Samanta Lowe watched the TV news with a sense of alarm.The politician was making disparaging remarks about three women and his audience was not disturbed. Weren’t there boundaries for what could be said in public and what not? Some sense of shame, hesitation, restraint…? Inhibition maybe? What sense of safety, progress, growth and justice could be expected from such a candidate who nurtured biased views about women? Above all, she thought, why aren’t the people protesting? Yet, ‘limits’ and ‘boundaries’ had come up again and again in many meetings with Abhay Kaul, CEO of Camfor India, who engaged them to think about it.Samanta who had been posted to India last year as Camfor India’s marketing head, had been watching the political scene unfurl, understanding little, gleaning a lot about respect, culture — more its absence, as Kaul put it.In six months, Samanta had begun to notice a complete lack of boundaries, the absence of a defined personal space in India and had quickly learnt to back off when she felt intruded. The politician’s comment was that very same intrusion of personal space. At work she heard murmurs of protest from some managers over what they believed was excessive ‘disrespect’. Respect, Kaul said, was in fact about boundaries.At Camfora they had been grappling with two distinct issues. But for Kaul, they were both about respect. The first was the case of Jai Raman, a colleague in customer care. Jai realised that his date of birth (DOB) was wrongly stated on one document in the office records, which created dissonance with other documents that bore his right date. Consequently, he was facing grief with the municipal authority and the sub registrar as he was transferring some land to his sister. So when he wrote to HR’s Aseem Paulose seeking to make the change, Paulose “regretted inability”, and said, “The company does not entertain any changes to dates once recorded.” Jai was surprised. Recalling the General V.K. Singh and Government of India episode, he wondered if Paulose feared that Jai would seek an extended tenure. But that did not make sense because the period of change was just three months. He said to Paulose, “Boss, there are various documents in court right now that are based on my passport, which has my correct date. I don’t want unnecessary difficulty with the law; they will reject so many of those documents because those are based on the company document with the old date. It is so much easier for you to make the change...” But Paulose refused, saying “these had tax implications”. As Jai struggled, all proceedings on the transfer of property got derailed over the matter of his DOB. After this, Paulose stopped answering calls from Jai.Paulose sat in Bangalore, where the corporate office was, while Jai sat in Mumbai, which was termed key region. Jai’s attention was needed in the market, but his property transfer got rejected over the variation in his DOB, his sister accused him of reluctance to part with the ancestral property, families collided, and it was messy. His daughter’s Board exams were at hand, Jai could not travel for three weeks and Paulose would not take his calls.Jai took up the issue with Kaul finally. “I find this completely absurd that a three-month correction which is requested in order to help property matters, is being rejected?” Kaul too wondered why it was so complex. When he asked, Paulose mumbled something about the imminent change in Camfor’s pension plan. Paulose ‘felt’ that this would give Jai unfair advantage in the proposed revision. But there were wheels within wheels; it seems Paulose was nursing a grouse and had used the opportunity to trouble Jai.This is what happened: HR wanted Alisha Reuben to be promoted. Jai, under whom she worked, had stopped it because she had not made up for the extra time she took for her maternity. “Same old story,” Jai explained. “She wanted 6 months, I granted it; She came back after a year, did not offer to work out of home during the extra period, and still demanded her promotion. I said work this whole year, pull your scores up and take the promotion. Paulose was upset. He said this was going against our gender diversity programme...” Jai clarified, “Gender diversity is a noble initiative, but I cannot be hasty about it. Finally the cause is Camfor’s business, not Reuben. Reuben knows the rules; she will deliver the scores and she can take her promotion. Others before her have done so happily. And we have made it so easy to deliver that.”It disturbed Kaul that the person with whom he had vested people management responsibility, had breached boundaries. “Law or the rule book is not to be wielded like a shield. You need to go beyond and examine its fibre!” he told him. break-page-breakToday, as Samantha watched the Indian news unfurl grief after grief, scam after scam, posture after posture, the dichotomy amazed her: the intelligence to engage with state-of-the-art technology combined with a waning inclination to engage with its own cultural supremacy, where its heritage values did not permeate everyday life. This was fascinating – exactly like the man with the caste marks on his forehead, who worshipped a female goddess, aspired to lead and govern but whose ambition did not include respect for humans.Where did the country make the breach with its culture, wondered Samanta. Where did Paulose lose touch with HR management tenets?Then there was the case of Shannu Guha, the senior accountant who had been asked to go in that same appraisal year. Shannu was a very nice person, worked hard more because it took him longer to deliver, but as Kaul said, “The point is he delivers!” But Chintan Dave, the chief of accounts had disagreed and Guha was asked to go.Rajdeep Rai, another senior manager, had been unhappy with this. He had said, “Should we be assuming more responsibility when it comes to asking someone to leave?”And here they were all on a late evening, after a huge presentation to a bank, exhausted. Now they all lounged in Kaul’s office polishing off his collection of dry fruits and chocolates. Samanta was in the ante room watching news, listening to another politician's tweet that downright insulted an artist. One more disparaging remark about women, she mused. What dichotomy! Here were companies like Camfor bringing in gender diversity, and here too were people with archaic, feudal views about women... India, she was coming to see, was divided by literacy — the educated and the illiterate, kept apart by a ruling class. That had been Jai’s interpretation and she saw now he was right.As she entered with her coffee, Rajdeep was saying, “But who is giving you the boundaries? The law? No... the law is the essential edifice upon which you construct your life, but you must question it, ponder on it... that is the birth of the thinking human. It is not enough to simply receive the law or rule book and adapt to it. What my ex-employers, the cigarette-maker did, corroborates my thoughts on Shannu Guha’s exit — that it is mediocre to just follow law.”And Rajdeep began to explain.“The excise was levied on the length of a cigarette. What did my company do? They cut the length of the cigarette by a certain millimetre measure. That pushed them to a different slab for excising, brought the levy down and hence the cost as well, which helped them not take a price hit! Now, so that the consumer does not notice the reduced length of the cigarette, they increased the length of the filter! This did not add to cost, because tobacco is more expensive than the filter. And there is a tape that is wound where the filter meets the paper. That was adjusted so that the filter also did not look longer! All we did was play with the size of the cigarette to save costs at the same price to the consumer!”Samanta: But is there not a duty towards the consumer to let him know that he is getting less now? Consumers don’t like information to be withheld, just as they don’t like hidden risks such as chemicals in their food. Or animal bone in their sugar. More than the law, your employer played with rights, with faith, with belief!Rajdeep: Exactly! Law is a guide. Yes, you must work within its tenets, but I believe you can work within the law yet be supremely dishonest! One, you gave the consumer less tobacco than he was paying for; two, you tricked the government of revenue, rubbishing its intent to deter the habit.Abhay: There is a word that was eluding me; the word is lajja. Traditionally, lajja is a social construct that defines soft boundaries for people. It is also linked with a person’s sense of right and wrong; creating a boundary that a person decides for himself. And when everyone has lajja, societies become predictable and integrated, provided the boundaries are in congruence with shared values of the majority. The individual boundaries collectively create the aura for the collective lajja. So when individual lajja boundaries begin to blur, there isseen a change in the collective lajja, that is, social behaviours.Rajdeep: So when we see widespread corruption, we can understand that it began with individual corrupt minds that went unchecked?Abhay: Yes. It takes two to do that. One to be corrupt and another to condone it. Is a man wrong to take government favours or was a government wrong to let him take those favours?Rajdeep: What my cigarette company did was therefore a breach of boundaries. Now I see it. Jai: Then lajja is the unspoken social contract that people make with each other — either as citizens or as leaders, which includes organisations – offering to abide by mutually acceptable behaviours rooted in simple honesty, so