Rethink Teamwork: The Ringelmann Effect

Do you believe in teamwork?

Once upon a time, a scientist called Ringelmann did a small experiment, he made a few individuals pull a rope separately and measured their efforts. Later, he made the individuals pull the rope together and measured their total effort.

Surprisingly, when he divided the sum of their effort over the number of individuals, the result was less than their individual efforts! It could be that the more members you add to the team, the more they rely on each other until the point where it affects efficiency of the teamwork.

In one of my previous posts I highlighted synergy (1+1=3) and in this post it is obvious that teamwork is not an ultimately good thing, well yes, this is just the true essence of critical thinking.

* Reference: Mullins, L. J. (2007). Management and Organisational Behaviour (8th Edition ed.) Harlow: Financial Times/ Prentice Hall.

Lessons Learned from My First Marathon

I did my first full marathon (42.1 km)! And I thought of reflecting about the lessons I learned from this experience. But first, let me connect the dots in a chronological order:

• Quit Facebook in (2008 maybe?)
• Had to look for something else. Joined Flickr and came across the photo below, which encouraged me to cut the pile of wood we had (and enhanced my fitness level)
• Played Muay Thai for six months (thanks Abraj)
• Watched Rocky and got inspired by him jogging in the streets of Philadelphia
• October, 2009: first fun run (10 km), learned half of our potential is hidden
• April, 2012: first half marathon (21 km), learned that performance can improve in multiple dimensions
• November, 2013: first full marathon (42.1 km). Although my result was not decent, I am so glad I did it, lessons are below..

Somewhere around the 30 km point a guy seemed to be in pain, I gave him a pat as I went on. A couple of km later, my legs started to hurt so bad and I stopped to do some helpless stretching, I got a pat on my back! It was the same guy I passed by earlier.I got my push and joined him. Ricardo is an American from Panama, we kept motivating each other for the remaining distance of the marathon and we crossed the finish line together. He told me that he was just about to quit when my pat encouraged him to go on.

Lesson #1: What goes around comes around

Lesson #2: Do not underestimate what small gestures can do to others

Lesson #3: You can do an average challenge by your own, but for a tough challenge you would probably need someone besides you

Lesson #4: Running is a universal language

Lesson #5: Doing a marathon requires proper preparation, planning and some sacrifices

Lesson #6: As Emil Zatopek says "If you want to win a race, run a mile. If you want to experience life, run a marathon"

It happens that I was wearing this shirt in the race. I figured out that the millage for the races I ran wearing this shirt is 103 km, which also reminds me of the number of years Circassians fought before being expelled from their homeland (101 years).

Herzberg's Two-Factor Theory

Another motivation theory? Not precisely, this time I am blogging in continuation to my previous post. I have recently concluded my MBA studies and I had the opportunity to give the speech on behalf of my peer students at the completion ceremony. I thought of sharing an excerpt from my speech, but before that maybe I should explain a bit about Herzberg's two-factor theory. This theory is related to human motivation and consists of two factors:

• Motivation factors: Of which availability would motivate humans; such as the sense of achievement, recognition and an having a space for self-development

• Hygiene factors: Of which absence cause dissatisfaction (though if available would not motivate humans); such as finding a parking space at work and having a safe working environment.

Back to my speech:

"...Recently, I had a debate with a close friend where we had two contrasting points of view. Our debate was objective, yet eventually at the end of our debate neither one of us was able to change the opposing opinion, therefore each had concluded sticking to his initial position. I would say that usually such an incident would make me feel a bit uncomfortable as I could not win someone else’s support towards my opinion, but this time the case was different. I realized that I was happy that we concluded our debate with two independent mindsets, and neither one of us tried to impose his point of view on the other, to me this was surprisingly more fulfilling than winning another supporter for my opinion. But how does this relate to my first point?

Going back to academia, to our organizational behavior module in specific, we came across two theories about human motivation; namely Herzberg’s two-factor theory and Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. Without going into details about these two theories, at first glance, the two theories look different; after all they both have different names. Nevertheless, and upon further exploration, one would realize that both theories actually present the same elements but in two different forms*. Similar to my story, sometimes truth holds more than one form and if one side is right, it does not necessarily mean the other side is wrong..."

The main purpose of writing this post is to act as a tribute towards my instructors who tried hard to instill the principles of critical thinking in their students and to set a reminder to oneself that evaluation of thoughts differs according to different perspectives - therefore one should always try to accept other people's opinions.

* Reference: Mullins, L. J. (2007). Management and Organisational Behaviour (8th Edition ed.) Harlow: Financial Times/ Prentice Hall.

Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs

Voila! Today I will be using the Louvre Pyramid to illustrate Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs. Maslow's framework suggests that humans have needs that are sorted in a hierarchy of five levels; mentioned hereunder from lowest to highest precedence:

- Physiological: including the need for oxygen, water, food and sleep

- Safety: security, freedom from pain and protection from danger

- Love: affection, belongingness and friendship

- Esteem:  self respect, prestige, freedom, status, and recognition

- Self-actualization: challenge, creativity or broadly "becoming everything that one is capable of becoming"

Once a lower need has been satisfied it is no longer a motivator, the next level becomes the motivator; e.g. Once the Safety need starts to become satisfied, the Love need becomes the next motivator.

