Finding Nemo - Team work

Topic - Team work

Movie - Finding Nemo, By Pixar (2003)

Movie summary - Marlin is a more-than-slightly paranoid Clown Fish who is extremely devoted to his young son, Nemo, the only survivor after an undersea predator swallowed up Nemo's mother and her other offspring. It's not Marlin's nature to explore unfamiliar waters, but when he and Nemo are accidentally separated near the Great Barrier Reef en route to Nemo's first day of fish school, Marlin gathers his courage and sets out to find his son. What Marlin doesn't know, however, is that while Nemo was looking at a boat passing on the surface, he was caught in a net and given a new home in a dentist's aquarium. As Marlin searches for his son, he makes friends with a friendly but absent-minded Regal Blue Tang named Dory, a Great White Shark named Bruce, who is trying to cut fish out of his diet, a beach-rat Sea Tortoise named Crush, and Nigel, a Pelican who can take Marlin's search from the ocean to dry land.

Concepts - The movie's key messages is that teamwork can help you achieve more than you can achieve by yourself. Clearly, teamwork and cooperation are vital to success and achievement. I especially love the scene when the net caught hundreds of fish including Marlin and Dory. At first, the hundreds of fish were just swimming frantically in every direction, then as Nemo’s found out that the fish better to swim down together and chanting the phrase in unison. They make headway, putting pressure on the part of the boat that held up the net, and it eventually snaps, allowing the net to crash into the ocean floor and free lots of gleeful fish. The event also rightfully shocks the men on the boat! I get so much from this scene. First of all, how often do people go in their own direction when faced with a problem rather than collaborating efforts and sticking together? The effort is always more impactful when there is a team rather than an individual. Also, how rare are Nemo and Marlin as leaders in this situation? They were not the ones trapped, but out of compassion for those that were, they stepped in and led. They did not sheepishly yell from the sidelines, thinking that no one would listen, but they aggressively chanted with faith that others would catch on.

Slumdog Millionaire - Motivation

Topic - Motivation

Movie - Slumdog Millionaire, (2008) by Fox Pictures

Movie summary -  Slumdog Millionaire is the story of Jamal Malik, an 18 year-old orphan from the slums of Mumbai, who is about to win a staggering 20 million rupees on India's "Kaun Banega Crorepati?" (Who Wants To Be A Millionaire?) But when the show breaks for the night, police arrest him on suspicion of cheating; how could a street kid know so much? Desperate to prove his innocence, Jamal tells the story of his life in the slum where he and his brother grew up, of their adventures together on the road, of vicious encounters with local gangs, and of Latika, the girl he loved and lost. Each chapter of his story reveals the key to the answer to one of the game show's questions. Each chapter of Jamal's increasingly layered story reveals where he learned the answers to the show’s seemingly impossible quiz.

Concepts - The questions were raising between the audience sand the program crews that how come like Jamal, a self confessed non-genius who grew up in the slums of Mumbai, can be doing so well on the show when others who are brighter, more educated and wealthier than him have failed. Is Jamal cheating? Is it purely luck that they have asked him the questions to which he knows the answers? Seeing Jamal's life journey to this point ultimately answers these questions. His life journey includes being orphaned at an early age; growing up with an older brother, Salim, who was both his guardian/protector and antagonist; and having a relationship since childhood with another orphaned child, a girl named Latika. His motivation for being on the show may provide the key to his success. Clearly, he got both intrinsic motivation and extrinsic motivation. He not only wants to get the big prize of “Who wants to be a millionaire?”, but also he wants to find the answers for his life and his love life, and he’s very persistent to his goal. After observing his chapters of life, we can see all his elements of his motivation: His direction of behavior, his level of effort, and his level of persistent. It probably that his motivation and his effort to achieve the goal is one of reason why the movie got the Oscar Award for the best film in 2009.

Career Builder - Employee Satisfaction

Synopsis- The commercial is aimed at employees who feel like they are the only ones doing any real work at their job; or feel like they don’t have the same work ethic as their co-workers.

Concepts- I think this commercial touches on two key organizational behavior concepts; corporate culture and employee satisfaction. Corporate culture is the collective way an organization does things. At the man’s office, the corporate culture is that they monkey around a lot (which could be because they are monkeys). He seems unwilling to conform and unhappy with that culture. Which leads to the next concept of employee satisfaction; employee satisfaction is the terminology used to describe whether employees are happy and contented and fulfilling their desires and needs at work. Many factors contribute to employee satisfaction, such as treating employees with respect, providing regular employee recognition, empowering employees, and positive management within a success framework of goals, measurements, and expectations, just to name a few. Greater employee satisfaction has been linked to higher productivity. It’s easy to see from the clip that neither the guy that works with the monkeys nor the lady that works with the donkeys is very satisfied at their current job, which is why they would use Career Builder to find a new one.

