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Friday, October 7, 2011

Johari Window in Action: Management Case Study 1


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Johari Window in Action: Management Case Study 1 (Hidden Talent Changed People's Life)

(For better understanding, read the previous post before reading this post at http://johari-window-model.blogspot.com/2011/09/johari-window.html)

My wife and I are management consultants and are often invited by many organizations in the corporate sector to conduct various kinds of management development and personal development training programs for their employees at different levels, right from shop floor workers to directors of companies.

This incident relates to one such program we conducted for a factory site of an Indian corporate conglomerate located in a remote interior village of India. The training program was meant for the factory’s workers who were never exposed to any kind of formal training earlier. So, they were quite excited about it and equally awed.

One session of the program was devoted to the well known management concept called “Johari Window”. My wife’s treatment to this particular topic is a treat to the audience. So, I always request her to teach the “Johari Window” sessions.

In the particular training program that we conducted for the workers of this factory, the topic rolled out like this. My wife said:

“The human actions are guided by the mind and therefore, knowing about our mind is very crucial. It’s difficult to visualize the mind but “Johari Window” describes the mind in a very simple to understand manner. Joseph Luft and Harry Ingham gave a pictorial definition of mind through their “Johari Window”. They mentioned that mind is like a window with four partitions; each partition with different kinds of glass panes- one transparent, other two allowing one way vision (like through a tinted glass) and fourth partition has opaque glass.

The first one with transparent glass is called “open self (or arena)” of the mind, being transparent to self as well as to others. Whatever is contained in this portion of the mind is a common knowledge to all. For example, my published bio-data gives some specific information about me and that information is known to me and to all those who have seen my bio-data. Certain of the strengths and the weaknesses of a person come out into the open and while these strengths can be used, the weaknesses can be reduced.

Second portion of the window depicting the mind, with the tinted glass, is from where you can peep outside but you cannot look into it from outside. This partition is called the “hidden self (facade)”. Hidden means that certain aspects of strengths and weaknesses are known to me alone, I am hiding them but they cannot be seen by others. Therefore, for me to be wiser on the knowledge of myself, I, on my own initiative, must start using my strengths by bringing them into the “open self (arena)” and reduce my weaknesses. This method is called “disclosure”.

Third portion of the window depicting the mind, again with the tinted glass, is where you can peep inside but from where you cannot look outside. This partition is called the “blind self (blind spot)”. Blind means that certain aspects of my strengths and weaknesses are known only to others but I am totally unaware of them, I am blind to them. Therefore, for me to be wiser on the knowledge of myself, I must get the feedback from others on such strengths and weaknesses of mine which are unknown to me. This method is called “feedback”.

Fourth portion with opaque glass is called “dark self (unknown)”. Large degrees of strengths and weaknesses are neither known to me nor to the others. We are, kind of, totally in dark about them. And apparently, I and others have no way of tapping them.

While “dark self” is a very large portion of mind (80%, 90% or even 95%), there are no solutions readily available on the platter to tap it. So what can be done immediately is to start using the strengths that are already available in “hidden self” and “blind self” and bringing more and more of them into “open self” by ways of “disclosure” and “feedback” explained earlier. More you use your “hidden” and “blind” strengths, more capable and effective you become. The “open self” should become larger and larger and “hidden self’ and “blind self” should become smaller and smaller.”

And the topic kept rolling like this.

The participants listened to all of this in a spell bound manner and asked many questions. The training program concluded pretty decently.

Then, my wife and I got busy with other assignments. Also, we used to visit this factory often.

In one of our later visits to this factory, say around six to seven months after we had conducted the training program for the batch of workers mentioned above, one of the workers from that batch came to the company’s guesthouse, where we were residing, in the evening.

The factory, as we told you, was situated in an interior village and the company had built up a nice township there. Other than this township, no civilization could be found as far as 30 to 40 kilometers from there. The township dwellers had to go all the way to the nearest town 30 to 40 kilometers away to buy their grocery, vegetables etc.

This worker came to us in the guesthouse, introduced himself and told us some very interesting things he did after he learnt about “Johari Window” in our training program that he had attended.

He said, “Madam and sir, when madam told that normally, we don’t use even 2% to 3% of our mind since most of it is taken up in our “dark self”, I started thinking about it seriously. Madam also told that if we could use our mind even a little bit more, we could achieve a lot more in life. Plus I remembered her saying that we keep hiding lots of our talent, knowledge and skills in our “hidden self” and do not use them and what we don’t use, we lose. I gave it lots of thought.”

My wife asked, “Do you have a piece of land nearby?”

He mentioned, “I have a very small plot of land in front of my small house allotted by the company. I was not using it till then. But that is not adequate. Then, it occurred to me that there were lots of my friends in the township who had plots of land in front of their house but they were not using them at all. I contacted them and most of them agreed to allow me to grow vegetables in their plots provided they can use the vegetables at concessional price. I agreed to it. And now I have already acquired some 14 plots for this purpose. I have employed couple of local hands and gave them employment as gardeners to look after these kitchen gardens that I have developed. Company has given me a small wooden cabin from where I sell the vegetables and the township residents are very happy about the whole thing. The ladies in the township can now walk up to my shop and buy fresh vegetables at reasonable prices.”

My wife and I congratulated him on his achievements.

But he stopped us in the middle and said, “It’s all because of the training you gave me that I thought about using “Johari Window” in actual practice. I am really thankful to both of you.”

Then, he walked away.

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