The Tower building exercise

 

Introduction

Research shows that good leadership improves the bottom line performance radically. This exercise , conducted in the session as a part of lecture series on "Principles of Management" by Dr. Prasad, helps us to look at leadership in action, really helping the message to hit home. It gives participants a chance to think what makes a great leader and provides rich inputs about leadership behavior and its impact on the followers and team members. With reference to this, one can cite the following quote:

"A good objective of leadership is to help those who are doing poorly to do well and to help those who are doing well to do even better - Jim Rohn"

The exercise

The tower building exercise challenges one to build a tower by  putting one square block over another and achieving the maximum height possible till the tower falls down. The students were asked to set a goal of the maximum height of the tower they can achieve in terms of the square blocks.

The students came up with varying responses ranging from 10 blocks to 30 square blocks. Once the goals are set, a student who had set 10 blocks as his target was called to the dais to build the tower . The student performed the exercise and the achieved a height of 17 blocks. 

Considering 17 blocks as the historical data of the height of the tower, students are asked to re assess their goals. Results of reassessment are discussed in the 'Learning' section.

The twist in the tale

At a later part of the exercise, one of the students is blind folded and is asked to build the tower with his non-dominant hand while two open-eyed students act as his instructors and guide him in building the tower.

Learning

After the demonstration of historical data, when the students were asked to reassess their respective target heights, the students altered their target heights based on their new perceptions.

The students are then categorized into two groups based on their target height:

• Students who had set the goal as more than 17 blocks where Goal Set > Attainable Goal from historical data. This is subject to change based on the performance and goal setting by an individual. They tried increasing their goals further.
• The students who had set the goal as less than 17 blocks would now increase the their goal to a higher number because Goal Set > Achievable Performance > Historical Performance.

  As soon as an individual was blindfolded for building the tower with his non-dominant hand,  and was helped by two other open-eyed individuals, there had been a drastic shift in the targets of students. It was observed that

1) Some of the students lowered the target from the previously stated value. These were not preferred in an organization as the organization shouldn't lower its targets despite the hurdles that comes in its path and should strive its best to achieve the target.

2) Some of the students retained their original 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,

3) A few of the students increased the target. Organizations require such kind of people who have an appetite for risk even during tough times.

I learned that there is a need for people of category 2 and 3 in an organization and such an organization expands even in times of crisis.  The tower building exercise helps in discovering some important elements of management namely Goal setting. Leadership, trusting others, being progressive and taking calculated risks.