Thursday, December 31, 2009
Monday, December 14, 2009
Friday, September 18, 2009
Leadership---- the Ramayana Way
Leadership begins where logic ends, it surely gets lonely out there, but you show the valor, walk the talk, and your teammates are sure to follow you.
When the Harvard Business Review (HBR) came out with a survey of 188 MNCs worldwide, in one of its recent editions, on personal capabilities that contribute in the making of a successful leader, I could not help but go back 12,000 years in time to the age of the Ramayana. You might find it rather queer; after all what connection could an article in HBR have with a mythological epic? Before I begin to put that in context, let me state what the aforementioned survey, conducted by Goldman, found.
It said that leaders by their very nature are of six types:
Coercive—meaning ones who compel team members to follow their decisions; authoritative—the ‘come with me’ type; affiliating—ones who work through close association; democratic—those who believe in building consensus; pace-setting—the ‘I will jump and you will follow’ type; and coaching—the ones who believe in mentoring.
The survey found out that with regards to the faculties that go towards making a successful leader, there are three primary ones: Technical skills, cognitive and analytical skills, and emotional intelligence (EI). In their interactions with hundreds of leaders worldwide, the surveyors found EI to be twice as important as the other two attributes. In fact, the importance of EI, which is an embodiment of motivation, empathy, and social skills, increases as one goes up the management chain. It is in this importance of EI that I recognize a similarity with Ramayana. And how!
In the mythical Ramayana, the battle leading to the climax was being played out. Would the exiled Rama edge out the evil Ravana, rescue his wife Sita whom the latter had abducted, and return home to reclaim kingship, or would he face defeat at the hands of Ravana’s massive army?
Rama’s motley group of men and monkeys were no match for the evil Ravana’s forces and weaponry. Or so thought Vibhishan, Ravana’s brother who had defected to Rama’s side. Unable to contain his concerns, he questioned Rama: How will you defeat this huge army with your limited resources? The reply that Rama gave stands out as a great lesson in leadership, more on the role and importance of EI as one can ever come across.
As a charioteer, he told Vibhishan who listened with rapt attention; you have to make sure you have a clear vision, and a cause worth fighting for. In the case of Ramayana, the cause was to rescue his beloved Sita and the vision was to defeat the evil forces.
Many prominent industry leaders today opine that you need not necessarily have a vision; rather, taking one step at a time could be a much more practical way of going about, but I think that unless you have a vision, you will never be able to follow a trajectory. In the words of the great Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, “The world steps aside to a person who knows where he or she is going.” In that parlance, unless you know where you are going, how will the world step aside and aid you in your pursuit?
Coming back to the battlefield of Ramayana, Rama narrated to Vibhishan, that the four wheels of the chariot are character, courage, ethics, and valor. Character is the most fundamental thing for a leader. As a leader, you must know who you are and what you stand for and communicate the same to your people through actions rather than words. It is essential for a leader to walk the talk; leadership doesn’t come from a business card, nor does respect. It is the ethics, the value system you embody that does the needful. Courage in this scenario would be the ability to take unpopular decisions, while valor is the courage to defend those very decisions. In the event of an unpopular decision, and such decisions are a part and parcel of a leader’s life since leadership begins where logic ends, it surely gets lonely out there, but you show the valor, walk the talk, and your teammates are sure to follow you.
Rama continued to enumerate what the horses drawing the chariot stood for. They are, he said with gusto, strength, energy, and passion. In a battle, you must have the strength to discriminate between the right and wrong, and the zeal and perseverance to keep working towards your goal.
The four reins of a horse, he went on to say, are forgiveness, compassion, consistency, and equanimity. It is essential to touch the hearts before you ask for the hand. Touching heart needs compassion and forgiveness. Consistency and equanimity are hallmark of character which creates trust with the followers.
The chariot’s wheels, the horses, and their reins are among the most important of a warrior’s (and therefore a leader’s) repertoire: The weaponry: knowledge, strategy, intelligence, skills, commitment, and a restraint of ego—these are the weapons that will help us win this mammoth battle, proclaimed Rama to his army and Vibhishan before leading them into the epic struggle. “Arm yourself with these and no war will be lost,” he told them. After a spirited battle, his army—the motley group of men and monkeys defeated the heavily equipped Ravana and his forces.
The way the Ramayana portrays the essential attributes of a leader is a revelation. Many of today’s thinkers analyze too much and thus lose the charm of simplicity. You need not analyze and complicate things; what the HBR and the statement of Rama in the Ramayana say are one and the same; that EI, an embodiment of all these things mentioned above, is what makes victory possible against any opposition.
You might wonder as to how one person can possess all these qualities. Well, one need not master all of them. No great leader has been exceptional in all of them. They, like each one of us, were strong in a few of the attributes mentioned above, which provided core strength to their leadership.
You need to be consistent in your approach to different people, no matter who they are and where they are coming from. Leadership calls for consistency, one of the reins of the horse, as the Ramayana so beautifully enumerates. Keep the words of the charioteer in mind and results are sure to follow. As leaders, you might be doing 200 things, from inspiring to coaching to strategizing but nothing will be accounted for if you don’t produce results. And the best way to produce results, my friends, is the ability to motivate yourself and inspire your team to achieve your goal. That’s what leadership, as well as the essence of Rama’s words, is all about.
When the Harvard Business Review (HBR) came out with a survey of 188 MNCs worldwide, in one of its recent editions, on personal capabilities that contribute in the making of a successful leader, I could not help but go back 12,000 years in time to the age of the Ramayana. You might find it rather queer; after all what connection could an article in HBR have with a mythological epic? Before I begin to put that in context, let me state what the aforementioned survey, conducted by Goldman, found.
It said that leaders by their very nature are of six types:
Coercive—meaning ones who compel team members to follow their decisions; authoritative—the ‘come with me’ type; affiliating—ones who work through close association; democratic—those who believe in building consensus; pace-setting—the ‘I will jump and you will follow’ type; and coaching—the ones who believe in mentoring.
The survey found out that with regards to the faculties that go towards making a successful leader, there are three primary ones: Technical skills, cognitive and analytical skills, and emotional intelligence (EI). In their interactions with hundreds of leaders worldwide, the surveyors found EI to be twice as important as the other two attributes. In fact, the importance of EI, which is an embodiment of motivation, empathy, and social skills, increases as one goes up the management chain. It is in this importance of EI that I recognize a similarity with Ramayana. And how!
In the mythical Ramayana, the battle leading to the climax was being played out. Would the exiled Rama edge out the evil Ravana, rescue his wife Sita whom the latter had abducted, and return home to reclaim kingship, or would he face defeat at the hands of Ravana’s massive army?
Rama’s motley group of men and monkeys were no match for the evil Ravana’s forces and weaponry. Or so thought Vibhishan, Ravana’s brother who had defected to Rama’s side. Unable to contain his concerns, he questioned Rama: How will you defeat this huge army with your limited resources? The reply that Rama gave stands out as a great lesson in leadership, more on the role and importance of EI as one can ever come across.
As a charioteer, he told Vibhishan who listened with rapt attention; you have to make sure you have a clear vision, and a cause worth fighting for. In the case of Ramayana, the cause was to rescue his beloved Sita and the vision was to defeat the evil forces.
Many prominent industry leaders today opine that you need not necessarily have a vision; rather, taking one step at a time could be a much more practical way of going about, but I think that unless you have a vision, you will never be able to follow a trajectory. In the words of the great Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, “The world steps aside to a person who knows where he or she is going.” In that parlance, unless you know where you are going, how will the world step aside and aid you in your pursuit?
Coming back to the battlefield of Ramayana, Rama narrated to Vibhishan, that the four wheels of the chariot are character, courage, ethics, and valor. Character is the most fundamental thing for a leader. As a leader, you must know who you are and what you stand for and communicate the same to your people through actions rather than words. It is essential for a leader to walk the talk; leadership doesn’t come from a business card, nor does respect. It is the ethics, the value system you embody that does the needful. Courage in this scenario would be the ability to take unpopular decisions, while valor is the courage to defend those very decisions. In the event of an unpopular decision, and such decisions are a part and parcel of a leader’s life since leadership begins where logic ends, it surely gets lonely out there, but you show the valor, walk the talk, and your teammates are sure to follow you.
Rama continued to enumerate what the horses drawing the chariot stood for. They are, he said with gusto, strength, energy, and passion. In a battle, you must have the strength to discriminate between the right and wrong, and the zeal and perseverance to keep working towards your goal.
The four reins of a horse, he went on to say, are forgiveness, compassion, consistency, and equanimity. It is essential to touch the hearts before you ask for the hand. Touching heart needs compassion and forgiveness. Consistency and equanimity are hallmark of character which creates trust with the followers.
The chariot’s wheels, the horses, and their reins are among the most important of a warrior’s (and therefore a leader’s) repertoire: The weaponry: knowledge, strategy, intelligence, skills, commitment, and a restraint of ego—these are the weapons that will help us win this mammoth battle, proclaimed Rama to his army and Vibhishan before leading them into the epic struggle. “Arm yourself with these and no war will be lost,” he told them. After a spirited battle, his army—the motley group of men and monkeys defeated the heavily equipped Ravana and his forces.
The way the Ramayana portrays the essential attributes of a leader is a revelation. Many of today’s thinkers analyze too much and thus lose the charm of simplicity. You need not analyze and complicate things; what the HBR and the statement of Rama in the Ramayana say are one and the same; that EI, an embodiment of all these things mentioned above, is what makes victory possible against any opposition.
You might wonder as to how one person can possess all these qualities. Well, one need not master all of them. No great leader has been exceptional in all of them. They, like each one of us, were strong in a few of the attributes mentioned above, which provided core strength to their leadership.
You need to be consistent in your approach to different people, no matter who they are and where they are coming from. Leadership calls for consistency, one of the reins of the horse, as the Ramayana so beautifully enumerates. Keep the words of the charioteer in mind and results are sure to follow. As leaders, you might be doing 200 things, from inspiring to coaching to strategizing but nothing will be accounted for if you don’t produce results. And the best way to produce results, my friends, is the ability to motivate yourself and inspire your team to achieve your goal. That’s what leadership, as well as the essence of Rama’s words, is all about.
Ramayana - Management Principles
Duty has the regular definition of a moral or legal obligation, a responsibility, or a task or action that someone is required to perform. However, in the context of the story of Ramayana, duty, or dharma, has a more specific interpretation. Dharma is a set of laws or principles carried out with the purpose of creating social and religious order in the society. In this story of Ramayana, many times this duty conflicts with other values or personal desires, forcing characters to compare the choices of following the dharma or fulfilling another human value. Within the context of the relationship between Rama and Sita in the story "The Ramayana of Valmiki", duty is worth the sacrificing of love, because his duty is fulfilled to maintain order within the society and above all, order is needed for a society to run well.
For example, teamwork is an important principle in management, and Rama applied the same in search of Sita and was successful in the mission. Another one is in an organisation one must be treated affectionately which Rama did when he met Guhan and Vibhishana. Management principles such as encouraging lower category of employees, rewards for good work, self-motivation, decision-making, recognition, market survey, market exploitation, time management and the art of communication are aligned with instances in the epic. The book is a valuable one, giving new interpretation to Ramayana.
