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This is the original transcript of Maharaji's comments on the third day of a training session that took place in Arundel, England, in 1999. The transcript was written by Chuck Nathan, and the only edits that have been done are the replacement of attendees' names with initials, and obvious spelling corrections.
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M COMMENTS
UK SESSION #1
7/25/99
8:55am (before the team was in the room)
Close those doors and tell security not to let people in until I say so.
9am
The front row is supposed to be in the rear. The rear row is supposed to be in the front.
Who's missing? Where is she (P)? It's time to begin and we're missing a person. Why don't you decide what to do?
(Comments)
What happened to our volume? I bet you don't have a whole lot left.
(Comments)
Hello people. This is for real. This is not an exercise.
(Comments)
The doors are closed. You can't close them now.
(Comments)
This is for real. You're not taking it for real. This is a person. There are consequences. There are consequences to the team and there are consequences to that person. There's a real situation. How are you going to deal with it? Wow. Is that how you're going to deal with it? Silence. What are you going to decide? Half of you are gone. You are not even engaged.
(Comments)
What's the if? This is a real situation.
(Comments)
What if she has only got one ticket left? Just a thought. Since you don't know.
(Comments)
How many of you think this is serious? Why aren't you acting on it? So far N, D, J, S, C, couple of those guys spoke, K, that's about it. That's serious? N. Is that what you consider serious? 21 minutes have gone by. This is a real situation. Do you think I told her not to come in? And how do you know that she went to get her pass?
(Comments)
If I were you, I'd grab her hand and tell her come with me, we'll sort it out when we get there.
I have a boat. When I go out on it, I tell somebody about every hour do a head count. I don't want to have somebody to have fallen off. I'm responsible for that. Everybody's responsible for that. That make any sense to you? Is that how you dealt with that situation?
A person is blatantly telling you, I'll going to be late. It's like a person drunk and is leaning over the railing over the boat and you. You know the conference is starting. You know they're going to be late. And you tell them to talk to a facilitator.
What would be the solution to the problem when this drunkard is sitting on the boat? You'd just watch?
The consequence was based on not being here. The consequence was never discussed of not having your tickets. Be a human being for crying out loud.
One time when Hansi was a little boy I was staying at the 47th floor of an apartment in New Jersey. Hansi went out on to the balcony. He sticks his head out and can't get back in. I saw that and what should I have done? As a father what should I have done? Should I have said let me go consult your mother? No. I pulled him back in. Look at the obviousness of the situation.
When you arrive at an airport, when you arrive in a foreign country and you wait and you wait. You arrive in France and they tell you your luggage will arrive tomorrow afternoon. Are you going to stay there? You take care of what's important. If this person is important to you, if you care of the integrity of the team, you take care of that integrity.
So many of us deal with these situations by saying "I told you so". I told you so doesn't do people any good. That doesn't mean anything to me except for my ego. I want to make sure the right people, the right focus, the right elements are there. I could just say, "I told you so." I don't want that. That's too much of a consequence to me.
She turns to you for help. I'm drunk. Help me. And you're saying I told you so.
When somebody takes ownership of a situation that is so great, that has such a consequence to it, you don't just sit down in the chair. I don't why you are saying I'm uncomfortable. When you never demonstrated a connection with that situation.
Very very strange attitude. It's not a team attitude at all. Second attitude is, we made a boo boo, let's just fix it and go on. How the hell did I get to this boo boo? I don't ever want to that again? People came up with a solution. If C had said the solution of 3 points yesterday, I would have understood it. But she might have only one ticket. And I'm kind of stumped too. We'll all take a ticket out. That doesn't mean anything. How many of you have got one 3 ticket left. You'll be pushing them in the tents for the next infringement that they make.
If you don't know how many tickets you have left, that's very serious. I know what will happen when you will lose these tickets. RJ saw a violation and I said no, it's OK. To me it's serious.
I don't get it guys, or folks. This is a real situation. Is anybody happy with your own performance? And you're going to try to accommodate what as a team? And after the training is over you're going to try to facilitate things for them? Whoa. This is just one person. In future you might be dealing with 8000 people. When are you going to start thinking as a team?
In a football team if someone decided I can do this all myself, what do you thank would happen? One person against the whole other team? No way. They'd get killed.
You're still not looking at this as a team, as a serious situation. It's like yesterday never happened and the day before that never happened. You say yes to every question and then you turn around and do the opposite.
We should take a 15-minute break.
(Regarding P asking Chuck whether she should go to her room and get her pass and tickets, T said M said that telling P that the decision was her responsibility was correct but that the facilitator team should have been immediately informed of the situation) (Put in facilitator checklist.)
(Break)
10am
So is the problem fixed? Why do you always take the attitude, let's just fix the problem?
(Comments)
So the way you figure out how close you are to the car in front of me is you ram it and then you back off 10 feet is that right?
He says it's based on experience How many of you have gone bungie jumping? Would you like to go? How can you say that? You haven't tried it?
If someone put you in the cockpit of an airplane
If you have no experience, you become no experience You don't just grab a woman and start kissing her because you like her. You go through a whole procedure. I'm astounded at this mentality. This is a very strange mentality to me.
