Group Assignment

The Story of Godbole

Course Name: Organizational Behavior
Submitted to: Prof. Roopak Gupta

Working Group: AA1

Name of the Students
Archana Nair (16S507)
Mahashweta Jha (16S525)
Naresh Heda (16S528)
Ninad Bhise (16S532)
Sanket Modh (15F343)

TERM 2 2016-17
T A PAI MANAGEMENT INSTITUTE, MANIPAL

Mumbai Dabbawala Mr. Vishal Godbole

This is a story of Mr Vishal Godbole who works in the Six Sigma Certified organization Mumbai Dabbawala. In
2012, Godbole worked in a team of 3 people who carried lunch boxes from Andheri station to Churchgate in
Mumbai local train and delivered those boxes to their clients office. Godbole was working since six months
and with every passing day he was getting annoyed with his colleagues behavior and work load. Initially he had
to carry 20 lunch boxes per day, however when the customer base started increasing his workload also
proportionally increased. Though the team consisted of three people, the work load was not divided equally.
Godbole tried convincing his colleagues to share his weight of the boxes but his efforts went in vain and
moreover he felt ignored. Day by day he was getting annoyed with his team mates and was getting disinterested
towards his work. He felt that he was diligent towards his job but it did not add any value to his job position and
no job enrichment at work. This instance shows that there was no organizational justice and equity theory was
not being applied. Hence, this lead to change in inputs as he exerted less effort since his work was not being
appreciated or rewarded. He also had a distorted perception that nobody in his organization worked as hard as
he did. Every day, towards the end of the day, his colleagues Mr Patil and Mr Jadhav used to have snacks and
tea but they never took Godbole along with them. Many times Godbole even insisted that they accompany him
in their snack time but he wasnt called. There was no sense of belongingness in his current team. Godbole
thought numerous times that he must raise his concerns to his manager Mr Hegde, but he came to know from
one of his colleagues in other team that if people came with complaints about work, they were asked to leave
the job.
Mr Godbole was living in a Chawl with his old parents and newly wedded wife. His parents were depended on
his earnings and his wife used to take care of his parents. Hence, he was the sole earner for his family. Also, he
was financially burdened and it was difficult for him to make ends meet. Here, Maslows lowest level in the
hierarchy of needs was not met i.e. he did not feel secured financially and with the current situation at work, his
self-esteem was also at a toss. Godboles motivation to work was diminishing day by day but he could not even
think of leaving this job until he found another one. Few weeks later Godbole was loaded with double work of a
typical Dabbawala capacity and even Mr Hegde received some complaints from his clients. After investigation
he came to know that all the complaints were from the customers to whom Godbole served. Hence, he called
Godbole to reprimand him. In the meeting, Godbole did not express what he went through in the team, on the
other hand conveyed that he would not repeat those mistakes again and work efficiently. Godbole started having
negative core-self evaluations i.e. he started disliking himself and questioned his capabilities. His self-efficacy
started lowering day by day.
After a few weeks Mr Hegde received complaints against Godbole again. This time he did not call him and
asked about Godboles behaviour from his co-workers. He was informed that he was very low and
unenthusiastic in work. Mr Hegde recollected that initially Godbole was very energetic and enthusiastic towards
his work, he had seen the potential of becoming the next team leader in him. He thought he must call the HR
consultant Sonia to solve this problem.
Sonia was a very rational HR manager who had the past of improving on employee morale. She called Godbole
and tried understanding his problems at work and at home. She felt he was overburdened at work. She promised
that his work will be justified. He also told that why should he work more if all get the same pay in his team.
Sonia made notes of all his entanglements. Later, she did the Big -5 test as well.
Sonia considered conducting the Big Five Personality Model test in order to assess the personality of Godbole
and to relate it to the problems he was facing. The Extraversion score was low which meant that he was not
sociable and he was reserved in nature. This justified the fact that he did not talk much with his team mates. The
agreeable scores were very high which is not desirable. This means that he agrees and accepts the decisions of