that... any breach is seen as shameful?Samanta: So we have social lajja, corporate lajja... personal lajja?Abhay: Lajja is lajja. It applies to individuals who create it and abide by it. They will bring it to bear at home, in society, country, workplace. So, logically yes, organisations are a collective of individuals and lajja will apply where humans relate to the each other and the external world.Samanta: So, gracefulness in the workplace is the equivalent of adherence to norms, boundaries and respect for each one’s personal space? Non-intrusion? Isn’t that why we also build boundaries with respect to performance and conduct? And these inform individuals whether they are performing within the boundaries (desirable) or outside the boundaries (undesirable).Abhay: It is perceptions of being judged by others as being in the ‘undesirable’ zone that may invoke lajja. But as the composition of the collective changes, boundaries will blur... bodyline bowling shocked people in the 1930s. Today match fixing angers, but does not shock.Jai: Also, I feel, boundaries ensure turf respect... but more workable in formal environments like the workplace, not at home. Abhay: That is because at home we invest in relationships; in the workplace you work around relationships clinically, with a view to protecting resources, with a view to ensuring profits!Rajdeep: When there is power inequity — boss–subordinate, parent-child — we allow grace to drop. Think Shannu Guha. We will see that the one with power can afford to drop grace and even get away without loss of status. Indian marriages see a lot of that. And that will also explain why bosses can shout at subordinates; husbands at wives; and master at servant. The sacking of Shannu Guha was less about his incapability and more about his boss’s inability to tend to him, respect him.Samanta: Fall of grace or breach of boundaries? break-page-breakAbhay: They are the same. Grace drops when it is a veneer and not an inner quality. Water can wash off make up, but not beauty. So when you don grace like a mask, an accessory, like an accent, it has a role to play. When it is inborn, it pervades all actions. So see, grace was a boundary of behaviour meant to keep me in check... I feel this is where lajja orginates — from notions of right and wrong which we agree are good for us. And we soon come to depend upon them as sturdy, strong barriers to unethical conduct.Jai thought about Paulose. Honesty was a necessary boundary. Paulose had breached it by using his personal grievance to handle a professional situation. Samanta thought, ‘Paulose was appointed head of HR because Camfor believed he had the grace to manage people. But it turned out to be a mere mask he wore to earn a salary.’Samanta: ...what is the opposite of lajja?Abhay: Nirlajja, to be without shame, lose grace. So why do some people become nirlajja and not others? The answer points to shifts in values. Once it was a matter of personal pride to be clean and honest. Not anymore..Jai (only to Samanta): Wasn’t Paulose being nirlajja? My rejecting Reuben’s promotion was a professional one; his stymieing my birth date issue was a personal response, a breach of organisational boundaries.Samanta: And what led to Paulose choosing nirlajja-ness? (Then to Abhay) Isn’t losing grip with your values or the boundaries of your role or function, nirlajja?Abhay: There is an inner humanity or human-ness which is necessary to complete the meaning of ‘Man’. If he has not completed his growth inwardly to become a human, then you will see that when he is boxed in by stresses, he will behave inhumanly — Not necessarily violent, although that holds true too, but also he will be combative and necessarily graceless. All this cutthroat, coveting and cunning is an expression of incomplete evolution into man. Just being nar is not enough; you have to become manushya... English sadly does not have equivalents for these. Let’s say, ‘being man is not enough, but being human is the goal’.Lajja is not just about boundaries; it also includes an inner feeling of shame when you transgress. Boundaries have meaning as long as people feel they should not be crossed. We should feel shame when we breach rules.Jai (thinking of Paulose): I think I agree... Breaching rules has become easy because there is no shame felt. So as Rajdeep was saying about law, a government when defining law can think of a law up to a point. The user is allowed to go beyond and he does, applying intelligence. That leads to avoidance or evasion.Rajdeep: Avoidance is about more than law; it is about philosophical intent too. But when you evade the law, you clearly operate in the realms of ignorance, disrespect and intentional dishonesty. Jai: But the real challenge is when you avoid law. Because you are choosing to do differently than what you should be doing. Which means you have an opportunity to do a thing and you are either choosing to bypass it or do it suiting your own convenience. Or the convenience of your conscience.Like Paulose, thought Jai.Did we avoid law or evade it when we asked Shannu Guha to leave? It was felt he was not performing. Should we assume more responsibility when it comes to asking people to leave? If it was moral turpitude, yes, ask him to go. But non-performance is different. He can be given more opportunities or more time.What is fairness? Is it fair to give him more time to perform? Or is it fair to think that by asking him to go, I am keeping the company operating at a higher level of efficiency and that is better? In fact, is the company really operating better by asking Shannu Guha to go? That is where my struggle is. I can work around law, but beyond that, into the realms of fairness and justice... there, the thin line is you the operating manager, the minister, the cop.Rajdeep (Googling...): ‘Lajja is from lajj, to be ashamed. ....of having done an impious act.’ An impious act is one which lacks respect or dutifulness according to Dictionary.com.Samanta (under her breath): As the politician did with his remarks against women.Jai: And as we did in the case of Shannu Guha.Rajdeep: As my company did with the cigarettes and the consumer.. Abhay: So how do you remain on the right side of piety, lajja? Recall he defined it as a sense of shame arising from doing impious acts. So does it make you feel that sacking Shannu was impious? Jai: What is impious? Sacking? Or not thinking before sacking?Samanta: That act is impious which has not been thought out, whose performance was not based on introspection; an act done in haste or for your own benefit, but without considering whether you have done all that you should be doing, whether you have brought to bear upon the act all your learning, skills and potential....To my mind, the lowest, basic value is law, following law. Doing what is legally pardonable. The highest value is interpreting law. Going beyond it, understanding and probing its essence and deriving a personal law for yourself. I repeat, a personal law should evolve out of common law. That is when you bring your conscience to work. That is piety. That is lajja... right?Classroom DiscussionIsn’t motivation in the workplace a function of respecting boundariescasestudymeera at gmail dot com Now, discuss case studies on Facebook(This story was published in Businessworld Issue Dated 03-12-2012)
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Anant Deo’s resignation was shared by the regional president Riyaaz Akhtar in a joint email to senior management of Elszy India. He wrote: “In the last several weeks I have been sharing with David Dwight, family situations and circumstances that will need my personal attention to which I am committed. I will be spending the next few years attending to my sister who is ailing from....”Only a handful had been by Deo’s side last month as he sat late into the night in his office, holding his head. They had all been on that conference call. Rao had confessed to knowing that the work of Effort Little involved ‘clearing the road’ for legitimising a large tract of land that Elszy India was buying upon which it would then build its first ever factory in India.Elszy India was an American consumer products company which was until now only distributing its products in India. In 2012, plans were afoot to set up manufacturing facilities in India, large enough to also serve the Asian markets. Country head Anant Deo was a very dedicated and hardworking MBA from a good b-school, set upon making this his prime responsibility.Deo told his GM Sahil Wazir to do the ground work. Wazir in turn hired Effort Little India — a firm of consultants and legal advisors — to set the ball rolling. Effort had told Elszy India that it will not be a direct government allotted land and hence they should be patient till all the paperwork was completed. Deo, having handed over the work to Wazir and Effort, did not anticipate what followed. When the investigating team probed, they found that it was common for new companies to outsource this work as it was fraught with complications. These small ‘law firms’ did ‘stuff’ ranging from creating documents to changing land records, to ensure that there is no lien at a later date. Further probing showed that Wazir, in haste and enthusiasm to get the prized land, on facing obstacle after obstacle to get a clear title to the land, had said in an innocent but practiced old style, “Yaar kuch bhi karo, clear title chahiye!” (Do anything but give me a clear title.)So the law firm did ‘anything’— they paid various people to buy comfort at every level and to be rid of their hold on the land. In short, it was