Here's the thing about the Blind Square Exercise - you'll probably see it again. It is a classic team-building and ice-breaking exercise. So what you can learn from doing it repeatedly? Many of the veterans understood that the frustration of being a new-person at the task is important, but what about the frustration of being a non-new person? Can anything be learned from that? Moreover, thinking about Onder's comment in class - you all apparently failed miserably at the task last time, so what wisdom did you have to impart? Some say there was no incentive for doing the task again - how about to do it successfully? So, you believe that the only incentive for doing anything well is payment? What about the intrinsic
value of a job well-done, of pride? We'll talk about it later in class, but consider what makes you do the things you do and consider whether
if everyone only did things based upon an economic calculation of personal benefit would result in a functioning society?
How did your behavior in the Blind Square task fit with your core values? How do you reconcile your actions there with the visions you have of yourself as a leader?
The blind square exercise done repeatedly will hopefully give you new skills each time you do it. The exercise changes based on the instructor's changes and the flavor of the group. Our group, composed of MBA students, suffered from the "too many chiefs, too few Indians" syndrome. An undergraduate or High School level group would react differently. I would say that the main incentive for the group is the learning or experience you gain from doing it multiple times. Now that the class has done it, learned from it, reflected on it, we should do it again at the end of the semester, with a new twist and blindfolds.
ReplyDeleteWhat did my behavior as a leader say that day? Generally that when I ran out of good advice, I was quiet, my ego was not defined by the solution being "mine." I think a good leader can lead or follow as the situation demands.
How does my behavior at the blind square reconcile with my core value of integrity? I think the ability to only peek a look at the square once during a 30 minute exercise. The instructions were to not look, so I primarily did not, even when I was getting pulled left and right by the rope, and was frustrated by the lack of success during the activity. It would have been easy to look and could have resulted in faster success, but was not the point of the exercise.
Doing the exercise again was very interesting since it brought me different perspectives. It is like traveling to a place for the second time: Whatever we are living and experience at the moment at any time and circunstance directly affect how we see and perceive things.
ReplyDeleteMy behavior was not the most ethical during the second time I participate. I was extremely curious to see how the classmates were progressing and following the 1000 instructions that were happening at the same time. Well, that might not transmit a positive response to your question of how my behavior reconcile with my core value of integrety. The frustration of not being able to give directions since I already played and since there were already too many leaders were hard. I believe that as leaders one of the hardest tasks is let some other leaders, who have their own styles that often are different than the way you do things - take control.
The fact that I always valued more passion, purpose and satisfaction than economic values sometimes makes me wonder if I am on the right field, business.