One of the most obvious incidences, in which use management principles is very clearly visible is that of Hanuman going to Lanka. His mission was to locate Sita there and give her Lord Ram’s message. When it became clear that Sita was in Lanka, Jamvant asked Hanuman to go there. He helped him in realising his true potential and motivated him to go in the enemy’s camp. Once mentally prepared for the job and reached there, first thing which Hanuman did was to completely analyse the situation in Lanka. He did a complete study about the Lankans, assessing their strengths and weaknesses, the various threats and opportunities which he had in the enemy’s camp.
This is what management is all about
· Ascertaining the goals, or job to be done.
· Getting mentally prepared for it.
· Having a right plan.
· Analyzing the strengths and weaknesses of the competitor and what threats and opportunities are there in the business.
This SWOT [strength, weakness, opportunities and threats] analysis is one of the most important aspects of modern day management. Moreover Jamvant motivating Hanuman is a classic example of a good Manager helping his personnel to realise their potential and acting accordingly.
The other example which I would like to talk about here is that of good and bad managers. A good manager is the one, who can get his work done even from the rivals. In Ramayana Sughriv has shown some of the best managerial characteristics. As a successful manager he had Ram to work accordingly and got his kingdom back from a brother who was far mightier than him.
· A good example of getting into strategic alliance with others to achieve your desired goal.
Using his managerial skills he even had Angad to work for him. Angad was the son of his brother whom he got killed by Ram. Had Sughriv been a bad manager then the same Angad would have proved to be his arch nemesis.
In the same Ramayana, again and again Ravana has shown the signs of a bad manager, and hence led to the demise of his kingdom. From the starting itself he ignored the suggestions of his managers and got his kingdom in the state of war with Ram. Moreover during a crisis, a company needs its best of the managers to bail it out of the same. A good manager listens to what his subordinates has to say and tries to keep them together especially when the organization needs them the most. But Ravana’s mismanagement was responsible for Vibhishan [one of the wisest manager he should have listened to] leaving him amidst a crisis.
It is said that businesses are run on relations. A manager who can nurture good relations with the employees, clients and anyone in whose contact the organization and the manager comes in, can do wonders for his company. Lord Ram was very good at it. He was the master of nurturing relations. His prowess at it was so great that while Ravana was lying wounded in the battle field and was about to die, he shared some important lessons which he had learnt in his life. The same Ravana, who at the same time had not responded to Lakshman, when he was sent to seek Ravana’s wisdom by Ram, was more than happy in sharing his knowledge with Ram.
All these examples and many more like this, tells us a great deal about management. For a manager there is lot to learn from our epics. Not just Ramayana, but Gita, Mahabharat and others as well have a lot to offer as management lessons.
For example, teamwork is an important principle in management, and Rama applied the same in search of Sita and was successful in the mission. Another one is in an organisation one must be treated affectionately which Rama did when he met Guhan and Vibhishana. Management principles such as encouraging lower category of employees, rewards for good work, self-motivation, decision-making, recognition, market survey, market exploitation, time management and the art of communication are aligned with instances in the epic. The book is a valuable one, giving new interpretation to Ramayana.
One of the most obvious incidences, in which use management principles is very clearly visible is that of Hanuman going to Lanka. His mission was to locate Sita there and give her Lord Ram’s message. When it became clear that Sita was in Lanka, Jamvant asked Hanuman to go there. He helped him in realising his true potential and motivated him to go in the enemy’s camp. Once mentally prepared for the job and reached there, first thing which Hanuman did was to completely analyse the situation in Lanka. He did a complete study about the Lankans, assessing their strengths and weaknesses, the various threats and opportunities which he had in the enemy’s camp.
This is what management is all about
· Ascertaining the goals, or job to be done.
· Getting mentally prepared for it.
· Having a right plan.
· Analyzing the strengths and weaknesses of the competitor and what threats and opportunities are there in the business.
This SWOT [strength, weakness, opportunities and threats] analysis is one of the most important aspects of modern day management. Moreover Jamvant motivating Hanuman is a classic example of a good Manager helping his personnel to realise their potential and acting accordingly.
The other example which I would like to talk about here is that of good and bad managers. A good manager is the one, who can get his work done even from the rivals. In Ramayana Sughriv has shown some of the best managerial characteristics. As a successful manager he had Ram to work accordingly and got his kingdom back from a brother who was far mightier than him.
· A good example of getting into strategic alliance with others to achieve your desired goal.
Using his managerial skills he even had Angad to work for him. Angad was the son of his brother whom he got killed by Ram. Had Sughriv been a bad manager then the same Angad would have proved to be his arch nemesis.
In the same Ramayana, again and again Ravana has shown the signs of a bad manager, and hence led to the demise of his kingdom. From the starting itself he ignored the suggestions of his managers and got his kingdom in the state of war with Ram. Moreover during a crisis, a company needs its best of the managers to bail it out of the same. A good manager listens to what his subordinates has to say and tries to keep them together especially when the organization needs them the most. But Ravana’s mismanagement was responsible for Vibhishan [one of the wisest manager he should have listened to] leaving him amidst a crisis.
It is said that businesses are run on relations. A manager who can nurture good relations with the employees, clients and anyone in whose contact the organization and the manager comes in, can do wonders for his company. Lord Ram was very good at it. He was the master of nurturing relations. His prowess at it was so great that while Ravana was lying wounded in the battle field and was about to die, he shared some important lessons which he had learnt in his life. The same Ravana, who at the same time had not responded to Lakshman, when he was sent to seek Ravana’s wisdom by Ram, was more than happy in sharing his knowledge with Ram.
All these examples and many more like this, tells us a great deal about management. For a manager there is lot to learn from our epics. Not just Ramayana, but Gita, Mahabharat and others as well have a lot to offer as management lessons.
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
Gurukulams and Management
Most of the issues we observe at workplace and in general life ultimately translates to the lack of spirituality in our day to day life.
Did you ask these questions to yourself? - a) What is the meaning of your life? b) What do you want to do with your life? c) What motivates you to work? d) Are you able to differentiate personal life from work life? Our current system of education does not help us find the right answer to these questions.
Did you ask these questions to yourself? - a) What is the meaning of your life? b) What do you want to do with your life? c) What motivates you to work? d) Are you able to differentiate personal life from work life? Our current system of education does not help us find the right answer to these questions.
Today materialism is a great influence in our lives. Wealthy people are getting obsessed with accumulating more wealth in spite of knowing deep in their hearts that the wealth does not create happiness. The poor, are trying hard to become wealthy in spite of knowing that the wealth alone cannot create happiness. The race for materialism is depressing. Human consciousness and values has taken a back seat in this race. Our basic needs have expanded to owning posh villas, enjoying foreign food, costly designer clothing, hi-tech entertainment, pubs, clubs, etc.. Personal ambitions are around individual achievements, power and position. Social consciousness and values does not get into the list of personal ambitions.
With our current system of education, the possibilities of self discovery or self realization get severely limited. In our commercial world today, these qualities do not have any market value. You cannot make a living by being self-realized. Our education system does not give an insight into the nature and other worldly knowledge.
It is said that people who are more spiritually involved achieve better results in organizational performance. They are innovative and motivated. The time has come to encourage spirituality in workplace. It is time to reclaim India’s own spiritual heritage by returning to our arsha bharatha spiritual ancestry after reshaping it to suit the present situation.
In modern management professional and personal lives are considered two separate entities. Nowadays the “tough” and “aggressive” managers who order things to get done are looked upon as “good” managers! The competition and aspiration for a higher lifestyle eliminates any possibility of genuine compassion, ethics, social welfare and integrity in management.
During the period of Gurukulams(The Gurukulams is the place where the students resided together as equals, irrespective of their social standing. The students learn from the guru and also helps the guru in his day-to-day life, including the carrying out of chores such as washing clothes, cooking, etc.,) the gurus at schools were also spiritual teachers, taking responsibility for an overall development of a pupil. It was the guru-shishya relationship which moulds the pupil. The gurus were capable of guiding the pupil. Today management students go abroad and earn their MBA degree to manage basic human problems in India, without having any exposure to real life problems. The meaning of education has become to get a job and earn money. And if there are any serious students they get caught in the system that is not designed for them.
Wednesday, January 28, 2009
Time Management from Mahabharat
It is well known that the great battle of Mahabharat was the consequence of a long series of intrigues and conspiracies planned and abetted by the wicked prince Duryodhana, the eldest son of Dhritarashtra. Right from the very beginning, it had been a major (and the only) preoccupation of Duryodhana and his maternal uncle, Shakuni, to deprive the Pandav brothers of their legitimate rights. In order to achieve their goals, they were bent upon using any methods foul or fair. The duo did not let any opportunity slip by to eliminate Pandavas or at least to keep them away from the throne of Indraprastha.
One such occasion for hatching a conspiracy presented itself when the Pandavas were sent to Varnavrat festival. Unknown to them, Duryodhana and Shakuni had an apparently magnificent palace erected for the Pandavas. The grandeur of the palace impressed the Pandavas so much that they felt a very deep sense of gratitude towards their cousin Duryodhana who, in their view, took so much pain to make their stay at Varnavrat so comfortable.
However, Vidur, the uncle of the Pandavas and Kauravas, was not convinced that Duryodahana and Shakuni could be doing all this as a matter of affectionate hospitality. Vidur has always been admired - and rightly so - for his wisdom. He viewed and examined everything critically; more so where there was involvement of Duryodhana or Shakuni. He found out that the apparently grand palace was built of wax.
And why wax? Shakuni had worked out his scheme with meticulous planning. He had planned that the Pandavas would be invited to Varnavrat festival and lodged in this palace of wax, where they would be provided with generous hospitality. Their needs would be attended to with utmost care and politeness. In the process, they would develop an uncritical and affectionate attitude towards Duryodhana. Nothing would be done which might incite their suspicion. They would thus stay till the last day of the Varnavrat festival. Doing anything untoward during the days of the festival would create confusion and invite the ire of the general population who are joyfully participating in the festival.
Once the festival was over and the Pandavas were left alone in the palace, they would be requested as a matter of courtesy to stay on for a couple of days more. On the last night of their stay, the palace of wax would be put on fire. The unsuspecting Pandavas would be consumed by fire in their sleep. The world would know of the accident only to sympathise with Duryodhana rather despise him.
As indicated above, Vidur had anticipated some trouble, and could read through the wicked designs of Shakuni and Duryodhana. By the time he got to know the totality of the conspiracy, only one week was left. But he lost no time in arranging to do what the situation demanded. He sent for a very skilled Khanik (tunnel maker) and asked him to prepare a tunnel well before the night when the wax palace was to be put on fire. In the meantime, Vidur was able to send across his message to the Pandavas as well, indicating to them as to how they would escape from the palace without the knowledge of the men of Duryodhana, who were all around the palace on a constant vigil.
As pre-planned, the wax palace was put on fire and with the help of foresight of Vidur the tunnel was completed in time and all the Pandavas walked out of the palace, untouched by the evil designs of Duryodhana and Shakuni.
This is a crystal clear instance of how Time Management plays a vital role in achieving success along with meticulous planning. If these two are done, 90% of success is inevitable.
One such occasion for hatching a conspiracy presented itself when the Pandavas were sent to Varnavrat festival. Unknown to them, Duryodhana and Shakuni had an apparently magnificent palace erected for the Pandavas. The grandeur of the palace impressed the Pandavas so much that they felt a very deep sense of gratitude towards their cousin Duryodhana who, in their view, took so much pain to make their stay at Varnavrat so comfortable.
