Sanskar – an unmistakable part of every Indian family is a strong and potent force in shaping the personality of an individual. There is no synonym of the word in English, it can be explained as a mix of values, culture, tradition and belief – something that you inherit with your genes and imbibe on as you grow. It is this sanskar that distinguishes a person – positive or negative as the case may be. From family to society to business that flourish in the society– as the cycle goes the sanskar remains an indelible mark of being your own self. Thus what distinguishes Indian companies with their counterpart is their personality shaped with a culture that respects traditions and is bound by belief to create value.
While going through Peter Cappelli’s The Indian Way what struck me was what people looking from outside notice and analyse while we who are part and parcel of a path-breaking phenomena simply live it without appreciating the enormity of it – just like the deer enchanted with the fragrance that actually emanates from its navel. Indian organizations thrive on a culture (or perish, as the case may be) that they build. Given the nature of GenY Indian business class, whose balance sheet weighs heavily on how its human capital performs, people centricity but naturally becomes the core. And, if its about people, it has to be about culture and tradition and belief and values – the sanskar that an organization gives its employees.
My initiation into the world of management was late, having born in a Red environ fraught with conflict between the workforce and management. Management back then was a bad word almost an abuse, symbolic of all the differences between the men sitting in revolving chairs behind glass doors and the sweat smeared workers toiling in furnace like factories. The glass doors too were smoked, not transparent. The divide -pronounced and distinct. There existed two different sets of people within most organizations. Hands were dispensable as they were in abundance and therefore belonged to lower strata. The class struggle was thus the order of the day. And many thrived in keeping the struggle alive. A divided house could hardly give a sanskar worth its name to its people, especially when it looked on them as mere tools.
But it was a different economy altogether, a different era. In this era of knowledge economy people being the core can no longer be made to toil in indescript quarters. They are the fuel organizations run on. The cabins could no more be cut off, nor remain smoked– maybe the modern day transparent glass buildings are symbolic of the clichéd ‘paradigm shift’ in the way businesses are conducted. With people seen as one, all working for the same goal – of creating shared value – a family is born and its sanskar incepted.
Taking liberty to quote the answer that a NASA truck driver reportedly gave when asked of his work “I am helping to put the man on moon”, it’s the significance of the role each individual plays – and his realization of it – that makes an organization thrive. Indians used to the concept of joint families and shared resources are easily able to extend the same to their businesses. With the entire workforce - top to bottom- seen as one people one family organizations step into a different realm – of managing varied aspirations, personalities and priorities. Unless these diversities are made to unite under one umbrella the walk on the growth path was fraught with stumbling blocks. And, what better way to bind these distinct people than a common culture, a shared belief and a shareholder and co-creator of value.
When the CXOs to the grass root employees of the organization are bound with a common goal and see value in their delivery, there emerges a strong bonding. When the Chief Editor and Chief Executive Officer of a start up News Broadcast organization sit cross-legged on the floor at a work in progress studio along with the 200 odd team(all the recruits from across the country) , deciding on what to call the new venture, a different bonhomie is formed. The passion is contagious and the spirit to excel is felt in the air. This is what happened when the current numero uno English news channel in the country, Times Now was being born way back in 2006. At that instance in a rainy June day in monsoon drenched Mumbai, employees across the country built a new culture, a sanskar was given that made it stand tall among its peers.
Emotions have the strength to move mountains and cross the sea of fire barefoot. It is this emotional bonding that makes an organization succeed as an entity. Applying the same theory Subroto Bagchi, one of the more thinking minds in Indian IT spectrum, Gardener at MindTree and his collaborator, Vijay Govindarajan of Dartmouth's Tuck School of Business, concentrate on what they call "emotional infrastructure," an aggregate of the positive feelings employees have for their company and for one another. It is distinct from the physical and intellectual (skills and knowledge) as it is difficult to replicate. As, they put it, the emotional infrastructure – culture and values- of a company that makes it immortal and makes an organization stand apart. In 2009 on the basis of sociological research on groups, they came up with a paper titled The Emotionally Bonded Organization: Why Emotional Infrastructure Matters and How Leaders Can Build It The framework and ideas for this paper were developed based on in-depth studies of corporations such as Nucor, Deere, Hasbro, FedEx, MindTree Consulting, Southwest, Tata Motors, Lincoln Electric, eBay, General Electric, and McKinsey.
Back in September 2008 when most CEOs of Indian IT companies were busy ‘standing by’ their US based clients in the wake of Lehman Brothers collapse, Vinit Nayyar, CEO of HCL Technologies was busy speaking to his employees in Bangalore in an exclusive event that the company organizes as an interface at regular intervals. This was part of his effort to connect people across all levels to the collective vision.
His logic: it’s the employees who create value and keep the client coming back for more, therefore its Employee First. “The recession has sent us a signal: Size does not matter. Big companies are often slow, lethargic, and arrogant. If innovation has to drive us out of this recession, the best brains must come together to create value. That will happen only if we start believing in the power of Collaboration 2.0.”, says Vineet in his HBR blog in Sep 08. At the time of crisis when most companies were looking too be lean and cutting down the bench, this CEO found an opportune moment to build team moral by decreeing “no one left behind”. “As each of us renews our determination to achieve our goals within the downturn, what we see immediately ahead can best be described as a bend on the road. Most organizations are applying the brakes to navigate this bend, and I am sure there is merit in their reasons for doing so, keeping in mind their circumstances. However, for an aggressive company that is hungry for growth, there is opportunity beyond the bend and stepping on the accelerator at this time makes perfect business sense.” says Vineet in his scrapbook.
