The 3 monks mirror to Evolution & Revolution

Evolution & Revolution As Organization Grows

The class begun with a concept of Evolution and Revolution and we came with a definition for both terminologies:-                  

EVOLUTION:- Smooth Line shows the recovery of an organization and it more in high performing organization.

REVOLUTION:-The obstruction faced by organization on timely basis. 

To understand the phase of challenges in an organization and how to implement the solution ,there is a need to go through the following question :-

• Typical organizational life cycle
• what stage are we in?
• what problem will we faced next?

And for that the organization needs to focus on 4 quadrant that are People,External,Internal,Performance.It should follow spiral model.

Competing Value Framework

Developing of each quadrant depends on the following:-

• Size of organization
• Age of organization
• Stages of evolution
• Stages of revolution
• Growth rate of industry

The stage of evolution and the stage of revolution can be sub categorized into:-

Relating this with the 3 monk Story :-

Context:-

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

• Won the outstanding film award at China's Ministry of Culture.
• Won the Best animated film prize at the first Golden Rooster Awards in 1981.

It is a short and beautiful movie with a wonderful message. A must watch for managers and practitioners who try to implement working-teams in an organization without looking at the other side of the picture.

Film:-

Analyzing the  methods being followed in the movie were as follows:-

Method 1:- One monk fetches the water:-The monk fetches the water faithfully and regularly every day. As his needs are limited he doesn't mind carrying two buckets with a stick on his shoulders.   Method 2:-Two monks fetches water:-When the second monk moves in then the first monk thinks of distributing his work. Initially they both fight over how to carry water but later on they find a solution. They find a pole and jointly fetch a single bucket of water every day. Although they work as a team but it seems as if they are not satisfied with each other.

Method 3:- Three monks works as a team to fetch out water:-

When the third monk moves in, both monks try to delegate entire work to the newcomer. In fact  third monk fetches the water once but he consumes all by himself. After arguing with each other constantly over whose turn it is to fetch the water, nobody goes to fetch the water. No water gets fetched even after they all are thirsty.

Learning:-

The movie throws light on some important concepts of management .

1) Productivity - It is a measure of how well an operations system functions. In previous posts we have come across the important equation:-(as discussed in my previous blog)

Excellence = Efficiency X Effectiveness

2) Design of Operations systems : So how do we increase the productivity of a system. One of the most important tool is the designing the operation systems. It includes finding answers to 4 main questions: 

It is a continuous process of optimizing the work so that maximum efficiency can be derived out of it.

 3)Innovation:-Transition from method 2 to method 3 is innovation.When the monastery is on fire they realize that it is better to think in terms of team goals rather than individualistic goals. The monk at the bottom fills the buckets, the middle monk works on pulley system and the third monk at the top douses the fire with water in the bucket. This shows difficult situation inspires ingenious solution.

3)Teamwork:-

Thus we  see a totally new phenomenon that as the number of people increase,the productivity has come down drastically.

So combining the learning of three monk and the theory of evolution and revolution as a whole we can say:-

Without Cooperation, 1 monk can fetch 2 buckets of water, 2 monks can fetch 1 bucket of water and 3 monks will fetch no water at all. 

With cooperation, 3 monks can increase the efficiency of the process to a level previously unattainable. All the above learning plays a very vital role in achieving proficiency in task.

Taking an example from the class of tower building which  had a vision  of " To meet & beat the Height" for that the whole group had to work as a team with cooperation & coordination to attain the maximum height tower successfully.