However, Vidur, the uncle of the Pandavas and Kauravas, was not convinced that Duryodahana and Shakuni could be doing all this as a matter of affectionate hospitality. Vidur has always been admired - and rightly so - for his wisdom. He viewed and examined everything critically; more so where there was involvement of Duryodhana or Shakuni. He found out that the apparently grand palace was built of wax.
And why wax? Shakuni had worked out his scheme with meticulous planning. He had planned that the Pandavas would be invited to Varnavrat festival and lodged in this palace of wax, where they would be provided with generous hospitality. Their needs would be attended to with utmost care and politeness. In the process, they would develop an uncritical and affectionate attitude towards Duryodhana. Nothing would be done which might incite their suspicion. They would thus stay till the last day of the Varnavrat festival. Doing anything untoward during the days of the festival would create confusion and invite the ire of the general population who are joyfully participating in the festival.
Once the festival was over and the Pandavas were left alone in the palace, they would be requested as a matter of courtesy to stay on for a couple of days more. On the last night of their stay, the palace of wax would be put on fire. The unsuspecting Pandavas would be consumed by fire in their sleep. The world would know of the accident only to sympathise with Duryodhana rather despise him.
As indicated above, Vidur had anticipated some trouble, and could read through the wicked designs of Shakuni and Duryodhana. By the time he got to know the totality of the conspiracy, only one week was left. But he lost no time in arranging to do what the situation demanded. He sent for a very skilled Khanik (tunnel maker) and asked him to prepare a tunnel well before the night when the wax palace was to be put on fire. In the meantime, Vidur was able to send across his message to the Pandavas as well, indicating to them as to how they would escape from the palace without the knowledge of the men of Duryodhana, who were all around the palace on a constant vigil.
As pre-planned, the wax palace was put on fire and with the help of foresight of Vidur the tunnel was completed in time and all the Pandavas walked out of the palace, untouched by the evil designs of Duryodhana and Shakuni.
This is a crystal clear instance of how Time Management plays a vital role in achieving success along with meticulous planning. If these two are done, 90% of success is inevitable.
Leading the Ramayana way
Leadership begins where logic ends, it surely gets lonely out there, but you show the valor, walk the talk, and your teammates are sure to follow you.
When the Harvard Business Review (HBR) came out with a survey of 188 MNCs worldwide, in one of its recent editions, on personal capabilities that contribute in the making of a successful leader, I could not help but go back 12,000 years in time to the age of the Ramayana. You might find it rather queer; after all what connection could an article in HBR have with a mythological epic? Before I begin to put that in context, let me state what the aforementioned survey, conducted by Goldman, found.
It said that leaders by their very nature are of six types:
Coercive—meaning ones who compel team members to follow their decisions; authoritative—the ‘come with me’ type; affiliating—ones who work through close association; democratic—those who believe in building consensus; pace-setting—the ‘I will jump and you will follow’ type; and coaching—the ones who believe in mentoring.
The survey found out that with regards to the faculties that go towards making a successful leader, there are three primary ones: Technical skills, cognitive and analytical skills, and emotional intelligence (EI). In their interactions with hundreds of leaders worldwide, the surveyors found EI to be twice as important as the other two attributes. In fact, the importance of EI, which is an embodiment of motivation, empathy, and social skills, increases as one goes up the management chain. It is in this importance of EI that I recognize a similarity with Ramayana. And how!
In the Ramayana, the battle leading to the climax was being played out. Would the exiled Rama edge out the evil Ravana, rescue his wife Sita whom the latter had abducted, and return home to reclaim kingship, or would he face defeat at the hands of Ravana’s massive army?
Rama’s motley group of men and monkeys were no match for the evil Ravana’s forces and weaponry. Or so thought Vibhishan, Ravana’s brother who had defected to Rama’s side. Unable to contain his concerns, he questioned Rama: How will you defeat this huge army with your limited resources? The reply that Rama gave stands out as a great lesson in leadership, more on the role and importance of EI as one can ever come across.
As a charioteer, he told Vibhishan who listened with rapt attention; you have to make sure you have a clear vision, and a cause worth fighting for. In the case of Ramayana, the cause was to rescue his beloved Sita and the vision was to defeat the evil forces.
Many prominent industry leaders today opine that you need not necessarily have a vision; rather, taking one step at a time could be a much more practical way of going about, but I think that unless you have a vision, you will never be able to follow a trajectory. In the words of the great Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, “The world steps aside to a person who knows where he or she is going.” In that parlance, unless you know where you are going, how will the world step aside and aid you in your pursuit?
Coming back to the battlefield of Ramayana, Rama narrated to Vibhishan, that the four wheels of the chariot are character, courage, ethics, and valor. Character is the most fundamental thing for a leader. As a leader, you must know who you are and what you stand for and communicate the same to your people through actions rather than words. It is essential for a leader to walk the talk; leadership doesn’t come from a business card, nor does respect. It is the ethics, the value system you embody that does the needful. Courage in this scenario would be the ability to take unpopular decisions, while valor is the courage to defend those very decisions. In the event of an unpopular decision, and such decisions are a part and parcel of a leader’s life since leadership begins where logic ends, it surely gets lonely out there, but you show the valor, walk the talk, and your teammates are sure to follow you.
Rama continued to enumerate what the horses drawing the chariot stood for. They are, he said with gusto, strength, energy, and passion. In a battle, you must have the strength to discriminate between the right and wrong, and the zeal and perseverance to keep working towards your goal.
The four reins of a horse, he went on to say, are forgiveness, compassion, consistency, and equanimity. It is essential to touch the hearts before you ask for the hand. Touching heart needs compassion and forgiveness. Consistency and equanimity are hallmark of character which creates trust with the followers.
The chariot’s wheels, the horses, and their reins are among the most important of a warrior’s (and therefore a leader’s) repertoire: The weaponry: knowledge, strategy, intelligence, skills, commitment, and a restraint of ego—these are the weapons that will help us win this mammoth battle, proclaimed Rama to his army and Vibhishan before leading them into the epic struggle. “Arm yourself with these and no war will be lost,” he told them. After a spirited battle, his army—the motley group of men and monkeys defeated the heavily equipped Ravana and his forces.
The way the Ramayana portrays the essential attributes of a leader is a revelation. Many of today’s thinkers analyze too much and thus lose the charm of simplicity. You need not analyze and complicate things; what the HBR and the statement of Rama in the Ramayana say are one and the same; that EI, an embodiment of all these things mentioned above, is what makes victory possible against any opposition.
You might wonder as to how one person can possess all these qualities. Well, one need not master all of them. No great leader has been exceptional in all of them. They, like each one of us, were strong in a few of the attributes mentioned above, which provided core strength to their leadership.
You need to be consistent in your approach to different people, no matter who they are and where they are coming from. Leadership calls for consistency, one of the reins of the horse, as the Ramayana so beautifully enumerates. Keep the words of the charioteer in mind and results are sure to follow. As leaders, you might be doing 200 things, from inspiring to coaching to strategizing but nothing will be accounted for if you don’t produce results. And the best way to produce results, my friends, is the ability to motivate yourself and inspire your team to achieve your goal. That’s what leadership, as well as the essence of Rama’s words, is all about.
When the Harvard Business Review (HBR) came out with a survey of 188 MNCs worldwide, in one of its recent editions, on personal capabilities that contribute in the making of a successful leader, I could not help but go back 12,000 years in time to the age of the Ramayana. You might find it rather queer; after all what connection could an article in HBR have with a mythological epic? Before I begin to put that in context, let me state what the aforementioned survey, conducted by Goldman, found.
It said that leaders by their very nature are of six types:
Coercive—meaning ones who compel team members to follow their decisions; authoritative—the ‘come with me’ type; affiliating—ones who work through close association; democratic—those who believe in building consensus; pace-setting—the ‘I will jump and you will follow’ type; and coaching—the ones who believe in mentoring.
The survey found out that with regards to the faculties that go towards making a successful leader, there are three primary ones: Technical skills, cognitive and analytical skills, and emotional intelligence (EI). In their interactions with hundreds of leaders worldwide, the surveyors found EI to be twice as important as the other two attributes. In fact, the importance of EI, which is an embodiment of motivation, empathy, and social skills, increases as one goes up the management chain. It is in this importance of EI that I recognize a similarity with Ramayana. And how!
In the Ramayana, the battle leading to the climax was being played out. Would the exiled Rama edge out the evil Ravana, rescue his wife Sita whom the latter had abducted, and return home to reclaim kingship, or would he face defeat at the hands of Ravana’s massive army?
Rama’s motley group of men and monkeys were no match for the evil Ravana’s forces and weaponry. Or so thought Vibhishan, Ravana’s brother who had defected to Rama’s side. Unable to contain his concerns, he questioned Rama: How will you defeat this huge army with your limited resources? The reply that Rama gave stands out as a great lesson in leadership, more on the role and importance of EI as one can ever come across.
As a charioteer, he told Vibhishan who listened with rapt attention; you have to make sure you have a clear vision, and a cause worth fighting for. In the case of Ramayana, the cause was to rescue his beloved Sita and the vision was to defeat the evil forces.
Many prominent industry leaders today opine that you need not necessarily have a vision; rather, taking one step at a time could be a much more practical way of going about, but I think that unless you have a vision, you will never be able to follow a trajectory. In the words of the great Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, “The world steps aside to a person who knows where he or she is going.” In that parlance, unless you know where you are going, how will the world step aside and aid you in your pursuit?
Coming back to the battlefield of Ramayana, Rama narrated to Vibhishan, that the four wheels of the chariot are character, courage, ethics, and valor. Character is the most fundamental thing for a leader. As a leader, you must know who you are and what you stand for and communicate the same to your people through actions rather than words. It is essential for a leader to walk the talk; leadership doesn’t come from a business card, nor does respect. It is the ethics, the value system you embody that does the needful. Courage in this scenario would be the ability to take unpopular decisions, while valor is the courage to defend those very decisions. In the event of an unpopular decision, and such decisions are a part and parcel of a leader’s life since leadership begins where logic ends, it surely gets lonely out there, but you show the valor, walk the talk, and your teammates are sure to follow you.
Rama continued to enumerate what the horses drawing the chariot stood for. They are, he said with gusto, strength, energy, and passion. In a battle, you must have the strength to discriminate between the right and wrong, and the zeal and perseverance to keep working towards your goal.
The four reins of a horse, he went on to say, are forgiveness, compassion, consistency, and equanimity. It is essential to touch the hearts before you ask for the hand. Touching heart needs compassion and forgiveness. Consistency and equanimity are hallmark of character which creates trust with the followers.
The chariot’s wheels, the horses, and their reins are among the most important of a warrior’s (and therefore a leader’s) repertoire: The weaponry: knowledge, strategy, intelligence, skills, commitment, and a restraint of ego—these are the weapons that will help us win this mammoth battle, proclaimed Rama to his army and Vibhishan before leading them into the epic struggle. “Arm yourself with these and no war will be lost,” he told them. After a spirited battle, his army—the motley group of men and monkeys defeated the heavily equipped Ravana and his forces.
