THREE MONKS (A Chinese tale to teach teamwork)

Three Monks is a Chinese animated short video, released back in early 80's . It is one of the most famous and beloved kid tales in China. It is still used widely in Chinese schools to teach moral lessons to students in primary schools. The clip has won awards at film festivals throughout the world. A note about the columns of text that appear at the beginning (English translation): 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.

Synopsis of the Video 

The story revolves around three monks who come to live at the top of a mountain. The first monk had to fetch water from the foot of the mountain, using a yoke and two buckets.  That provided him with enough water for his personal needs and to water his small vegetable garden. 

One day, he was joined by an older monk.  Their combined attempts to bring water up the mountain together, using a pole and a bucket carried between them, was not very successful; and each felt it was the other’s responsibility to fetch more water, so neither went.  The plant kept in front of the Buddha began to die. 

Then a third monk arrived, and the situation worsened.  As each monk refused to give in, or compromise his stance in any way, the situation became worse, and none of them was even able to concentrate on their meditation.

Then one day, disaster struck and a big fire was caused by a small mouse in the monastery. At time of disaster all of them realize the importance of co-operation and Synergy.

Analysis of the Video  

Three Monks when interpreted, explains the virtues of teamwork.

The red monk gets to the temple first and initiates individual responsibility for the water. He fetches water himself for the almost dead plant at the Buddha’s statue. It grows and the statue smiles at him – a visual that suggests that the monk is doing what he should be doing.

The monk as long as he was alone, thought of work as worship and used to do all his work alone. Each monk graciously gathers water from the river his first day at the temple. However, after they realise the taste of someone else doing the work, they want less and less to do for themselves. They do not see how unjust it is to expect others to do work that benefits you while you stand idle. They would rather steal water from the Buddha statue’s plant than get it themselves. When all three of them selfishly refuse to get the water, they are trapped in a deadlock which can only be relieved by retribution: The Fire.

When the monks finally notice the fire, they set out to work hard and restore balance in the temple by putting out the fire together. They each play their own role, just as every living thing in nature is called to do, and they manage to save the temple, thereby achieving new levels of Resource Management and efficient use of Human Capital.  They decide on a fair, balanced, and intelligent solution to their water gathering problems and the Buddhist temple is at harmonious peace once again. The new solution involved using a pulley to fetch water which is much more efficient and can be coordinated easily.

Learning from the video

1.       Discipline and Team Work:

When the third monk went downhill to fetch water for the first time, he came back and drank water all by himself, exhibiting a selfish tendency not aligned to the goals of the team i.e. To have water stored at all times. This led to further animosity among the 3 monks and the task never got completed. Hence even in an organization, selfish motives should be discouraged. There should be a discipline in the workings of the organization, which can be enforced only through management. A team working towards a common goal is the best direction to head to.

2.       Process improvement:

Management is both about people and processes. But for processes to work and achieve results, the preliminary thing is establishing a well-defined method. Once an efficient method is established, one can work towards people management, but not vice versa. 

For the film, we try do a Productivity analysis according to which getting 1 bucket shared by the two monks is a much better proposition. Just to make it clearer, here is a table illustrating the productivity statistics in either case. Assuming 1 Man uses 1 unit of energy to lift 1 bucket.

Event	Output (No. of buckets)	Input(Worker Energy units)	Productivity = Output/Input
1 Man – 2 buckets	2	2	1
2 Men – 1 bucket	1	0.5	2
3 Men – No bucket	0	NA	0

 

Productivity is Important. Productivity is about how well an organization converts resource inputs into goods or services. Workplace productivity is about how firms can utilize labour and skills, innovation, technology and organizational structure to improve the quantity and quality of their output.

3.       Complex Problems, Simple Solutions: Innovation

There should be an innovative approach to solve any problem. This should be the motto of decision making for any manager or team member in an organization. This also highlights the need of engineering brains in management arena. The productivity analysis as shown above is one method. Innovative thinking is also one of the main requirements.

4.       Division Of Work and Synergy among roles:

As soon as the new monk entered, the old monk tried to put the whole responsibility on the new monk hence trying to avoid any efforts. Consider a similar situation in any organization, if that is done every employee will have to spend more time in learning new things than implementing the things that he already has learnt so minimizing possible output. So, effective division of labour and synergy among the roles is important.