Scrambled Planning

My “eggs-cellent” management professor held an impromptu, in-class planning assignment on Wednesday.  We split into groups of four or five and were to plan, design, and construct an “egg-protection device” that would prevent the egg from breaking when dropped from ten feet onto the classroom carpet (don’t worry we had a tarp).  Since this “social experiment” took place before our planning lecture, it is interesting to compare known academic theory on planning with the class’ planning culture and how we ultimately performed.

What are we doing?

The first step in the planning process is to define your goals and objectives.  The entire class was initially somewhat confused about what the goals and objects of the assignment actually were (we did not receive a formal handout).  We must be specific in order to be effective in achieving our goals.  This takes structure.  Luckily, roles naturally emerge in group settings.  Hence, the first “bureaucrat” of our team was “elected” a Secretary, in order to immediately pen the rules and record our progression in design and implication.  We all soon became aware of what we wanted to achieve.  The goal and deadlines were already specified by the professor - we just had to figure out the “best way of getting there.”

Who can do what? What can’t we do?  

I threw around a few questions: Does anyone have engineering background? Is anyone an artist? Google it?  Step 2, determining current status compared to objectives, does suggest to examine group strengths and weaknesses and apply each members skills accordingly.  However, when I asked, nobody had any relative skills, so they thought.  I was subsequently elected the “Leader.”      

What is the best way to do it?

Something told me to brainstorm.  I instructed the group to sketch ideas for at least our first five minutes.  However the group’s roles were further emerging and half of the group focused on the design aspect of the contraption while the others acted as “overseers” of the design - constantly checking our use of the resources, reminding the group of time deadlines, and making sure the group was satisfying all requirements.  Ideally we should have developed a premise by comparing the pros and cons of various premises and should have had several alternative strategies (if for some reason our strategy does not seem to be working).  However, time constraints narrowed our choices.

How can we do it the best way?

Step four in the planning process suggests to analyze alternatives and make a tactical plan.  Our pyramid-design plan was the plan most likely to complete our objectives, since it was our only plan.  We allocated jobs so that everyone could play their role in the actual implementation - two of us were to construct sides, one of us was to deliver the device and test it, one of us was to check and oversee our process, and one of us was to record and edit.  However, these roles were not ideally based according to the person’s skills or experience.  

Do it, correct and revise.

Out of necessity for completion, our implemented plan was constantly corrected and revised during the 10 minute construction phase.  The overseers repeatedly edited the fabricators construction and questioned the professor about design requirements.  Group roles even were somewhat revised - my hands were shaking so much during fabrication that Greg jumped in to help me.  

All in all, our group planning culture, which was largely based on previous life experiences, did not totally achieve its goals - the egg slightly cracked when the apparatus was dropped.  The underlying obstacle that repeatedly caused hardship was the time constraint.  Teams that were successful were not necessarily better planners than the teams that were not successful.  The divider in this case was an idea - to connect the straws and tape so the eggs would be dropped from only two feet (both winning teams shared this theory).  Perhaps if we had more time to draw-up and compare different strategies, we may have had been able to choose a more effective application.