Corporate Learning from Bahubali2

Bahubali 2: The Conclusion

The invincible Corporate learning’s you must not ignore

Bahubali 2 the conclusion, has created historic benchmark of INR10 billion earned within first ten days only. I was just wandering about why this movie is so much liked. What is so different in it that has stunned the viewers not once but hundreds of times in duration of 2.45 hrs. while sitting in theater’s couch. Is that technographic cinematic fun filled thrilling entertainment, only? Or something else, something not so apparent?

The well-crafted story with impactful appealing moments of thrills sequenced on silver screen one after other. It amazed audience’s scene after scene without a pause. It has touched the heart of every viewer in-dubiously.

This is not just entertainment; the movie has showcased most critical behavioral aspects and responses of human nature in tough, tougher and toughest situations of life. It demonstrates great lessons to learn and apply in our personal and professional lives, in corporate and social environment and prominently in our self-awareness for better human being.

Before you read further, I would request you to imagine that “bahubali-1 and 2” seen on screen is not just a movie, its real kingdom of real characters. Once you consider it real then only you can look beyond the bare on-scene show to the steep possibilities of raising your own bow.

Let’s begin…

People may have numerous expressions about their feelings on the level of qualitative entertainment they received while sitting in the theater for three hours.

As an audience, I would like to express my thoughts and feelings though the key learning which the well-researched movie presents before us. There are, great learning take away opportunities in each of the scene & sequence arrives one after another on the screen but to keep it precised I am consolidating in five major gizmos.

Countdown begins from 5 ….4…3…2…1

5. When Only Position communicates, it communicates gaps too

Before Amarendra’s Crown ceremony, mother Shivgami sends him for visit to browse through the whole kingdom to understand the culture and people. The intention was clear. It was to develop Amarendra as more empathetic leader. He did it well. Shivgami has been getting updates about his on the field training, though her formal sources of information. The confusion begins there. When Amarendra came back to Mahismati Kingdom with his would-be wife Devsena, the confusion turned into arguments further fueled by opponent’s party of Bhallaldev. Soon the viewpoint of Mother Shivgami ingested a drastic change. She forgot to communicate and investigate the matter informally, with Amrendra, like a mother should have been doing. If she could have connected just once with Amrendra as mother, all doubts must have been resolved. All conspiracies could have been reviled. The wrong perceptions could have been corrected. No communication gap could have happened. But it happened. Formal positional communication has grown the gap so gigantically that she committed the most brutal mistake of her life that too not by chance but by a firm choice. The result is known to all of you who have watched the movie. She lost everything she ever loved, even her life. Just imagine if she could have come out of her positional ego and talked once to his beloved son, Amrendra. What could have been the new story?  

Does this not happen in Corporate life? How miscommunication take place at first? How misunderstandings evolve to spoil the whole corporate culture and business in turn? If we become courteous to go beyond the positional ego and connect with people informally as well, then what could be the new story? Will the miscommunication still happen? Even if they happen will they be powerful enough to destroy the people’s credibility or organization’s behavior? Certainly, not.

Whatever is the structure of an organization, be it functional, divisional, matrix or mixed, one thing holds common and that is resourceful management of resources. Employees must manage right peer relationships to evolve as productive teams. Managers must align the teams to meet business goals. Altogether everyone should develop an unbreakable level of trust, a level which is formal but open enough to discuss on doubts, disciplined but courteous enough to put a genuine effort for investigating the underlying truth.

Communicate to connect courteously, it may not solve all problems but will resolve all probs.

 

In the root of every problem either there is a real cark or unreal doubt evolved from real miscommunication. It’s up to you that what you want to hit, the cark or reason behind cark.

 

4. Before taking a hard decision, double check your personal ego

There can be situations in personal, professional or social life when we have just one option left in hand and that option is to take a real hard decision. We know that decision will create continuous trouble waves around us. The decision that may lead our future or ruin our present. We know the risk is high. Sometimes we evaluate risk very carefully but this happens when we are clam and well informed, like our buying decisions. We do a lot of research before buying a costly cell phone, house or even switching the job. If we like the job offer but have doubts about employer’s credibility we seek information from all possible resources, we keep ignoring negative feedbacks in the wait of positive ones. As soon as someone give positive feedback we get thrilled. We like to listen what we like to listen. We decide what we want to decide, but we collect a lot of evidences to justify our decision as right. The hidden line is, we collect evidences to blame them later if the decision goes wrong. Take a pause here. Think. Does this happen in your life as well? I bet, it does.

