Squid Game for Management Professionals — Part V

Lessons to learn from the third game about Leadership and the Art of Battling Giants

9 min readJan 11, 2022

The fifth article of the series extracts lessons from the third game of the competition — Tug-Of-War.

Tug-of-War is a rather common game — two teams have to pull their ends of the rope, and the game continues until the rope is let go by one of the teams or at least one player of the team crosses the center mark and steps on the other side, making the other team win.

Tug-Of-War

In the TV show, the players are given a chance to divide themselves into teams of 10 players each. We can see that people are making the choice of teammates on the basis of acquaintance, strength or sympathy. Since the players are unaware of the game, the have no idea about the factors that can actually help them in the game, but they do assume that strength is going to play a role.

Once they are moved to the arena, they see that there is are two insanely high platforms at he same height, but have a gap between them. When the instructions are narrated, players are told that in order to win, they have to make the other team fall down to the floor from that gap. So the fall would obviously kill everyone in the losing team, but what if they keep hanging by the rope? Well that is the plan. Their hands are tied with the rope with the help of hand cuffs so they cannot set themselves free even if they release the rope. In order to ensure that they fall, the rope has been made to pass through a hole with blades by design so that it can slice the rope to make the hanging players of the losing team fall on the ground.

For each round, teams are chosen by a draw, so they don’t know which team they are going to play the game with. And, once again, since the players were unaware of the game while making teams, some teams can be at a natural disadvantage on the basis of strength.

When one of the team is on their way to their platform, one of the players is heard to be telling his fellows that the game of tug-of-war is not just about raw strength and can actually be won with a good strategy and teamwork. He further highlights the importance of the following factors in order to defeat a seemingly stronger opponent:

A Good Leader: The leader faces the opponent team and reads how they are performing, and acts accordingly. The followers focus on (read: cannot and should not see anything other than) the back of the leader’s head. If the leader appears to be weak or looks like their spirit is beginning to falter, then the game is already over.
The Anchor: On the rear end of the line of players, there should be someone strong and dependable, like the anchor of the ship.
The Team Arrangement: One player has to stand on the right of the rope, while the other stands on the left, all the way down the rope. Both feet should be facing straight forward. Players should hold the rope in their armpits so that they can put in all their strength.
Holding One’s Ground: When the game begins, for the first 10 seconds you have to hold your ground. Leaning back, the players should practically lie down, pushing their lower abdomens up to the sky, and pulling their heads back to the extent that they can almost see the groin of the person behind them. If the whole team does that, the other team won’t be able to pull them on their side. Meanwhile, the other team will start to get frustrated, astonished by why the other team isn’t budging, as they believed they were much stronger. That is when one might catch a moment when the opponent’s rhythm slips and breaks.

Although the team follows this plan and is successful to catch the right moment, it fails as eventually, the other team starts to pull them towards the gap. Watching their team failing to deliver and collapsing, a member of the team volunteers to lead.

He says that they should all move 3 steps forward when he gives the signal.
When another team member expresses that the idea is foolish as they will fall down, he responds by saying that if they don’t do it, they will die. The leader, the guy at the front, also agrees that they should give it a try.
When he gives the signal, all of them take 3 steps forward. The opponent team, not ready for the force in this direction fall down. Using this as an opportunity, the standing team pulls them to the gap and they drop down hanging, and eventually fall down to death when the rope gets cut.

When the game ends, quite obviously, considering that 8 teams of 10 players each are playing this game, 4 teams win over the other 4, leaving 40 survivors, which means 50% success rate. And by the way, this is the first game where the victory of a player or a team of players is directly dependent on the defeat, and in fact death, of other players. This adds to the conflict of conscience of the players as well.

Leadership

Leadership is the art of inspiring people to do what you want them to do. In a situation of panic, emerging as a leader is hard. The old man who in this case emerges as the leader initially, does it by providing answers to certain questions, asked or unasked, for the team to believe in him.