completely and fully in contravention of everything that the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) declares an American company cannot do.To the probing teams, Wazir explained (not intending to justify): “You will not find even one piece of land with a clear title. Most of the registrations and documents are several decades old. Many are mortgaged, and most not backed by proper documentation. On need basis the local authorities would make another set of documents ... and add it to their manual records.”To Deo he had said, “Buying land with full white payment? Not possible. Every agent has told me ‘the lentils will not cook like this’ (an Indian idiom; here, ‘we do not have a context anymore if you cannot pay black’.)” But Anant had not for a moment thought that Wazir would seek to ‘handle’ it. For Anant, recounting this to his parent company was excruciating because he had clearly breached the rules. He himself had done nothing. But when Elszy USA questioned him, he was taken aback as he realised that he had signed many bearer cheques for Wazir to pay Effort, not alert to the implications.The shocker was that Anant’s reporting line led to David Dwight, the US business head for MEA countries, and he stood to be indicted too. Anyway, FCPA probes began. A shocked Dwight took some time to digest all this. News of Deo’s confession reached him as he shook his head. Deo was such a nice person!Today Dwight’s boss Alfred Crawley and another, who was likely taking over Dwight’s debris, Bradley Green, met the core team in India at the Connemara Hotel. Green, who had worked in India in the 1990s, knew that India was a great market, absolute delight of foreign players, the Indian consumer was a marketer’s delight. But India was not easy to do business in.He gathered through informal business forums online that India had a multitude of laws and statutes which were not administered efficiently or which were applied by many as a means to make money but not as a means of enforcing a legislation. For example, there were a number of statutes to protect the environment from pollution. “I have worked in India in the 90s up until the early 2002,” wrote one person. “But I have not seen any determination to enforce these. How effective have these laws been for the objective it seeks to serve? Is there anyone monitoring pollution itself to say if the purpose is served by the law? I think not.”Riyaaz Akhtar, an American Indian, was Dwight’s counterpart in Asia and keen on Elszy setting up the feeder plant in India. In a closed door meeting with the India team he said, “These laws which are meant to be strong fortifications to enable business, are unable to work for you the user of the law. It ends up being a weapon in the hands of those meant to administrate it, and they use it not for the advantage of the system, but against it! But I am of the belief that administration includes the users too...” Kushal: Meaning?Riyaaz: What Wazir did, what Deo did not do... refusing to be a part of the parallel economy is your role as a user!Jaideep Walia, Kushal Desai and Sridhar Iyer were three senior managers from the India business. The irony was they agreed with many of Crawley and Green’s observations but felt constrained from vehemently agreeing. As Crawley held one set of chats with Riyaz and Green, they spoke among themselves in Hindi, naturally. break-page-breakKushal: It is such a difficult law; companies have to pay a lot of money to stay on the right side. The administration does not seem to want to reform it to what is doable; if anything it seems to be designed to stop me from being productive! Deo must be so frustrated!Jaideep: When I was with a beverage company, the pesticide level in Indian water was a big challenge. With huge investments we treated the water and levels reduced significantly. Yet we were asked to ensure standards that were more stringent than the European standards! Why would you make that demand of only the soft drink industry, when all around you, whether it is milk or vegetables, the pesticide level is higher? And as the economic and industrial environment evolves, shouldn’t your laws evolve too? But the laws not only contradict each other, they are also archaic! Sridhar: The foods company where I was, grappled a lot with irrelevant laws. The Factories’ Act 1948, for example, still has things like ‘compulsory spittoons’. You are laughing? If you don’t have spittoons at specified points in your factory, you are liable to imprisonment and fine! So while our workers were trained and committed to hygiene, and we had huge posters everywhere that forbade paan and gum, we also had spittoons everywhere! Then there is a provision that requires ‘a drinking water area with an attendant in uniform’! These goras used to tease us!Jaideep: Sadly breach of the law has become a source of harassment, so I can see why you had 44 spittoons... someone has to audit and ask are these laws relevant, needed, can they be honoured? So while spittoons are easy, the law on land acquisition — a maze when you operate at panchayat level — is draconian and nobody will adhere to it. In some cases, they would rather be in breach paying off the inspectors... what are the rates for breach in your experience?Sridhar: Not sure, but something like Rs 50 if you are in breach of a spittoon, and if you are in breach of a doctor, then you pay Rs 50,000.Riyaaz (turning to participate in their discussion): Those are fines, not bribes. The FCPA is very clear that we are not supposed to be bribing anybody. Very, very clear. We are not supposed to be getting any unfair advantage in doing business. Yes they want to take their products everywhere, but if to do so we have to resort to corrupt ways, then the US government, forbids that! Naturally then, doing business in India was tricky, because many acts demanded candy money for fulfilment. [Riyaaz recounted for them how a low level clerk had put out his hand for baksheesh adding, “Aapki bhaabhi khush hogi.” (Your sister-in-law (clerk’s wife) will be pleased.)]Kushal to Riyaaz: But in India you need to often pay look-the-other-way (LOW) money.Riyaaz: That is what makes it so darn difficult to be successful here. The US laws are tough. American companies have to report all penalties paid in their SEC filing, which means it becomes a public document. So it’s not like I will wilfully contravene the law, pay the fine and continue to do business because the consequent profit is still ill-gained profits for my business! break-page-breakJaideep: Wazir probably thought he could cleverly tuck the bribe into sundry expenses. But their audit processes are so sharp,that even penalty or fine must be shown as penalty or fine. There is an audit process through which it goes and an SEC filing too. You cannot go wink- wink to your auditors and have them pretend they did not see it. The auditors have far greater liabilities upon them and jail is inevitable for any misdemeanour that the US government apprehends. So your chairman can go to jail if some plant of his anywhere in the world — no matter its local laws — uses child labour!Kushal: You mean, even if he was unaware?Riyaaz: Absolutely! The CEO is almost always culpable and answerable for any acts of felony done by the people working under him. Which is why Dwight and Deo are in trouble. See, the American industry was beginning to get a bad name in the 90s because wherever they went to in emerging markets they had to pay bribes to get business advantages. It was almost an accepted norm of doing business in some parts. But their competitors who had refused to bribe began to complain that unethical ways could not count as success, especially since both players paid the same taxes! Then the industry heads got together and questioned the price of doing business, the global spread of depraved business practices which finally would be reaped by today’s young!”Crawley had explained: “You must understand that governments are answerable to the people, to its businesses — if its foreign policy with regard to a country was influenced by its business relations! So it starts with the governance, the leadership; what he or she will not do, the businesses cannot do too. And what the businesses cannot do, he or she cannot do either.”So whether it was Enron, Andersen in India or XYZ in Indonesia or anywhere else, the call was for a closer look at American businesses and the US government’s relationship with the host countries.Crawley seemed to staunchly vote in favour of the FCPA. And they seemed to be saying, ‘if bribing is an offence within the US, how come you are turning a blind eye to what we are doing on foreign soil?’” Jaideep: American companies have been in India since 1993 at least. They would have done some due diligence on the country, to see how business is usually accomplishable here. Surely they would know... the risk of this kind...!Riyaaz: They do. In the end everyone will be given a brief to succeed and they will have to find legal and lawful solutions to succeed and stay successful. So it’s just that if India as a country is showing an 8 or 9 per cent GDP growth and the consumer surplus is growing, then there is a lot of incentive for foreign companies to come here and they will think it is worth the struggle and they will say , ‘Yeah.. it is a tough environment’; but the best they will do is step up your legal department from five to 50, because we know everything will go to court and nothing will get decided. But nothing more than that...Point is, India wants to do business and so does the US, except that American laws are very tough, unbending and unforgiving. Everybody knows where bribes are involved, the US even more so. Hence for Deo to cry foul is not pretty. All responsible US companies are very clear that you cannot have growth without governance, nor success, without compliance to law. And this is not a grey area at all.... either you are in breach or you are in compliance. There is nothing like ‘mostly in compliance’. So nobody in the US is going to give you leeway because you say ‘I tried so hard but one has to bribe...!’ Kushal: But Deo did not know....Riyaaz: Like I told you, that does not work! If you are the CEO, along with the plush carpets comes the responsibility of knowing what your people are doing. “I did not know!” is not a valid script, which is why he is under the scanner now.Sridhar: So now what happens?Riyaaz: Maybe emerging markets are still figuring out the ethics of doing business with foreign partners... Dwight or Green will maybe spell out clearly what is accountability for a manager who is unable to sustain a business in India because of compliance reasons, especially in countries where LOW money is called for.Kushal: This is not a level playing field at all. They have tough laws, we do not have tough laws. It’s easy (for them) to shut shop and leave... but is is fair? We have worked so hard on building this business and now this had to happen! Somehow, we imbibed their style yaar, but not their unbending nature when it comes to law.Riyaaz: We must first copy their national pride! The guy who is stonewalling our land purchase in India, does not take ownership for his country’s success! He feels no national pride! So he will talk about uncooked lentils, ha!Jaideep: This was not about spittoons or water dispensers. This is serious... a new plant in a state. This impacts every damn thing — the employment level, hence health, consumer surpluses, literacy, happiness.... children grow up better, schools come up, careers are planned and all is gung ho. There should have been greater commitment!But how do I acquire land? Acquisition of land has become so difficult. I have to be willing to bribe every level of human being between Elszy and the land owner — they will probably forcibly evict all the peasants and hand over the land to me. They will probably give the peasants a tenth of what I pay, resettle them and everything will be gung ho. And I do not want to be party to this. But then I cannot grow either!”Everyone they talked to pointed to a hasty greed that had swept the country. “This is what is hampering growth,” said Jaideep.The same sentiments had increasingly taken form in numerous articles, books... They had found Green reading Gurcharan Das’s book, India Grows at Night. He had told them, “These are Indians talking about India. These are accomplished Indians in material and manner and mind. Yet they are not able to wrest the country out of the stranglehold of corrupt ways. Because as a people, you are very submissive; your inaction is mistakenly called ‘tolerance’. Read this man’s words, how succinctly he states the truth: ‘...the nation may be rising despite the state. India’s is a tale of private success and public failure. Prosperity is, indeed, spreading across the country even as governance failure pervades public life... wouldn’t it be wonderful if public policy supported private enterprise?”Riyaaz: The chips are loaded against us now. Earlier it was ‘India is this huge goldmine of growth and opportunity, the famous 250 million middle class whose private spending accounts for 60 per cent of the GDP, the glorious 8 per cent GDP growth etc. But is this an attractive destination anymore? I have sat through presentations globally and heard the disappointment. That 8 has dropped to 5; other countries such as Indonesia and South Africa are far better opportunities and are making it easier for business to be done. These countries are not exactly not corrupt, but they facilitate, things happen, people see reason, bribing may exist but not in all spheres... I don’t know but companies have found it easier to work there.“The broader point is we are not an attractive destination anymore because of the drop in growth. This combined with corruption, combined with the difficulty of doing business with archaic laws, simply means you are going the pre reforms era, pre liberalisation where nobody wants to touch you, and the rupee will touch 60, everything will become expensive.”Jaideep: The key thing is we have to drop the arrogance that we are the second largest power in the world after China. China has gotten so far ahead that it is a speck in the distance. There are other emerging markets. They are relatively clean, lean and hungry. So if we don’t want to be left behind as an investment destination and an economic activity group, we should smarten up our act really fast.As Crawley said over lunch, “It’s not that I am insensitive to how you feel; The choices are do I abide by the law and not do business or abide by my business needs and not worry about the law? But I also have the law of my country to adhere to, where law comes above all else.” Classroom DiscussionFor a land that is proud of its heritage, how may Brand India be relaunched?casestudymeera (at)gmail(dot)comNow, discuss case studies on Facebook(This story was published in Businessworld Issue Dated 31-12-2012)
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We all glibly speak of experience mattering. Companies select the 'experienced' candidate. How much attention do we actually pay to the nature of the experience? Twenty years of varying jobs on a CV means little. One has to go deeper into really looking at the actual experience a person has had. In a sense, experience is something that accrues to one's inner 'bank account' on the basis of situations or challenges faced and decisions made. If one habitually takes the easy way out or escapes from challenges, the personal accrual of experience in one's own (inner) bank account amounts to little. It is discounted. It has low value and there is little to show apart from a big external bank balance.Arjun has a great academic record, but that is only a potentiality, a possibility, a promise...something that can achieve things. What did he actually do with the challenges he faced, that which would have been instrumental in providing him the bank of experiences? Several things: he is bored and decides to leave internal audit, prefers to work with his ex-boss in a unknown start up consultancy, joins a clothing company and decides to leave because his boss fudges numbers and makes wild projections, goes to the Middle East as a taxation manager and leaves because he finds they expect him to drink beer with them, becomes a VP of an IT company but when they want to post him to Lagos in Nigeria, he quits. He joins Pleats, a manufacturer of children's clothes and leaves because the pricing of the clothes is over the top for the Indian market. He seems to systematically escape from every challenge he has had to face (especially the last one, where his education as an accountant, a cost accountant could have been employed to develop a winner pricing strategy for the company where he was not a minion but the financial controller). He doesn't appear to dive in but merely skims the surface, then leaves so he can start afresh in a new industry.When he is asked about the nature of the IT business he is currently in and is unable to answer, in spite of having been there for 7 months, it shows his level of disconnect with what he is doing. Arjun clearly comes across as a person who has had little by way of experience (or chooses not to experience). He has seen to it that he remains untouched by life. These are people who are very different from those who have faced challenges and have had to make it the hard way, by making decisions that have dealt with issues and not just escaped. What are some of the ways he might have done things differently? First would be leaving internal audit not because it was boring but because he had outgrown it to something larger. Second, he would have faced the fudging boss and tried to push for a cleaner image. Or that he would have had pricing conversations — difficult ones — with Pleats.Organisational life is full of these things. There is no smooth ride for anybody. The smoother one expects it to be, the flatter one's growth. If we do not take on difficulties, we remain forever 'unlined' by time.We outgrow a condition. A job becomes too small because we know it so well; it ceases to be a challenge. A baby outgrows the womb. A child outgrows a class. We all have outgrown our clothes. The world of experience is not that different. If we are not open to the experiences we have outgrown we continue to remain within that space, not unlike a child wearing clothes that are too small for him. The reverse is also true; we transition to something too soon, before we outgrow it, before real mastery takes place.On the other hand there is Sudarshan who, by contrast starts up with a lesser academic record. However, the little that we have here says that he was posted to the US after 5 years of initial work. In his first company with whom he lasted 10 years, he was posted across six locations. Here is a person who has not jumped ship but has seemingly stayed the course. His need to move back to India comes from his wanting to be with his classical music learning son. Definitely unlike Arjun who decides to move to Delhi from Hyderabad because his wife wants Bombay when his mother is alone and ailing in Bhopal! There is mindlessness about this decision-making that appears to protect him from facing life.All in all, while one would have preferred some more information on the 'sacrifice-for-son' Sudarshan, the one red thread that is clear is that bypassing challenges does not create relevant experience. One thing that can actively support the formation of such personal equity is the setting up of intentional choices. These choices determine the direction of experience. It is about 'leading oneself' more than simply 'leading others'. When one begins to lead oneself, the basis is being aware of oneself in the context of the world. We see clearly who we are and where we stand as well as where we need to go. This is the foundation of choice that leads one to develop an intentional approach to building requisite competence.The author is at the Asia Pacific office of the Center for Creative Leadership (This story was published in Businessworld Issue Dated 17-12-2012)