The other type of decisions, which are much harder and devastating in nature, are taken when we are not calm but emotionally stormed. Our head inside is thundering, burning and accelerating to blast a decision. A decision invoked by negative emotions and elicited by uncontrolled ego. We do not seek out information from all possible resources in this case, we do not wait for a positive feedback but immediately accept the negative one. We do not listen even what we like to listen. We do not collect evidences to justify our decision as right. We do not think that decision may go wrong. We ride over doubt; we overlook the hollering risk and blast the decision. Take a pause again. Think. Does this happen in your life as well? Yes, it does, evetime when you are fueled by anger it does. It happened every time when you argued with your spouse or boss or even any relative.

To explain it better, I would request you to recall the situation produced in the movie in front of Queen Shivgami. How she blasted the most brutal decision of her life, why she blasted the decision, what evidences she evaluated before making the decision, what all sources of information she groped before conclusion? Above all this, it’s more important to understand what fueled her to trust the traitorous and to explode the decision. Was that instantaneous decision based on momentary face of information? No.

It was her wounded self-ego which forced her most defiant decision into instantaneous one. First time her ego was wounded by the words of princess Devsena, second time by the disobedient acts of his son Amrendra-bahubali ,then soon after repeated disrespectful words of Devsena intensified the pain on her wounded-self-ego. Devsena could not realize the harm she was developing for Amrendra by her wrong words though her arguments were right. Shivgami could not realize the harm she was developing for Amrenrda by protecting her positional ego though her arguments were wrong. Neither Devsena controlled her ego intelligently nor Shivgami utilized her wisdom to calm her ego diligently. 

 

  When two egos collide, they produce nothing but intense antipathy and extreme destruction.

Ego clashed and created a series of agony, misunderstanding, distrust and injustice. Ego clashed and jolted affection, belief and intelligence. Who Killed Bahubali,Katappa? No. It was clash of ego between Shivgami and Devsena. Both has the strongest affection for Bahubali but none could see the destruction they created by themselves for Bahubali. Ego immersed their foresight and made them blind.

The result was destruction all around. Bahubali lost his life , Shivgami lost her life , Devsena became imprisoned slave for lifetime.

Shivgami thrown out Devsena and Amrendra from the premises of Mahismati palace by laws of punishment. The wound was relaxed, but she was not. She was still struggling inside with herself as she knew that somewhere is was losing on her motherly love for Amrendra. Soon, the same wounds have been scratched, this time by unfaithful Bhijjal Deva and Bhallal deva. Her wounded self-ego came alive, fueled her into a fire, taken over her motherly love, seized her intelligence and agreed to order Katappa to kill bhahubali without evaluating the evidences. After losing her beloved son, later when she realized he failure both as Queen and as Mother she broke. Humongous guilt has killed her ego too. Like she has been wakening up from a dark sleep. But It was too late. She failed to manage self-ego. She failed to constrict the ego of Devsena too. She forgot that a word of empathy can completely nip her opponent’s ego, though she was an expert leader in empathetic behavior. Remember her first words she uttered to Devsena,” Shivgami ki bahu par itana ahnakar…aakarshak lagta hai!” (this much pride looks enticing on Shigami’s daughter-in-law)  and the whole premises has got thrilled with such a wise presentation of humor.

Reel life is just a demonstration of real life emotions. In real life, all of us have faced odd times. Something wrong has happened to us or we ourselves did something wrong and regret later. Look back at such events in your life. Was that not a byproduct of ego? If it was self-ego then you should have taken responsibility to control it. If it was someone else’s ego then also you should have been able to foresee and mold it into your favor. In both cases loss is yours not others , in both cases no one else but only you could have rescued yourself.

What I want to conclude as message here?