Why should the team even listen to him?
For survival. It is not like they have in their minds a way to get out of the impending doom. The old man is the only one among them with an idea and the rest of them have to give in to him due to scarcity of ideas.
Why should the team follow him?
The old man makes a case that he has played the game in his childhood and defeated opponents, who were even wrestlers sometimes. On the basis of his experience and wisdom, his authority in how to play the game goes unchallenged. That is why, the team executes his instructions.

Now despite his expertise in the domain, the old man is aware of his incapability to serve in an effective role because of his age and physical weakness. So he describes the roles and indicators to identify people who are suitable for those roles, and himself becomes one of the followers.

Indicators for a Leader

Confidence, to face the opponent.
Observation, to read the performance of the opponents.
Tolerance, to bear the struggle without appearing to be weak to one’s own team.

Indicators for an Anchor

Strength, to add to the inertia of the team and resist their motion against their will.
Dependability, to enable the rest of the team members to focus on pulling the rope only, depending on the anchor to hold them all standing in their places when the other team pulls them.

Once people for these roles are chosen, the old man gives following instructions to the team in terms of behaviors that the whole team is expected to show.

Focus — Everyone has to focus on the leader’s head. This also can be interpreted as an instruction to avoid distractions.
Arrangement — Alternative positions of each player consecutively is balance out the force that is going to be exerted on the rope. The purpose is to maximize the output by uniting the individual inputs.
Alignment of feet — All team members have to place their feet in forward direction. This is to avoid internal conflicts of the team.
Ropes in arms — Maximizing the utilization of individual strength. This is efficient use of available resources.
Harmony — Each one of them had to exhibit these behaviors so that there is harmony in the team.

The Art of Battling Giants

The heading is inspired from the Malcom Gladwell’s book “David and Goliath: Underdogs, Misfits, and the Art of Battling Giants”, as the book is basically a magnificent guide on this topic.

In broader context, a “giant” refers to any challenge that appears to be unbeatable or any goal that seems unachievable. In the game of tug-of-war, the original plan of the team, under the guidance of the old chap is to take strength out of the equation, as it is the only apparent advantage that the other team has. They do it by holding their ground.

But does that mean they are stronger than the other team? Not at all. They just know 2 things:

The other team must have greater confidence due to their apparent advantage of strength and having all men in the team. This confidence must have made them arrogant, and thus they must undermine their opponent team, and won’t think to much about how to win the game.
Unity — simultaneous and harmonized effort — has the ability to win over greater strength. The team exhibits amazing teamwork and are therefore able to get the other team frustrated

However, failing to finish the game and eventually faltering, one team member suggests to take three steps forward. Why? There is also a similar strategy in arm wrestling to engage the opponent for a while and then exploit them by taking them by surprise. When all the force is being exerted in a particular direction, whether pushing or pulling, the sudden motion of the object under the exertion of force in the wanted direction makes those exerting the force stumble. That is because they are not expecting the motion of that velocity.

Key Learnings

The case with the “giants” is that they are not only strong but terribly arrogant. This arrogance is perceived as a victory even before the game by weaker opponents. One way to make people tremble even before facing a challenge is to create an intense fear, so that they get to believe that they do not stand a chance. But being in a position where you and your team are subjected to challenges that are huge and seem unwinnable, what can create a chance of win is:

Solid Leadership — Leaders need to be courageous and dependable. Honest people with high integrity and ability to think on their feet while fighting their impulses of fear and panic make the best leaders in tough times.
Strong Foundations — Challenges usually attempt to break you away, like a hurricane does to a tree. What enables survival for trees in hurricanes are roots and nothing else. Similarly, when teams, under right leadership, learn to face tough times while staying intact to their roots, to their stance, it reduces their chances of defeat drastically.
The Element of Surprise — A good strategist is able to take challenges in a way that gets them to use their strengths while exploiting the weaknesses of the challenge or the opponents. Giants, or seemingly unwinnable situations, do not expect their opponents to be able to survive in front of them and get frustrated and stumble when that happens.

So good leadership, strong foundations, and art of taking the challenges and opponents by surprise — by tackling them in innovative, unexpected ways — can make you win against even the toughest and hardest of the odds.

Check out the other published parts of the series:

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