the team very easily and gets influenced by the team decision. Conscientiousness scores were moderate which
explains that he is responsible and works in an organized manner. The Emotional stability scores were low
which tends to show that he is usually nervous and anxious. He is constantly worried about his family and how
he would satisfy their needs with his low income. Openness scores were high which indicated that he is
adaptable to change and can work efficiently in a new situation.
One of the recommendations that Sonia gave to Hedge was to apply Theory Y in his organization. Hedge
should include participative decision making which would increase involvement of his employees. He should
include every employees in decision making which would increase their motivation and thereby increase
productivity. By adopting Theory Y, Hedge would have more dedicated and optimistic workers in his
organization.
Ms Sonia explained the Vrooms Expectancy theory to Mr Hedge. She elaborated the benefit of applying this
theory as it would lead to an increase in motivation of the employees. She explained that the employees will be
motivated to exert a high level of effort if they are rewarded which would lead to a good performance. The
theory focuses on three relationships; the employee thinks that exerting an amount of effort would lead to
performance. The performance would then lead to the desired outcome. If the employee is rewarded for his
performance, it would satisfy the individuals personal goals. Hence Sonia guided Hedge that Godbole is
expecting a reward for the effort he is putting as he feels he is working more than others. The reward could be
either intrinsic or extrinsic which would increase his motivation and he would be more enthusiastic to work for
the organization. Mr Hegde cultivated an environment of participative management thereby implementing open
culture within the organisation. This helped Godbole and others to express their grievances and hence the team
of Godbole was expanded. Also incentivizing the extra efforts put up by the employees made Godbole receive
awards several times.
After 4 years of hard work, Godbole was promoted to be a manager. A new branch was opened in the Central
line of Mumbai and Godbole was made to handle this office in entirety. He had to manage a team of five people
with different team roles. Godbole instructed his subordinates that they have to work in the same manner as they
were used to working for their previous manager. Though all of them were new to him, they were not new to the
organisation neither he was. For a few weeks everything went on very smoothly in his team. However, within 2
months, the team was getting late in deliveries and he felt a lot of time was wasted in their chatting and passing
time without any work. He called them up and asked to adhere to the stipulated timings else they would be
losing out on their customers soon. He even swapped the roles of his team members without their consent.
Though the team knew that Godbole was very strict about his work they themselves changed back to their
original roles. When Godbole came to know about this mismanagement he was furious. He did not know how to
deal with a team which hardly listened to him. He felt lost. Hence, he thought of calling th HR consultant Sonia.
When Sonia arrived, she immediately knew that since the group was new to each other it was in a storming
stage of the five stages of group formation. Godbole explained to her that how he was very friendly and liberal
to them, he did not lay any rules and regulations unlike many strict managers do, also that he was treating them
like adults but the teams were not behaving in the unexpected manner.
Sonia said she desired to interact with each of the team members and she needed to ask a few questions to the
team and him for FIRO-B and Belbin test.
After talking to team members she felt that all the employees talked how affectionate their previous mangers
were. They wanted Godbole to act and behave as their ex-managers had done. Sonia understood that they were
going through the contrast effect.

Interpersonal
Needs
Godbole
Expressed
Wanted

Inclusio Contro Affectio

n
l
n
1
1
0
6
6
5

Mr Godboles FIRO B results showed that his Wanted Inclusion is high which represents that he wants others to
invite and include him in their plans and he may take lack of acknowledgement as a negative answer.
With a low Expressed Inclusion scores, it dictates that he does not make an effort to include others in his
activities. He does not include others and does not indulge in team building activities.
He has a high Wanted Affection which shows that he requires continuous feedback and expects affection from
others. He wants his team members to express and talk to him. He tends to be more comfortable with his
teammates encouraging and sharing personal matters with him
His Expressed Affection is very low which represents that he does not like to show emotions. He is not
comfortable in expressing his emotions to others and does not try and engage with people on a personal level.
It shows that he has a high Wanted Control which means that he is comfortable with someone else being in
charge and is fine with getting influenced by others. He is not very stern on his decisions and gets carried away
with the recommendations of others.
He has a very low Expressed Control score which depicts that he is not comfortable in influencing others and he
would not make an effort to control a situation. There is a discomfort in organizing and taking responsibility for
others.
He has a total expressed score of 2 which represents that he does not usually initiate activities with others. With
a medium total wanted score, he usually wants others to initiate and include him in their activities.
He has a medium low total need score which indicates that he is likely to be choosy about how, when and where
he associates with people and about how he uses or shares his authority. Interaction with others in all areas of
inclusion, control and affection may appeal on a selective basis.

Employee 1:

Team Member 1
Expressed
Wanted

Inclusio Contro Affectio

n
l
n
4
3
7
2
0
4

He has a high Wanted Affection which indicates that he expects affection from others. He also has low Wanted
Control which depicts that he is very selective in accepting orders from people.

Employee 2:
Team Member 1
Expressed
Wanted

Inclusio Contro Affectio

n
l
n
4
3
7
2
0
4

He has high Expressed Control and very low Wanted Control. Hence he is extremely selective and likes to be
dominant and controlling.
After analysing the scores of all the employees, Sonia realized that the characteristics of these two employees
did not go along with that of Godbole. This resulted in the discrepancy in the working of the team. Also these 2
employees influenced the other employees thus creating a groupthink which resulted in a decrease in the
performance of the employees.
Sonia said that he needs to show his leadership skills as they expect a strong leader who considers involvement
of every employee. Also the employees want him to
Belbin test was also conducted in order to find out the perfect role for the employees. With the results, Sonia
guided Godbole how he can allocate roles according to the strengths and capabilities of each employee.
Hence the analysis given by Sonia helped Godbole in achieving the true potential of the team. Godbole
deciphered that identifying each members strengths and weakness and their interpersonal needs for affection
would help him motivating the employees for work which would then lead to accomplishment of their personal
goals and hence job satisfaction.