Captain of a ship (wreck)

This dates back to the year of 2009. Every time a Professor announced that this semester's coursework is a group one , instantly one could hear murmurs in the class. Friends , peers and rival teams devising a perfect plan for a winning team. One could hear in silent whispers, "Let’s take her, she has the experience in Pharmaceuticals" and another gesturing a classmate sitting in the opposite corner, “we will be in one team". I would dread the 'work in progress' stage.  Judging from the experience of two group coursework in the past , there is always peculiar traits in one or the other of the team members.

• a person who is lazy and procrastinates
• a person who dominates / alpha male
• A person just incapable of comprehending the basics.
• the wise crack who loves to criticize others ideas and isn't talented enough to produce his own

As my luck would have it, i worked with team mates with all of the above traits in one person or weird permutation and combinations in one or the other. This made me cringe to the idea of group work. I would never understand , what coursework one could do brilliantly solo, turned out to be a average piece of work when working collectively.

I understood this after working for 3 years in the business.

Manpower Management , you get this right and you have nailed it.  Business schools insist on  group works because in the real world we do not work in isolation. There is no appointed leader in university coursework and hence there is trouble.

As you grow the business, you have to ready the second in line to your business. In our company , we have so many things that are going wrong. Seniority comes with experience and knowledge from growing in the same working environment. The staff is unskilled, our products are not well designed , there is no delegation of authority , the real masters are missing. The list goes on and on.

I am at my demotivated best.  I keep telling myself , this is not i was born to do .. this is no use of my full potential.

A friend responded . " I just want to be the captain of the ship and sail with my crew".   I responded, " Same here !! its just that i am looking for human beings worthy being my crew ".    As on today , I got none.