Overview

Designed to boost performance levels, this exercise encourages participants to consider simple, workable, and nonmanipulative ways to remove performance blocks and to develop employees’ full potential.

Purpose

To acquaint participants with positive tools for narrowing the gap between task demands and available (or assumed to be unavailable) resources.

To effect realization that fear is a negative and sometimes unethical way to motivate employees.

Group Size

Any number of individuals can participate. The group should be divided into subgroups of four or five.

Room Arrangement

If possible, arrange table groups for four or five participants each.

Materials

Flipchart and marking pens

Projector for transparencies or for PowerPoint slides

Transparency 40.1, “The Walk”

Transparency 40.2, “The Jump”

Transparency 40.3, “The Leap”

Transparency 40.4, “The Motivation”

Procedure

1.Begin by narrating the story of Tenali Rama and the Royal Banquet, as follows:

Krishna Deva Raya, famous king of Vijaynagar (a powerful south Indian Empire of the 15th century), devised a test of his courtiers’ resourcefulness. He invited them all to a grand banquet at the palace. Raya received the guests himself on the appointed day, and before leading them in to the banquet hall—all readied with rows of ornate chairs and silver plates and goblets—he laid down a seemingly small condition. The guests were to partake of the feast without flexing their elbows! The puzzled guests thought this a cruel joke and were about to turn away, clearly crestfallen, when the ever-resourceful Tenali Rama (the chief courtier and the king’s confidant) came up with a workable solution that enabled them all to enjoy the banquet.

2.Ask the group members to discuss a possible solution to the problem. Record their responses on a flipchart.

3.Share the solution: If each guest fed the guest to his or her left, none would have to bend his or her elbows. Discuss the answers from the perspective of practicality.

4.Emphasize the point that Tenali Rama succeeded by adapting to the awkward condition imposed by the king.

5.Conclude by pointing out that a shortfall between allocated resources and task demands is best bridged by adaptation, that is, matching changes in operational conditions with suitable modifications in operational methods.

Use these classic examples:

Napoleon Bonaparte, when asked how he responded to unfavorable circumstances, replied, “Unfavorable circumstances? Why, I always make my own circumstances and I never make them unfavorable.” To be sure, he kept his adversaries at bay by making suitable and necessary changes in his own strategies. He provides an excellent example of adapting to changing task demands.

In World War II, bomber pilots learned to neutralize the newly developed RADAR tracking system, just by going out of range and flying at treetop level. They used ingenuity to adapt to this potential threat of detection.

Variation

Relate the discussion of task demands and available or assumed-to-be-unavailable resources to the following experience the author of this exercise had.

Once, sitting in his parked car on the roadside adjacent to an irrigation ditch, he saw a youngster and an old man (perhaps the grandfather) walking along the ditch on the far side of the road. (Display Transparency 40.1 at this point.) At a narrow point of the ditch, the boy jumped across and waited for the old man to do likewise. (Show Transparency 40.2 at this point.) But the old man stayed on his side and pointed to the stone slab across the ditch, a little way off. The old man said he thought it would be safer to use the slab than to jump over. After a couple of steps, however, the old man hitched up his dhothi (loincloth) and took a flying leap over the ditch. (Display Transparency 40.3.)

Ask the group to discuss why the old man suddenly changed his mind. Have the groups note their answers in a few words on slips of paper. You can read these aloud and then lead a group discussion that compares their answers to this one (illustrated by showing Transparency 40.4).

Answer: The physical capacity for leaping lay dormant in the old man, hidden under the imagined infirmities of old age. It came alive only when the motivation was provided by a rushing bull. The magic of motivation is that it unlocks dormant potential. All feats of mankind over the ages have been primed by motivation—whether those feats are accomplished by a single individual or by an entire team.

It is not likely that any group realized a charging bull could bring out potential the old man didn’t even realize he had. But, if a group did realize this possibility, they are to be applauded.

Discussion

What’s the best way for a manager to motivate his or her staff?

Is fear ever appropriate as a motivational tool? If so, under what circumstances?

Quotation

“The first problem for all of us, men and women, is not to learn, but to unlearn.”

–Gloria Steinem

Points of Interest

The story of the Yuks illustrates the need for caution when unleashing positive and powerful forces within the workplace. (It is possible to have too much of a good thing.) Sugar cane beetles were destroying the crops in Australia until scientists introduced a unique toad, nicknamed the “Yuk.” Balance in the ecosystem was to have been achieved when the yuks destroyed the beetles and allowed the vegetation to thrive. Instead, the yuks thrived. They had no natural enemies and in time became more of a threat to the environment than the original beetles were.

The phenomenon has since come to be called the “yuk effect” and pertains to the downside of positive change.

M. VASUDEVAN, Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore. Mr. Vasudevan has been a votary of maximizing efficiency in all spheres of human endeavor, with the aim of improving the welfare of humanity. He is a freelance writer and speaker on practical ways to boost productivity and has been the recipient of the State Government Award (from Karnataka State Government, in recognition of contributions in the field of Social Service) in 1991 and the National Award (from the Ministry of Social Welfare, in recognition of Outstanding Efficiency) in 1984.

TRANSPARENCY 40.1

TRANSPARENCY 40.2

TRANSPARENCY 40.3

TRANSPARENCY 40.4