TAKING THINGS FOR GRANTED!

          It was mid july 2006. I had just joined as a CEO of a Hospitality compay. I was to conduct an interview for selection of a ‘Manager -Marketing and Sales’ for my company. I received a lot of ‘resumes’—all high profile and highly experienced persons.  I shortlisted five candidates, who were MBAs from renowned Institutes and had a good academic career. I worked out the programme of selection to get a hang of their self- confidence, knowledge and inter-personal communication skills . I had decided to put them through a GROUP DISCUSSION TEST, followed by a LECTURETTE TEST and culminating into PERSONAL INTERVIEW with me and my MD.The five persons were very well qualified and adequately experienced for the  job. One could have blindly picked up anyone based on their academic achievements and years of experiences. But I had different ideas, as I believe one should not go by the razzle-dazzle of the surface but look beneath it. You see the WHITE WASHED WALLS MIGHT SEEM SOOTHING TO THE EYES BUT THEY HIDE THEIR HOLLOWNESS.

        So, as per my plans, I put them through a group discussion. I gave a very funny subject for the discussion. It was how to KICK THAT DOG OUT? It was a very vague subject  and I wanted them to show their capability to grasp and reflect. You see a good salesman is the one who can sell a Refrigerator to an ESKIMO  or any one who lures a bald person to buy a comb. You should be good in inter-personal communications. I will give only their gist and thrust of arguments—because the whole discussion carried on for two hours. This is how they started off.

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        Sumesh Chohan (Name changed for reasons of privacy) : Well, it is niether a phrase nor a maxim I would like to first know its meaning. (Everyone looks at me but I just shake my shoulders as gesture.)  I suppose this term is used for a ‘bad head’ in an organisation and how do we go about getting rid of him? He could be a constant nuisance—always critical of management—whatever it does.His presence is a bad influence on every one. He needs to be weeded out at the earliest.

         Rajveer(Name changed): I do not agree. It has nothing to do with an organisation but ‘Self’. ‘Dog’  is a euphemism used for the ‘Anger’ and ‘Bad Temper’.  I think it boils down to controlling your anger and remaining cool under crisis. This we can do so by practising ‘Yoga’. Anger-management is a must to have smooth working relations in any organisation—particularly when you are in the ‘Sales and Marketing’ job. Your irritation can lead you to antagonising your clients.

         Kaviraj(name changed): No, it is not ‘anger’ but the ‘inefficiency’ and the ‘inability’ of a man. I reckon the term seeks to improve upon the efficiency in an individual. If you are a good at your work no one can kick you out like a dog. Incompetence leads to your failure and also your entrenchment. I suppose ‘Kicking the dog’ would imply to enhance your efficiency by removing your shortcomings.This demands your constant upgradation of your skills and knowledge.

         Lakhmir Singh(name changed): I think the ‘dog symbolises’ extreme loyality which can also be seen as sycophancy. It is no doubt loyality is needed but its excess leads to resentment and friction within  any organisation. I reckon the whole question is about how to remove sychophancy from the organisation. It is basically a function of Top Management.

         Manoj Kumar(name changed): I somehow see the ‘Dog’ as a sense of complascency in individuals and organisations. It leads to ‘over-confidence’. This makes the people lazy and lethargic. As a result, inefficiency sets in. I think we have to look at the whole issue from the point of view of  how to check complascency stting in. All the same, we must know what it really means before we proceed further. Would you like to clarify, sir? (Manoj had thrown a querry at me.)       

          Sumesh: Yes, sir, You might like to tell  us the real meaning of the term “Kick That Dog Out”, so as to allow us to progress further.        

           Rajveer:  Am I right, sir, to assume that it is predominance of anger and ‘short- tempered-nature’? Definitely, it has ought to concern an individual.

           Kaviraj:   Rajveer, you are right but it has nothing to with anger but your own inefficiency. I think we must focus on its reduction.

           Lakhmir:  Well! let us think it has something to do with Sycophancy. Sycophants are not only inefficient and incompetent but also parasites on the organisation and they eat it up.

           Manoj  : I am afraid we are discussing irrelevant things. It could have been “DONKEY” in place of “DOG”. Dogs and Donkeys are required in the organisations to make them survive and withstand the shocks. A dog and a donkey, headed by a monkey, makes the team perfect----

            Sumesh   : What do you mean by a perfect Team?