Further in an interview to a leading financial daily in the recession hit year he elaborates, “As any athlete might tell you, a bend on the race-track represents an opportunity—a chance to move ahead, to step up the speed and overtake those ahead. This is particularly true if you are a middle or long distance runner.” He saw opportunity in crisis, but he made sure he was not alone in his vision. All his team, the extended HCL Technologies family was made to be a part of this thought process. The result was the company did exceptionally well in the troubled times. When other ships sank, it did not only sail, it sailed better.
Further in an interview to a leading financial daily in the recession hit year he elaborates, “As any athlete might tell you, a bend on the race-track represents an opportunity—a chance to move ahead, to step up the speed and overtake those ahead. This is particularly true if you are a middle or long distance runner.” He saw opportunity in crisis, but he made sure he was not alone in his vision. All his team, the extended HCL Technologies family was made to be a part of this thought process. The result was the company did exceptionally well in the troubled times. When other ships sank, it did not only sail, it sailed better.
Talking of family bonding and sanskar is easy but the critical question is how to build it. Tools and processes, systems and procedures must be laid down and followed. But these are common to any organization. What is that special ingredient that will form a lasting impact, take people along to a shared vision? While narrating his experience of setting up MindTree, a distinctly placed technology company in the crowded IT spectrum in an interview to India Knowledge @ Wharton in 2007 Subroto Bagchi says “Process is not a substitute for building an emotionally rich organization. Process without emotion can quickly bring you down to the lowest common denominator. It is very important while dealing with human situations, dealing with customers, suppliers, investors and with our own people. We must balance process with empathy. We must build on process but be led with empathy.”
Building empathy and connecting a diverse range of people with a common thread is not a day’s work. A large part of it depends on the communication system that the organization puts in place. Another more critical aspect is leadership. A leader must be inspiring and accessible. While it’s the leadership that will set the sanskar, it’s the bottom up view of theirs that will sustain it. As Mahatma Gandhi, a leader unmatched in his out of box thinking once said, "I suppose leadership at one time meant muscles; but today it means getting along with people”, and if I may add, taking people along. Its more about eye level contact, making your people see eye to eye with the company vision. It also requires the strength of character, of being able to provide a leadership that has the personality of a being who can mix with the commonest of commons and yet stand apart.
A routine mail from CXO to every employee’s mailbox every now and then is not enough. It is important to make each one feel important and proud of his role. It is important to make sure even the routine work within the organization has a larger buy in. Employees must feel ‘insider’, privy to strategy decisions. There has to be trust and transparency. In a flat world having a hierarchical pyramid as far as approach and accessibility is concerned, is obsolete. Each voice needs to be valued, each query needs answers. Ahead of every “All Minds Meet”, the employees open forum at MindTree, Asok Soota, its CMD, would remind his leadership team that “no question is ever stupid, the answer you have for it might well be!”
Keeping employees engaged and connected is no longer the responsibility of HR alone, it is core to company’s strategy, vision and action. Newborn organizations, start ups, deal with the critical issue of building their own sanskar among people already entrenched in different cultures, carrying the baggage of their past connect. Those who come on board would both be excited and somewhat sceptical as well. But if from the very first step they assume the role of founding fathers, the sanskar takes shape on its own. There is no greater bonding than the feeling of giving birth to a new baby – a new future. Each aspiration gets aligned to a common goal seeing the baby stand up and run. The second generation by the time it comes on board sees a personality already shaped and seeped in. It is then the job of the founding fathers to include gen next as partners in future of the organization. Again, it’s the culture that gets to you before the first pay check at the end of the month.
An organization is what its employees are. For organizations that bear a dual personality, a different persona to the world outside and another face for those within, long term growth and sustenance would be a constant worry. It would not be able to foster in its family a camaraderie, unison of purpose. Most organizations do not do it consciously, no one would. But it still is the case with a large majority. The reason behind is lack of communication culture. Its communication, communication and communication alone that builds, strengthens and transports organization’s personality to all its constituents. Its culture, values, beliefs, traditions – all get metamorphosed in one unique sanskar that is imbibed by all who are part of it. But if this fails to reach the man at the end of the line, its lost its touch and renders the company incomplete.
Companies today invest more in their employees and set up infrastructure to keep them connected and in the know of things. Communication strategy that till the other day was more an after thought is today a key agenda in CXOs priority list. Indians talk, and talk a lot. We are known to chat up the strangers, reveal the deepest of personal secrets in the space of minutes in the moving compartment of a packed local train and be friends for life with whom we jump on the ferry each day. Its perhaps this openness that is reflective of Indian mindset. For others a personal tragedy might be something to be kept strictly outside office, but out here each one feels the need to share, console and be consoled. The same applies to organizational issues. A new venture, a line extension or even a change in the paint on the campus façade becomes an emotive issue. And, each would like to feel ‘consulted’, ‘informed’ and part of ‘decision making’. While in actual terms this might not be possible in letter, it must be done in spirit. This is where the communication culture of the organization figures high, for its how you communicate will decide how much buy in you get in your decisions.
Same size does not fit all but then its imperative that an effort is shown to have made to cut cloth according to each size. In knowledge industry the brains that bring fat revenues can also bring stagnation and loss of repute. In such instances sanskar of the company comes to rescue. It’s the collective spirit that steers the growth vehicle and keeps the organization steady even in rough weather. While we have learnt a lot from the west and still gape at the way some of the world leaders run their businesses, a culture, a sanskar of our own distinguishes India Inc. Its not only the sons of the soil that have come to respect the sanskar, but also those who set up houses here and want to reap harvest on this fertile soil have accepted building an organization culture distinct and indelible is what will decide how long you sustain and how far you go in the race.
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