Stamps his foot. That's what we've been doing for three days. I'm sorry. That's BS. That's the biggest pile of BS I've ever seen.
What do you think we've been doing for two days, wasting our time?
That's what we talked about following the rules yesterday. I thought that was a done deal? Why are we going on and pretending this problem is gone? Is this problem finished?
When you go into areas where you have no experience, you become far more cautious, far more careful to make sure you have all the bases covered. You get in your car to drive somewhere and you think do I have everything? Do I need a pen? A pad of paper? I don't know. More unknown the situation, more cautious you become. If I'm driving in a place I've never driven before, I'm going to get my map.
If I'm going to Dunrite I don't do that. But if I'm going someplace else where I've never been, make the map. So here you are, maybe you don't have an experience of a team. How many of you believe you're not working to be a team? So you all agree you're trying to be a team? And you have no experience of that. So you should be extra cautious.
Remember when you first started to drive? Here's the key, here's the light. Did you drive then like you drive now? No. So cautious. That's how real world is.
When you conduct business with someone you don't know, how many checks and balances are you going to have? Contracts. You don't do that with your wife. Very very important to understand this. But now you want to have commentary. You're out of the situation. And then a comment: I will explain what has happened. If you can explain, then let's all go home. We'll train one person and that one person can train all of you. Is that what you'll been learning, what's on the flipcharts? The learning hasn't been on the flipcharts, it's been here (in the head). So please take care of this problem so we can go on.
(Comments)
That's fine, after you solve your immediate problem. So far as people keep making mistakes and fix them, they will
When are you going to get to the mode when you don't have any problems so you don't have to fix it?
Last night your dinner was delayed for one hour. What if it happened every night and you kept getting a letter of apology every night?
Do you know the contract for this hotel was not reviewed properly? The rooms were not secured properly. The way it was fixed, let's just ask everyone to double up. And you who had booked your single room said OK, I'll do it. Is this acceptable to you? You know, when you say I don't care, you really mean it. You don't care. How can you not care?
One time I arrived in Greece. They picked up me up and I'm in the lobby waiting to be escorted to my room. It was a hectic day. I had to do my preflight. And Greece is not easy, they don't have modern equipment. Someone said we don't have a room. The President is coming and the suite is going to the President. That pissed me off. I had a letter of confirmation. I asked for the manager. He said I can't help you. I said I have a letter of confirmation. I said that's your problem that the President is coming. I'm got my family here. You know what happened. They cleared out four suites for me. You've got to stand up for those standards that need to be set. Why have programs not changed? Because nobody has changed the standard. Unless someone changes the standard, nothing is going to change.
How many of you want to live like that slob pig? Pigs are really clean animals. Only one problem with pigs. They accept that. You are just like that pig, accepting mediocre standards.
Remember I have asked you so many times, bring your strength. Did you bring your strength with her? No, you brought your weakness. How many of you understand the concept that V was talking about that the team should apologize to her? Really, do you understand? Why should the team apologize to her?
You don't act like a team in here at all. Do you really understand it?
All I have to do is remind, remind you. What happens, I give the 5-minute satsang, I reminded everybody, now everybody has the license to fuck up and I can say I'll tell you so. What would it have taken to have the contract crystal clear? How many of you think the hotel is here to provide service? No, they're here to make money.
When I saw the stars and the crowns in front they had 5 crowns. But they don't even have AC. In America, they wouldn't even give it one star.
If you bought a brand new Ford sedan, white beautiful interior and you bought it. And they said come tomorrow and pick it up at 9:30am. And you come and they say come to the delivery center. You walk in and the whole front end is smashed. Are you sure you won't accept it? The guy is saying please sign that there's nothing wrong with the car. That's exactly what you have demonstrated that you would do.
I like this car so much, even if the fucking front end is smashed, it's OK. That's where your standards are at. You can't bring that into any team.
When are we going to learn to put our foot down and say no?
So fix it, right?
(Comments)
That's inconsequential. We'll all come together again and decide what we've already decided. And then when the same thing happens again, we'll all come together and again and decide it again.
Do you realize where you are at? And do you see the parallel with events not improving?
So many people told me that Barcelona and Manchester were incredible. I asked people why. They said because what you said was incredible. What I would have liked to hear was the way the hall was, all the arrangements, everything was so nice and then when you spoke, it was incredible. The surroundings should represent me.
The quality of what M says, if that gets reflected in the materials for new people, would that make any difference? And don't you think the same mentality that is allowing you stay status quo for this problem is the same mentality that is resulting in no changes in events? Then why aren't you changing it?
How an usher reacts, when people start reflecting that quality. We're not talking about changing K, you don't have to worry about changing M. We're talking about changing you. M has already evolved. The quality of the content, the quality of the delivery, the quality of what is represented, it's beautiful. Knowledge sessions have evolved.
Are we old in an new way. new new new old way
The way Knowledge sessions are done is completely brand new.
