Leadership Skills for the Global Corporate Series - The One with the Mangoes - By Seema Anand

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10 Jul 2021

Leadership Skills for the Global Corporate Series - The One with the Mangoes - By Seema Anand Remixed - Myth and Management series Storyteller Researcher Seema Anand Seema Anand is an expert on Narrative Practices working with the uses and the implications of Oralness specialising in Story telling Seema specialises in global mythologies - comparing and retelling stories through different cultural nuances to give everyone ownership of the tales info seema anand gmail com Film Maker Creative Head Bineeta Mitra Videographer Shozeb Haider Management Consultant Smita Tharoor Blog a http 3A 2F 2Fwww tharoorassociates com 2F 3Fq 3Dblog a Copyright Bineeta Mitra and Seema Anand Production The learning The life of Sheryl Sandberg COO Facebook possibly the most influential woman in the corporate sector has been used a compelling narrative experiment by management trainers Her story to success a tough one as is to be expected was converted into an anonymous training model But and here is the interesting part it was converted into 2 case studies one with a woman protagonist and one with a man The training sessions showed that where her story was told as that of an anonymous woman people reacted negatively to what they saw as a manipulative conniving unsympathetic woman The same story told with a male lead he was admired as a goal oriented achiever a worthy role model Studies show that gender bias is not gender specific meaning that men and women both have the same biases about gender The conventional methods ruses and insights that a man might use to forge forward we are not comfortable with women doing the same When I tell the story of the old woman in a corporate setting there is always a debate were the old woman s actions ethical Is she not manipulative Is this not the same as gaining the trust of a person and then breaking that trust The old woman was not breaking anybody s trust We know that the mango seller was passing off rotten fruit as perfect Suppose he had managed to cheat the old woman what then The answer is nothing Oh dear what a pity but it would still be her problem To me this story is a brilliant example of goal setting It is about understanding clearly what you want and how to achieve it as efficiently as possible taking into account the limitations that you are working with The old woman wanted good fruit realised her handicaps and used her skills to make sure she was not cheated