Citizenship Behavior

It was around 4:30 p.m. on 26^th January, India’s Republic Day.

Megha and I were sipping on ‘Filter Kaapi’ in Mysore Café, Matunga and reflecting on the events of morning and afternoon.

We had spent 4 hours in Babasaheb Ambedkar Hall in Matunga Labor Camp, Dharavi witnessing a ‘Citizen’s Workshop’ for residents of the area.

It had taken Megha and me some effort to figure out where the Hall was.  We had weaved our way through a row of narrow alleys to make it there. I was reminded of old streets in Asansol and in villages of industrial Bengal – buzzing with activity but might make a newcomer feel ‘enclosed’.

We reached the Hall around 12 p.m. Not many people were there in the hall at that time. There was a group of young kids practicing a dance sequence they were going to perform on, and Vinitha and her friends/team members.

I was anxious and excited about this event. I had been working with Vinitha on how to ensure, efforts of her organization made an impact. ‘Impact’ for We-The-People meant people understood their rights and duties as citizens, took responsibility for the same, and displayed appropriate behaviors.

This workshop was built around a theme - what could residents in Matunga Labor Camp do in next few weeks, to ensure that they did the right things in upcoming Municipal Elections.

So the workshop had ‘immediate relevance’ for people we were targeting. They could implement almost immediately what they would learn.

Around 100 people turned up – that was an impressive number given that the workshop had been advertised entirely through word of mouth. Most participants were young mothers, and old men/women.  I wondered why I didn’t see too many young men and unmarried women – I still don’t have an answer to this. .

Soon we were into thick of action. 100 participants had split into 8-9 groups, discussing 1 of 3 themes of Role of Citizens, Role of BMC (Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation), and Role of Councillor. 

I was eagerly awaiting this part of the discussion. Vinita and I had talked at length, about need for making people take ownership for their behavior.   The facilitators themselves were a stumbling block towards ensuring we achieved this end.  They viewed themselves as ‘problem solvers’, but this mindset ensured that citizens/participants became perennially dependent on these facilitators when trying to address new situations.  It was necessary to make the facilitators empower the participants (helping them find their own solutions).

I was eager to see if both facilitators and participants accepted and played these new roles.

I was a bit uncomfortable during the initial part of the discussion within the groups.  The facilitators seemed to be instructive. I heard a lot of ‘Do this if you are faced with this situation’. I was becoming impatient and wondered ‘Where was the attempt to empower people to respond effectively irrespective of the situation?’

My anxiety started ebbing mid-way through the discussions. Slowly I found the participants connecting the dots, and stating to ask questions on how what they were learning could be implemented in other situations too.  By the end of the discussion, all groups had ‘citizen’ volunteers who came forth to present to the audience what their group had discussed and learnt, and what they were committing to do.

I realized that the journey from being dependent on a parent to being independent takes time, and can’t be an immediate process. Probably journey for any newcomer in a situation, would usually start from being dependent on a parent. The only variable might be the period and amount of dependency.

I noticed something else too. When the groups were presenting to the audience, everyone in the room listened with rapt attention. There were some 100 people in the audience, there was noise coming in from outside, and the sound system wasn’t the best you would come across. It was difficult to hear what was being presented, but everyone seemed to be zoned in and concentrating. I wondered ‘why don’t we see so much attention/concentration in classes in schools/colleges and in classroom training sessions at workplaces?’

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Sourav

Inter-Dependent Groups and Conflict

So here I was in a group of about 45 people. It was the 1^st day of a workshop that was to span across 2 days. The seating arrangement was different. We were to sit on mattresses placed on the floor in U shaped arrangement. There strangely seemed to be no PPT.

Most of us knew each other but still there was this anxiety and excitement on what lay ahead. I was aware that there was this group of some 10 participants who had participated in a planning workshop before. I had heard, through informal networks, good reviews of the planning workshop. I, and the other first time participants, were curious to know what had transpired there.

The facilitators found a unique way of transferring context from one group to the other. They 1^st called in the “experienced” group to sit in a circle, within the U, and share their experiences of their experience of the first workshop and Appreciate Inquiry discussion they would have had with their subordinates (a planned post workshop event). The first time participants sat in the outside U and could comment/ pitch in anytime we felt like.

