Ever since my article ‘6 Corporate Lessons from Kabali’ received a decent response, I have to admit that watching movies with that perspective has almost become a habit. I am invariably always looking for corporate lessons in the stories which I admit is fun at some level, especially, since my readers tend to associate with these articles more than they would if I ended up writing “Six Most Effective Corporate Lessons You Can Learn By Watching Your Boss Of Choice Or..err..Compulsion”!
This weekend I watched the movie along with my family was “MS Dhoni- The untold story” for obvious reason that cricket like 95% of the Indians, is my great love too. The movie stayed true to a biopic portraying our Captain Earnest’s lesser known background and struggles which made him the record breaking batsman which brought India a world cup after 28 years!
If I go by the story, each screen shot would question our morality and offer a valuable lesson to learn, but I will stick to the ones that we as corporate employees would readily associate with.
Lesson 1: Learnings from Mentor
As a young kid, Dhoni’s talent was first noticed by his school’s coach who found him fit for wicket keeping. When approached through one of his friend, Dhoni had interest lying in other sports and turned down the idea of cricket. He bumped into the coach the next day who taunted him for being scared of the hard cricket ball. A young Dhoni, in order to prove the coach wrong, showed up for the cricket practise the very next day.
Learning: The coach realised Dhoni’s talent before anyone else did and he motivated the child to channelize the talent then letting go by doing nothing at all. Similarly, such call to actions require a leap of faith at every level by recognizing an employee’s talent and entrusting them with responsibilities that bring out their true potential
Lesson 2 Champion leader learns from other champions
Dhoni goes ahead and becomes a local hero with his sixes painting the Ranchi sky in myriad colours. During one match he saw a fellow sportsman; who later became one of his best friend; give one swirling shot that landed on the other’s girl friend’s balcony. The lesson could be that boys perform better when their love interests are hovering in their terraces, however, neither Dhoni nor we will talk about the obvious. Where Dhoni’s attention was restricted to shot, which later became the famous “helicopter shot”, one of our lessons was how selflessly his friend taught and trained him in that shot without ever feeling threatened that someone would later outperform him.
Learning: There always are distractions around but it is the attention to details that sometimes later become monumental hits and misses. By listening and watching others keenly, you open yourself to learning from different habits and thus incorporate new things in your armour which adds on to your personality and talent.
Lesson 3: Failure is inevitable
Dhoni got an opportunity to play in Duleep trophy which required him to travel in a tight time line sans money. He tried to seek help from the men up the ladder but in no vain. His then boss only as much offered to reimburse their travel cost for a taxi they hired to travel over night for Dhoni to catch a flight to the next stop. The friend’s pitched in to help with whatever money they could collect and hit the road taking turns to drive. After a night of such hardships they reach the airport only to realise they have missed the flight and Dhoni lost the opportunity to play in the first match of Duleep trophy.
Learning: Failure, truly, is the most necessary step we must take to reach success. In this case, it was not just failure of one person, but of the entire team and an honest victory lies only in our ability to recognize our failures and learn from them. There are so many organizations that do not permit the teams to fail, thereby killing the mere spirit of innovation.
Lesson 4: Focus on Possibilities
Dhoni later joins the Indian Railways much to his father’s respite. He succumbs to the routine life of running between trains and training for railways and his yearning for playing nationals only gets fainter with each passing day. One day as a lost Dhoni sits pondering about where his life is headed, his then boss, AK Ganguly, another cricket fanatic tells Dhoni of similarities between cricket and life. He quotes, “If there is a tough bouncer, simply duck.”
Learning: Life will always give you options. It is for you to decide what it is that you want. As enterprises, we are offered a hundred million random options to do or not to do something. We cannot take every option on our platter and do nothing about everything. Instead, we must concentrate on the possibilities that are true to our cause. We rather, just deliver that which is imperative, than be a jack of all trades and master of none really!
Lesson 5: Taking Tough Calls as a Leader
Dhoni follows his dream which finally lands him in the Indian Cricket Team where his performance in matches as its finisher, fetches him such rewards and recognition that he soon becomes the captain of the Indian team. Three years before the world cup, and with T-20 world cup in his pocket, Dhoni took a tough call as a leader to replace the then famous cricketers who were slow in field with those who were fast enough to save runs. His decision fetched scandalous responses from every corner but he stuck to his guns of setting high standards and demanding impeccable performance. He was tough but also fair with people.
Learning: As a leader, you will have to take tough calls at every nook and cranny. Probably the hardest part of leadership is to make sure that you will not compromise when choosing people. You cannot let emotions get in the way when making a choice.
Lesson 6: Commitment
During the 2011 world cup, with raw energy bursting throughout the country, Dhoni saw Murli balling and told his coach Gary that he would like to go up the order and take responsibility. Throughout the world cup he refrained from making this decision but at the heat of the moment on the final’s night, he did.
Learning: The biggest learning to each one of us here is we need the ability to take the ownership of tough decision and not delegate them elsewhere. It’s not fair to let the guy below you take the brunt of making hard decisions.
As Indians who starts playing cricket before we learn to spell our name, I have been playing the game for a real long time and now that I think of it, have also incorporated several learning from the game in my professional life. Even Satya Nadella quoted “I think playing cricket taught me more about working in teams and leadership that has stayed with me throughout my career.”
All said and done, the movie has the greatest life’s lesson to offer – corporate/no corporate: Nothing is impossible! Dream On!