However, Maslow's hierarchy is not of fixed order, some exceptions might exist where the order is reversed. Think about how Muslims fast the Holly month of Ramadan where they don't eat or drink anything from dawn to dusk (Physiological needs) while they still have to be productive in their daily lives. In other cases a need might be completely absent, "some people who have been deprived of love in early childhood may experience the permanent loss of love needs".

Knowing how to motivate others can do good or bad and one of my 'motives' about writing this post was what I read about Egypt's Battle of the Camel. Back then some attackers have been hired to attack demonstrators in exchange for meals. It is clear that when people are striving for basic needs (Physiological in this example) you would not expect them to realize what damage they are doing to the big picture; i.e. they can be easily manipulated.

Probably you now have an idea on how to motivate your peers and beloved ones. I will conclude by what Bob Marley said "Don't let them fool ya".

References:

* Mullins, L. J. (2007). Management and Organisational Behaviour (8th Edition ed.). Harlow: Financial Times/ Prentice Hall, Pages: 257-260

* Photo edited using http://pixlr.com/ (thx Soz)

Reflections: My First Half-Marathon

Probably you've made the guess, indeed it is another jogging story but this time it is a totally different lesson.

I have participated in five marathons, all of which were in the fun run category (10 km), until one day I decided to go for the half marathon (21 km). Previously, I always tried to finish the race in less time than the race before, but at one point I realized my performance is not improving impressively. It came to my mind then that the performance formula may consist of more than one variable; so if I my old variable was 'time', the new variable to benchmark my performance would be 'distance'. My hypothesis was that if my speed is not going to improve, maybe I can leave my speed as is but challenge my endurance by running a longer distance.

Although my result was not that decent (2:15:00) I can confirm that I have achieved my goal (by the way last 5 km were not a piece of cake!). So what have I learnt?

- When performance won't improve anymore, start looking for a different dimension, hypothetically speaking the later can have potential for improvement.

- If it ain't getting any better it might not get any worse.

BTW, one of my motives about finishing the race was that I can blog about it. Cheers!

Why To Run?

This is the shirt that I usually wear in marathons. Although I am not an athlete, but participating in a couple of 10 km fun-runs made me think of sharing my jogging reflections.

Committing to marathons helps maintain one's fitness level, the festive atmosphere of the marathon might even help you discover and unleash hidden potential. One good thing about marathons is that part of the participation fees would support charity. However, you can also promote a  good cause yourself by wearing your own shirt (for me I have Nosochi2014.com on my shirt). It feels awesome to participate in your first marathon and it feels great:

• To challenge yourself and beat your own record
• To convince a friend to participate in their first marathon
• To cross the finish line where your persistence helped you 1 km at a time go through the whole distance; continuous minor efforts sum up to a considerable one.

You can run or walk in a marathon, but you can never underestimate an individual effort.

What is cc ?

You might have been introduced to the Ⓒ copyright symbol, but what's up with the double C's ?

(cc) stands for creative commons; a nonprofit organization that believes in the power of sharing creativity. Unlike copyrighted material that you usually have to pay for, using creative commons material is only controlled by a simple type of license (for example: some creators might not allow re-editing). Hence, if you intend to look for music, pictures or even videos, the starting point would be by going to: http://creativecommons.org/

So, what's in it for the author who uses (cc) content?

The author gets to use quality content for free.

What's in it for the original creator?

The creator could become famous by contributing for free. For example: All my pictures in flickr are shared under (cc), please have a look at the second picture used in this article.

Besides introducing the role creative commons seeks to influence culture in this globe, my goal in this post was also to share this inspiring concept. Can you imagine how great the founders of this organization are; who contribute something towards others without even expecting any return? Well if you want something good to brag about, now you may support creative commons and order from their store.

PS. Special thanks goes to Clara and Mithaq

Passion Leads, Profit Follows.

Have you ever wondered why this old man is smiling, and what's up with his white hair? This old man's name is Harland Sanders and he is the founder of the Kentucky Fried Chicken fast food chain. I will be writing today about the motivating story behind this man's success.

Sanders grew up in a poor family. He lost his father when he was six; so he had to take care of his younger brother and sister. One of the things he had to do was to cook and that's how he learned how to fry chicken. Years passed and our friend continued to work in several jobs until he opened his own restaurant which was a big success. Sanders discovered his passion for fried chicken and he received the Kentucky Colonel honorary title in his town.

However one day, a new highway construction diverted major traffic from the town which made Colonel Sanders close his business. He was 65, broke and about to receive his first social security cheque of $100. He lost everything but his passion for fried chicken. Sanders decided that he would not set and wait for social security cheques, on the contrary he went to sell his secret recipe to restaurants for a share in sales. More than 1,000 restaurants showed him the way to the door, refusing to even listen to him until he made his first deal on his 1,009th visit. Did he make it? The answer relies in the KFC chain which is spread nowadays over more than 100 countries all around the world!

Bottom line:

1. It does not matter what we do, but it matters a great deal that we have passion about it. Once you have passion, be sure that you will survive the bad times and good results & profit will eventually appear.
2. It is never too late, the age of 65 could indeed be a starting point!

Disclaimer: This post intends to promote determination rather than promoting eating at KFC, I personally do not eat there.