After those in the inner circle were done sharing their experiences, we were called in to the inner circle to share what we had felt while we had heard the 1^st group sharing their stories.

At the end of these 2 sharing sessions, all of us were on almost common ground.

At the start of the 1^st day, there were 2 specific groups in the room. There was a need to bring them to common ground. The facilitators acknowledged this need and found a creative, experiential way to bring the groups together.

What might have happened had this initial exercise not being done? The presence of the 2 groups within the same room might have been a White Elephant- something no one speaks about but is present and influences all interactions within the room.

What are the other situations where different groups need to be brought to common ground? I can think of inter-dependent departments (e.g.- production and maintenance, sales and commercial, research and marketing). Even mergers and acquisitions would come under this realm. What seems to go wrong in these situations? Why do we frequently see friction and heartburn in these integrations/inter-dependent relationships? What can be done about them?

I think the answer lies in ‘speed’ and ‘norms’ of the different teams.

Different teams have different ‘speeds/flows’ in which they work. A simple manifestation of this would be the turnaround time for any query which flows into the team-some teams may respond in 24 hours; others may take 48 hours. Another manifestation would be what is meant by a project timeline- an IT team might be used to working on year long projects while a sales team would talk in terms of quarters.

Different teams also have different ‘norms’ – these would be in terms of decision making, communication, rituals, etc. Sales might prefer things to be done over phone, while accounts might need everything written down and documented.

Many a times these differences in ‘speed’ and ‘norms’ are not acknowledged leading to continuous and, at times, caustic friction between inter-dependent teams. Acknowledging these differences and making the teams take conscious steps towards reaching common ground on ‘speed’ and ‘norms’ would be the first step in ensuring effective collaboration.

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Sourav

When do Self Evaluation Tools Work?

Do self evaluation tools help in an organizational context?

Or rather the question should be ‘When do self evaluation tools help in an organizational context?’

There are 2 requirements for ensuring effectiveness of self evaluation tools. Firstly, respondents must be willing to mark choices which genuinely characterize them instead of marking ‘more socially acceptable choices’. Secondly, respondents must be willing to identify areas for action and act on them. Often the usual response after taking a self evaluation tool is ‘I am of this type and that explains why I behave the way I do. I am ok with this and I don’t think I need to change anything.’

As Managers and Facilitators at workplace what can we do to make self evaluation tools more effective?

It is easy to say that we must administer these tools to individuals only when they are ready for the same. There is merit in this school of thought but there is also a danger. This danger is of managers/facilitators being passive spectators in the entire process; of absolving oneself of any responsibility to actively shape their workplace.

The question is ‘When are individuals ready to answer genuinely to self evaluation tools, identify action areas, and act on the same? What can managers/ facilitators do to create relevant environmental conditions?’

There are two ways of addressing this situation. You either create conditions for ‘safety’ or of ‘discomfort’. Do you remember the times when you experimented or when you felt you changed significantly? These would have come either from situations where ‘discomfort’ with status quo was so high that you had no option but to change, or from situations characterized by ‘safety’ where you chanced upon a better way of doing things while experimenting and adopted the same.

Which one is a better environmental condition to create – Discomfort or Safety?

Would you want to be in discomfort 7 days a week, 365 days a year? I am fairly sure most people would not want to be in discomfort continuously.

I do feel the challenge for managers/facilitators is to create conditions of ‘safety’ at the workplace. When an employee feels safe, he is willing to experiment. Self evaluation tools can work under such circumstances. Feeling safe is a state of being we are okay being in continuously – rather we would want ‘safe conditions’.

Does this mean there is no place for discomfort at the workplace? There is place for discomfort – but not continuous discomfort. You would not want your adrenaline pumping 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.

What should a manager do if he realizes there is no sense of discomfort within his team ever? I would contend it does not matter as long as from the safety domain within which the team is working, it is extending itself and performing well. And if you really want individuals to answer genuinely to self evaluation tools and act on identified areas, I doubt whether conditions of discomfort/non-safety are effective.

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Sourav