Travails of an Amateurish Manager

It was almost 30 years ago. Interning with Mahindra Tractors as an apprentice, I was getting my first taste of the industry, trying to learn the ropes of real engineering. We were a bunch of newbies each in our early 20s going around the factory, feeling important and giving an onlooker the impression that it was we who really made the tractors roll.

The progressive Mahindra management decided to put us all through a 10-day Management Development program, where we would take classes in an on-campus seminar room. Experienced honchos from the organization would come to lecture us on various aspects of management.

One of the sessions of those times has lingered with me, and keeps making an impact time and again.

A manager who came to teach us leadership qualities had devised a game. Three teams would compete to assemble a disheveled bunch of loose papers into three neatly ordered books, each identified and serialized by page numbers. 

Eager to get into action, I volunteered to be the leader of one of the teams. The teams were given 10 minutes to discuss and plan their strategy. The competition took off at the whistle, and sheets of paper rustled around in a frenzy. One by one the teams submitted their three organized books.

To my dismay, my team finished last, taking almost twice the amount of time as the second slowest team.

What had gone wrong?

The other teams had put one team-member in charge of each book. The sheets would be handed over by all to the respective book owner, who would quickly organize his book serially.

I had however led my team on a horrendously inefficient path. I the leader took upon myself to personally assemble every book. The rest of the team had to just stand by hand me the sheets of paper. The process went on and on and on.

The management gurus were nice people. No one branded me a failed leader.

Piecing together the events of the day, the differences between our team and the others stood out stark.

Other teams planned together. Five heads put together spawned the plan and made it work. Our team plan was the chief's plan alone. Others needed to follow suit.

The other teams split the work; each intelligent member in charge of assembling his book. All books got ready concurrently. Our team leader trusted only himself to do all the work. 

Other teams took up the challenge as a team. For our team the whole thing was the leader’s baby, the leader’s making; and as it turned out eventually, the leader’s debacle :)

Three decades since, as I sit through the many planning sessions that happen in the office, I look at those awesome youngsters on our team with admiration. Each young man and woman capable of thought, plan and innovation. 'Oh just leave it to them', I say to myself. They will do it. Clearly, the team stands out a lot more capable than each member in isolation. The leader needs to play merely a support role.

Those loose sheets of paper taught me a lesson of teamwork that I will cherish.

I quietly smile at the wet-behind-the-ears, 20 something boy from not so long ago.