Leadership lessons from the theater

Last class of the subject of leadership in my MBA was one of the most memorial experience for me personally. To my surprise our dean Dr Tapan Panda has called almost every faculty from school of management and some of the women officials from Hero MotoCorp as our audience for our play which was supposed to be presented by us as our last activity for this leadership course.

This activity was supposed to be a whole day workshop which included from modeling our idea into play (pre-production to final production), In the morning my group was given just a word “hatred”, so when this word was given to us then immediately as a group we started discussing on how to make this word as our theme for our play. Here at this pre-production stage I contributed with idea which was very much related to the present education system of India i.e. positive and negative impact of reservation and how it creates a big divide among society based on caste system.

When we were clear about our theme for our play, we stared discussing about how to develop characters based on the theme which we decided. So at this stage as a group we came with an idea to invite our colleagues from 1^st year MBA batch as actors, there we asked a boy to act for the character who was supposed to be a student who got admission in a Delhi university college in spite of having average marks and a girl who in spite of getting excellent marks was not able get admission as the boy got admission over her seat on the basis of caste reservation. So in the end it was shown in the play as to how the girl developed hatred towards that boy and the whole education system. 

From the forgoing, we can learn leadership lessons from the theater. In the current market environment, command and control models of leadership have given way to approaches that emphasize vision, values, collaboration and coaching. Business leaders need to empower their employees to encourage team work and collaboration to free their employees to innovate. The theater director and the business leader share many similarities regarding roles and responsibility yet the techniques they employ differ sharply. Theater director’s job entails analysis interpretation and planning. He must spend his time working with those he is leading, coaching, cajoling, guiding and collaborating. Consider these skills an example of the principal of unity and multiplicity at work- a core competency of successful directors. “Best in class” theater director articulates a unifying vision and pull together a group of disparate talents and skills. They allow each individual the autonomy to bring his unique talents to bear on the role. The craft of “best in class” director can be analyzed in three stages: preproduction, rehearsal and performance. At preproduction stage the director forms his ideas about the play, develops a vision and begins selecting the team. It can be compared to business leader-entering a new market, launching a new product and examining existing and potential strategies. Deeper understanding of human nature is a must for both. Director emphasize good casting i.e. right people in the right roles. Similarly, business leader recruits bright people eager to work, who will fit into his team. Their training is equally important. Good theater director put collaboration at the heart of the work. Warm up exercise and improvisation attempt to build group trust and individual confidence.

Theater director engage in “Prismatic thinking”. Business leaders also need to encourage themselves and their team members to adopt a more open ended approach to problem solving. Business leaders look at the end result- profits, market share etc. “Best-in-class” directors are most interested in the process. Both must embrace continual learning to further their growth. The process of learning and doing is what creates engagement – fun.

In rapidly changing, increasingly complex world, in which the business professional operates, they seek to instill greater speed, creativity and flexibility into their organization, the principal of unity and multiplicity can become a key source of guidance.