Three Monks

                                             INTRODUCTION

The film is based on the Chinese proverb "One monk will shoulder two buckets of water, two will share the load, but add a third and no one will want to fetch water."
Is a Chinese animated story released in 1980 and directed by A Da. The story is about three monks coming to a monastery and learning to co-exist just like a real world corporate scenario where people from different backgrounds come to a common forum and have to co-exist.

                    The movie : 

The Plot:

The story starts with a monk reaching the monastery and has the whole place to himself he seems to be a pure soul and as expected does well to keep the place warm. He knows all the work has to be done by him and he does as required, goes and fills in water (which seems to be quite a task) and preaches for the rest of the day, this has striking similarities to our day to day lives, when we do not depend on others all our work get done on time, the problem arises when we have to get things done by others and the skill set required are different from each other.Being alone is never a great idea the challenge comes when we have to perform as a team.

Then to complicate things another monks enters the picture, he too is a pure soul which can be observed from the way he treats the butterfly, also the way he handle it proves he is an intelligent individual.

 All is well when he steps in, he is assigned the job of filling water and he does it till he is new to the place, but just like in real world he refuses to do all the work alone. Now there are two ways to handle this problem, first both can go in turns and fill water which sounds fair in terms of load shared, or they could both do it together by carrying the load up and down together. Although the first option might look more apt for the scenario the resultant productivity in the second option is better, in order to extract work from his employees a manager has to make sure that the work load is shared in such a way that highest productivity can be reached.

  

As seen with the first two the third one also has clean consciences and as soon as he reaches the other two quickly team up against the third. A while later three fight against each other. This shows us that if the resources are not managed properly it could result in a lot of problems. Like when the three monks were choked , there was no water in the house and stay put that way because the problem was rather too small, but when a bigger issue like fire came up they had to team up to fight against it. Probably the better solution was this when compared to the earlier ones discussed. This way they learned to work as a team and this helped them come up with a more modernised pulley system, hence we learn how important it is to work as a team and better solutions can be thought of if we work as a team.

Conclusion:The management principles we learn from the movie

1.     

      Attitude of each team member determines the fate of the task and decides the success      rate

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2.     Disputes tend to arise when there is more than one person involved

3.     Scientific and objectives measurements and instruments should be used to resolve the conflict

                                                             

4.     Experiences in crisis management comes handy to come up with new innovative methods to solve a problems

5.     Teamwork and team interest should take precedence over the personal interest

6.     Teamwork does enhances the efficiency in the working of task

7.     Synergistic roles:   Individual sums become bigger than what was there individually

Khan Academy

KHAN ACADEMY

It’s intriguing to know how people associated with the market having long and mentally drenching working hours can take time out for an entirely socially benefiting agenda. We are talking about khan academy started by Salman Khan, a space online for quality education.

The mission of this portal is to educate as many people it can around the globe on a no profit basis. The idea came to Salman when he used to tutor his cousins online; they benefitted a lot from those. Slowly his portal became common among a lot of parents and teachers this was mostly due to the way things were explained and the infrastructure on the site. Students can watch, pause and re-watch as many times as they wish to; this gives them a better understanding of the subject. This is when salman quit his job and started khan academy full time. The way the students are tested about their understanding is amazing, they are given ample time to absorb the material and have a firm grip on the fundamentals. The student teacher interaction is an area which required more time then what it is given so automatically when the time devoted to students increased their understanding also increased and the entire data of which videos were seen by the student to which problems he attempted to the problems faced by him is recorded and sent to the person in charge. The innovation at teaching level is minimal it’s just how beautifully the time devoted to them has been increased is what is amusing.

The organisation skills have come into play beautifully, the information was always there in the book and on the internet but the intelligent assortment was definitely lacking previously, the way the matter has been brought up goes to show the clarity of the idea in the persons mind. The knowledge has imparted and along with it a check has been carried out as to how much the student is holding on to, if not clear then a process is started to take care of the scenario, not only is the assessment taken but the data is also generated which can be very helpful when human efforts are made to guide the student. We can easily associate this with our theory Y managers who have a positive mind set about his team irrespective of their efforts or results; the particular has been desighened in such a way that maximum efforts can be extracted from the child.
The blocks of the building have to be put  to place in a very subtle way, especially the first few. as we see in khan academy the motive behind the project was not money or fame it was pure passion and a will to teach hence the first few bricks were built with a mission of excellence and innovation these provided a very strong base to the project and now its getting into good shape. 