The way the Ramayana portrays the essential attributes of a leader is a revelation. Many of today’s thinkers analyze too much and thus lose the charm of simplicity. You need not analyze and complicate things; what the HBR and the statement of Rama in the Ramayana say are one and the same; that EI, an embodiment of all these things mentioned above, is what makes victory possible against any opposition.
You might wonder as to how one person can possess all these qualities. Well, one need not master all of them. No great leader has been exceptional in all of them. They, like each one of us, were strong in a few of the attributes mentioned above, which provided core strength to their leadership.
You need to be consistent in your approach to different people, no matter who they are and where they are coming from. Leadership calls for consistency, one of the reins of the horse, as the Ramayana so beautifully enumerates. Keep the words of the charioteer in mind and results are sure to follow. As leaders, you might be doing 200 things, from inspiring to coaching to strategizing but nothing will be accounted for if you don’t produce results. And the best way to produce results, my friends, is the ability to motivate yourself and inspire your team to achieve your goal. That’s what leadership, as well as the essence of Rama’s words, is all about.
Management and Ramayana
Management of any type, whether in business or some other human activity, in simplest of words is the act of bringing people together to work for achieving the desired goal. Broadly speaking management is defined by five functions
· Planning
· Organizing
· Leading
· Controlling
· Coordinating
There are number of books, journals, articles etc are available, which talks about various management theories. They explain management not only as a science but also as an art. Numerous research papers and case studies provide us real life experiences and examples of using these management theories in building an organization. But way before the modern day management gurus gave their theories, principles and concepts of management the great writers like Tulsidas, Valmiki etc had explained them in the ancient Hindu epics.
If one studies these mythological books, then one can easily make out about the various management lessons which are taught in them. Every incidence teaches us a new lesson and in itself is a classic example of putting management at its best use and getting the work done.
Examples from Ramayana
One of the most obvious incidences, in which use management principles is very clearly visible is that of Hanuman going to Lanka. His mission was to locate Sita there and give her Lord Ram’s message. When it became clear that Sita was in Lanka, Jamvant asked Hanuman to go there. He helped him in realising his true potential and motivated him to go in the enemy’s camp. Once mentally prepared for the job and reached there, first thing which Hanuman did was to completely analyse the situation in Lanka. He did a complete study about the Lankans, assessing their strengths and weaknesses, the various threats and opportunities which he had in the enemy’s camp.
This is what management is all about
· Ascertaining the goals, or job to be done.
· Getting mentally prepared for it.
· Having a right plan.
· Analyzing the strengths and weaknesses of the competitor and what threats and opportunities are there in the business.
This SWOT [strength, weakness, opportunities and threats] analysis is one of the most important aspects of modern day management. Moreover Jamvant motivating Hanuman is a classic example of a good Manager helping his personnel to realise their potential and acting accordingly.
The other example which I would like to talk about here is that of good and bad managers. A good manager is the one, who can get his work done even from the rivals. In Ramayana Sughriv has shown some of the best managerial characteristics. As a successful manager he had Ram to work accordingly and got his kingdom back from a brother who was far mightier than him.
· A good example of getting into strategic alliance with others to achieve your desired goal.
Using his managerial skills he even had Angad to work for him. Angad was the son of his brother whom he got killed by Ram. Had Sughriv been a bad manager then the same Angad would have proved to be his arch nemesis.
In the same Ramayana, again and again Ravana has shown the signs of a bad manager, and hence led to the demise of his kingdom. From the starting itself he ignored the suggestions of his managers and got his kingdom in the state of war with Ram. Moreover during a crisis, a company needs its best of the managers to bail it out of the same. A good manager listens to what his subordinates has to say and tries to keep them together especially when the organization needs them the most. But Ravana’s mismanagement was responsible for Vibhishan [one of the wisest manager he should have listened to] leaving him amidst a crisis.
It is said that businesses are run on relations. A manager who can nurture good relations with the employees, clients and anyone in whose contact the organization and the manager comes in, can do wonders for his company. Lord Ram was very good at it. He was the master of nurturing relations. His prowess at it was so great that while Ravana was lying wounded in the battle field and was about to die, he shared some important lessons which he had learnt in his life. The same Ravana, who at the same time had not responded to Lakshman, when he was sent to seek Ravana’s wisdom by Ram, was more than happy in sharing his knowledge with Ram.
All these examples and many more like this, tells us a great deal about management. For a manager there is lot to learn from our epics. Not just Ramayana, but Gita, Mahabharat and others as well have a lot to offer as management lessons.
· Planning
· Organizing
· Leading
· Controlling
· Coordinating
There are number of books, journals, articles etc are available, which talks about various management theories. They explain management not only as a science but also as an art. Numerous research papers and case studies provide us real life experiences and examples of using these management theories in building an organization. But way before the modern day management gurus gave their theories, principles and concepts of management the great writers like Tulsidas, Valmiki etc had explained them in the ancient Hindu epics.
If one studies these mythological books, then one can easily make out about the various management lessons which are taught in them. Every incidence teaches us a new lesson and in itself is a classic example of putting management at its best use and getting the work done.
Examples from Ramayana
One of the most obvious incidences, in which use management principles is very clearly visible is that of Hanuman going to Lanka. His mission was to locate Sita there and give her Lord Ram’s message. When it became clear that Sita was in Lanka, Jamvant asked Hanuman to go there. He helped him in realising his true potential and motivated him to go in the enemy’s camp. Once mentally prepared for the job and reached there, first thing which Hanuman did was to completely analyse the situation in Lanka. He did a complete study about the Lankans, assessing their strengths and weaknesses, the various threats and opportunities which he had in the enemy’s camp.
This is what management is all about
· Ascertaining the goals, or job to be done.
· Getting mentally prepared for it.
· Having a right plan.
· Analyzing the strengths and weaknesses of the competitor and what threats and opportunities are there in the business.
This SWOT [strength, weakness, opportunities and threats] analysis is one of the most important aspects of modern day management. Moreover Jamvant motivating Hanuman is a classic example of a good Manager helping his personnel to realise their potential and acting accordingly.
The other example which I would like to talk about here is that of good and bad managers. A good manager is the one, who can get his work done even from the rivals. In Ramayana Sughriv has shown some of the best managerial characteristics. As a successful manager he had Ram to work accordingly and got his kingdom back from a brother who was far mightier than him.
· A good example of getting into strategic alliance with others to achieve your desired goal.
Using his managerial skills he even had Angad to work for him. Angad was the son of his brother whom he got killed by Ram. Had Sughriv been a bad manager then the same Angad would have proved to be his arch nemesis.
In the same Ramayana, again and again Ravana has shown the signs of a bad manager, and hence led to the demise of his kingdom. From the starting itself he ignored the suggestions of his managers and got his kingdom in the state of war with Ram. Moreover during a crisis, a company needs its best of the managers to bail it out of the same. A good manager listens to what his subordinates has to say and tries to keep them together especially when the organization needs them the most. But Ravana’s mismanagement was responsible for Vibhishan [one of the wisest manager he should have listened to] leaving him amidst a crisis.
It is said that businesses are run on relations. A manager who can nurture good relations with the employees, clients and anyone in whose contact the organization and the manager comes in, can do wonders for his company. Lord Ram was very good at it. He was the master of nurturing relations. His prowess at it was so great that while Ravana was lying wounded in the battle field and was about to die, he shared some important lessons which he had learnt in his life. The same Ravana, who at the same time had not responded to Lakshman, when he was sent to seek Ravana’s wisdom by Ram, was more than happy in sharing his knowledge with Ram.
All these examples and many more like this, tells us a great deal about management. For a manager there is lot to learn from our epics. Not just Ramayana, but Gita, Mahabharat and others as well have a lot to offer as management lessons.
Ramayana's Tips for Good Governance
The Ramayana, the saga of Rama's life written by Valmiki, is widely acclaimed as among the greatest of all Indian epics. The narrative is regarded as a veritable treatise on social sciences, offering lessons that transcend both time and space. In fact, this famous Grantha carries useful tips on ethics and values, statecraft and politics, and even general and human resources management.
The Ramayana can serve as a useful reference book for those willing to learn. With Rama Rajya as a model for good governance, the Ramayana is a must read for practitioners of statecraft.
The Ramayana, the saga of Rama's life written by Valmiki, is widely acclaimed as among the greatest of all Indian epics. The narrative is regarded as a veritable treatise on social sciences, offering lessons that transcend both time and space. In fact, this famous Grantha carries useful tips on ethics and values, statecraft and politics, and even general and human resources management.
The Ramayana can serve as a useful reference book for those willing to learn. With Rama Rajya as a model for good governance, the Ramayana is a must read for practitioners of statecraft.
The Ayodhya Kanda, the second chapter, contains comprehensive lessons on good governance. When Bharata, the younger brother of Rama, goes to meet the latter in the forest to request him to return to Ayodhya and rule, the two brothers enter into a long and instructive dialogue.
Rama counsels Bharata on governance. From quality of ministers and the importance of strategy sessions, to temperance in administration to justice, Rama expounds on all the subtleties of statecraft in a lucid manner. Apparently, Rama seems to be inquiring of Bharata his well-being, whether all is well at Ayodhya - in fact, however, in the process, the lessons on effective governance are offered in a powerful manner. Though the dialogue between the two brothers runs into several pages and a thorough reading is required to understand the intricacies, some important lessons are obvious, particularly the ones given on pages 441-449 of the Valmiki Ramayana.
A critical factor in good governance is the quality of ministers. Rama asks Bharata whether he has appointed courageous, knowledgeable, strong-willed men with a high emotional quotient as his ministers, because quality advice is the key to effective governance. The emphasis is on competence and confidentiality. Rama's advice to Bharata is to take a decision on a complex issue neither unilaterally nor in consultation with too many people. There should be an efficient core group.
A good administrator can ensure high returns from minimum investments. Rama tells Bharata to prefer one wise man to a thousand fools as it is the wise who can ensure prosperity during an economic crisis. Even if there is one minister who is really effective, the king will gain immensely. Appointing tested men of noble lineage and integrity for strategic positions is the key to successful government. Moderate taxes should be levied on the people, lest they revolt. Rama wants Bharata to treat his soldiers well and pay their legitimate wages on time. Delays in payment of wages and other allowances can lead to dangerous consequences.
Trade and agriculture are important and Rama wants Bharata to ensure good irrigation facilities rather than being overly dependent on rains. Traders need to be ensured of a fear-free environment and their grievances should be redressed promptly.
Protecting the forests and maintaining livestock have also been dealt with as important aspects of effective governance. In fact, the vision of the Ramayana has eternal relevance. Law and justice, finance and business, corruption framing of innocents for monetary gains, injustice to the poor are all mentioned.
Rama's words of advice to Bharata are as relevant today as they were in the Treta period, the time when Rama appeared. For the benefit of present and future generations, Rama gave valuable tips to Bharata on good governance. We should focus on this aspect rather than on outward worship.
Vedas and CSR
Based on the Vedas, CSR(Corporate Social Responsibility) can be looked at from three dimensions constituting the individual, social and cosmic perspectives.
Individual Dimension
The individual dimension of CSR focuses on the concept of dharma (righteousness).
The Vedas call upon one to speak the truth and follow the righteous path.
