominence to the efficiency of the whole." However, there is no universally-accepted definition of "teamwork" in the academic literature.

Team work is very important in each and everyone’s life. It has been witnessed many times that a good team can win many difficulties and achieve great heights. It becomes easier when team members help each other and make other’s job easier. Another important aspect is that while working in a team, a bonding  and unity is formed which really helps to fight odd situations. Hence it helps us to achieve excellence in together effort.

Team Effort helps to equally distribute the load. It is another very important aspect in team work. It helps 

In one study, teamwork quality as measured in this manner correlated with team performance in the areas of effectiveness (i.e., producing high quality work) and efficiency (i.e., meeting schedules and budgets).Team members’ ratings of their satisfaction with a team is correlated with the level of teamwork processes present

This particular exercise was to be performed in groups of three members each. Task given to  a group is to  switch over from left side of the valley to the right side of the valley by taking  the support  of the  pole as shown in the cartoon. Direct jumping and attempts are considered FATAL and not welcomed at all. The basic motto of the task is to enable the students to understand the teamwork and Organization and Management  through experiencing this task. 

All the three members  have interchanging roles in the completion of the task .If we look closely at the table of the steps of the exercise we would notice that the here friends have equal distribution of risky ,half-risky and no-risky. Therefore all three members roles are designed “EQUALLY STRONG”. A big part of this exercise is in the preparation of the exercise. All the movement must be properly synchronous for proper completion of the task. All the three members while crossing the river communicate and coordinate with each other through sound/signal. We also see that the structuring of the Team Roles is very important the completion of the task.

As a manager one need to come out with step by step plan in order to help the three members to cross the valley. In order for the three persons to cross the valley the width of the valley must be slightly larger than a single step of one person but must be smaller than two steps. Moreover few technical specifications must be taken into account i.e. strength of the pole, creating markings on pole etc. The managers needs to specify the variety of roles when the three cross the valley. 

KHAN ACADEMY

     

The Khan Academy is a non-profit educational organization, created in 2006 by Bangladeshi American educator Salman Khan, a graduate of MIT and Harvard Business School. The mission is to providing a high quality education to anyone, anywhere.

How it started

He always wanted to give back to the society and the idea of teaching for free was in his mind. And he started almost by accident when he was tutoring one of his cousins using Yahoo Doodle images. Based on the feedback from his cousin, other cousins began to take advantage of the interactive, remote tutoring. In order to make better use of his and their time, Khan transitioned to making YouTube video tutorials. While all videos continue to be hosted on Khan Academy's YouTube channel, they also are available through Khan Academy's own website, which also contains many other features such as progress tracking, practice exercises, and a variety of tools for teachers in public schools.

Help for the students


In the given picture, we can find that by this way, the concepts are taught in the lecture, the best part is the student feels more than the classroom because it happens in the class that a student can not concentrate for the whole time, so in between if something misses out then it becomes difficult for the student to recall and understand further. But in the video lectures even if some one misses something then one has ample opportunity to go back and play the video as many times as his wish and understand the concept. This enables better understanding and this is one of the usp's for the success of Khan academy. Salman Khan en cashed in this one, provided great help for the students and so it becomes such a huge success. This can be a great learning for mba students like us as we need to recognize the opportunities. This academy served many purposes, it came as a huge relief for students as well as it created a new doorway for starting own business. It teaches us principle of entrepreneurship ,how he realized a huge potential in this sector, this is a huge learning for all of us.

Mission and vision

The mission of Khan Academy was to become the free, world-class virtual school where anyone can learn anything for free. The videos are just part of the vision. They are building out the adaptive software to cover all the topics that the videos cover. They also intend to develop simulation games to give more nuanced and applied understanding of concepts.

Recipe for success

Salman Khan chose to avoid the standard format of a person standing by a whiteboard, deciding instead to present the learning concepts. It was like sitting next to someone and working out a problem on a sheet of paper. Many universities simply post recorded lectures, while Khan stresses hands-on learning, moving step by step through multiple problems and encouraging students to work alongside him. He posted for nearly all the math and physics encountered in those grades, and has created a math program that spits out problems that grow more difficult as students progress. It also raises a question whether this kind of education can replace the tradition classroom class or not.

What we can learn

Salman khan had great belief in his students and belief gives fruitful results as we have seen in theory X and Y that if you boost confidence in someone then that motivates the person to excel in his field. Here in this kind of education one can watch the video as many times as he wish and this really helps to understand the concept clearly. Salman Khan stood example for all of us, there are lot to learn from him, his entrepreneurship skills as how he created the new idea and implemented it successfully. His example can be seen as successful implementation of all the business model which we learn in B school.