Making of Managers - 16 ::: "Champion" versus Championship TEAM

prelude :: I was not able to log on to our forum last week with the advent of next spell of inertness....I tried to not take cognizance of it BUT I think it lasted for 3 - 4 days during the course of the week but it kept growing....I was back to cheers on Friday only....But I could notice that this time, it was not growing so fast as it used to be !!
Dear Gowri
Today at my class was again a wonderful experience....As I have been expressing time and again, I am surely going to miss this class after next sunday.....it is so entertaining as well as testing.....learning value for me as well as offering opportunities to help out others in need.....I could see a huge improvement in not only my public speaking skills but also my inter- personal skills & how I handle relationships with every one around me....!! In fact I am already putting to practise & admiring the power of few of the personality development tools that I have learnt during this class (like Transaction analysis - which was a mind blowing concept.....I may record it seperately....some time later).
Today was an interesting session of enacting small Dramas amongs us....each of us were divided as 5 member team and we were given particular situations and we did a short play for 8 - 10 minutes.....There was a week earlier when we practised extempored speech, one week when we had debate, one week on technical presentation......every one was exciting.....!!
In fact this particular practise session (on Dramas) went on for close to 1 hour only...and then we had a video shooting of our speech in our second half....which was slightly longer than usual.....!! This particular musing is on the immense learning that I had during the DRAMA session.....
In our group, we had a old man (50 + ... he is a industrialist in Ambattur Estate...self made man), One Girl, one boy (both are quite young.....), myself and one mid aged woman.....We were given a situation of house and having "generation gap" as the theme of our play...
Since the time was short for preparation (just 10 minutes was given), when I looked around the others, and got started naturally taking the lead....we decided upon the roles almost immediately and unanimously...>The old man is the OLD father for me....and the mid aged lady was my wife & the two were our children...( natural choice...isn't it ??)
Considering the theme, I quickly suggested that we need to have an extempored rehearsel after we decide upon a "one line" for each one of the character...which all of them agreed....!! I should talk about this old man here...He has not missed a single class until now and quite participative...but is a man of limited words...and never takes initiatives himself....!! Think that was a perfect description (how naive I am !!) and I suggested him that his role will be to simply irritate my wife to keep calling her for coffee with this head down in newspaper....(we also agreed that he will be deaf....to add to some comedy !!). All of us except this old man were quite excited about the roles that we were going to play....and we made a quick mock session....that my wife is kept in household pressure of serving coffee to her old FIL and my son glued to computer screen....!! While I enter from office - after 2 j/3 minutes of their roles, I try to pacify her....and treating my father with lot of respect....and also balancing between mother and son.....I too lose my temper when my daughter enters home very late..and speaks very curtly and disrespectfully.....The drama was supposed to end with every one shouting at each other.....
We did a practise session...I kept pumping lot of ideas when people stammered.....kept telling that they can keep thinking on their dialogues until we were called to the centre of the stage.....!! I think I did a good job as a facilitator allowing every one some freedom and creativity....also giving my support when it was needed...Every one was quite thrilled with the mock session...the only tragedy is that we underestimated....OR did not guage the old man...
This person who was given a role considering his normal appearance and the way he behaved with all of us, did not have any complaint during our practise session....just was doing what was suggested to him by me so respectfully (I mean both of us)... IN the moment it maters most, he showed what a champion he is....!!
I really enjoyed his humour sense.....and the way he cracked lot of timing jokes...but I am really at loss to understand how he can take an individualistic stance on the flow of the drama....when my wife was supposed to speak some thing, this person is cursing the entire home (urupudaatha viidu......) and telling at us that he is giving us his pension....!! I dont deny that he had a big round of applause...but it would have lot more helped me and the entire group if only he cared to be participative during our preliminary discussion....I repeat, he was supposed to irritate with his call for "coffeeeee!" once a while....and keep glued to the paper......!!
The one who was most affected in his over doing was of course me....!! inspite of planning the whole thing totally balanced between all the team members, I was really not ready to face this old man...and his extempored dialogues....!! I still managed quite well and converted my stance of being a flexible and adaptable person trying to reach out to every one.....I made myself quite furious out of helplessness......and inability to improve the situation....!!
When we completed (incidentally all others except our group - the 5 other teams - dragged it too much more than 8 minutes.....making many of us yawning ) ours was to the time..and also extremely entertaining...Soon after it was over, I told the audience that the old man delivered lot of dialogues quite extempored...and satisfied his ego....!!
This put me in deep thought ..... for quite some time.....!! Why dont people really understand the spirit and the common goal....and try to avoid getting individual attention ? This particular musing will not be in this place if only this person gave an insight to us that he is capable of being in full flow too.....!!
Any way, that was just one more feather to my wisdom cap....!! Never assume things !!!
suchoo