Taking Initiative
"Don't let school get in the way of your education."
- Mark Twain
I have been toying with writing this piece for some time now. One reason I couldn’t get it out of my system is because I have not been able to make up my mind whom am I addressing it to - the students or the faculty. So if you feel a little lost reading it there is nothing wrong with you. The idea is to convey that it is the lack of understanding, both on the part of the students as well as the faculty in business schools about the role of the teachers, which unobtrusively hinders developing the very traits we are trying to ostensibly encourage and develop in the future managers. The school comes in the way of education ever so surreptitiously.
MBA is not primarily about attending classes. Don’t get me wrong. I am not saying you don’t have to attend classes or that you should not attend classes. In fact we expect you to have 100 percent attendance nothing less. Without learning what you will get to learn in the class you are not even ready to appreciate what you will need to learn outside the class. What I am saying is that though what you learn in the domain classes is the foundation on which you have to build the real you. MBA is not about attending classes it is about who you become because of your training in the business school. And who you will become will be determined by your character traits like creativity, tenacity, honesty, integrity, curiosity or willingness to learn, interpersonal skills, oral and written presentation skills, and many other important traits. Let us talk about initiative.
Stephen R. Covey in his seminal book, ‘The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People’ says that,"The difference between people who exercise initiative and those who don't is literally the difference between night and day. I'm not talking about a 25 to 50 percent difference in effectiveness; I'm talking about a 5000-plus percent difference, particularly if they are smart, aware, and sensitive to others." As a manager one of the most important trait you ought to inculcate is the readiness to initiate action; to take responsibility and to get things done. It is called initiative. Business school students must seize every opportunity to demonstrate initiative and prove it to the faculty in general and to themselves in particular that they have it in them to get things done.
If the faculty cannot foster a ‘can do attitude’ in the students they will never become assertive and productive which means they are really not employable. One of the hallmarks of a good manager is that he or she knows the types of tasks that require permission and those that don't. Students need to be put through situations where they must exercise their discretion and learn with experience to distinguish between the two. It is so important for the teacher, trainer, mentor or facilitator, depending on what role the faculty sees itself in, to demonstrate extreme caution and desist from taking decisions for the student.
The faculty has to learn to stop talking and start listening and encouraging students to look for solutions to the problems they are facing. The faculty must ask them to come out with two or three solutions and then encourage them to choose one they think is the best option. The faculty should at best guide them and endorse their course of action or politely suggest looking for a better solution. I see so many trainers strut about pompously all over the place dispensing obsolete academic solutions and defeat the entire purpose of helping students to take initiative.
The worst thing about the faculty playing the oracle or letting unsuspecting students believe that they are the ‘be all and end all’ of all knowledge is not just that it kills initiative among students but that it puts a ceiling on their capacity to learn. It says to them, ‘thou shall go thus far and no further’. It limits them. It cuts off their wings before they have learnt to fly. The members of the faculty must consider themselves as just another resource like books and the Internet for the students to consult when they want to. The trouble the faculty can talk, and how. The faculty has to be trained to listen, listen, listen and listen and hold their horses (tongues). If they don’t do that they kill the initiative in the students. You kill the initiative you kill the manager.
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