Valuable Lessons To Learn From Kung Fu Panda

As part of my EMBA program, students were asked to watch a movie, a scene or a series and comment about the aspects of managing people and organization. It was shocking to learn how a simple cartoon movie can bring value to current and future leaders.

I shared the lessons learned with one of my colleagues couple of days ago. He asked me to present this internally in our organization but I wanted to go further and share it with all of you.

FILM SYNOPSIS

Po is an active yet clumsy panda in the Valley of Peace. He idolized the Furious Five and dreamt about becoming a Kung Fu legend. Unfortunately, Po was unable to follow his dreams as he was helping his father in a noodle restaurant.

Grand Master Oogway had a vision that the evil leopard Tai Lung will escape prison and will threaten the inhabitants of the Valley. This is where Po, astonishingly, made his way to be the chosen warrior.

After a failed attempt from the Furious Five, Po, under the training of Master Shifu, defeated Tai Lung and gained the respect of the Furious Five.

THE MAIN CHARACTERS 

Po admired the Furious Five and wanted to be a Kung Fu hero. He was keen to satisfy his father despite of dreaming to become a Kung Fu fighter. Po had low self esteem and did not believe in himself. He thought he was incapable of becoming a warrior due to his weight, and also since historically Kung Fu never had a panda hero. Po was represented as a kind, gentle and a non-violent character. He showed constant sense of humor, loved food and was comfortable in his own skin. Po is an example of a determined character as he explored his potential and used his strength to defeat the enemy.

Master Shifu is a Kung Fu Master and the Furious Five's trainer. He continuously rejected to train Po despite his nomination by Grand Master Oogway as the Dragon Warrior. Shifu was counting on Tigress (one of his trainees) to be nominated instead. Master Shifu humiliated Po constantly by giving him impossible training with hopes that he would quit. After a great scene under the Peach Tree with Master Oogway, Master Shifu realizes that Po was his only hope to defeat the villain leopard. Shifu then discovered that Po was motivated by food and included dumplings as rewards during his training.. 

Tigress is the leader of the Furious Five and one of the two few female characters in the movie (Viper is the second one). She is Master Shifu’s favorite and was supposed to be nominated as the Dragon Warrior. She has all the qualities of a champion. Tigress is presented as courageous, daring, and willing to do anything to save the day. She did not believe in Po and continued to intimidate him on every possible occasion. Tigress was bitter and did not show any respect towards Po despite the respect gained by the other four later in the movie. She refused to comply to that decision and lost her fight, along with her team, against Tai Lung.

Grand Master Oogway is Shifu’s trainer. He is represented as the wise master. Oogway was always calm in the toughest situations because of his ability to see the future. He insisted on keeping Po’s nomination and remained calm throughout the movie despite Master Shifu’s constant requests to nominate Tigress. Grand Master Oogway had mentioned to Shifu twice that “there are no accidents” as he believed that nothing happens by coincidence.

This movie, although a cartoon, has a clear hierarchical chart very identical to an organization…

THE SCENES

Scene#1

In the first few moments in the movie, Master Shifu was unable to reach inner peace. He loses his temper when he hears Grand Master Oogway’s vision and orders Zeng to visit the prison commander to double the security on Tai Lung. Frightened by Shifu’s reaction, Zeng hits the wall on his way to deliver the message. Because of his nervousness, Zeng unintentionally let go one of his fur that will be the trigger to Tai Lung’s freedom. 

Scene#2

Master Shifu was expecting Grand Master Oogway to nominate Tigress as the “chosen” one. To show his frustration in front of his team, Shifu declares, “If the panda has not quit by morning, then I would have failed you.” Instead of accepting the situation and training Po as the Dragon Warrior, Shifu shows his rejection to Po too…

Scene#3

Shifu still insisted to prove to Oogway that Po was a joke. He challenged him with tiring exercises to make him quit by the morning. However, Po did not surrender and proved to be passionate and firm. One of the scenes show that Po was trying to train alone and had woken up earlier than the Furious Five. Shifu and his trainee were surprised. They thought he had quit.

Scene#4

Instead of accepting Po as the Dragon Warrior, Tigress insisted that she has the power and the skills to defend the Valley of Peace. Although Mantis, Crane, Monkey and Viper started to respect Po, they decided to join her to the battle against Tai Lung, in order to prove that Po is incapable of defeating the villain. Despite all their specialized skills, they got beaten and had lost their bet.