Nature is incredible. It's one thing that works. Nature works. Nature always evolves. Nature does not ever throw anything out that works. You know that? In the first experiment, nature said we're going to create bodies that derive their energy from the sun. Snakes, lizards. Then nature said we'll create a storage system: Trees. Then once there were trees, creatures could derive their energy from stored energy, ie. Cows, human beings. But the snakes got to stay. Two systems completely different. Snakes got to say and evolve.
And nature knows that what is not capable of evolving, goes.
In Macuau Island off Japan, these monkeys survived ever though too cold to survive. Scientist found that monkeys survived by sitting in hot tubs during winter. Scientists starting feeding the monkeys and the monkeys got sand in the food and they were having trouble with it. One female from one tribe figured out if she washed her food, the sand would be washed away. She understood it and then her kids saw her sand did the same. And that tribe is the healthiest tribe. The other tribes watch, but they don't do that.
In the Pyrenees mountains the eagle drops the bone on a rock ands splits it open and therefore has a new food source that other birds don't have. Crows don't get it.
To evolve is crucial for survival. Do you know how many people have come and said we've got the answer and disippated and disappeared. Every time we evolve we benefit. You know that right? If we would have stayed where we were in the early 70's it would have been a very static thing.
It's amazing. Do you see what evolving can do? How powerful it is? And how you can't be afraid of it. The chance to evolve is a golden opportunity. Do you want to take it or not? So far you've demonstrated you don't care. Can you think of a better time and place to evolve than right now? We're in an environment where we can evolve and learn how to walk with that new evolution and survive. Unless we take that opportunity, it won't mean anything. And you're not taking it.
Yesterday, we did the numbers game, where you were at. After some high numbers were said, I said I don't think you got it. I know it was ambigous all the way until the end what was really being asked for. If one person got up and said could you please clarify that, would it have helped the team? If a second person got up and asked for clarification, would it have helped the team? Of course. Is there a limit to how clear a person needs to be?
But you love ambiguity. Lots of times V gets up and gives instructions and it's not clear. It's clear, but it's not clear. And then people make their interpretations. No one wants to get up and ask for clarification.
V says I'm not going to repeat. Maybe somebody in the group got it. Why not get that clarity? Is that expensive? No, it's free. You get penalized for boo boo ing.
You've got to get rid of this thing, we don't have experience. I'd go around with the rules tatooed. Because it matters.
So please, let's resolve this situation satisfactorily, to everyone's satisfaction. Then we'll move onto the homework and then we can go on.
(Comments)
Why are you bringing up a new proposal when one proposal has been made and it hasn't been acted on?
(Someone makes a comment and then after M asks what they mean, the person says they are making the comment instead of objecting.) If you object, then say you object. They don't know if you are making a comment or having a fucking brain fart.
His proposal was simple enough. We all apologize to P.
(Someone starts apologizing to P.) You can't do that. There's one person who objected to the proposal.
You might have a great idea. But if wrong time. Doesn't help the team.
(comments)
Obviously you've got a problem. She doesn't understand something. She got up and people said 10 seconds and people said it's OK, it's OK, it's OK. That could have ended the whole training. The sanctity of the rules was compromised. Did it go through your head what she was saying, "It's OK, it's OK." The issue is not resolved.
You're talking about a boat not just with one hole, but with multiple holes. Easy way to discover if there's a hole in the boat, put it in the water and see if it sinks.
Because she got up and apologized to everybody, then nobody had a problem apologizing to her.
The pact that you made yesterday was a sacred pact. We're going to follow these rules. She just got up and said don't worry about it. To me that's the greatest fuck you on the planet earth.
That's like a captain of a plane saying fuck the safety rules when you point out a problem.
So how can there be a resolution?
(Comments)
So everyone should become individuals.
(Comments)
She (K) is the person who definitely figures there's definitely 70 assholes here.
I'm not saying what you did was wrong. That was the proposal that was passed to apologize. But she (P) has demonstrated that she is a loose cannon.
And there is another person who is another loose cannon right there (K), thinking everyone else is an asshole. She will fuck up this team by saying I will do what I feel like, not what is beneficial to the team. You've got two big gaping holes. You've got very serious problems.
Time for another break. I'm going to take a break. 15 minutes.
11:13am
If you wanted to own up to this, you could have stayed and resolved it.
You won't be able to do this by yourself. Everyone has to have that understanding. It's called ownership.
Everything is confidential. The two people who are in that room. One is a doctor and one is R, a technician and they have been through the training. All the facilitators have been through the training. I am here. The doors are closed. This is a safe environment.
Do you own the situation here? Do you feel, do you understand there needs to be a team?
I must also inform you that we are right now in this period, this is a very very dangerous period. The facilitators haven't been saying much. This time is going to be short-lived. Right now, all of you are practicing bad habits. You're busting the 10 second, 5 second rule. There's going to be a point when they will go back into their mode and you will lose all your tickets. I am positive.
Right now you are very very close to this training terminating. You're not getting it. You have a problem, you're not resolving it.
(Comments)
We commit to the rules even though we don't understand them? N's proposal is good and so is C's. I think it would be good to have one before the other. Is there anybody here who doesn't understand the rules?
(Comments)
Very interesting twist. She realized she'd forgotten her blindfold and tickets and went to get them. Right? How many of you are missing your blindfolds? We found two. But they didn't go to get them. But you were asked to bring them here. She didn't leave them on purpose. She forgot too. So you've got another problem. It's not just her. The other ones didn't have it and didn't try to recover, nor said I don't have it and tried to go get it.
(G apologizes) He thought about reminding the team to bring their blindfolds but didn't do it.
Problems, why are problems bad? Do you know? Consequences. Right? So what you have mastered is to fix the consequences, not the problem. The shit is lying on the floor, but you're going to get some cologne and spray it, but not remove the shit.
Isn't the whole team a buddy? Shouldn't the whole team being
It's amazing. Other there comes a voice saying "Hey we're getting away from it, can we get back to the issue." It felt so good. And for the first time, someone acknowleldge the problem and tried to fix the problem, not the consequence. For the first time, he acknowledges, hey I'm a hole too because all I thought of was myself, not the team. That's the problem.
This is who we are. This is how we operate. Having a tool like K in your life is liking having a hyper rocket. You should be soaring. Why doesn't it happen? Because you have always trying to fix the consequences in your life, never the problems. So the problems never get solved.
There are people who go to these banks to consolidate their bills. They get another loan and pay a smaller amount now. Do you know of these people? So now they can go shopping because their payments are lower. So they pile up more bills. These people will never get ahead financially in their lives because they haven't fixed the problem.
People, fix the problem, not the consequences. So you've got a proposal. It's a sound proposal. How many of you don't understand these rules? Isn't that the proposal? Go ahead. Continue. Resume.
I thought of a good example of unanimity. A child is just starting to walk. The parent sees a danger over there, maybe a lake. The child is walking. The parent is right along. And when too close to the steps, the parent guides the child away from the steps. It's very awkward for the parent to walk like that. The parent can't touch the kid. Unanimity, let it go. Allowing the team to learn to walk, as long as there's no harm. You do whatever you have to do, I'll watch you. We take the child and say, no walk this way. You can't do that.
I remember this one kid. She came on the boat. She was a wild cannon. She would walk off, right into the water. The father there is being unanimous with the child saying I'm with you. I'm not going to let you get hurt, but within that, it's fine. Even though I have better ideas, letting the exploring and learning happen. It wouldn't help to force the ideas at this point. It's another way of looking at unanimity.
Honesty is your standard. How piggish you want to feel. Wallow in the mud of unclarity. You like it, you'll sit there and say this is fine. Gee I forgot my blindfold. You have to realize the processes happpening in someone's head. Either you say I forgot my blindfold. I don't want to live in that uncertainty. Did I make a mistake. I told the facilitator, so it's not my problem How does telling the facilitator help the team? Can somebody explain that to me? If you lose your blindfold, who should you tell first?
If you were in a real live situation and you were asked to fax a contract and you forgot to do it, you would tell the facilitator? Let's be real about it. Call V in the middle of the night? Or tell the team?
You've got to fix the problem, not the consequence. How do the fix the consequence. (Addressed to V: Every time someone tells a facilitator a problem, the facilitator shouldn't even listen to it.)
I'm going to go on. Up the ante one, up the standards one. What if the team decided it's dark outside? It's not obviously, but what if the team decided? What would you do?
He says I'll support the team. He says I'll show the team it's not. Everyone's in agreement but you. The proposal is made "it's dark outside." 99% of the people agree.
Could you please all take off your shoes? Any problem? Those of you have socks, please take off your socks. If you have stockings it's ok. Any problems? OK, trake off your pants. Problem. Don't laugh. This is what I want you to understand. This is exactly the point. No harm done. You all have to have a threshhold beyond which you are not going to to go, that you should have as a human being living on this earth. Do you understand that?
To me there's nothing more sickening when a policeman comes over and says I'm just doing my job. Do your job, but have a threshhold beyond which you are not going to go. Your standards. And that's it.
So if the team decides it's dark outside, is it? What's the harm? You took off your socks, shoes. Pants, wait a minute. Isn't pants just like a sock? Just covers as different part.
How can your threshold be so low? What's the harm? Maybe we're going to do an exercise in which we're going to pretend. They do that all the time in flight safety. You sit in the simulator, it's dark. I have never heard a pilot say, wait it's not dark. 100 degrees. In the simulator it's snowing.
You should understand that the team is not going to go off the deep end. The team is not going to form resolutions that we should all get naked and run thru the streets. For simulation purposes all over the world, reality is thrown out the window. I remember going to Panam school, they had as dummy, 747. You get to deploy the shute and jump out. But there isn't an emergency. Is there? They're pretending.
Maybe we're all going to do survival training. Have you ever done it? It's really fun. Right now there's one coming up. I really hope this guy does more survival training for us. I know half of you would have a horrible time. They were taken to Florida swamps, mosquitos, no food. You had to kill the snakes and eat them. True blue survival training. They had to do that. Find the snake, kill it, cut it up. Light the fire. Eat it.
I've sat there and had cattail plants. We impose so many limits on ourselves
There was an airplane that crashed in the Amazon. This girl instact, she was blind, she fell out of the sky. The fall was broken by a tree. She was alive in the middle of the Amazon. She survived. Blind. She got out of there.
Do you have faith, trust that this team is not going to lead you astray?
When you were young, you used to pretend all the time. Pretend it was dark.
Do you have that trust in this team? They're not a bunch of assholes. They're not going to tell you to jump off a cliff without a net there? The team is going in a direction where we're going to jump off a cliff. Your question should be "is there a net?" "What is the safety feature?" It's a one foot drop. OK, let's go. Take care of your concerns. But they don't have to come as a disagreement.
What's the purpose? We're going to take a picture and send it to M. OK.
I know what has been spoken in the last few minutes is very compacted.
Does this mean you trust Y, S? No, you trust the team. I'm not saying everything N says is right. No, she's going to have brain farts. I'm talking about meshing with the team and trusting in that.
You should trust the bus driver. That's a good thing. He's done a lot of favors. He's fixed the bus. If I'm the bus driver in that analogy, I'm not asking you to do what I do. Don't get that confused. You're not replacing me. You're trying to create a team, a tool that can help me. The machinery that we have now is machinery that existed in 1971.
The tools we have now only fix a prop plane. But we need tools to fix a jet plane. Then we can go really fast. That tool is a team.
Teamwork is really really incredible. It's very satisfying. At the residence, kids wanted little chicks when they were little. Somehow the tradition was started. So now we have all these chickens. There's this one rooster who's really big. He's got 7 or 8 hens. Some are RI. Some are from France. He takes care of them. He finds bugs for them. He won't eat them. He finds bugs for the hens.
If he feels a threat coming, he calls them and they come running. Teamwork is really good.
You have to have your own personal threshold. That's what the father is doing. He's got absolute thresholds where he's not going to let the child go. But between that, he'll let the child go. Definitely something to think about.
Trusting individuals. That will come too. More you get to know them. But team you should trust.
Let's take a break. A lot has been said. Try to digest it. This morning I said I want to do this about it's dark outside. Take off the shoes….. Absolute thresholds.
Another anology: After WWII there was a tribunal assigned for war criminals. The judge selected was an American judge. There's a movie with Spencer Tracey, incredible movie. He went out and started communicating with local people. He posed them a question, "Why did you let that happen?" First he asked, did you know about this? They said, yes. How many of you knew about it? Well what could we do? He faulted the entire country for that. That was one of his biggest things. He said it wasn't just the question of the officers or other people who signed the papers or judges who sentenced these people, because the judges were on trial. There was one judge who was on trial, who was considered the most honest and fair judge. While all the other judges were trying to get out of it, he actually said no, I should have made it my business to know what was going on and I didn't care.
My analogy here is it was a team he looked at, the country was a team. I certainly hope there are no people here who will have blind faith. I don't need those people. Bring strength, not doubt, not ambiguity. That's not a leader that anybody likes. I need to be clear.
Is it dark outside? "No I object." Wrong approach. "I want to know why we're talking about it being dark outside." Well, we're doing a simulated training putting on life vests. We're going to pretend. So it's so fucking dark outside. Yes sir. No problem.
This is a joke. I heard it yesterday. Two ladies are playing golf. One gets her club and the ball goes flying up. There are a couple of men and they see the ball hit this guy and he crumples to the ground in pain. The lady says oh no I hit him in the balls. The lady goes up to the guy and says I'm a massage therapist. The guy is moaning. He lady puts her hand in his pants and starts massaging his balls. The guy stops moaning. The lady ask how do you feel. The guy says it feels really good but my hand is still as sore as before.
That's what assumptions do.
OK, let's take a 15-minute break.
(During break in facilitator room:)
People need to learn to operate not from absolutes but instead using the no harm guideline.
People react in a training if they perceive you are telling them something they already know.
I see the same dynamics here as in flight training. People try to take what is being taught and put it in the framework of what they already know. "Oh, is that like this?"
The 5 and 10 second rules are really important because they are very concrete. Once people see they can do the 5 and 10 second rules, then it helps them see that they can follow the other rules too. You need to really enforce the 5 and 10 second rules closely. This can provide people with the first step they need to be able to follow the rest of the rules.
12:35pm
OK, let's resolve the current issues and then move on.
I think we're all going to help each other right?
I need for each person to come up and say, "Can you hear me?" Don't speak from here, speak from here, stomach.
That's how you need to speak every time because on the team whoever has the loudest voice wins.
This is serious. This is serious.
So remember that. From now on I do not expect anybody to be violated for speaking too softly. You have all demonstrated you can speak loud enough for everyone to hear. Other people's time is important. What you have to say is important.
Let's see where we are. Homework, did we do that assignment. Let's do this in the most expeditious way possible. Figure out what would be the most expeditious way and do it.
Quickest possible way.
OK. From now on violations are back up.
See when you want to do it, you can do it. Cut the shit, the ahhs, the oohs.
The task is very simple. You've done your homework. You need to present your homework to me. How can you present your homework expeditiously to me so it doesn't waste my time and your time?
First of all, can you decide how long you want to take for this. What would you consider expeditious. Quickly. What would you consider expeditious so my time and your time is not wasted.
You mean the way you wrote it, you wrote it in a way that would abuse time.
The precedent was already set with the first day homework. If I say to somebody, we need a Knowledge center and they go look and never send me a proposal.
I made an observation to the facilitators. The 5 and 10 second rule -- you're doing really poorly with it. Since you can't cope with those two rules, you're throwing out the rest of the rules. I'm getting a little concerned here. I've invested 2 1/2 days and I'm seeing the end coming very quickly. Already we have 7 violations in the last few minutes. We've already got one person with a 10 point violation. We've got a problem brewing.
A suggestion was made we'll take 20 minutes to do this. An analogy was given. This is how we will do it. You could have proceeded instead of going all over the place. But when the individual kicks in, wants to be the smarter of the group, then things happen.
Anybody will tell you if I give you an assignment, write your weakness, your strength, it's not that you have to come up with a long list. Anybody would expect you to write the greatest strength and the greatest weakness. And cut the BS. That's just common sense. Not go on and on. What is your the greatest strength? Greatest weakness?
Unfortunately we have no concept of time. I would have hoped we could have completed the homework before lunch. I know we've got an exercise for you. I know you'll forfeit that too.
It's 1:15pm At 1:30 you should go out for lunch. You leave at 1:30pm and come back at 2:30pm. You take this time and figure out what to do. I see the end coming very soon. The five second rule is catching you. I think you need to fix this. This is crazy. You've been given all the tools but you are not using them. You've got to fix it.
(Lunch break)
2:30pm
OK so what did you decide? Was there a decision reached or any conclusion reached?
OK, so should we resume the task of presenting the homework? OK, let's do so.
(In response to the question should people leave 5 seconds between each person reading their homework:) No because I'm the one who is going to assimilate and I can do it faster than you guys can.
(People read homework)
You're starting to mumble again. Now how do I get across to you that for the benefit of the whole team you have to speak loudly?
(More people read homework)
OK. With a few variations I think we're pretty much in the same place. Not really any different. There are two rules - 10 second and 5 seconds. And there was also a proposal about whether to say where we are headed: comment, proposal, question.
You're having a very hard time with speaking loudly, 10 seconds, 5 seconds. Then there's the fourth thing about identifying your comment, having a header to your comments.
I don't know if you want to do something about these four things.
(Comments)
Yeah, I see the end approaching very rapidly. Time and bust. The facilitators get money for the amount of tickets that they get. For 3 points they get $3. For 10 points they get $10.
I'm only going to give you 5 minutes to decide on this. After that we're going to move on.
(Comments)
That's it. Five minutes are up. She was right. I wasn't going to let you change the 10 second rule. But I would have let you change the 5 second rule. He was right. If something isn't working, change it. OK, we're going to move on. Now you are going to get violated for the five second rule. I guess I'll be going home tonight.
(V asks how much time the team wants to strategize the next exercise)
I wonder who the first person is who is going to sing the song (for speaking too softly).
Maybe it would be more interesting if they sing it in the lobby.
You're the timekeeper. Have you seen those big clocks in the city center. If you keep this up, not speaking loud enough, I'm going to put music on. I've got CD's. Pretty obnoxious ones. Woody Allen, Robin Williams, standup. Choo choo trains. Weird music. Jerry Seinfeld. Poison clan. Unpredictable mystical. Let's try poison plant. You know how many times I've asked everybody to speak loudly?
(M turns on some music)
That's what it's going to be like. Pretty obnoxious huh?
(Comments)
(Someone proposes the breakout sessions not using the tables) Why eliminate the tables? (Someone says because there aren't enough for all the breakout groups) It's like a bunch of men walk into the shower and someone has a shorter dick so everyone cuts theirs off. Does anybody know how many tables there are? Yoram come with me to look at how many tables there are.
(Comments)
Are there people who are uncomfortable with this? Why are you being dishonest and not speaking up?
I think the process you are agreeing to is jumping off the cliff without a net.
(Blue Papaya exercise)
There is no conflict. What one group wants the other group doesn't need. There is no problem. But it's very easy to become a hog. I want everything.
But I'm stumped. I'm having a big, big problem with the group going along. Forget about the tables. Going along that we're not going to use flipcharts. How can the group do that?
You realize whatever you need wouldn't be unanimous. There's that concern that R had. Is it dark outside. Here you were walking into a dangerous situation. Resources that could have been helpful were dropped. So I'm having a problem. Which also means here we are on the third day and we haven't really set up the facility yet. For which you also take the record. You're breaking records.
In fact I hinted to you that let's set up and we're going to work in groups. So you still haven't set up yet. You haven't even taken a look at what would be the most optimum. By default in one room there's two groups, three in another room.
I think there are people here who are relying on certain people to take care of them.
Goal orientation is not going to work.
The exercises are representing real life jobs that you would be doing for me as a team. You understand that, right? So in this one, security wants certain rooms in a hall and productions want certain rooms. They don't realize there's no conflict. How many times does that happen?
Last time at Amaroo security requested 250 people not including kitchen staff. And 1300 people were going to stay on the property. 500 of those are staff who are going to be staying there at reduced fees. Did they need that many people? Of course not.
We're faced with the same situation. We're going to be using significantly less people to pull a bigger event together. These exercises are representing what you will be doing out there. If this is how you are going to approach that, it's not going to work.
R will murder you and be happy to go to prison if you go to the shed at Amaroo and just take whatever you need. And I'd go bail him out. He did the right thing. You'll have to spend eternity in the Yamanto cemetery. Pretty lonely place. One horse town.
How many of you remembered that? (to wear shoes to do outside exercises)
They can't take notes, right?
(V announces Acid River Crossing)
(20 minute break)
(Acid River Crossing exercise)
I'm kind of surprised you guys decided to change what I said you couldn't do. No one objected? How come? You object for the wrong things, but you don't object for the right things?
I gave you the opportunity to change it. You didn't. Time was up. I made it very clear that you couldn't change it because time was up. I don't know where you're coming from. Weird mentality. I've never experienced a group like this. No discipline.
Already this is three days that has gone by. We have only 3 days left. Today seeing the progress that's been made it's not very encouraging at all. You have the capacity. But you don't seem to want to put it in the right direction. So I don't know what you are going to do.
(M replays video of the exercise)
I want you to pay particular attention to this one ordeal that you have here. Now you see, they are wanting to try something but they are being interrupted. The task that they're doing, that's an interruption, period. Do they listen to you? No, because they're too busy.
All right, here comes trouble. You watch how close he comes to hurting people. You know that he's just frustrated as hell. That's why he's doing it (lifting the wood beam). He's not doing it in a sane way. So if he's doing it from frustration, what's going to happen? Disaster.
Would that work? The other people standing around will carry the beam? Of course it's really exciting. Like in the beginning, people got excited and counted off and counted up to 37. It was supposed to be 36. But people got really happy. You're right, it's not funny.
We could show this at an event. Just put those square things on everybody's face. Look at how many people are involved here. No one plan. Even if you started with something that took basic things into account. But hesitancy and more plans, hesitancy and more plans, and frustration, at the end of the day, it doesn't help.
It just gets painful after this.
You've done this before, right? He was bringing incredible strength. He could have helped you do the whole thing in a few minutes. But there's still no ability to listen at all.
So you really want a captain who has never flown an airplane. The world respects experience.
But let's say you had to do something like that, cross a river. It's got pirhanas in it. Just as bad. Any critique you'd like to share among yourselves? V said this is just perfect for the bus analogy. If some people had been out of there watching, it would have helped so much. But everybody stayed, complicating the situation many, many fold.
Unanimity would have been no problem had the rest of the people had stepped aside and let the others do the task. You may have had people who didn't want to do it or didn't understand the language too well. You could have watched the whole scene much better and helped more. If you had gotten out where you were, you could have given the most valuable piece of information. I'm not going to tell you what it is.
Actually I have a comment about that set up (for the exercise) (Put in Facilitator checklist). OK let's take a 15-minute break.
(Break)
5:40pm
No, it's not time yet.
OK.
I want to say a couple of things. One is, why are you so defensive?
I understand what you're saying, but that hasn't been the case. I understand that the rules feel constraining, but actually not following the rules is what has been constraining. If a rat can learn push this lever and get candy, and that's just a rat, why can't you learn?
But why are you so defensive? Are you trying to pair off against me and the facilitators.
I don't consider P particularly brilliant. He's smart, but not brilliant. But he taught me something. Driving together, he told me not to turn the steering wheel before the turn. If someone is willing to show me, to expand my horizons, then should I be defensive? Then why are you defensive? But here that's not necessary. Ass-saving hasn't helped with events, with other work. People don't want to go. S is very concerned about the hotel contract. There is no reason to be defensive. If you are going to go into defensive mode, you're not going to learn anything. If you have never made any mistakes, then you can be defensive.
V says you shouldn't have discussed the rules, but immediately the reaction is, no, no we didn't. Who are we helping with this kind of attitude? If you say to me that M yells and screams, that's perfectly normal, it's not. There are circumstances which drive me nuts. Then I scream.
So goal oriented to win, to succeed. Forget the rules. What is the objective of any exercise? To obey the rules. That is it. That is it. The purpose of any exercise given is to follow the rules. That is it.
Fear of failure is the very thing that is causing you to fail. What good would it do to walk away from this training wtihout your horizons expanded, exactly the same as when you arrived? To me that would be pointless. I go to a lot of trainings. I have to go to refreshers. Helicopter training, glider refreshers. In my life to learn is just fun. And I despise those people when an opportunity is presented don't want to learn. I'm still learning. I am.
Do you know that most people don't know most of the things that I fiddle with? I love computers. I open computers. Putting the memory in, making sure all the boards are intact. I know how to open them and I open them. Then when everything is right, start. Erase the hard disk. I know where I'm starting from.
