The Balancing Act of Tower Making

I am back and as I promised, I am here to share yet another new experience with all of you.

In second lecture, Prof Mandi brought with him small identical wooden cubes as usual they were distributed among the students. After a while, Prof asked us to perform what seemed a very easy task, to make a single tower using those cubes. The condition was simple enough, only one person was supposed to make it all alone and no support could be used.

Well, as you might have thought by now, everyone was on his feet for this activity. But our smart Prof had a trick up his sleeve to cut through this competition, he told that in order to build the tower the interested person has to bid. So the process of bidding started, students started to bid onward Rs 100. The bid was won by a student for Rs 500. Professor then elucidated us that the bid was a way to teach us ‘One has to take risks to fulfill his/her dreams’.

The selected person went ahead to make a tower of 16 blocks against the class’s predicted 10 blocks. 

Professor now asked us to repeat the activity; with a change that now more than one person could participate in the process. In total 7 people decided to make the tower. But the basic conditions were still the same, still only one person would work with cubes others can assist that person henceforth termed as worker. 

As the number of people involved increased, professor asked the worker to be blind folded.

So with the worker blind folded and one person to closely supervise and instruct him as to where the next block should be placed, the activity started. Other 5 people were made to sit at a distance and were allowed to give their advice to the duo involved in tower making. Prior to the start of the activity the class was once again asked to predict the height of tower in terms of number of blocks. There were few who thought that this group would exceed the individual’s performance.

What happened next was a sight for eyes; it was a perfect miniaturized replica of any other office. One person trying to work, and others just pitching in their ‘expert advice’ at the top of their voices. Any guesses about the height of the tower? Well, they could make a tower of 7 cubes only. When asked to the ‘worker’ for the reason of the debacle he said he confused by deluge of voices.

So what was the professor trying to teach us? He was not teaching us something new, it is something that most of us have experienced in our life. In majority of the companies it is middle level of management which causes the trouble. This middle level as described by professor becomes ‘Overhead’ instead of ‘head’. The reason why an individual could make a tower of greater height than that of a group was he was not distracted by other’s advice. He could follow his heart and mind.

Wait the lesson is not yet over, this is just the beginning. Professor then explained to us that the first stage where only a single person was working is termed as ‘Craftsmanship’ while the second stage is ‘Organization’.

Both the patterns have certain advantages as well as disadvantages.

Advantages of Craftsmanship

·         The worker is the whole and soul. He is the worker, Manager, CEO everything in himself, jack of all trades.

·         The satisfaction of doing job is very high

·         Interdependency is very low: he need not depend on anyone to get the job done.

·         Skill level is very high.

Example: A tailor working alone will take the measurement himself, do cutting of clothes, stitching and then ironing the final cloth.

Disadvantages of ‘Craftsmanship’

·         No specific management.

·         No organization.

·         No specialization

·         No parallelism i;e jobs can’t be done simultaneously rather they are handled sequentially.

·         Throughput would be less as the time taken would be more.

Advantages of Organization:

·         The work is divided into very small units, which are done individually by many people.

·         Specialization of work is there. Every person does his job only.

·         Increase in dexterity, as the person keeps on doing the same job repeatedly.

·         Maximum efficiency.

·         Quality of product is better.

Disadvantages of Organization system:

·         Job satisfaction in employees goes down as the satisfaction depends on the appraisal policies, motivational incentives etc.

·         Inter-dependency increases.

·         ‘Non Worker’ is the head of affairs.

·         Skill level decreases as the person keeps doing the same task.

In this model each worker makes a part of the product, just like an assembly line process. This increases the dependency of a worker on his preceding worker.

The learning from this is that the job of an MBA is to create complexities in order to increase the efficiency, profit while using the resources optimally. In addition to this MBA holder has to make the policies in such a way that they keep the workers happy and their motivation level remains high.

Equally Important are the 3 E’s of management.

·         Efficiency

·         Excellence

·         Effectiveness

Excellence = Effectiveness * Efficiency

                  = Direction * Speed

Efficient means to have an affordable or low cost product.

In a nutshell Efficiency is: “More out of less is Efficiency”

Whereas, Excellence means:  “More out of less for more is Excellence”

While there are methods to exactly calculate the efficiency, there doesn’t exist any specific method to calculate the effectiveness of any process. Effectiveness is a subjective thing. Effectiveness can tell us whether we are moving in the same direction or not, it can tell us whether we are utilizing our resources in an efficient way or not.

Example: Internet help us increase our efficiency, but how we use internet is our effectiveness.

Efficiency and effectiveness are like speed and direction respectively together they help us come to calculate the rate by which an organization is heading towards excellence. So together both of them are key to make any decision about any organization.

All this gyaan must have taxed your brain..........have a break! may a cup of coffee or tea and ponder over these simple but powerful teachings. Meanwhile, I will prepare the next blog on McGregor's theory.