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Good discussion. Thus far, no further. This is what a seasoned recruiter can make out of the conversation between Jeetun, Rajam and Nakulaa. Inadvertently Nakulas reveals all when she said, “This is a clinical situation, client needs candidate, candidate comes with a personality... understand the client hires a personality finally, not his certificates or baggage.” Many recruiting and head hunting firms are driven by this logic, which is fundamentally wrong and smacks of a lack of depth among our service providers. First, hiring is not a clinical situation. It is a game-changing decision for most organisations, particularly when we are discussing senior management. Second, while each of us do come with a personality, it is behaviour that makes the difference in our on-the-job performance. Personality does influence behaviour, but it is only one among several factors that impact behaviour of employees. Personality is in the DNA of an individual, organisations cannot do much about it. But several behaviours like decision making, driving for results, detail orientation, etc., can be gained from hands-on in the right roles.Third, and perhaps the most fallacious understanding is: personality can be known from the CV and by pursing an apparently intelligent discussion about a person, as seen here. Personality study is a science by itself and there are highly reliable and valid tests crafted using the scientific methodology known as ‘psychometrics’ to figure out a candidate’s personality. Even so, in most Western countries employment laws are strict enough to bar organisations from deciding suitability based on these personality tests. Organisations have to provide evidence to courts of law that particular personality traits like extroversion, resilience, dependability, conscientiousness, optimism, etc., do actually contribute to job success. Only then, in the eyes of law, it is fair to retain or reject based on the outcome of personality tests. So what could have Jeetun done differently? Perhaps, he could have taken a more holistic view of both Arjun and Sudarshan, which would have included not only educational qualifications, work experience and motivational factors, but also competencies or behaviours required for success in the role of CFO at Morro. Work experience and educational factors are the easy part. They are objective and based on facts and so help in easy decision-making. The difficult part — and that is exactly where Jeetun and Rajam are unable to see eye-to-eye — is to decipher what a prospective candidate would be able to actually do and what would satisfy or annoy (motivational factors) a candidate in a new job. To predict what a candidate can actually do, one needs to know the must-have competencies or behaviours that are required for the job. Armed with this information, Jeetun could have taken a competency-based interview of Arjun and Sudarshan and gathered data about their past on-the-job behaviours. The thumb rule is past behaviour predicts future behaviour. Unfortunately, Jeetun was myopic in just investigating Arjun’s job-hopping rather than an entire gamut of behaviours that lead to job success in the role of CFO. For instance, he could have asked “tell me about a time when you had contributed to a ‘make-or-buy decision’ (a critical result area for a CFO) from the perspective of available budget vis-à-vis efficient utilisation of funds?” Such questions would have helped him get much more data about on-the-job behaviour, which would give him more clarity about the strength and areas of development for both. A data-driven analysis would have also helped Vinayak in taking a quick and well-informed call as to who among the two would be appropriate for Morro’s cultural context. Similar behavioural questions around motivation to stick or move from one company to another would have been much more revealing. Jeetun’s persistence in seeking a direct rationale from Arjun as to the reasons for changing so many jobs could yield only socially desirable answers. No wonder, Jeetun was speculative in his analysis of Arjun as seen in his statements like “He does not seem to be a chap who tries hard”; “I think he has made a lot of poor judgments in his career…”, etc. Needless to say the discussion between Jeetun, Nakulaa and Rajam completely missed out on the competency (behaviour) aspect and, therefore, was technically unsound and from a perspective of outcome, inconclusive. Behavioural interviewing skills are a must for those in the hiring industry. Instead of a personal interview, they can look at the CV and ask relevant behavioural questions to better understand the candidate’s suitability for the job. The author is a senior consultant in the Mumbai office of DDI, a global talent management consulting firm headquartered in Pittsburgh, USA. devashis.rath@ ddiworld.com(This story was published in Businessworld Issue Dated 17-12-2012)
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In days of yore, he was called chief accountant, a.k.a. bean counter and book keeper. But in the past 10 years, there has been a paradigm shift in a CFO’s role. Add to this, the advent of technology, breakdown of geographical barriers and the global financial crisis. The spotlight is now glaring on the CFO as never before. This is what Jeetun Patki needs to keep in mind as he defines his ideal candidate. The CFO is not merely a name change, but a new role. Increasing investments from private equity brought the CFO to centre stage in managing stakeholder expectations and investor relations. Increasingly, the CFO is being seen as the shadow CEO, and in many companies, the CFO has become a natural successor to the CEO. Apart from corporate governance, the CFO now takes operational and strategic decisions, moving from supplying financial information to providing business advice, especially about mergers, acquisitions and divestments. In progressive organisations, the CFO is often seen deftly handling areas that were previously not considered his domain of expertise (such as talent management), contributing beyond finance. Often, the CFO is the custodian of ethics and governance. The contemporary board governance structure offers an opportunity for the CFO to work closely with one of the most important board committees, the audit committee.Today, the CFO is not only preoccupied in building credibility for the finance function, he also has to instill a sense of confidence among employees, customers and partners as a person who knows the pulse of the organisation. Jeetun’s candidate needs these skills: 1. Focus on business fundamentals without sacrificing on accounting and controls.2. Create more bandwidth to focus on corporate and strategic parts of the business by effectively delegating and outsourcing routine tasks such as maintenance of accounting records. 3. Managing stakeholder expectations, both internal and external.4. Demonstrate commitment to create value for stakeholders.5. Emerge as the external face of the corporation, especially with investors — it is not surprising to see the CFO managing additional responsibilities for investor relations in many large companies.6. Acquire skills in change management so as to emerge as a sole advisor to the CEO.7. Be constantly updated on local and international corporate and taxation laws as also manage multi-currency exposures skillfully.8. Blend risks, compliance and governance into business enablers by offering solution-based advice to business managers.9. Move from the traditional bureaucrat role to emerge as a partner and collaborator to business in vital decisions such as outsourcing, investing in IT and driving systems, processes and people.Against this backdrop, let us consider the candidatures of Arjun Setalvad and Sudarshan Krishnan. As mentioned, Morro wants continuity especially since it is expanding in a big way in the next four years. Its CFO must know how to meet shareholder expectations on financial gearing and that would not be possible if he has not gone beyond financial controllership. The role requires a kind of mentality that has to be unrestrained by the ordinariness of life. Arjun has an impeccable academic record and experience including in MNCs and listed companies. It is true that he has changed many jobs with an average tenure of 2-3 years in a job, and some of his decisions for the change do not seem convincing. But in today’s corporate world, the average tenure of a CEO has dropped to almost half, to 3-7 years. In many ways, compensation drives job changes and, willingness to take risks in trying out the ‘unknown’ has increased, especially in case of successful professionals with an entrepreneurial streak. Working in many organisations can be discounted as not gathering moss. Gaining diverse cultural experience is a strength that such individuals possess; it helps them manage a variety of stakeholders. In today’s dynamic world, stability is no longer a virtue. As the cliché goes, even to stay at the same point, one has to keep running. Companies that aspire to grow rapidly can scarcely afford to have a CFO who is over-cautious and cannot keep pace with the external world. While Sudarshan may appear stable, his academic record is far from what a fast-growing company would need in its CFO's profile. More importantly, his reason to return to India is not driven by career aspiration. Having spent 20 years in the US, he may not easily fit into the role of a CFO in an Asian economy. Arjun, therefore, seems the better choice, and I would urge Jeetun to discuss the job requirements with him and ensure that his family is comfortable with the location. Jeetun should underscore the unique opportunity that Morro, as an Indian MNC, offers to Arjun.The author is vicepresident and chief internal auditor of Voltas, chairman of the audit committee at BOC India, and independent director at Speciality Restaurants. Views expressed are personal(This story was published in Businessworld Issue Dated 17-12-2012)
