Three Monks: Lessons Learnt

Hello friends, it’s raining cats and dogs outside and I am back with a gust of Chinese monsoon.  Here follows a short piece of beauty from the great old land. Let’s first have a look at it and then we’ll move forward.

A great piece, indeed! Released in 1980 and directed by A Da, the video is a beautiful creation of Shanghai Animation Film Studio. This time around, we revisited this and tried to learn a lesson or two about teamwork and organization skills.

Self-explanatory as it is, the video highlights various natures of team dynamics, problem solving and in turn, pointers to making a team work.

1.      Individuals v/s Team: A team is supposed to achieve what an individual is incapable of. With a conscious observation, we can figure it out in the video.

Load remains to be a vital factor to measure team performance. The video has 3 solutions with one, two and three team members respectively. Let’s try to analyze their respective loads:

·         1^st solution: The first monk carries a load of two buckets on his own:

the load of each bucket is, say, b, and that of his own weight is w. Now considering that his load efficiency is inversely proportional to his load, load efficiency per person, P₁ = k₁/(b+b)w [k1 = constant]= 0.5 k₁/bw

·         2^nd solution: Two monks share the load of one bucket:

Now by the same logic, load efficiency per person, P₂ = k₂/(b/2)w [b/2 as they share the load] = 2 k₂/bw

Moreover, although not shown in the video, we might speculate another option (Would like to have your view on this), which might reduce individual load, but enhances productivity:

·         3^rd solution: Three monks devise a pulley like structure, that almost eliminates w. So load efficiency increases manifolds.

A team, thus, signifies exponential growth in possibilities as it grows.

2.      Make It Simple:

Experts point out, there are 4 possibilities while providing any solution:

Problems Solutions	Simple	Complex
Simple	Area 1	Area 2
Complex	Area 3	Area4

We want simple solutions, irrespective of whether the Problem is complex or simple. They say, there is no complex solution – it’s just the lack of creativity.

While watching the video in the classroom, we paused it 3 times to suggest 3 solutions to the conflicts caused, and we all came up with complex solutions.

On the contrary, the monks succeeded to make the team work when they sorted their problems out in simple creative manner.

3.      With great power comes…:

Teams empower us, true. However, it’s equally important to take care of the integrity of the team members. The monks got involved in a number of conflicts, apparently because of trifle reasons. They eventually overcame them with ingenuity. However, the same might not be true always.


In fact, at the very beginning of the video, of the columns of text in Chinese that appear at the beginning: the first column reads, "one monk fetches water to drink", the second column reads, "two monks carry water to drink", and the third one merely says, "three monks". The unfinished sentence reflects the film's central question, which is whether the three main characters will learn to work together so that they can all have water to drink. [courtesy: Youtube].
So let’s make the team work at the very outset. After all, the best teams are not big in volume, but in integrity.

 Other Observations:

The video, apart from the above pointers, have many other intriguing angles to it. It actually shows some interesting characteristics of team dynamics.

For example, the first two monks (chronologically as they were shown), at first shared a good relationship. However, after the load-sharing conflict, they didn’t share the same cordiality. But interestingly, as the third monk arrived and they found that they have a common interest to rebuke the third monk, they united.

The video also highlights the need of maintain composure in times of crisis (the fire). Another interesting observation is the portrait of Lord Buddha, His reactions at different situations and the plant before His portrait.

I believe there are many other cues we can learn from in this video. I’ll definitely look for them. I’d like you also to look for them. I’d be happy to have your comments and views on this.

On that note, I'll take a pause. Happy Learning !!!

On that note