                     Look back into your self-ego before taking a hard decision.

Most of the time our intentions are good, our passion is positive but our actions go negative. Why?  Because some or other kind of ego intrudes into our thought process and takes over the whole mindset. This new mindset is not in our conscious control instead it has immense power control us the way it wants. Then we do what we could never have done with a cool mind. Our emotions overwhelm us so strongly, so quickly and so brutally that we forget all our intelligent, this state is so bad that it can even motivate to suicide or murder. Do you agree? Do you feel what such emotions do with us? If your answer is yes, certainly after reading this blog you will rethink before committing any dangerous act evoked by emotional volcano in future.

Do not take a decision when you are in emotional imbalance, it’s better to sleep over situation until you feel that you are free from emotional bias.

                  Great decisions are not driven by dark emotions but by bright intellect.

 

3. Personal power dominates over Positional Power

The Lead character Amrendra Bhahubali has been the greatest king of Mahismati kingdom, though he has never been crowned as king formally.

If you have already watched the movie, you do not need any explanation to understand this learning, it’s just a reminder on what you have felt already in the mid part of movie. Though Amrendra has not been crowned but has created his personal place, as King, in the hearts of every citizen of his kingdom through highly emphatical deeds and behavior. When he has been thrown out of his own Palace and position, he has created a new informal kingdom in no time. That’s the beauty of personal power. The Positional power of Bhallal deva has become a flyspeck in front of the gigantic personal power of Amraendra bahubali.

The message is vast, valuable and realistic. This presents the most fruitful learning for today’s corporate leaders. The learning that is obvious yet ignored. Giant yet overlooked. Fulfilling yet undernourished. Understood yet unpracticed. Everyone is running after position, designation and formal title. Everyone believe that position is power. Everyone blame that it is their non-leadership designation which incapacitated their unleashed leadership qualities. But the truth is, leadership needs no position to cultivate itself, it just needs an intuitive personal will to lead.

Positional power earns authority to command but constricts within its own boundaries,

Personal power not only earns dignity to demand but expands beyond all boundaries.

By holding a position one can be authoritative to command and control people with or without their willingness but by holding true intuitive empathy one can earn the power to demand without authority. People support promptly with their own willingness to the person who holds personal power over them. This is the root of true leadership which can produce amazing results. Authoritative commands may be dishonored at times but respectful demands are accomplished even without asking for it. People stretch their limits to support personal power by heart. They are ready to take extraneous pain to stand with such leaders. It’s a never-ending loyalty gained by leaders through their fulfilling emotional intelligence. When we lose on our position, wealth or health we usually seek out for sympathy. We like those who sympathize with us. When we find someone else losing on his position, wealth or health we offer them sympathy and they too like it usually. But what is the gain? It’s crucial to understand those who sympathize you, are ‘actually’ weakening your strength to bounce-back like winner and strengthening your weaknesses to sit-back in the comfort zone of a looser. You do the same when you are sympathizing others. Leaders do not sympathize. They empathize. Empathy is magical.

Practicing empathy is true leadership.

When you empathize others, you gain personal power over them. When you are in tough times those people will come along with you so positively, so openly and so empathetically that you will regain all your strength with a lightning speed.

To explain it better, I recall the scene of the movie when Amrendra was leaving his palace, the whole crowd was waiting for him outside the palace. It was a situation of tremendous loss. It was a situation of losing all hopes. Then suddenly, someone came out of the crowed and said, “Rote kyun ho? Utsav ki taiyari karo. Hamare bhagwan swayam hamare beech rahne aa rahe hain “. (Why to cry, Celebrate. Our god is coming along with us.)

 

In tuff times, personal power always dominates over positional power. Position is awarded by someone else but personal power is earned by self. It is derived from personal institutive positive behavior. Its cultivated from the seeds of empathy. Its harvested from the greatness of empathetic behavior.

Empathy generates limitless personal power.