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Jeetun Patki looked at the CV before him and back at the candidate. Arjun Setalvad — articled in one of the finest audit firms in India, a rank holder CA, a company secretary and a graduate cost accountant. And well spoken and confident. Overall, ‘good chap’ as one would say.But all was not well. Something about the overall feel of this candidate bothered Jeetun.Jeetun was an associate VP at First Bench, a placement firm in Mumbai and he was hiring a CFO for a client. While all things matched, he had only now noticed, Arjun had changed jobs almost every 2-3 years. Jeetun was not happy. He saw that with every change, Arjun’s choice of company had become more non-descript and vague. Placing the CV before Rajam Rajanna, the senior VP, Jeetun said, “I don’t know what to make of this chap...”Rajam stared at the CV, took in its variations, and said, “Fine academic profile... any MNCs?”Jeetun ran his eye over the sheets and said, “Yes, eight out of the 12 employers were MNCs.”Rajam: Hmm... Vinayak Morro will not touch a full MNC fellow. He is like his father, Vittal Morro, and will take only what he wants. What is your other candidate like?Nakulaa Simha (another associate VP): Sudarshan Krishnan. Two employers in 20 years, no Indian company experience, and he has worked in India only five years. His US roots are strong, may not stick.Jeetun: He wants to come back. His son is studying Indian classical music, and has found a guru. They are finalising housing right now.Nakulaa: Not strong reasons. Morro won’t buy. Go for this Arjun fellow.Jeetun: Too many job changes. And not gathering moss. Importantly, I don’t see good reasons for the changes. Not even money. Nakulaa: In today’s scenario, two years in a job is a long time. Must be a restless sort; But question is, what is Morro's horizon?Rajam: But then neither does Sudarshan have listed company experience, which Morro insists on. He is pure MNC, whereas Arjun has a few years of Indian companies.Jeetun: It’s not rocket science: if you have functional intelligence, you can pick it up, but the other things you cannot ‘learn’. And Sudarshan has all that. And resilience! He has stayed with the same organisation 20 years; he comes across as a good leader... Rajam: First check this Arjun. I still think he will work well for Morro. Maybe even Morro will work for him.Nakulaa: I am not going by Sudarshan’s 20 years. Afterall they posted him to the US. Send me to the US, I will never come back!Rajam: What’s your point of dissent with Arjun?Jeetun: I am not sure his heart will be in any job. He lacks passion. He works, earns, lives. Does not define himself by his career. No passion. With Morro you need to be able to jump when told. Arjun will quit. I have seen his reasons so far...Nakulaa: And why will Sudarshan stick?Jeetun: He has a reason now, see? His son.Arjun and Jeetun chatArjun left marketing and trading organisation Arcalite (his first job) in two years, to accept his ex-boss’s offer to work in his new consulting firm because, as he explained, “I was quite bored as Arcalite was almost entirely internal audit and I had done enough of that.”Jeetun: Then you left your ex-boss Pillai by 1993; what happened?Arjun: The firm was being run more by Pillai’s brother, and this guy was fudging numbers and making wild projections to foreign companies and I was not comfortable with that. As it happened we were doing some work for Raltier’s (clothing company) India entry strategy... they were very impressed with my qualifications and I joined as their head of accounting and finance.Analysis: A Discussion Gone WasteAnalysis: The Inner Bank AccountAnalysis: No Time To Gather Moss break-page-breakJeetun could see that Arjun’s academic list was captivating. In the early 1990s, a company secretary was much sought after in liberalised India, to decode entry laws. By mid-1990s, a number of mergers and acquisitions crowded the market as foreign companies bought Indian brands, Indian firms sold brands, Indian companies bought Indian brands to dilute them... Jeetun saw a pattern would emerge now. 1994-95 was when many foreign players entered India; the salaries offered were definitely far greater than the value that Indian market placed on an Indian manager. Mass scale movements to the new foreign companies abounded. From internal audit to consulting to being finance manager, Arjun had coasted without gathering much value addition. Jeetun to Rajam: It was the time everybody was trying to book profits fast — salaries were negotiable across the table. Good people were willing to leave an established place if you were willing to make it worthwhile. Many encashed their experience and took home a fatter salary.Nakulaa: But our friend here did not have experience that counts for much — all of eight years then and that too across four organisations. Rajam: I think the market was unusual then. With the best managers being in demand, firms hired good chaps quickly before they were lost to foreign players. So what did he do next?Jeetun: Joined Albary Venn, the food company, as their taxation manager. Did 22 months and went to Abu Dhabi as financial controller (FC) of a hotel business; but he left them in 9 months.Arjun (about Albary Venn): I found the culture beyond me. It was pretentious, almost encouraging a work-life imbalance, too much beer and a lot of posturing...Jeetun: Was there a compulsion to adhere to the beer drinking, etc?Arjun: In an unspoken way. If you were not with them, you were not one of them; you stood out.After quitting Albary Venn, Arjun moved to Delhi to Bank Information Technology as its VP finance. Jeetun read the job description: Budget management, costing and pricing (after promotion as CFO for South-east Asia). Managed global budgets equivalent of Rs 300 million; installed SAP across locations. Now the CV was beginning to sound good. But two years on, when they asked Arjun to move to Nigeria to the Chairman’s office, he quit. Arjun explained: “The transfer to Nigeria was an unnecessary demand. The work conditions were bad, security is so bad in Lagos... I was willing to work out of India but did not see any reason why I needed to be near the Chairman!”Next Arjun joined Pleats Garments’ India operations. It was a small foreign company. “Focussed business; just garments, but retail, and retail was new to India in 2007. “Unfortunately they lost steam, and courage. Many foreign players were struggling. Lot of media hype about how some companies were not breaking even after five years. Then the madness about the estimate of the Indian middle-class being rubbish. Pleats didn’t want to have any of this. Their clothes were for kids, and very expensive. The Indian mother was not ready to spend Rs 700 for a little dress that a 3-month old would outgrow in a month...”Jeetun could not fault his arguments. Soon Arjun entered the IT industry, thanks to his tryst with BIT. But here too, he changed jobs thrice in five years... Once it was because his mother was falling ill too many times; staying in Hyderabad with her in Bhopal was not working. Arjun quit Tesystema in Hyderabad and moved to Informajor in Delhi as financial controller. Jeetun did not understand this move. Arjun explained, “Actually, I was planning to bring my mother to live with me but my wife hated Hyderabad and wanted to move to Mumbai — she is from Mumbai. So I decided to move to Delhi.”Jeetun: How did moving to Delhi help? Arjun: It did not, but at least we were not in Hyderabad, and I needed to work, and had to take what was reasonably good job content!Here was a guy with good academics and a confusing life story. But the wife angle confused Jeetun even more. “You would not have considered living away from the family?” Arjun did not approve. “I am not the sort who gets obsessed about work. I work to earn; it is a means for me. If it disrupts my peace of mind, I will recalibrate!”Jeetun: There are employers who will seek a longer term of relationship. Yes, we must consult family and factor in all discomforts. But once he joins, I think the employee needs to be fair to the employer, deliver the agreed period and so on...Later... Jeetun to Nakulaa: He does not seem to be a chap who tries hard. Or that he does not care about trying hard... nine changes in 21 years!Nakulaa: But if someone could find continuity of purpose in that change, I would find that understandable. I am not getting emotional about the changes... I think we share it openly with Morro and ask Vinayak what he thinks. This chap has something unique. Why does he want to leave his current job? Jeetun with ArjunArjun: I am the group FC — there are 5-6 companies: one in hospitality, one in cargo management, one in education, one in IT...Jeetun: And what are their revenues? Arjun: The hospitality business is new. A turnkey engineering company, they build hotels for a brand. This business is reporting Rs 675 crores. The cargo management does 295 to 350 crores — varies year to year, it is a high fluctuation business. The IT business does 270 crores...Jeetun: What is the nature of the IT business?Arjun faltered. “I am not too familiar with that but I guess mostly body shopping...”