One shall speak the truth. (Satyam Vada - Taittiriya Upanishad i-11)
One shall follow the path of righteousness. (Dharmam cara - Taittiriya Upanishad i-11)
One shall do what he speaks and what he thinks. (Taittiriya Aranyaka i-90)
One shall not sin against his neighbor or a foreigner. (Rig Veda Samhita v-85-7)
One who does not work is a social evil. (Rig Veda Samhita x-22-8)
Fair Means of Wealth Acquisition
The Vedas emphasize that wealth has to be earned only through fair means and one should put in his best efforts to acquire wealth through ethical and moral practices. One has to acquire wealth by ethical means.
Wealth has to be won by deeds of glory. (Rig Veda Samhita vi-19-10)
One shall be led by the fair path to riches. (Vajasaneya Samhita v-36)
One should tread the sinless path and gather wealth. (Vajasaneya Samhita iv-9)
A man shall strive to win wealth by the righteous path. (Rig Veda Samhita x-31-2)
One who helps others wins wealth. (Rig Veda Samhita iv-50-9)
One who gets up early morning gets the treasure. (Rig Veda Samhita i-125-1)
Social Distribution of Wealth
The Vedas assert that there shall be proper distribution of wealth from the wealthy to the poor. They also condemn those who enjoy wealth without partaking it with others.
One shall not be selfish and consume all by himself. (Rig Veda Sam x-117-6)
Wealth accumulated through 100 hands should be distributed to 1000 hands. (Atharva Veda Samhita iii-24-5)
One who eats alone is a sinner. (Rig Veda Samhita x-117-6)
The leader is the distributor of wondrous wealth. (Vajasaneya Samhita xxx-4)
Let the rich satisfy the poor with a broader vision. (Rig Veda Samhita x-117-5)
Conservation of Resources
The Vedas advocate conservation of resources to take care of future requirements. They condemn poverty and give the clarion call to eradicate it.
One shall produce fair wealth for today and tomorrow. (Rig Veda Samhita vi-71-6)
Poverty should be banished. (Rig Veda Samhita x-76-4)
Environment
The Vedas attach great importance to environmental protection and purity. They insist on safeguarding the habitation, proper afforestation and non-pollution.
Earth, atmosphere, sky, sun, moon, stars, waters, plants, trees, moving creatures, swimming creatures, creeping creatures all are hailed and offered oblations. (Taittiriya Samhita i-8-13)
Habitation
One should protect the habitation. (Rig Veda Samhita vi-71-3)
Waters as friends of man give full protection to his progenies. (Rig Veda Samhita vi-50-7)
Animal welfare
One shall take care of quadrupeds. (Taittiriya Samhita iv-4-10)
One shall be auspicious to animals. (Taittiriya Samhita ii-3-14)
One shall not find fault with animals. (Chandogya Upanishad ii-18-2)
Plant Life Welfare
The Vedas stress the need for protection and development of forests. Human beings have to safeguard the trees. They assert that the plants and trees are verily the treasures for generations.
One should not destroy the trees. (Rig Veda Samhita vi-48-17)
Plants are mothers and Goddesses. (Rig Veda Samhita x-97-4)
Trees are homes and mansions. (Rig Veda Samhita x-97-5)
Sacred grass has to be protected from man's exploitation (Rig Veda Samhita vii-75-8)
Plants and waters are treasures for generations. (Rig Veda Samhita vii-70-4)
Non-pollution
The Vedas give the clarion call for non-pollution of the environment. They condemn in unequivocal terms those who pollute and defile the environment. Waters are invoked to be friendly to humanity.
Waters represent splendor. (Atharva Veda Samhita iii-13-5)
Waters bear off all defilements and cleanse people. (Vajasaneya Samhita iv-2)
Whoever injures the essence of food, kine or steeds is a robber who sinks both himself and his offspring into destruction. (Rig Veda Samhita vii-104-10)
Offerings are dedicated to waters of wells, pools, clefts, holes, lakes, morasses, ponds, tanks, marshes, rains, rime, streams, rivers and ocean. (Taittiriya Samhita vii-4-13)
There was only water in the beginning. (Brihadaranyaka Upanishad v-5-1)
Waters and herbs should have no poison. (Rig Veda Samhita vi-39-5)
Waters are to be freed from defilement. (Atharva Veda Samhita x-5-24)
Waters cleanse humanity from the evil of pollution committed by it. (Atharva Veda Samhita xii-2-40)
Waters are healing and they strengthen one to see great joy. (Taittiriya Samhita vii-4-19)
Individual Dimension
The individual dimension of CSR focuses on the concept of dharma (righteousness).
The Vedas call upon one to speak the truth and follow the righteous path.
One shall speak the truth. (Satyam Vada - Taittiriya Upanishad i-11)
One shall follow the path of righteousness. (Dharmam cara - Taittiriya Upanishad i-11)
One shall do what he speaks and what he thinks. (Taittiriya Aranyaka i-90)
One shall not sin against his neighbor or a foreigner. (Rig Veda Samhita v-85-7)
One who does not work is a social evil. (Rig Veda Samhita x-22-8)
Fair Means of Wealth Acquisition
The Vedas emphasize that wealth has to be earned only through fair means and one should put in his best efforts to acquire wealth through ethical and moral practices. One has to acquire wealth by ethical means.
Wealth has to be won by deeds of glory. (Rig Veda Samhita vi-19-10)
One shall be led by the fair path to riches. (Vajasaneya Samhita v-36)
One should tread the sinless path and gather wealth. (Vajasaneya Samhita iv-9)
A man shall strive to win wealth by the righteous path. (Rig Veda Samhita x-31-2)
One who helps others wins wealth. (Rig Veda Samhita iv-50-9)
One who gets up early morning gets the treasure. (Rig Veda Samhita i-125-1)
Social Distribution of Wealth
The Vedas assert that there shall be proper distribution of wealth from the wealthy to the poor. They also condemn those who enjoy wealth without partaking it with others.
One shall not be selfish and consume all by himself. (Rig Veda Sam x-117-6)
Wealth accumulated through 100 hands should be distributed to 1000 hands. (Atharva Veda Samhita iii-24-5)
One who eats alone is a sinner. (Rig Veda Samhita x-117-6)
The leader is the distributor of wondrous wealth. (Vajasaneya Samhita xxx-4)
Let the rich satisfy the poor with a broader vision. (Rig Veda Samhita x-117-5)
Conservation of Resources
The Vedas advocate conservation of resources to take care of future requirements. They condemn poverty and give the clarion call to eradicate it.
One shall produce fair wealth for today and tomorrow. (Rig Veda Samhita vi-71-6)
Poverty should be banished. (Rig Veda Samhita x-76-4)
Environment
The Vedas attach great importance to environmental protection and purity. They insist on safeguarding the habitation, proper afforestation and non-pollution.
Earth, atmosphere, sky, sun, moon, stars, waters, plants, trees, moving creatures, swimming creatures, creeping creatures all are hailed and offered oblations. (Taittiriya Samhita i-8-13)
Habitation
One should protect the habitation. (Rig Veda Samhita vi-71-3)
Waters as friends of man give full protection to his progenies. (Rig Veda Samhita vi-50-7)
Animal welfare
One shall take care of quadrupeds. (Taittiriya Samhita iv-4-10)
One shall be auspicious to animals. (Taittiriya Samhita ii-3-14)
One shall not find fault with animals. (Chandogya Upanishad ii-18-2)
Plant Life Welfare
The Vedas stress the need for protection and development of forests. Human beings have to safeguard the trees. They assert that the plants and trees are verily the treasures for generations.
One should not destroy the trees. (Rig Veda Samhita vi-48-17)
Plants are mothers and Goddesses. (Rig Veda Samhita x-97-4)
Trees are homes and mansions. (Rig Veda Samhita x-97-5)
Sacred grass has to be protected from man's exploitation (Rig Veda Samhita vii-75-8)
Plants and waters are treasures for generations. (Rig Veda Samhita vii-70-4)
Non-pollution
The Vedas give the clarion call for non-pollution of the environment. They condemn in unequivocal terms those who pollute and defile the environment. Waters are invoked to be friendly to humanity.
Waters represent splendor. (Atharva Veda Samhita iii-13-5)
Waters bear off all defilements and cleanse people. (Vajasaneya Samhita iv-2)
Whoever injures the essence of food, kine or steeds is a robber who sinks both himself and his offspring into destruction. (Rig Veda Samhita vii-104-10)
Offerings are dedicated to waters of wells, pools, clefts, holes, lakes, morasses, ponds, tanks, marshes, rains, rime, streams, rivers and ocean. (Taittiriya Samhita vii-4-13)
There was only water in the beginning. (Brihadaranyaka Upanishad v-5-1)
Waters and herbs should have no poison. (Rig Veda Samhita vi-39-5)
Waters are to be freed from defilement. (Atharva Veda Samhita x-5-24)
Waters cleanse humanity from the evil of pollution committed by it. (Atharva Veda Samhita xii-2-40)
Waters are healing and they strengthen one to see great joy. (Taittiriya Samhita vii-4-19)
Bhagavad Gita and Management
Management has become a part and parcel in everyday life, be it at home, office, factory, Government, or in any other organization where a group of human beings assemble for a common purpose, management principles come into play through their various facets like management of time, resources, personnel, materials, machinery, finance, planning, priorities, policies and practice.
Management is a systematic way of doing all activities in any field of human effort. It is about keeping oneself engaged in interactive relationship with other human beings in the course of performing one's duty. Its task is to make people capable of joint performance, to make their weaknesses irrelevant -so says the Management Guru Peter Drucker.
It strikes harmony in working -equilibrium in thoughts and actions, goals and achievements, plans and performance, products and markets. It resolves situations of scarcities be they in the physical, technical or human fields through maximum utilization with the minimum available processes to achieve the goal
The lack of management will cause disorder, confusion, wastage, delay, destruction and even depression. Managing men, money and material in the best possible way according to circumstances and environment is the most important and essential factor for a successful management. Managing men is supposed have the best tactics. Man is the first syllable in management which speaks volumes on the role and significance of man in a scheme of management practices. From the pre-historic days of aborigines to the present day of robots and computers the ideas of managing available resources have been in existence in some form or other. When the world has become a big global village now, management practices have become more complex and what was once considered a golden rule is now thought to be an anachronism.
Management Guidelines from The Bhagavad Gita
There is an important distinction between effectiveness and efficiency in managing. Effectiveness is doing the right things and Efficiency is doing things right. The general principles of effective management can be applied in every fields the differences being mainly in the application than in principles. Again, effective management is not limited in its application only to business or industrial enterprises but to all organizations where the aim is to reach a given goal through a Chief Executive or a Manager with the help of a group of workers.
The Manager's functions can be briefly summed up as under :
Forming a vision and planning the strategy to realize such vision.
Cultivating the art of leadership.
Establishing the institutional excellence and building an innovative organization.
Developing human resources.
Team building and teamwork.
Delegation, motivation, and communication and
Reviewing performance and taking corrective steps whenever called for.
Thus Management is a process in search of excellence to align people and get them committed to work for a common goal to the maximum social benefit.
The critical question in every Manager's mind is how to be effective in his job. The answer to this fundamental question is found in the Bhagavad Gita which repeatedly proclaims that 'you try to manage yourself'. The reason is that unless the Manager reaches a level of excellence and effectiveness that sets him apart from the others whom he is managing, he will be merely a face in the crowd and not an achiever.
