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Pearls of wisdom

Published in Headstart, The Indian Express, October, 13th, 2000

Many of us subscribe to the mistaken belief that the challenge of change is unique to our time and space. Nothing is further from the truth! From time immemorial mankind has been wrestling successfully with change continuously. If this were not true, it is entirely possible that we would all be still living in caves and foraging for food! It therefore stands to reason that we could perhaps learn a few lessons in change management from our ancestors. Glitz and glamour of contemporary technology and management fads blind us somewhat to the treasures that history has in store for us!

The Panchatantra, for example is a veritable storehouse of knowledge on human resources, strategy, leadership, statecraft and almost any other field that you choose to name. Similarly, the history of warfare has much to offer us. If we are open minds, we can come away with many new ideas for the present.

Each of the following stories has an important lesson for us today as we are engaged in coping with an overwhelming change.

Involve People Who Are Affected By Change

A charming story from the Panchatantra brings home the point that concerted action by affected people bears wondrous results; results that guarantee survival.

A flock of famished doves chanced to see an abundant quantity of grain spread out below them. Without a second thought they swooped down and began to feast on the grain. And in a trice the trap was sprung! All the doves were caught in a wily fowler's net.
In their haste to feed, the doves had forgotten their usual caution and so had missed the possibility of danger. Now that their future was bleak, a sense of despondency spread through the flock. But the leader of the flock, Chitragriva, had other ideas. He realized that individuals thrashing about would hasten their doom by twisting the net even tighter around all of them. So he calmed them down and asked them to be quiet while he outlined a plan. If we all flap our wings at the same time at the same speed, he said, we can be saved for then we will generate a powerful lift that can carry us, net and all, well clear off the ground. The doves complied because that was their only hope. And so, at the leader's signal they commenced flapping their wings at the same speed. The result: The entire flock soared into the sky with the net, much to the chagrin of the fowler.

Chitragriva epitomized leadership by calm thinking in a crisis and communicating clearly that acting in unison is a survival imperative. He also drove home the point that imminent death (individual or corporate) leaves no scope for the pursuance of disagreements and fights: everyone has to sink their differences if the differences are not to sink them! Though the story is ancient and simple it contains a valuable lesson for leaders and corporates: concerted action focused on a goal enhances the chances of survival; without such concerted action, survival is virtually impossible.

If we explore the lesson more deeply, several corollaries become visible: the importance of problem solving without panic, communicating the solution with crystal clarity to everyone concerned, setting a time limit for action to begin and end (together) and finally, clearly articulating the connection between survival and concerted action. In the case of that most wrenching change of all, the dreaded pink slips (downsizing number of employees) this becomes even more relevant and important. Instead of the corporate elite ensconcing themselves in conference halls and producing a grand design to enact the downsizing tragedy, an inclusive and empowering approach has to be adopted.
The very people who are likely to be asked to leave must be included in the design team; only then will the reality of a sudden and traumatic alteration in the employee's social status, relationships and financial position be understood and planned for. Every company that plans a downsizing must follow a win-win approach; only then the benefits of downsizing will flow. No company can afford to lose a large part of its talented manpower and then discover that the expected increase in productivity and savings have not really materialized. This is a sure-fire recipe for disaster of the worst kind: complete erosion in the credibility of the leadership of the company.

Tinkering Just Won't Do

When change is bewildering in pace and scope, the temptation is to take refuge in familiar solutions and thinking. However, resorting to incremental solutions in the face of paradigm shifts is akin to altering the rules of the game being played hitherto when the game itself has changed. The story of the French knights locked in battle with English archers illustrates poignantly the mismatch of incremental thinking with paradigm shifts.

In 1346, Edward III of England went across the English Channel to conquer what he could of France. He had trained his longbow archers each, to deliver 15 arrows per minute with deadly accuracy. The speed and penetrating power of these arrows was such that they could pierce even heavy armor. Edward ran into a huge army of French knights just outside the little village of Crecy. Outnumbered, cold and hungry, Edward, like Chitragriva, did some lightening fast thinking and decided to fall back on his core competence. He deployed the longbow archers tactically in a battle, arguably for the first time in the history of European warfare.

The French army was mostly made up of noblemen who considered it infra dig to fight on foot; heavily armored, they rode into battle on warhorses. Observing the Frenchmen advancing, Edward ordered his archers to hold fire until the knights came within range. Once they were well within range, the order was given to fire. The knights were hit by hundreds upon hundreds of arrows which pierced their armor and felled their horses. On foot the knights were weighed down by the weight of the armor and so were cut to ribbons by the English food soldiers. The result was one of the most one-sided victories in the history of warfare: some 300 English dead versus nearly 16,000 Frenchmen slaughtered.

The essential reason for the French debacle was that the English deployed a new technology (the longbow) in a devastating combination with a new tactic (waiting to fire and then letting loose the foot soldiers). The English had therefore changed the paradigm of the battle. The French however, were totally unprepared for the new paradigm and they coped with the change as best as they could (with disastrous results).

Having paid such a heavy price one would have expected the French to learn from the experience. Yet, over the next hundred years or so they fought the English many, many times, with exactly the same catastrophic results. They had not learned anything at all!.

This story seems very familiar to most of us: when faced with a paradigm shift most companied resort to incremental changes. They tinker with their products, processes, markets and people. The results are always the same and very predictable: declining market share, profitability and finally corporate demise. The lesson to learn from the battle of Crecy is that paradigm shifts demand a quantum change in thinking. Incremental change or doing more of the same thing is incompatible with survival in the face of new technology and tactics that have redrawn the entire competitive space. Of course, the caution of Will and Ariel Durant have to be kept in mind too: "History repeats".

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V.K.Madhav Mohan - The Leader : Mentoring Services, Mentoring Workshops, Mentoring products- Articles / Audio / Video/ Posters, Lectures