(Later, Jeetun told Rajam, “I have been hiring for the IT vertical far too long and I know who is doing what and who is capable of what. I know the businesses pretty well. It is not adding up.”) Jeetun to Arjun: “You know this is a tough business. Pardon my saying so, but this looks tricky. You say you are the FC... you would know something about the business even if you have been there just seven months. May be you want to tell me why you really want to leave?”Arjun: You are right. All is not right with this group. They hired me telling me that they were growing and they needed someone to manage the finances. The chap who hired me told me he was from IIM-A; I had no reason to doubt him. Jeetun: So what is not right about this place?Arjun: The cargo business; something is wrong there. I don’t have the nerve to probe; I want to quit fast.Jeetun: Your qualifications are covetable. It is not easy accomplishing this level of academic excellence. How could you not have known there was something shady here? It is written all over!Arjun: Well... They agreed to my terms, the remuneration was very good, the CEO who interviewed me was very professional. Later, when I examined the books, I began to realise that I was hired to help with concealing much more. Then, one day, the CEO sent me a note saying he was appalled to see that HR had undervalued me, and that my remuneration should have been 50 per cent more. I was perplexed, but I was fighting fires daily, I did not pay attention… Jeetun: And what alerted you? Arjun: Our banker told me at lunch one day, ‘Surely you know, every banker knows your assets have to be discounted by 65 per cent...’Jeetun: And this came as a surprise?Arjun: No no... I began to see how we were perceived. I began to see how I would be perceived... He was already seeing me as the mastermind... It was humiliating and scary. break-page-breakJeetun to Nakulaa and Rajam: I have put all the pieces together. Arjun does not ‘fit’. His acads are exemplary but his attitude is not working for me. Next, he has mostly controlled finances, but he has not been responsible for funds. “The unfortunate part of the MNC-isation of India is that every CA ranker ends up going to an MNC. At an MNC you are just being controlling finances, managing budgets, watching where money goes, where it should not be allowed to go. MNCs in India do not have to raise funds. No bank relationships, managing investors, etc., because budget is assigned and thereafter it is more about running a budget! “Yes, there is P&L and cash flow management — how to issue dividends, how to expatriate funds without real outflow, there is financial strategy like reducing excise duty, managing slow-moving inventory... But in a publicly listed Indian firm, there is raising funds, IPOs, investor relation skills, etc. Morro is operating internationally in Latin America, Turkey, Romania; so they need someone with Indian company experience, who has been a CFO than an FC!“I think Arjun has made a lot of poor judgements in his career and such a person cannot make a good leader. A CFO position is more about leadership and less about how much functional excellence you have attained. Sometimes, when your skills as a leader show poorly, the academics cease to matter. All the finance skills you can get done from people below you; but what you cannot delegate is your leadership. And this is why Sudarshan fits best! And leadership is about how well you judge people, how well you judge circumstances, how well you make decisions, problem solving... I didn’t see any of this in Arjun.”And as Jeetun thought, Morro was a company for the long haul, they wanted continuity especially since Morro was expanding in a big way in the next four years. Personality-wise they would not take kindly to a chap with Teflon coated soles. Yes, they were looking for a mature person, with 20 years in the function, and Arjun had 20 years. But it was not the kind of 20 years that Vinayak would find appealing. Vinayak’s CFO had to have skills that went beyond controlling finances to raising finance, managing fund flow, parking surpluses, etc. Vinayak Morro was worse than his father Vittal Morro, who was such a stickler for precision that he had once even driven Rajam to tears. Jeetun to Rajam and Nakulaa: Vinayak had said his CFO must know how to meet shareholder expectation on financial gearing and that would not be possible if he has not gone beyond financial controllership. All that requires a kind of mentality which has to be unrestrained by the ordinariness of life, whose life reveals a sturdy, steady outlook, definitely not one who would say he left a job because his wife did not like the city.Nakulaa: That is very male. You do not know what the real truth is.Jeetun: The truth for me is what he tells me. For that is what I will use to decide for my client. If you tell me there is more to it but I cannot tell you, then that does not exist for me. Please understand I am not forming an emotional relationship with the candidate... Nakulaa: But you must... candidates do not reveal the truth at times and the real personality hides in that truth. Jeetun: I am sorry but this new wave method of hiring does not wash with me. This is a clinical situation: client needs candidate, candidate comes with a personality. A client hires a personality finally, not his certificates or baggage. We all have a personal life and it comes with challenges, but those are not up for trading. They cannot become your stock-in-trade. What you get evaluated and compensated for is your intrinsic worth and your personality that fits the job. Rajam: What is your analysis of this chap?Jeetun: Simple. If his first two jobs were just testing the waters, then the third is typically where he needed to have pitched his flag and set up home. Maybe there are people like that... who drift and are unsure and are not very particular about the career bit but give first place to family. Very nice. But I know my client and I know what will work best for him and I can say with conviction that Arjun Setalvad does not fit the bill.Jeetun picked up Sudarshan Krishnan’s CV and slapped it on Rajam’s sticky board. “That’s your guy. We must tell Arjun we are sorry....”Krishnan was a fellow who had worked in two (sister) companies in a 20-year career life. Both companies, 10 years each almost. In the first he had worked across three of their locations in the same function, which made him a very interesting candidate. He had gone through their leadership programme, and that was terrific because it seemed to make up for everything else. Jeetun liked the fellow despite the fact that he did not have a listed company experience. Nakulaa: His academics are terrible. Not a patch on Arjun. Is a management accountant, but not a Company Secretary. Took four turns to pass his CA exams...Jeetun: That does not mean a thing! Isn’t it greater that his organisation kept him for 10 years? Clearly he meant a lot to them!Arjun had problems with “job content” or “boss” or “company culture”. Yes, Nakulaa was right, he was a restless soul. “But I am not in the business of counselling!” said Jeetun. “So either he had not developed a sense of figuring out these important factors when evaluating his next organisation, or he was unable to make the adjustment in each new organisation.”Rajam wondered about both candidates. “Is there anything about their personalities that tells us which one is a better candidate?”Classroom DiscussionDo we track the trail we leave behind to see the character sketch it makes? What does our trail say about us?casestudymeera(at)gmail(dot)comNow, discuss case studies on Facebook(This story was published in Businessworld Issue Dated 17-12-2012)