In this context the Bhagavad Gita expounded thousands of years ago by the Super Management Guru Bhagawan Sri Krishna enlightens us on all managerial techniques leading to a harmonious and blissful state of affairs as against conflicts, tensions, lowest efficiency and least productivity, absence of motivation and lack of work culture etc common to most of the Indian enterprises today.
The modern management concepts like vision, leadership, motivation, excellence in work, achieving goals, meaning of work, attitude towards work, nature of individual, decision making, planning etc., are all discussed in the Bhagavad Gita with a sharp insight and finest analysis to drive through our confused grey matter making it highly eligible to become a part of the modem management syllabus.
It may be noted that while Western design on management deals with the problems at superficial, material, external and peripheral levels, the ideas contained in the Bhagavad Gita tackle the issues from the grass roots level of human thinking because once the basic thinking of man is improved it will automatically enhance the quality of his actions and their results.
The management thoughts emanating from the Western countries particularly the U.S.A. are based mostly on the lure for materialism and a perennial thirst for profit irrespective of the quality of the means adopted to achieve that goal. This phenomenon has its source in abundance in the West particularly the U.S.A. Management by materialism caught the fancy of all the countries the world over, India being no exception to this trend.
Our country has been in the forefront in importing those ideas mainly because of its centuries old indoctrination by the colonial rulers which inculcated in us a feeling that anything Western is always good and anything Indian is always inferior. Hence our management schools have sprung up on the foundations of materialistic approach wherein no place of importance was given to a holistic view.
The result is while huge funds have been invested in building these temples of modem management education, no perceptible changes are visible in the improvement of the quality of life although the standard of living of a few has gone up. The same old struggles in almost all sectors of the economy, criminalization of institutions, more and more social violence, exploitation and such other vices have gone deep in the body politic.
The reasons for this sorry state of affairs are not far to seek. The western idea of management has placed utmost reliance on the worker (which includes Managers also) -to make him more efficient, to increase his productivity. They pay him more so that he may work more, produce more, sell more and will stick to the organization without looking for alternatives. The sole aim of extracting better and more work from him is for improving the bottom-line of the enterprise. Worker has become a hireable commodity, which can be used, replaced and discarded at will.
The workers have also seen through the game plan of their paymasters who have reduced them to the state of a mercantile product. They changed their attitude to work and started adopting such measures as uncalled for strikes, Gheraos, sit-ins, dharnas, go-slows, work-to-rule etc to get maximum benefit for themselves from the organizations without caring the least for the adverse impact that such coercive methods will cause to the society at large.
Thus we have reached a situation where management and workers have become separate and contradictory entities wherein their approaches are different and interests are conflicting. There is no common goal or understanding which predictably leads to constant suspicion, friction, disillusions and mistrust because of working at cross purposes. The absence of human values and erosion of human touch in the organizational structure resulted in a permanent crisis of confidence.
The western management thoughts although acquired prosperity to some for some time has absolutely failed in their aim to ensure betterment of individual life and social welfare. It has remained by and large a soulless management edifice and an oasis of plenty for a chosen few in the midst of poor quality of life to many. Hence there is an urgent need to have a re-look at the prevalent management discipline on its objectives, scope and content.
It should be redefined so as to underline the development of the worker as a man, as a human being with all his positive and negative characteristics and not as a mere wage-earner. In this changed perspective, management ceases to be a career-agent but becomes an instrument in the process of national development in all its segments.
Bhagavad Gita And Managerial Effectiveness
Now let us re-examine some of the modern management concepts in the light of the Bhagavad Gita which is a primer of management by values.
Utilization of Available Resources
The first lesson in the management science is to choose wisely and utilise optimally the scarce resources if one has to succeed in his venture. During the curtain raiser before the Mahabharata War Duryodhana chose Sri Krishna's large army for his help while Arjuna selected Sri Krishna's wisdom for his support. This episode gives us a clue as to who is an Effective Manager.
Attitude Towards Work
Three stone-cutters were engaged in erecting a temple. As usual a H.R.D. Consultant asked them what they were doing. The response of the three workers to this innocent-looking question is illuminating.
'I am a poor man. I have to maintain my family. I am making a living here,' said the first stone-cutter with a dejected face.
'Well, I work because I want to show that I am the best stone-cutter in the country,' said the second one with a sense of pride.
'Oh, I want to build the most beautiful temple in the country,' said the third one with a visionary gleam.
Their jobs were identical but their perspectives were different. What Gita tells us is to develop the visionary perspective in the work we do. It tells us to develop a sense of larger vision in one's work for the common good.
Work Commitment
The popular verse 2.47 of the Gita cited above advises non-attachment to the fruits or results of actions performed in the course of one's duty. Dedicated work has to mean 'work for the sake of work'. If we are always calculating the date of promotion for putting in our efforts, then such work cannot be commitment-oriented causing excellence in the results but it will be promotion-oriented resulting in inevitable disappointments. By tilting the performance towards the anticipated benefits, the quality of performance of the present duty suffers on account of the mental agitations caused by the anxieties of the future. Another reason for non-attachment to results is the fact that workings of the world are not designed to positively respond to our calculations and hence expected fruits may not always be forthcoming .
So, the Gita tells us not to mortgage the present commitment to an uncertain future. If we are not able to measure up to this height, then surly the fault lies with us and not with the teaching.
Some people argue that being unattached to the consequences of one's action would make one un-accountable as accountability is a much touted word these days with the vigilance department sitting on our shoulders. However, we have to understand that the entire second chapter has arisen as a sequel to the temporarily lost sense of accountability on the part of Arjuna in the first chapter of the Gita in performing his swadharma.
Bhagavad Gita is full of advice on the theory of cause and effect, making the doer responsible for the consequences of his deeds. The Gita, while advising detachment from the avarice of selfish gains by discharging one's accepted duty, does not absolve anybody of the consequences arising from discharge of his responsibilities.
This verse is a brilliant guide to the operating Manager for psychological energy conservation and a preventive method against stress and burn-outs in the work situations. Learning managerial stress prevention methods is quite costly now days and if only we understand the Gita we get the required cure free of cost.
Thus the best means for effective work performance is to become the work itself. Attaining this state of nishkama karma is the right attitude to work because it prevents the ego, the mind from dissipation through speculation on future gains or losses.
It has been presumed for long that satisfying lower needs of a worker like adequate food, clothing and shelter, recognition, appreciation, status, personality development etc are the key factors in the motivational theory of personnel management.
It is the common experience that the spirit of grievances from the clerk to the Director is identical and only their scales and composition vary. It should have been that once the lower-order needs are more than satisfied, the Director should have no problem in optimizing his contribution to the organization. But more often than not, it does not happen like that; the eagle soars high but keeps its eyes firmly fixed on the dead animal below. On the contrary a lowly paid school teacher, a self-employed artisan, ordinary artistes demonstrate higher levels of self- realization despite poor satisfaction of their lower- order needs.
This situation is explained by the theory of Self-transcendence or Self-realization propounded in the Gita. Self-transcendence is overcoming insuperable obstacles in one's path. It involves renouncing egoism, putting others before oneself, team work, dignity, sharing, co-operation, harmony, trust, sacrificing lower needs for higher goals, seeing others in you and yourself in others etc. The portrait of a self-realizing person is that he is a man who aims at his own position and underrates everything else. On the other hand the Self-transcenders are the visionaries and innovators. Their resolute efforts enable them to achieve the apparently impossible. They overcome all barriers to reach their goal.
The work must be done with detachment.' This is because it is the Ego which spoils the work. If this is not the backbone of the Theory of Motivation which the modern scholars talk about what else is it? I would say that this is not merely a theory of Motivation but it is a theory of Inspiration.
The Gita further advises to perform action with loving attention to the Divine which implies redirection of the empirical self away from its egocentric needs, desires, and passions for creating suitable conditions to perform actions in pursuit of excellence. Tagore says working for love is freedom in action which is described as disinterested work in the Gita. It is on the basis of the holistic vision that Indians have developed the work-ethos of life. They found that all work irrespective of its nature have to be directed towards a single purpose that is the manifestation of essential divinity in man by working for the good of all beings -lokasangraha. This vision was presented to us in the very first mantra of lsopanishad which says that whatever exists in the Universe is enveloped by God. How shall we enjoy this life then, if all are one? The answer it provides is enjoy and strengthen life by sacrificing your selfishness by not coveting other's wealth. The same motivation is given by Sri Krishna in the Third Chapter of Gita when He says that 'He who shares the wealth generated only after serving the people, through work done as a sacrifice for them, is freed from all the sins. On the contrary those who earn wealth only for themselves, eat sins that lead to frustration and failure.'
The disinterested work finds expression in devotion, surrender and equipoise. The former two are psychological while the third is the strong-willed determination to keep the mind free of and above the dualistic pulls of daily experiences. Detached involvement in work is the key to mental equanimity or the state of nirdwanda. This attitude leads to a stage where the worker begins to feel the presence of the Supreme Intelligence guiding the empirical individual intelligence. Such de-personified intelligence is best suited for those who sincerely believe in the supremacy of organizational goals as compared to narrow personal success and achievement.
Work culture means vigorous and arduous effort in pursuit of a given or chosen task. When Bhagawan Sri Krishna rebukes Arjuna in the strongest words for his unmanliness and imbecility in recoiling from his righteous duty it is nothing but a clarion call for the highest work culture. Poor work culture is the result of tamo guna overtaking one's mindset. Bhagawan's stinging rebuke is to bring out the temporarily dormant rajo guna in Arjuna. In Chapter 16 of the Gita Sri Krishna elaborates on two types of Work Ethic viz. daivi sampat or divine work culture and asuri sampat or demonic work culture.
Daivi work culture - means fearlessness, purity, self-control, sacrifice, straightforwardness, self-denial, calmness, absence of fault-finding, absence of greed, gentleness, modesty, absence of envy and pride.
Asuri work culture - means egoism, delusion, desire-centric, improper performance, work which is not oriented towards service. It is to be noted that mere work ethic is not enough in as much as a hardened criminal has also a very good work culture. What is needed is a work ethic conditioned by ethics in work.
It is in this light that the counsel 'yogah karmasu kausalam' should be understood. Kausalam means skill or method or technique of work which is an indispensable component of work ethic. Yogah is defined in the Gita itself as 'samatvam yogah uchyate' meaning unchanging equipoise of mind. Tilak tells us that performing actions with the special device of an equable mind is Yoga. By making the equable mind as the bed-rock of all actions Gita evolved the goal of unification of work ethic with ethics in work, for without ethical process no mind can attain equipoise. Adi Sankara says that the skill in performance of one's duty consists in maintaining the evenness of mind in success and failure because the calm mind in failure will lead him to deeper introspection and see clearly where the process went wrong so that corrective steps could be taken to avoid such shortcomings in future.
The principle of reducing our attachment to personal gains from the work done or controlling the aversion to personal losses enunciated in Ch.2 Verse 47 of the Gita is the foolproof prescription for attaining equanimity. The common apprehension about this principle that it will lead to lack of incentive for effort and work, striking at the very root of work ethic, is not valid because the advice is to be judged as relevant to man's overriding quest for true mental happiness. Thus while the common place theories on motivation lead us to bondage, the Gita theory takes us to freedom and real happiness.
