Valley Crossing and Management lessons

Introduction:

This activity was conducted in Principles of Management session by Dr. Prasad on 6th July, 2012. A group of people are asked to cross a valley that is twice as wide the distance they cover in one step. A pole, that acts as a common lever is provided to them. Each team member holds the pole on their shoulders at different equiv-spaced gaps and tries to walk in sync with others. The objective of the activity is to get all members of the group safely across the valley.


At any point of time, either the entire group is totally safe or at least one person is in danger of falling into the valley. The stress is on every team member to have an understanding and synchronization with other team members to cross the valley safely. The team should plan and walk in such a way that at any point of time, there are more team members(or rather more legs) on land to support those members who are holding the pole and are in the danger of falling into the valley. We had done this exercise in teams of three.

Learning:

The main performance constraints in the entire exercise can be outlined as below:

1. Communication gap

As a famous quote goes -

"If you dont know, please ask. If you dont agree, argue. If you dont like it, please say it. But don't sit there quiet and judge me".

There is a need for complete mutual understanding before one starts with this exercise.

The most important learning I perceived from this exercise is the magnitude of communication gap that exists even in a small team of three members. As this exercise demands perfect coordination, there is a need for the team members to be in sync with each other in their step as well as in their thought.

It is important that each team member starts the exercise with the same foot, either left or the right. Any mismatch will lead to an imbalanced pole and hence an unbalanced team leading to one of them falls into the valley.

At every step, there is a need for mutual coordination and communication to synchronize the steps and correct themselves when needed. I learned the importance of mutual understanding here.
Communication plays a pivotal role in the life of a manager. Whether to assign work or to delegate responsibilities to the team, there is a need for extensive communication skills for the manager.

2. Need for Planning

When a planner speaks of implementing goals rationally, he implies that it is possible to demonstrate logically and experimentally the relationship between the proposed means ad the ends they are intended to further.

Planning plays a pivotal role in an activity like this. Planning in this activity can be summarized upon the following key points:

1. The physical build of the team members being not alike, the distance covered in one step of a taller person need not be same to that of a shorter person. It is important that the team agrees upon a standard amount of distance to be covered in each step.

2. The team should also decide upon a facilitator who utters clear instructions to the team based on the circumstances. These instructions include, but not limited to,  when to take a step left and when to take a step right. This enables the shifting of weight of the entire team alternatively and hence reduces the probability of a false step. It is equally important that each team member sticks to the instructions of the leader.

Consider the situation where in the team members are not sure how much distance they need to cover in one step. Once the walk starts, the taller people start covering greater distance as compared to the shorter people. The shorter people, finding themselves lagging behind, will try to increase their pace. This will seriously disturb the team dynamics once they start crossing the valley. In the extreme case, one of them may slip into the valley. To avoid such situations, there is a pivotal need on the part of the team to plan effectively before starting the exercise.


Strategic planning plays an important role in building up of businesses. A video depicting the importance of planning by Sanjay Purohit - VP Corporate Planning and Business Assurance - Infosys Technologies - India,  can be viewed here.

3. Individual limitations

 I learned that every human brain is a unique specimen of itself and analyzes the same words and phrases differently. Hence, the word 'left' may not be processed as 'left' by everyone. There will be mismatch in synchronization and in focus. At such times, it is the individual responsibility of each team member to assess his/her position and align themselves in accordance with the team.

In case of a mishap, the entire team need to reassess the situation and undertake the damage control without jeopardizing the entire activity.



In spite of individual limitations, if the team communicates and plans well  by assessing their strengths and weaknesses, it is highly possible that it emerges victorious at the other end of the valley.

Summary

An activity which seems so simple on the surface proved to be a very difficult task at the end, even with teams as small as three members. What this activity makes one to realize is that, there are some prerequisite criteria for the successful execution of any task or running an organization namely:

•  Understanding  clearly  the task at hand,
•  Discussing the task with the team until clarity and consensus is achieved about the nature of the task,
• Analyzing different constraints for successful execution,
• Planning and coming up with a common code of conduct,
• Executing the task while sticking to the guidelines,
• Constantly correcting oneself and asking for help when needed,
• Taking care of oneself and of others in the team,
• Recovering and re-strategizing when a mishap happens,
• Overcoming the hurdles as a team