Scene#5

After losing hope, Master Shifu found himself obliged to train Po. Shifu did not trust or believed that Po had the capabilities to succeed in his training since he had showed no talents other than being able to cook good noodle, the moment when his teammates (except Tigress) started to show respect. The turning point in the movie was when Shifu noticed Po’s ability to reach the cookie jar using his hidden skills. This is when the master was able to relate Po’s motivation between food and exercise. 

Scene#6

Shifu’s first step towards Po was to console him spiritually after learning that the panda hated himself. He then showed Po he had faith in him and that he believed he will be the only one to defeat Tai Lung. Master Shifu had to reinvent his training program because of Po’s different motivational factors (food). The movie then displays a series of training exercises, all related to “catch me if you can” with the dumpling. Po failed in some of the hard training made by Master Shifu but he continued to show commitment and perseverance. The training program ends when Po outdone Shifu. Po declined the dumpling award which showed that he had overcome his dependency on food. 

THE LESSONS LEARNED

The Emotional Intelligence (EI) topic is very obvious in this movie. Both Master Shifu and Tigress fell into the trap of their amygdala. They lost control of their emotions and clearly regretted that later. On the contrary, Grand Master Oogway showed, on all occasions, his ability to remain calm, manage his emotions and did not show any sign of irritation in stressful situations.

Oogway is represented as a good listener and was able to calmly respond back to Shifu’s concerns. He is also characterized as a firm decision maker and trusted his intuition. For any future executive, the ultimate goal is to reach Oogway’s state of mind. We have to learn, to control and to master our emotions as they directly affect the individuals in our organization. The better we communicate and effectively work with others, the more successful we will become.

A quick and direct measurement of personal EI would be through Daniel’s Goleman 360 Degree Feedback. This is a great tool to anonymously receive people/colleague’s opinions to evaluate my own EI. It is one way to focus on one (or more) aspects for our own development plan.  

Another evident topic in this movie is about motivation. Shifu did not train Po similarly to his other trainees (Furious Five). If he did, Po would have no incentive to go through Shifu’s hard training program.

The message is clear: we all learn differently and each one of us has a different motivational drive.

In our current world, corporations and leaders believe that motivating an employee comes by an increase in wages, incentive programs, stocks options, medical packages etc… This might be effective but should not be considered efficient. 

A successful leader, instead, would know that accountability and giving more authority and responsibilities are ways to motivate employees to make their job more inspiring. These ways will trigger a sense of growth, recognition and achievement. 

As a future executive, my goal would be to have to find the hidden motives of the employees. This is a crucial point in our current world: one would never know, as we might end up unleashing a new talent in the team (like Po !) that would hurt the competition. 

It is noticeable throughout the scenes that the heroes of the movie (Po & Master Shifu) lacked one or more quality of a leader.

Every individual in an organization comes from a different background and this is clearly illustrated in this movie by representing different types of animals (Panda, Tiger, Monkey, Snake etc…)

For instance, Master Shifu lacked a critical quality which was controlling his emotional state while Po was looking for confidence and courage. Once both had gained these qualities, they were able to reach greatness!

A hidden leader lacking EI (like Shifu) will end up offending people, struggling in relationships, and unable to resolve problems. A hidden leader lacking confidence (like Po) will not speak up and will be unable to show his hidden skills. A hidden leader lacking discipline (like Tigress) might end up directing her team to failure.

Balancing and learning new qualities of a leader is vital for an executive. No matter how highly positioned an employee is in the organization, the ability to gain and strengthen such qualities remains as important. While some leaders have inborn qualities, others will have to learn it..

Women in the workplace is clearly represented in this movie too by having Tigress as the leader of the team. Today, women had proved themselves efficiently and had outdone men in many cases. However, in the Middle East and contrary to Europe & USA, women are still not as incorporated in the workplace. As a future leader, we are asked to work on having equal chances and participation and incorporate this through the HR system.

Here are some interesting data:

• As of 2019, In US/Europe, more women had graduated more than men by 56%.
• Nearly 54% of the doctors in developed countries are women.
• More than 70 nations have had female leaders.

Team diversification is also another hidden topic. This is illustrated through the Furious Five, different animal types, each with his/her own differentiable skill set. This is considered an important aspect for corporations as it brings different people from different backgrounds. Each individual will have a unique way to improve a product, or to bring in new, out of the box, concepts to the table. It has been proven, and you might have noticed that, every nationality in the world will have an inherent attribute that will be inborn within bringing new concepts and new ideas that will allow creativity and innovation.

Here is a summary that I recommend you keep to reach greatness: