Total Pageviews

Sunday, August 18, 2013

Management using Navrang Cube



Navrang cube, as the name suggests, it has total 27 small cubes coloured with 9 different colours. There are total 9 sets of each colour. Each set contain 3 small cubes as shown in the figure. Unlike the conventional cubes, this cube can be dis-assembled completely and can be assembled again as per objective. Dr. Mandi asked us to assemble Navrang cube in such a way that each face will contain all the 9 colours. As the cube could be manually disassembled, initially we thought of it as a very simple task. But, to our surprise it turned out to be a very difficult task. Then, Dr. Mandi showed us a structured way to solve the cube.  

 
The first challenge was for two of us to volunteer and solve the cube - put it back into place with the given set of constraints - 
1. Each face of the cube must have all the 9 colors. Which also means obviously that none of the colors can be repeated on any face - since there are only 9 slots in each.
2. We only had limited time in which to solve the cube in.Since our professor had 2 sets of the navrang in possession, he invited two groups of two students each to come to his desk and try their luck. The 27 smaller cubes were clustered randomly on the table, and it took the teams more than a minute to even segregate and arrange the smaller cubes in some order. Neither of them came close.




And then Prof. Prasad took over.
Management Lessons:

Attempt by Student (First time)
Attempt by Professor
A Trial Attempt without preparation
A planned attempt with early preparation
Random Format
Structured Format
Confusions, Uncertain, stressed,
Calm, Simple and Clear flow of ideas
Unrealistic goals set based on excitement
Realistic goals based on experience
Not done even upto 10 Mins
Done within 4 Minutes

  • Each Problem can be solved by systematic thinking
  • Each Block represents an entity (Labor, Machine etc.) in an organization and is to be assembled in a structured and hierarchical way like the above process, so efficiency is maximum
  • Two blocks of the same color may represent people who don't gel well with each other. And hence while forming a team, a structured approach is necessary