Shaan v/s shankar lessons learned

I happened to watch sangeeth ka maha muquabla after insistence from my MIL and i started to look at casually..Apparently, there was a tiff between shaan and shankar mahadevan and she wanted to see, which side i would be on? After watching the whole thing, i wonder why should she even ask this question as it was pretty straight forward? Does this mean, ahem, ahem?? Ignore the ahem, if u cannot understand...

The story goes as this:

Sangeet ka maha muqauable has 6 teams participating...Each team has a mentor who is a singer/music director and a team of participants who have been selected from talent shows where they have won. The competition is like cricket, where each team gets to play with the other team, challenge individual participants, duet round, medley round etc...and the rest of mentors from each team rate each other, along with the live audience. Apart from the participants, the mentors can also sing songs, the catch being that when a mentor sings, the audience alone gets to vote. The rest of the mentors cannot vote them.

In this particular match between shaan and shanker, there happened to many controversies like:
a) shankar singing 2 songs out of total 3 songs for his team (plus an overshadowing performance in the medley).
b) Shankar trying to convince the judges when one of his team members spoiled the duet round.

Obviously, point(b) has to do with ethics and let us not go there, since it digresses our main topic which is around management lessons learned.

On the whole, shankar's team has won the game, albeit narrowly. But, what can be said of his team's contestants? Have they gained confidence? Or have they lost confidence since their mentor didn't even trust them for the "BIG" MOMENT. Shankar wanted to win the match so badly, that he decided to sing himself..This already makes a big dent in the confidence of his team. Also, shankar's ego made him not realize that this is not his big venue..An acclaimed singer and music director like himself, should be here not to *WIN*, but to mentor and make sure that his participants become *BETTER*...Besides, him singing there and winning the match doesn't increase his self respect, but makes him look childish and egoistic. Shankar should let his competitive spirit unleash itself with players of his or above his stature. He should focus on why rahman could win an oscar and why not he himself have a stake at it. He can try to outdo rehman...When the sky is the limit, why did shankar look down and stoop down? On the whole, the mentoring style of shankar sucked big time and inspite of winning, many people were repulsed by his "ME FIRST" attitude.

A word about shaan...brillaint and simply superb work..Agreed that he lost his cool and was angry, but that made him look more human in my eyes...His anger in a way must have conveyed to his team that there might be a big guy out there who can possibly affect my career, but i will not bow down..That is an attitude that must have meant a lot to his team...That their mentor wouldn't be afraid of putting them first ahead of his own career....Second thing that i liked was that shaan didn't even attempt to go and sing himself when shankar was doling out song after another. Shaan's team was 4 points behind and he could easily justify that if the other team is doing it and when his team really needs it, he can go and save the day. But, he didn't...inspite of trailing an almost near impossible margin, he didn't let the faith on his team go down...He backed them and gave them the confidence to go and boldy face shankar, the heavy weight (literally as well). In the medley round, shaan didn't hog the limelight, he was more like a thread which was gluing the rest of the performances. On the whole, the contenstants in shaan's team learnt a lot and are probably better equipped to face the future than they were when they came to this show.

As i was personally watching the show, some of my fundamental assumptions around management were shattered...Team dynamics mean a lot and as a manager, you have greater responsibility and courage...Team looks upto you and it is you who shouldn't let them down. A good manager is one who just doesn't deliver the results, but actually makes the people working under him better prepared to face the challenges, regardless of their talent.

Shaan, my respect for you has increased manifold after watching this show..You have shown great deal of courage standing up for your team and such good karma will not go unnoticed. Shankarji, if you happen to read my blog, then well...there is nothing wrong with being competitive, but know whom to compete with...

And finally a word to myself...use this as a lesson for your betterment and never make your egoism make you stoop down.