Work Results
The Gita further explains the theory of non- attachment to the results of work in Ch.18 Verses 13-15 the import of which is as under:
If the result of sincere effort is a success, the entire credit should not be appropriated by the doer alone. If the result of sincere effort is a failure, then too the entire blame does not accrue to the doer.
The former attitude mollifies arrogance and conceit while the latter prevents excessive despondency, de-motivation and self-pity. Thus both these dispositions safeguard the doer against psychological vulnerability which is the cause for the Modem Managers' companions like Diabetes, High B.P. Ulcers etc.
Assimilation of the ideas behind 2.47 and 18.13-15 of the Gita leads us to the wider spectrum of lokasamgraha or general welfare.
There is also another dimension in the work ethic. If the karmayoga is blended with bhaktiyoga then the work itself becomes worship, a seva yoga.
Manager's Mental Health
The ideas mentioned above have a close bearing on the end-state of a manager which is his mental health. Sound mental health is the very goal of any human activity more so management. An expert describes sound mental health as that state of mind which can maintain a calm, positive poise or regain it when unsettled in the midst of all the external vagaries of work life and social existence. Internal constancy and peace are the pre- requisites for a healthy stress-free mind.
Some of the impediments to sound mental health are :
Greed -for power, position, prestige and money.
Envy -regarding others' achievements, success, rewards.
Egotism -about one's own accomplishments.
Suspicion, anger and frustration.
Anguish through comparisons.
The driving forces in today's rat-race are speed and greed as well as ambition and competition. The natural fallout from these forces is erosion of one's ethico-moral fibre which supersedes the value system as a means in the entrepreneurial path like tax evasion, undercutting, spreading canards against the competitors, entrepreneurial spying, instigating industrial strife in the business rivals' establishments etc. Although these practices are taken as normal business hazards for achieving progress, they always end up as a pursuit of mirage -the more the needs the more the disappointments. This phenomenon may be called as yayati-syndrome.
In Mahabharata we come across a king called Yayati who, in order to revel in the endless enjoyment of flesh exchanged his old age with the youth of his obliging youngest son for a mythical thousand years. However, he lost himself in the pursuit of sensual enjoyments and felt penitent. He came back to his son pleading to take back his youth. This yayati syndrome shows the conflict between externally directed acquisitions, motivations and inner reasoning, emotions and conscience.
Gita tells us how to get out of this universal phenomenon by prescribing the following capsules:
Cultivate sound philosophy of life.
Identify with inner core of self-sufficiency.
Get out of the habitual mindset towards the pairs of opposites.
Strive for excellence through work is worship.
Build up an internal integrated reference point to face contrary impulses, and emotions.
Pursue ethico-moral rectitude.
Cultivating this understanding by a manager would lead him to emancipation from falsifying ego-conscious state of confusion and distortion, to a state of pure and free mind i.e. universal, supreme consciousness wherefrom he can prove his effectiveness in discharging whatever duties that have fallen to his domain.
Bhagawan's advice is relevant here :
"tasmaat sarveshu kaaleshu mamanusmarah yuddha cha"
'Therefore under all circumstances remember Me and then fight' (Fight means perform your duties)
Management Needs those Who Practise what they Preach
Whatever the excellent and best ones do, the commoners follow, so says Sri Krishna in the Gita. This is the leadership quality prescribed in the Gita. The visionary leader must also be a missionary, extremely practical, intensively dynamic and capable of translating dreams into reality. This dynamism and strength of a true leader flows from an inspired and spontaneous motivation to help others. "I am the strength of those who are devoid of personal desire and attachment. O Arjuna, I am the legitimate desire in those, who are not opposed to righteousness" says Sri Krishna in the 10th Chapter of the Gita.
The Ultimate Message of Gita for Managers
The despondent position of Arjuna in the first chapter of the Gita is a typical human situation which may come in the life of all men of action some time or other. Sri Krishna by sheer power of his inspiring words raised the level of Arjuna's mind from the state of inertia to the state of righteous action, from the state of faithlessness to the state of faith and self-confidence in the ultimate victory of Dharma (ethical action). They are the powerful words of courage of strength, of self confidence, of faith in one's own infinite power, of the glory, of valour in the life of active people and of the need for intense calmness in the midst of intense action.
When Arjuna got over his despondency and stood ready to fight, Sri Krishna gave him the gospel for using his spirit of intense action not for his own benefit, not for satisfying his own greed and desire, but for using his action for the good of many, with faith in the ultimate victory of ethics over unethical actions and truth over untruth. Arjuna responds by emphatically declaring that all his delusions were removed and that he is ready to do what is expected of him in the given situation.
Sri Krishna's advice with regard to temporary failures in actions is 'No doer of good ever ends in misery'. Every action should produce results: good action produces good results and evil begets nothing but evil. Therefore always act well and be rewarded.
And finally the Gita's consoling message for all men of action is : He who follows My ideal in all walks of life without losing faith in the ideal or never deviating from it, I provide him with all that he needs (Yoga) and protect what he has already got (Kshema).
In conclusion the purport of this essay is not to suggest discarding of the Western model of efficiency, dynamism and striving for excellence but to make these ideals tuned to the India's holistic attitude of lokasangraha -for the welfare of many, for the good of many. The idea is that these management skills should be India-centric and not America-centric. Swami Vivekananda says a combination of both these approaches will certainly create future leaders of India who will be far superior to any that have ever been in the world.
Management is a systematic way of doing all activities in any field of human effort. It is about keeping oneself engaged in interactive relationship with other human beings in the course of performing one's duty. Its task is to make people capable of joint performance, to make their weaknesses irrelevant -so says the Management Guru Peter Drucker.
It strikes harmony in working -equilibrium in thoughts and actions, goals and achievements, plans and performance, products and markets. It resolves situations of scarcities be they in the physical, technical or human fields through maximum utilization with the minimum available processes to achieve the goal
The lack of management will cause disorder, confusion, wastage, delay, destruction and even depression. Managing men, money and material in the best possible way according to circumstances and environment is the most important and essential factor for a successful management. Managing men is supposed have the best tactics. Man is the first syllable in management which speaks volumes on the role and significance of man in a scheme of management practices. From the pre-historic days of aborigines to the present day of robots and computers the ideas of managing available resources have been in existence in some form or other. When the world has become a big global village now, management practices have become more complex and what was once considered a golden rule is now thought to be an anachronism.
Management Guidelines from The Bhagavad Gita
There is an important distinction between effectiveness and efficiency in managing. Effectiveness is doing the right things and Efficiency is doing things right. The general principles of effective management can be applied in every fields the differences being mainly in the application than in principles. Again, effective management is not limited in its application only to business or industrial enterprises but to all organizations where the aim is to reach a given goal through a Chief Executive or a Manager with the help of a group of workers.
The Manager's functions can be briefly summed up as under :
Forming a vision and planning the strategy to realize such vision.
Cultivating the art of leadership.
Establishing the institutional excellence and building an innovative organization.
Developing human resources.
Team building and teamwork.
Delegation, motivation, and communication and
Reviewing performance and taking corrective steps whenever called for.
Thus Management is a process in search of excellence to align people and get them committed to work for a common goal to the maximum social benefit.
The critical question in every Manager's mind is how to be effective in his job. The answer to this fundamental question is found in the Bhagavad Gita which repeatedly proclaims that 'you try to manage yourself'. The reason is that unless the Manager reaches a level of excellence and effectiveness that sets him apart from the others whom he is managing, he will be merely a face in the crowd and not an achiever.
In this context the Bhagavad Gita expounded thousands of years ago by the Super Management Guru Bhagawan Sri Krishna enlightens us on all managerial techniques leading to a harmonious and blissful state of affairs as against conflicts, tensions, lowest efficiency and least productivity, absence of motivation and lack of work culture etc common to most of the Indian enterprises today.
The modern management concepts like vision, leadership, motivation, excellence in work, achieving goals, meaning of work, attitude towards work, nature of individual, decision making, planning etc., are all discussed in the Bhagavad Gita with a sharp insight and finest analysis to drive through our confused grey matter making it highly eligible to become a part of the modem management syllabus.
It may be noted that while Western design on management deals with the problems at superficial, material, external and peripheral levels, the ideas contained in the Bhagavad Gita tackle the issues from the grass roots level of human thinking because once the basic thinking of man is improved it will automatically enhance the quality of his actions and their results.
The management thoughts emanating from the Western countries particularly the U.S.A. are based mostly on the lure for materialism and a perennial thirst for profit irrespective of the quality of the means adopted to achieve that goal. This phenomenon has its source in abundance in the West particularly the U.S.A. Management by materialism caught the fancy of all the countries the world over, India being no exception to this trend.
Our country has been in the forefront in importing those ideas mainly because of its centuries old indoctrination by the colonial rulers which inculcated in us a feeling that anything Western is always good and anything Indian is always inferior. Hence our management schools have sprung up on the foundations of materialistic approach wherein no place of importance was given to a holistic view.
The result is while huge funds have been invested in building these temples of modem management education, no perceptible changes are visible in the improvement of the quality of life although the standard of living of a few has gone up. The same old struggles in almost all sectors of the economy, criminalization of institutions, more and more social violence, exploitation and such other vices have gone deep in the body politic.
The reasons for this sorry state of affairs are not far to seek. The western idea of management has placed utmost reliance on the worker (which includes Managers also) -to make him more efficient, to increase his productivity. They pay him more so that he may work more, produce more, sell more and will stick to the organization without looking for alternatives. The sole aim of extracting better and more work from him is for improving the bottom-line of the enterprise. Worker has become a hireable commodity, which can be used, replaced and discarded at will.
The workers have also seen through the game plan of their paymasters who have reduced them to the state of a mercantile product. They changed their attitude to work and started adopting such measures as uncalled for strikes, Gheraos, sit-ins, dharnas, go-slows, work-to-rule etc to get maximum benefit for themselves from the organizations without caring the least for the adverse impact that such coercive methods will cause to the society at large.
Thus we have reached a situation where management and workers have become separate and contradictory entities wherein their approaches are different and interests are conflicting. There is no common goal or understanding which predictably leads to constant suspicion, friction, disillusions and mistrust because of working at cross purposes. The absence of human values and erosion of human touch in the organizational structure resulted in a permanent crisis of confidence.
The western management thoughts although acquired prosperity to some for some time has absolutely failed in their aim to ensure betterment of individual life and social welfare. It has remained by and large a soulless management edifice and an oasis of plenty for a chosen few in the midst of poor quality of life to many. Hence there is an urgent need to have a re-look at the prevalent management discipline on its objectives, scope and content.
It should be redefined so as to underline the development of the worker as a man, as a human being with all his positive and negative characteristics and not as a mere wage-earner. In this changed perspective, management ceases to be a career-agent but becomes an instrument in the process of national development in all its segments.
Bhagavad Gita And Managerial Effectiveness
Now let us re-examine some of the modern management concepts in the light of the Bhagavad Gita which is a primer of management by values.
Utilization of Available Resources
The first lesson in the management science is to choose wisely and utilise optimally the scarce resources if one has to succeed in his venture. During the curtain raiser before the Mahabharata War Duryodhana chose Sri Krishna's large army for his help while Arjuna selected Sri Krishna's wisdom for his support. This episode gives us a clue as to who is an Effective Manager.