 

2. Innovation can resolve the recourse crunch quickly

Everywhere, in every business, in every profession, in every organization one thing is common. All are putting immense provocation on ‘innovation’. Management consultants around the Globe are explaining humongous benefits of innovation. Companies have created dedicate departments to generate, capture and implement new ideas. It’s a huge investment. In the era of extremely disruptive and competitive market, many companies are relying on their R&D departments to innovate something new to gain the competitive edge over the competition. The need of hour is resource optimization and workforce reduction through automation to produce high quality products and services at low cost. Innovation is the key to create sustainable competitive advantage, true, but it has been observed that many a times cost of innovation itself is too high to trade-off. What innovation exactly is? Is it invention of new ways of working? Is it a way of producing new results? Is it development of new tools and techniques? Is it inventing a new wheel which is not round? Of course, not.

Innovation is something that can quickly yield greater deal of success even when you do not have enough resources to perform. It is something that can quickly convert resource crunch into unwinding performance. It is something that quickly grows into a savior-giant to overcome even the biggest hurdle upfront. Innovation is a competency that can quickly be transferred from one to another person to make a stronger team.

Recalling the scene of unprecedented war when Amrendra has quickly created an army of villagers with the help of Katappa, Devsena and Kumar Varma. The quick motivation and art of war transferred to Kumar Varma and Devsena. Well it’s a movie, true. But it’s a noble learning demonstrated well to motivate, team-up and win.

                           Innovation not only overcomes the scarcity of resource but fires the motivation to outperform.

 

 

1. Success can’t be sustained, without wellness within

 

 

We have seen people complaining about organizational politics every now and then. We have seen people moving up in the organizational hierarchy by playing cheap tricks, conspiracies and politics. We have also seen the sharp fall of such people rolled within a short tenure of their undeserved success. One can succeed though wrong ways of working at once but this success can’t be sustained longer. This kind of success never contains honor, joy or feeling of self-respect. Rather it entrenches the feeling of insecurity and fear.

One side, Bhallaldev has been crowned and positioned as King by the virtue of his dark intentions but was insecure, joyless and fearful.  Other side, Amrendra has been uncrowned and dispositioned but was respected like God and lived like a fearless King by the virtue of his bright intentions.

Leadership does not need a position or title, it’s inevitable, it’s boundless. It’s a reward of bright intentions oozing out from the wellness within.

Position leads to power of authority; competency leads to power of personality.

Personality is respected, rewarded and appreciated when it is able to create an effortlessly habitual, effort-fully crafted or even incidentally framed but positive influence. Personality is disrespected, penalized and disregarded when it creates habitual, accidental or even unintended but negative influence.

Technical competency is incomplete without a ravishing intellectual competency. Intellect is built on values and morals. Intellect is nourished by empathy and rituals. When complete competency is matured, it cultivates an invincible attitude. Attitude is personality, personality is power.

Right attitude is free from ego, fear and emotional jolts. Right attitude is the creator of your lifestyle. Your attitude is the execution engine of your lifestyle.

Wherever, whenever you feel that your lifestyle is not so rewarding, dull or boring just re-look at your attitude. It may be the servicing time, oil-up your attitude. Check its machinery parts. Is your intellect needs a repair? Are your rituals, morals, values or empathy got rusted by the time? Is your creativity not bouncing like before? Is your innovative mind not producing great new Ideas? Is your competency calling for a top-up? If yes, go and get it.

Corporate world today is obsessed with disruptive technologies and constructive minds.   

On technical positions, they hire for attitude. On management positions, they hire for attitude. On executive positions, they hire for attitude. Truthfully not in one single country but Globally they also fire for attitude but not for technical competency.

5 Major take ways –

1. Success is a byproduct of intention and attitude. Do not dream for success without correcting your intentions and attitude else you may get immovable roadblocks, frustration and stress.

2. Resources are never abundant anywhere, innovate to enhance your resourcefulness.

3. Do not just rely on your positional power, Focus on enhancement of your personal power.

4. Do not allow your emotions to drive your decisions, else you may have to regret sooner or later.

5. Be extremely aware on communication channels around you, remember communication is the only medium through which one person influence others or get influenced by others. This single quality, that human can communicate wisely, makes human a human, else animals also have mind and mouth. Practice the power of empathetic communication skills.

 

 

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