Yo Gabba Gabba - Norms

Topic- Norms
TV Show – Yo Gabba Gabba

Synopsis- Yo Gabba Gabba is a children’s show that attempts to engage children through music and teach them educational lessons and social skills.

Concept- This clip is a song titled “Don’t Bite Your Friends.” It’s an interesting illustrations of how norm are established. As adults there are many norms that are so ingrained in us, that it’s hard to pin down when you learned them or who taught them to you. Many things you learn through parenting and modeling without having to be specifically taught them; but that is not always the case, and not for every child. This song is an example of just that. From a very young age children explore everything with their mouth. Around the age of two some commonly begin to “bite” things. Through music Yo Gabba Gabba teaches the social norm that we don’t bite our friends.

Avenue Q - Biases

Topic- Biases
Broadway Play – Avenue Q

Play Synopsis- AVENUE Q is a musical that tells the story of a recent college grad named Princeton who moves into a shabby New York apartment all the way out on Avenue Q. There, he meets Kate (the girl next door), Rod (the Republican), Trekkie (the internet sexpert), Lucy (the slut) and other colorful types who help him finally discover his purpose in life!

Concepts- This clip is of one of the songs in the musical that talks about racism. The song is called, “Everyone’s A Little Bit Racist,” and attempts to address a serious matter in a very light hearted way. This song actually addresses internal biases that everyone has regarding different ethnicities and cultures. While racism is a very serious threat to diversity, it’s also important to realize that we all make judgments and we all have biases, even though rationally we may realize they don’t apply to everyone. Having awareness of our own biases, and acknowledging where they come from (experiences, second hand knowledge, cultural ignorance) can actually help to avoid letting stereotypes affect decision making and relationship building.

Firefly - Distributive Negotiations

Topic - Distributive Negotiations
TV show - Firefly, "The Train Job"

Scene Summary - Firefly is a space western that depicts the adventures of the crew of Serenity. The crew had been hired by Niska, a criminal, to steal a cargo. However, Captain Mal and the rest of the crew do not realize that they are stealing. When the realize they are stealing medical supplies away from a group that is needed, the crew of Serenity decided to renegade on the deal they had with Niska. In the scene, Mal is telling one of Niska’s lieutenants to take back the advanced money they were paid for taking on the mission.

Concepts - Distributive negotiations are characterized by win-lose mentality where one party gains, while the other loses. A strategy of distributive negations is the use of Hardball tactics, which are on display in this scene. One such hardball tactic is the use of intimation, which is described as an attempt to "force the other party to agree by means of an emotional ploy, usually anger or fear" (Lewicki et al. 57).

In this scene, Captain Mal is presenting his opening offers to the first prisoner. There are several ways to respond to hardball tactics including: ignore them, discuss them, respond in kind or co-op the other party (Lewicki et al. 57). Here, the prisoner responds in kind. He doesn’t back down or accept the offer. He uses the intimation tactic by making threats of his own toward Captain Mal. After Mal realizes he not getting what he wants, he pushes the captive, Crow, into the engine. This is an extreme example of hardball negotiation tactics. The prisoner pays with his life. However, it sets the tone for the next prisoner, who sees how serious Mal is, and how he won’t back down. The Captain will get what he wants or you pay for it with your life.

Then Mal offers up another prisoner the same deal, who immediately says, “Oh, I'm good. Best thing for everyone. I'm right there with you.” The 2nd prisoner realizes there are two choices—accept the terms as Mal has laid out, or end up like the first guy—kicked into an engine.

Platoon

Topic – Formal and Informal leadership.
Movie Title - Platoon

Movie Summary - This is a scene from a 1986 movie 'Platoon'. The movie is about a young recruit during the vietnam war who faces a moral crises when he is confronted with the horrors of wars. The movie shows the various phases that Chris Talyor the young recruit played by Charlie Sheen passes through when the effects of combat take a toll on him. Lt. Walfe played by Mark Moses is the formal leader of the platoon who has weak leadership qualities and hence his role is taken over by Sgt. Barnes played by Tom Berenger who displays strong leadership qualities but is undergoing a psychological meltdown. The team completely disregard Lt. Walfe although he is their formal leader and take instruction from Sgt. Barnes when the are getting deployed in the field.

Concepts - In organizations, we have both formal and informal leader. A formal leader is given formal authority by the company by title or the position held by the individual. This can be a teacher in a classroom or the father or mother in a household. Whereas Informal leaders have no formal authority but adopt the role and is supported by the others in the group or team because of their experience or respect they have earned. Informal leaders can be best leader in a team given that he was chosen sometimes by the group naturally to lead them. The above clip shows how a informal leader makes the decision and the team looks up to him to play that role while the real leader is side lined.