3 men valley crossing exercise and learnings

Valley Crossing

Scenario:

There are three people trying to cross a valley. The gap of the valley is in the range of one to two feet.They have a rod of a convenient size and they have to cross the valley using the rod as a support. 

Assumptions : 

Each of them has the same footstep.
Direct jumping over the valley is not allowed.

Look at this you will get the idea:

 STEP BY STEP ANALYSIS OF WHOLE PROCESS:

Persons	First Person	Second Person	Third person
Step
1	Safe	Safe	Safe
2	Half Risky,
3	Full Risky,
4	Half Risky,	Half Risky,
5		Full Risky,
6		Half Risky,	Half Risky,
7			Full Risky,
8			Half Risky,
9	Safe	Safe	Safe

• ·         Initially, the first person puts his leg forward and hid first foot remains in air and so he is only half safe. The remaining are fully safe. 
• ·         The next step, the first person is totally unsafe and he has hang from the rod, which is being supported by the other two with their weight. 
• ·         The next step, the first person puts its first foot on the other side of the valley and hence half safe again. The second person now puts his first foot in air and hence even he is half safe. 
• ·         At the end of next step, the first person totally reaches the other end of the valley and hence is totally safe again. The second person is totally unsafe hanging in the air with the support of the rod weighted by the first and third persons. 
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• ·         Next step, the second person puts his first step on the other side of the valley and the third person puts his first step in the air and hence both are half safe.
• ·         At the end of next step, the third person reaches the other end of the valley and hence totally safe again. The third person remains hanging in the air supported by the first two persons who have reached the other end of the valley. 
• ·         After two more steps, even the third person reaches the other end of the valley and the mission has been accomplished.

Lessons Learned:

Role Designing: 

In role designing manager has to think of specified roles for every team member.Roles which are connected one to the other is interlocked and the success of the whole task is dependent on this success of this concept. Here in this exercise, member roles for crossing the valley are interlocked. It is the ability of the management to think the roles in such  a way. 

 Watch how every player has a specific role in  a football match:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Xwy7DgRBg0

WORK PLANNING

It emphasizes the fact that staff clearly have a crucial understanding of the work that needs to be done, and how their individual or group effort contributes to the system.

  

 In Valley crossing process every member must know the instructions for them so that the assigned task can be completed without any confusion and hindrance.

Team work:

Valley crossing explicitly explains the concept of team work i.e. cooperation, coordination etc. The members have to match their steps, walk in tandem to achieve the desired result. If there had been slight deviation in the synchronization then it would have led to some hiccups.