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Let us steer clear of coffee makers who define their customers only as the people who pay for their coffee and the rest of the world as non-entities. If I was a coffee brand and I was sure that the quality of my coffee deteriorates after seven days, I will make sure that the coffee which is not as good as I want my brand to be is not made available to anyone. It is bad marketing. It is bad marketing as I am asking my customers to challenge me and ask me if they are getting ‘just about seven days' experience' each time they do not like the coffee. I am generating mistrust while assuming that I am trying to say to the customer I value you. It is definitely not social responsibility. Now let us talk about corporate social responsibility (CSR). One, social responsibility cannot exist in a vacuum. It has to be seen in a value framework that determines the way the organisation works. If the organisation believes in the environment and audits its processes for their impact on the environment and then funds a project which protects the environment, it is an example of corporate social responsibility. If the organisation pollutes and has a high carbon footprint and then funds a project on environment, it is not responsibility. It is a ritualistic undoing of guilt. CSR runs parallel with integrity. An organisation that does not pursue integrity in letter and spirit cannot definitely be socially responsible. If the organisation supports corrupt practices to save taxes, and then tries to run a school for street children, does it really understand how the corrupt practices are leading to decreased access to development in the country? And how these corrupt practices in turn are the cause of the child being on the street in the first instance? CSR is not charity; it is a duty. Each corporate has an opportunity to make profit in a discriminatory world. The discrimination and lack of equal opportunity may not be due to the actions of the corporate house. It is definitely due to the actions of many of its vendors and customers. It is, therefore, the duty of the corporate to decrease the impact of discrimination and lack of equal opportunity in the context that the organisation works in. It can do that through many of its practices and not just by sharing a minuscule part of its profits. It can be inclusive in its recruitment. It can be fair in its trading. It can be honest in planning its taxation. It can be much more diverse. It can support the work-life balance of its employees. It can provide good insurance cover to people for lean periods in business. It can insist on best labour practices when it outsources contractual services. All this makes the society an enabling environment. And all this is CSR. The organisation can also set aside some of its profits to support the development of the community it serves in a strategic manner. But the organisation has to be predictable and consistent when it does this. The CSR efforts cannot be linked to marketing the brand through surrogate advertising such as in case of a brand, which sells alcohol and supports health clinics in Haryana. It cannot be water harvesting projects that the organisation runs across the country, while it is fighting legal battles about depleting water resources in the country. It cannot be tokenistic vocational training in SEZ areas to create employment for young people when the land in the area has been bought at a very cheap price. All these methods lack respect for dignity and lack integrity. These cannot be seen as social responsibility.CSR is definitely not a branding exercise. It is not comparative. There is no ranking of who is more responsible and who is not. Besides, the customer is very unlikely to make decisions based on the CSR efforts that an organisation undertakes. There are various other ways of distinguishing one's brand. Those who try to sustain social responsibility by linking it to branding are just people who have not realised the importance of working in an environment that is enabling rather than working in an environment that is discriminatory and a barrier. We talk of liberalisation as a reform that all of us are still waiting for. In my opinion, conceptualisation of CSR as a duty is the paradigm shift, which will transform communities. Organisations that recognise this and follow this will be able to work within value-based frameworks and be the real leaders. So, Om and Shabad, let us not accidentally discover the lack of CSR as we drink our coffee. Let us audit ourselves and ask ourselves if we are really responsible and actually have the will to shoulder any CSR. As otherwise, these efforts just don't make any sense.Dr Achal Bhagat is a consultant psychiatrist and psychotherapist at Apollo Hospital, Delhi. He is also the founder director of Saarthak, a mental health NGO. var intro = jQuery.trim(jQuery('#commenth4').text()) var page = jQuery.trim(jQuery('#storyPage').text()) if (page.indexOf(intro) < 0) { jQuery('#commenth4').attr('style', 'display:block;') } (This story was published in Businessworld Issue Dated 05-10-2009)
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Economist Milton Friedman wrote in 1970 that a corporation's sole moral responsibility was to increase shareholder's profits. But that paradigm is changing fast. In today's transparent world, a corporation's moral responsibility is delivering total shareholder value, which is more than just delivering profits of today and tomorrow. Companies must also deliver to their shareholders the rewards of affiliation with an entity that values good reputation, ethical code of conduct, builds human potential and acts responsibly towards its stakeholders. Research has shown that companies, which cherish sustainability and act with broader perspective, deliver better returns. Closer home, Tata is a great example where equity, built by sustained CSR and nation-building, has helped the group immensely with consumer and investor support.Coming to the Bx story, it seems to be a case of shotgun approach to brand building and CSR. With the influence of corporates, they do need to adopt the principle of Triple P bottom line — profits, planet and people. But they must address them distinctively. Within Triple P, a corporation's first (but not sole) objective is to deliver profit in the right way. If that fails, all other ulterior goals are unachievable as the corporation is not sustainable. Bx was presumably doing well by delivering on its core proposition of unsurpassed freshness in its coffee experience. But then Bx seems to have been seduced by powerful insights in evolving societal and consumer expectations from corporations. Reportedly, 40 per cent US consumers patronise products from companies with strong moral and political values. Increasingly, investor community and specialist funds are taking CSR into consideration.While responding to such societal expectations is correct, it should be done in a meaningful and an integrated way, not in a throw-away fashion as Bx seems to be doing. Bx product brand's core promise of product freshness has been crudely linked to ‘doing good' by Bx, risking its product brand image and Bx corporate image. The sugar sachet story can possibly be explained by a scenario like this: "You get the freshest coffee because we don't use coffee after seven days — a great reason for superior freshness, claims the marketer justifiably. Then a CSR-biased corporate honcho says, "The public would think that we are wasting unused coffee and tarnish us as not green. Not ok." So, they work out a clever idea of doing good by donating unused stuff to charity, imagining coffee to be a great human necessity! Some people call this greenwash. First, the audiences of product brand and CSR are often different, although they might be some convergence. Products are distinctly for users and company must remain focused on delivering value in their experience. CSR is normally for stakeholders. So, the company must be equally sharp in delivering value to CSR target audience, which should be a relevant payoff. It may have little to do with the company's product or service offers. If it is naturally linked with company's activities, it could be a win-win situation. In fact, linkage is desirable because it makes CSR sustainable. But where there is force fit, the failure could happen. The Bx marketer is trying to create a halo effect of good cause and runs the risk of triviality and subsequent rejection by both audiences. Reading the sugar message might give several loyal customers angst about the company's naivety or false sense of doing good. My suggestion to marketers is do not play with consumer's emotions or exploit the sensibilities of a plain coffee drinking customer! Surely the company could do something more meaningful. Also, my advice would be to avoid mixing unrelated issues in targeted marketing communications as it runs the risk of diffused messaging or even dissonance. There are great win-win examples such as Cadbury's support of cocoa farmers and claiming fair-trade endorsement. If not, just support a good cause through cash, material or organisation resource.What I like in the Bx story is their declaration of CSR intent. One of the risks in CSR is its being volatile with profits. However, if you openly declare commitment to a cause, it will reap long-term benefits for the company. I would like to close with a recent case of changing expectations of society. With Iraq now open for oil exploration by foreign investors, a Chinese Oil company was surprised when local population objected to extracting crude from ‘their land' without them benefiting. Although perfectly legitimate, this new MNC may not have realised that paradigm of ownership is shifting from legal ownership to sustained mutual benefits and value sharing with the society. In a world of $100 per barrel, it is not difficult to understand the anguish and reaction of an impoverished society feeling exploited by a foreign company. The tension between legal and moral correctness can often be resolved by sharing the prosperity with the society where companies generate wealth for their shareholders.Naveen Kshatriya is vice-president Asia & Pacific, and regional head of BP Castrol Lubricants, based in Singapore. var intro = jQuery.trim(jQuery('#commenth4').text()) var page = jQuery.trim(jQuery('#storyPage').text()) if (page.indexOf(intro) < 0) { jQuery('#commenth4').attr('style', 'display:block;') } (This story was published in Businessworld Issue Dated 05-10-2009)
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