I've done videos, music, fixed cars, fly airplanes, helicopters, gliders, bulldozers, backhoes. Digital photography, regular photography. 8mm, 16mm. I tell people, I give them advice and they don't listen to me. You've seen pictures of me in India. I've seen 72 year old women with disposable cameras make more interesting pictures than the ones taken in India. You can't tell when it was taken. Every event picture looks the same. But those pictures from the 1970s there's some charm about them.
I have operated video editing systems. I edited "Now and Forever" and "Love and Blessings." They're good, classical, nice watching videos. I'm telling you, this is your chance. Don't get defensive. Don't get into this mode of us and them. I'm right. They're wrong. Bad bad scene to be caught in.
All right. We're going to cut you slack.
(V asks how much time the team wants to strategize the next exercise)
(V announces the Puzzle exercise)
(M side comment to Chuck: playing with baby toys again)
I know there are going to be a lot of people in the lobby. You're going to have to sing in front of them. They are going to think it's fucking hilarious. So why don't you speak loud? You've already demonstrated that you can.
(M side comment to Chuck: next time only get black markers for the flip charts. The other colors are too hard to see.) (Put in facilitator checklist)
What did you agree on? That's not unanimous. When did we resort back to satisfying personal requests? Nine of your members are missing. Claude makes a proposal. When they come back, he says "one minute." You break rules when you do this. Just think of the consequences for everybody. You could have done the same thing without losing these tickets. Wait until everyone is here before you make the proposal.
It's like this Air Canada incident. The captain said let's be nice to these guys. They converted pounds to kilos. The fuel guys said let's be nice to the crew. They said let's convert it. So there was a double reduction factor. 4.4 times less fuel. First one engine went out. Then the second engine went out. Luckily the pilot was a glider pilot. They survived. Assumptions. Not being clear.
(Exercise forfeited because the 15-minute strategy time is exceeded.)
How many times have you broken into groups? There was experience, but it wasn't used. Why not keep it very simple, just count off. This is what we have been doing, going around in circles.
Well, what should we do?
From J and G, this side is one group and that side is one group, OK? Your objective is to identify five people in this group and fire them. Fire them. Get rid of them. This group is going to figure out five people and fire them. You figure it out. OK, ten minutes. Get rid of them. They will come back to this conference no more. Not an exercise, this is very real. We'll reform the team after they are gone.
And you asked if this was for real. And I said this is not an exercise, this is real.
You can't volunteer. You can't be a sacrificial lamb.
So you fire people in your business. So you have a standard? And you keep it up? It's never easy to fire people but you know you have to do it. So the world gets better standards than you are willing to have for me, for K, for this work? So where do we begin? Is not the obviousness of it staring you right in the face and you're ignoring it? It's like God's face staring at you through the window.
Maybe that thing that's degrading year after year after year wasting millions of dollars that could be used for Knowledge centers or tours. Do you know that to have a hall that can seat 6-7000 people, air-conditioned, well lit, and I came up with a design, and it really reduces the cost of constructing a hall, is only around $6 million. Which is well within our means. You understand that? To have one say in England, built it, operate it, perfect it, then build one in Europe, one in Africa, one in South Africa, one in Australia, you know what that means, one in America, one in South America. Tour problems are solved. Do a tour, wherever the aspirants, premies are ready. Not based on hall availability. Do you know what that would do for the inspiration of the people? That reality is right around the corner. But we have to do the rest of the walking. It's possible for us to have a 24 hour satellite channel. The acquisition cost is so cheap and broadcast music, programs, broadcast live events. Best cuts of different tours, have news, have specific programs for aspirants, for people who have never heard anything. You know this is within our grasp. Screw the web. Live digital surround sound. Knock your socks off. Come home, turn it on. And record it. Do you know that's within our grasp? It is. Knowledge centers. Knowledge centers can also double up for training and then it can switch from these type of trainings to very specific task oriented trainings. Aspirant team can go through the issues. Completely academic training. Around the world, standardized.
It's possible. Teams around the world specifically created for new introduction. Introducing people to Knowledge. Find the various avenues, the various ways. You can advertise in public libraries, on the web. What can be done to improve the quality of these events. People learn specific techniques, learn what works, what people have done to improve things. All of those people having gone through trainings like this. Stop wasting millions of doolars and use it in directions where it can go somewhere.
We don't lack anything except for the crud that sits at that level and puts a cap on everything. And you have witnessed that mentality in this training. And you can identify why things don't happen the way they should be.
So please resume. You have a task at hand. You have 5 minutes more to do the task.
It's like God staring you in the face saying get rid of the crud, get rid of the things inhibiting you.
Anything not to have to do it. Is it that painful? No one yet has come up with the criteria that would make it obvious. So why don't you get to the criteria? Don't you have criteria when you fire people?
(Time expires - M extends the time a second time)
This is a safe environment. They have been disarmed. We took out their machetes.
All right. Since you guys have gone over the time, this group, you have the chance to fire five people over there. You have ten minutes. [Transcript ends at this point]
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