             Manoj      :  You see –a dog represents loyality---a donkey represents a slogger/industrious person and the ‘monkey’ stands for  a smart and a intelligent guy.

            Lakhmir:  What do you mean by smart and intelligent? Does it mean intellect and knowledge  or people adept at exploiting opportunities? What about academic qualifications?

            Manoj:  Somehow I feel that academic qualifications do not reflect the real capabilities of an individual. They misguide more than they can assist you. Most often I hear the phrase that Mr SO AND SO is a genious. My only advice to them is GENIOUSES are fine as SHOW PIECES  but they are not MEN of ACTIONS.

            Kaviraj : So you think the perfect organisation requires a combination of duffers and clever people to balance the organisation. Well! but ‘genious’ has nothing to do with academic qualificatons. Did you see that move “Rain man”?

            Manoj  :  Exactly, this is what I meant—the character played by that famous actor—as elder brother of Tom Cruise------------

            Myself: Cut it out gentlemen. I am afraid I have to intervene. I tell you a story. Here it is:

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Many many years ago(1984-86) I was in a premier institute as an instructor what you might like to call a ‘teacher’ or a ‘lecturer’ in your  vocabulary.  I was conducting a class on ‘Leadership and Management’. The young students were very keen participants and each one had his own point of view. Our discussion veered around to  the difference between Leadership and management. As an academician, I told them them that leadeship was part of management---leaders only deal with human beings, whereas managers deal with both human beings as well as  the resources. Therefore, a manager has to be perforce a leader, too. This was not sinking into one of our very bright students----I suppose his name was Chinnappa(real name). He would not comprehend this. He insisted that the leader had to be responsible for the both. Our Head of the Institute, Sh Y N sharma was also sitting there, too. As the discussion on this aspect touched limits of absurdity, Sh YN Sharma intervened.

YN Sharma: Four decades back, I was in the second class in a village school.  Our teacher Sh Bhagwan Dass was teaching us the tables. We were to learn the table of TWO. He had lined up 10 pups. He made these pups stand in pairs, next to the door. He started of with first pair. He counted them as two and said it is one pair---simply TWO ONES ARE TWO. Then he joined the second pair and said TWO –TWOS are four—as he said that a dog appeared in the doorway. Bhagwan Dass was not looking at the door—he asked Roopchand, a student as to how much were TWO TWOS ARE?

RoopChand: Masterji, they are FIVE.

Bhagwan dass: Are you blind? Can’t you count?

Roop chand: I can count—They are five.

Bhagwan Dass: shut up and Sitdown. Suresh, you tell me the answer.

Suresh : Sir, they make five.

Bhagwan Dass: shut up. Ok, Yogender Nath you tell me.

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YN SHARMA: The question was directed at me. And  I replied—Masterji, Four PUPS and one dog. This alerted the teacher. He furiously swung back and saw the dog with four pups. He shouted: KICK THAT DOG OUT. And how many, now? I said “four”. To say the least, sometimes we  take things for granted. We see them as we had perceived and learnt but in reality they might be covered by a web of unwanted  stuff. Therefore to see the reality, we have to KICK THE DOG OUT. In other words, to uncover TRUTH WE HAVE TO KICK OUT LIES.  While your instructor is right , he has taken things for granted because Leadership and Management, today have a very thin line dividing them. It is this thin line which Chinappa is not able to see because your instructor is taking certain things understood by most of you. What he was not telling you is that  management was a science and Leadership was a discipline under it. In leadership, there are three things i.e. SITUATION, PEOPLE and THE LEADER . Leaders have certain traits most essential to stand them out in a mob. It is also called TRAIT VALIDITY CONCEPT of leadership. But, here we were discussing the SITUATIONAL MODEL.    In management ,there are four things i.e. PEOPLE or THE ORGANISATION, MANAGER Or THE BOSS, MATERIAL or the RESOURCES and OBJECTIVE OR THE SITUATION.  To cut the story short, a manager has to be a leader whereas a leader need not not be a manager—such as military leaders—political leaders etc. Leaders rally people around themselves but managers organise people around themselves.