The ever shrinking world has just become smaller at this site as we see the viewership has almost no bias and the data is available to one and all. It must be kept in mind that even the non profit organisation when fully grown can have a high evaluation and could help the beneficiaries go a long way.

Lecture 2: Type of managers - Theory X & Y

The class started with Pygmalion effect. This deals with the power of positive thinking. As we know that we can make a difference by just thinking in a positive way, this process of thinking has to be inculcated. When we start thinking in a positive way the negativity around us reduces which helps us concentrate on our goals better. The desire of a man should be such that he can blow life into a statue this is exactly what we are talking about, our will power is a power which distinguishes us from the rest. This when well directed towards our goal can lead to results beyond our imagination. This is a highly desired skill in a manager, as we see the managers around us can be of different types and each one is unique in his/ her own way and the skill set possessed by them can be varied, but this is one quality that he should have in his armour.

We were taught about different kinds of managers – some who lay faith and believe their subordinates where as others always complains. The job of manager is not just to get the work done but also to create such an environment where in the same job can carried out by the employee themselves without any supervision.

Category	Type	Reality	Managers’ perception
X	I	Employees are lazy	Manager thinks employees are lazy
X	II	Employees are hard working	Manager thinks employees are lazy
Y	III	Employees are lazy	Manager thinks employees are hard working
Y	IV	Employees are hard working	Manager thinks employees are hard working

There are two types of managers. Some fall in the category of Theory X others fall in Theory Y. Managers belonging to theory X do not like work, have a negative attitude towards the workers and form an undue stress on the workers. Managers belonging to Theory Y are entirely opposite to their counterparts in Theory X. They are hardworking, show some regards towards the workers, are generally innovative and open to new ideas and are ready to shoulder responsibility.

The success associated with any work force has to vital components to it, efficiency and effectiveness. The former deals with precision and accuracy as a well trained engineer would do, while the later looks at the broader picture and assimilates the broken picture to form a coherent unit as a manager would do.This is to highlight a few qualities of a manager and a team.

Lecture 1: Bridge and tower building exercise

The bridge exercise is an excellent example of the independence and interdependence required to perform any activity in a corporate structure. The activity has three participants who are given a long rod which is carried by them on their shoulders, and then they have to cross a small crater as a group. There each person gets to be in motion for a few seconds without using their legs. The burden of the person in air is borne by the other two participants. This particular exercise taught us that in a corporate scenario one would be times when we have to look out for others and the favour surely does not get over looked and once in a while people take care of us also. It’s the trust of a person that we have to win and we should be able to adjust well in an interdependent scenario.

The other interesting activity that took place was the tower building. Here we had to use one hand and make a tower of cubes; the game gets over when the tower falls down. This taught me that mostly we tend to under estimate ourselves, when asked about the number of cubes that could be place the person doing the exercise anticipated 10 cubes but to his astonishment 18 cubes were placed one on top of the other. The target that is set should be greater than the organisation's assessment of what might their actual performance will be. Only when the goal is higher than the current idea of the firm's capabilities will the managers put in an effort that is beyond the scope of their current perceived capabilities. This in turn will lead to an increase in capability, leading to an ever increasing limit of goals that can be set. Some of the students lowered the target from the previously stated one .This is not preferred since the organization shouldn't lower their targets despite the hurdles which come across as this portrays a negative outlook this strategy does not work in the longer run for the growth of the company. Some of the students retained the target. This is preferable as the organization continues to work towards the defined target despite the hurdle through motivation and team effort and effective co-ordination. Some increased the target. Ideally, organizations need to expand even during tough times when others are contracting and avoiding risks. A good example can be Apple, which during recession perceived as threat to many used as opportunity to expand their market share and generate more products like iPad .This lead to increased profits and increased market share.Hence we can say that aiming at a sufficiently high target is a safe option.