Attitude Towards Work
Three stone-cutters were engaged in erecting a temple. As usual a H.R.D. Consultant asked them what they were doing. The response of the three workers to this innocent-looking question is illuminating.
'I am a poor man. I have to maintain my family. I am making a living here,' said the first stone-cutter with a dejected face.
'Well, I work because I want to show that I am the best stone-cutter in the country,' said the second one with a sense of pride.
'Oh, I want to build the most beautiful temple in the country,' said the third one with a visionary gleam.
Their jobs were identical but their perspectives were different. What Gita tells us is to develop the visionary perspective in the work we do. It tells us to develop a sense of larger vision in one's work for the common good.
Work Commitment
The popular verse 2.47 of the Gita cited above advises non-attachment to the fruits or results of actions performed in the course of one's duty. Dedicated work has to mean 'work for the sake of work'. If we are always calculating the date of promotion for putting in our efforts, then such work cannot be commitment-oriented causing excellence in the results but it will be promotion-oriented resulting in inevitable disappointments. By tilting the performance towards the anticipated benefits, the quality of performance of the present duty suffers on account of the mental agitations caused by the anxieties of the future. Another reason for non-attachment to results is the fact that workings of the world are not designed to positively respond to our calculations and hence expected fruits may not always be forthcoming .
So, the Gita tells us not to mortgage the present commitment to an uncertain future. If we are not able to measure up to this height, then surly the fault lies with us and not with the teaching.
Some people argue that being unattached to the consequences of one's action would make one un-accountable as accountability is a much touted word these days with the vigilance department sitting on our shoulders. However, we have to understand that the entire second chapter has arisen as a sequel to the temporarily lost sense of accountability on the part of Arjuna in the first chapter of the Gita in performing his swadharma.
Bhagavad Gita is full of advice on the theory of cause and effect, making the doer responsible for the consequences of his deeds. The Gita, while advising detachment from the avarice of selfish gains by discharging one's accepted duty, does not absolve anybody of the consequences arising from discharge of his responsibilities.
This verse is a brilliant guide to the operating Manager for psychological energy conservation and a preventive method against stress and burn-outs in the work situations. Learning managerial stress prevention methods is quite costly now days and if only we understand the Gita we get the required cure free of cost.
Thus the best means for effective work performance is to become the work itself. Attaining this state of nishkama karma is the right attitude to work because it prevents the ego, the mind from dissipation through speculation on future gains or losses.
It has been presumed for long that satisfying lower needs of a worker like adequate food, clothing and shelter, recognition, appreciation, status, personality development etc are the key factors in the motivational theory of personnel management.
It is the common experience that the spirit of grievances from the clerk to the Director is identical and only their scales and composition vary. It should have been that once the lower-order needs are more than satisfied, the Director should have no problem in optimizing his contribution to the organization. But more often than not, it does not happen like that; the eagle soars high but keeps its eyes firmly fixed on the dead animal below. On the contrary a lowly paid school teacher, a self-employed artisan, ordinary artistes demonstrate higher levels of self- realization despite poor satisfaction of their lower- order needs.
This situation is explained by the theory of Self-transcendence or Self-realization propounded in the Gita. Self-transcendence is overcoming insuperable obstacles in one's path. It involves renouncing egoism, putting others before oneself, team work, dignity, sharing, co-operation, harmony, trust, sacrificing lower needs for higher goals, seeing others in you and yourself in others etc. The portrait of a self-realizing person is that he is a man who aims at his own position and underrates everything else. On the other hand the Self-transcenders are the visionaries and innovators. Their resolute efforts enable them to achieve the apparently impossible. They overcome all barriers to reach their goal.
The work must be done with detachment.' This is because it is the Ego which spoils the work. If this is not the backbone of the Theory of Motivation which the modern scholars talk about what else is it? I would say that this is not merely a theory of Motivation but it is a theory of Inspiration.
The Gita further advises to perform action with loving attention to the Divine which implies redirection of the empirical self away from its egocentric needs, desires, and passions for creating suitable conditions to perform actions in pursuit of excellence. Tagore says working for love is freedom in action which is described as disinterested work in the Gita. It is on the basis of the holistic vision that Indians have developed the work-ethos of life. They found that all work irrespective of its nature have to be directed towards a single purpose that is the manifestation of essential divinity in man by working for the good of all beings -lokasangraha. This vision was presented to us in the very first mantra of lsopanishad which says that whatever exists in the Universe is enveloped by God. How shall we enjoy this life then, if all are one? The answer it provides is enjoy and strengthen life by sacrificing your selfishness by not coveting other's wealth. The same motivation is given by Sri Krishna in the Third Chapter of Gita when He says that 'He who shares the wealth generated only after serving the people, through work done as a sacrifice for them, is freed from all the sins. On the contrary those who earn wealth only for themselves, eat sins that lead to frustration and failure.'
The disinterested work finds expression in devotion, surrender and equipoise. The former two are psychological while the third is the strong-willed determination to keep the mind free of and above the dualistic pulls of daily experiences. Detached involvement in work is the key to mental equanimity or the state of nirdwanda. This attitude leads to a stage where the worker begins to feel the presence of the Supreme Intelligence guiding the empirical individual intelligence. Such de-personified intelligence is best suited for those who sincerely believe in the supremacy of organizational goals as compared to narrow personal success and achievement.
Work culture means vigorous and arduous effort in pursuit of a given or chosen task. When Bhagawan Sri Krishna rebukes Arjuna in the strongest words for his unmanliness and imbecility in recoiling from his righteous duty it is nothing but a clarion call for the highest work culture. Poor work culture is the result of tamo guna overtaking one's mindset. Bhagawan's stinging rebuke is to bring out the temporarily dormant rajo guna in Arjuna. In Chapter 16 of the Gita Sri Krishna elaborates on two types of Work Ethic viz. daivi sampat or divine work culture and asuri sampat or demonic work culture.
Daivi work culture - means fearlessness, purity, self-control, sacrifice, straightforwardness, self-denial, calmness, absence of fault-finding, absence of greed, gentleness, modesty, absence of envy and pride.
Asuri work culture - means egoism, delusion, desire-centric, improper performance, work which is not oriented towards service. It is to be noted that mere work ethic is not enough in as much as a hardened criminal has also a very good work culture. What is needed is a work ethic conditioned by ethics in work.
It is in this light that the counsel 'yogah karmasu kausalam' should be understood. Kausalam means skill or method or technique of work which is an indispensable component of work ethic. Yogah is defined in the Gita itself as 'samatvam yogah uchyate' meaning unchanging equipoise of mind. Tilak tells us that performing actions with the special device of an equable mind is Yoga. By making the equable mind as the bed-rock of all actions Gita evolved the goal of unification of work ethic with ethics in work, for without ethical process no mind can attain equipoise. Adi Sankara says that the skill in performance of one's duty consists in maintaining the evenness of mind in success and failure because the calm mind in failure will lead him to deeper introspection and see clearly where the process went wrong so that corrective steps could be taken to avoid such shortcomings in future.
The principle of reducing our attachment to personal gains from the work done or controlling the aversion to personal losses enunciated in Ch.2 Verse 47 of the Gita is the foolproof prescription for attaining equanimity. The common apprehension about this principle that it will lead to lack of incentive for effort and work, striking at the very root of work ethic, is not valid because the advice is to be judged as relevant to man's overriding quest for true mental happiness. Thus while the common place theories on motivation lead us to bondage, the Gita theory takes us to freedom and real happiness.
Work Results
The Gita further explains the theory of non- attachment to the results of work in Ch.18 Verses 13-15 the import of which is as under:
If the result of sincere effort is a success, the entire credit should not be appropriated by the doer alone. If the result of sincere effort is a failure, then too the entire blame does not accrue to the doer.
The former attitude mollifies arrogance and conceit while the latter prevents excessive despondency, de-motivation and self-pity. Thus both these dispositions safeguard the doer against psychological vulnerability which is the cause for the Modem Managers' companions like Diabetes, High B.P. Ulcers etc.
Assimilation of the ideas behind 2.47 and 18.13-15 of the Gita leads us to the wider spectrum of lokasamgraha or general welfare.
There is also another dimension in the work ethic. If the karmayoga is blended with bhaktiyoga then the work itself becomes worship, a seva yoga.
Manager's Mental Health
The ideas mentioned above have a close bearing on the end-state of a manager which is his mental health. Sound mental health is the very goal of any human activity more so management. An expert describes sound mental health as that state of mind which can maintain a calm, positive poise or regain it when unsettled in the midst of all the external vagaries of work life and social existence. Internal constancy and peace are the pre- requisites for a healthy stress-free mind.
Some of the impediments to sound mental health are :
Greed -for power, position, prestige and money.
Envy -regarding others' achievements, success, rewards.
Egotism -about one's own accomplishments.
Suspicion, anger and frustration.
Anguish through comparisons.
The driving forces in today's rat-race are speed and greed as well as ambition and competition. The natural fallout from these forces is erosion of one's ethico-moral fibre which supersedes the value system as a means in the entrepreneurial path like tax evasion, undercutting, spreading canards against the competitors, entrepreneurial spying, instigating industrial strife in the business rivals' establishments etc. Although these practices are taken as normal business hazards for achieving progress, they always end up as a pursuit of mirage -the more the needs the more the disappointments. This phenomenon may be called as yayati-syndrome.
In Mahabharata we come across a king called Yayati who, in order to revel in the endless enjoyment of flesh exchanged his old age with the youth of his obliging youngest son for a mythical thousand years. However, he lost himself in the pursuit of sensual enjoyments and felt penitent. He came back to his son pleading to take back his youth. This yayati syndrome shows the conflict between externally directed acquisitions, motivations and inner reasoning, emotions and conscience.
Gita tells us how to get out of this universal phenomenon by prescribing the following capsules:
Cultivate sound philosophy of life.
Identify with inner core of self-sufficiency.
Get out of the habitual mindset towards the pairs of opposites.
Strive for excellence through work is worship.
Build up an internal integrated reference point to face contrary impulses, and emotions.
Pursue ethico-moral rectitude.
Cultivating this understanding by a manager would lead him to emancipation from falsifying ego-conscious state of confusion and distortion, to a state of pure and free mind i.e. universal, supreme consciousness wherefrom he can prove his effectiveness in discharging whatever duties that have fallen to his domain.
Bhagawan's advice is relevant here :
"tasmaat sarveshu kaaleshu mamanusmarah yuddha cha"
'Therefore under all circumstances remember Me and then fight' (Fight means perform your duties)
Management Needs those Who Practise what they Preach
Whatever the excellent and best ones do, the commoners follow, so says Sri Krishna in the Gita. This is the leadership quality prescribed in the Gita. The visionary leader must also be a missionary, extremely practical, intensively dynamic and capable of translating dreams into reality. This dynamism and strength of a true leader flows from an inspired and spontaneous motivation to help others. "I am the strength of those who are devoid of personal desire and attachment. O Arjuna, I am the legitimate desire in those, who are not opposed to righteousness" says Sri Krishna in the 10th Chapter of the Gita.
The Ultimate Message of Gita for Managers
The despondent position of Arjuna in the first chapter of the Gita is a typical human situation which may come in the life of all men of action some time or other. Sri Krishna by sheer power of his inspiring words raised the level of Arjuna's mind from the state of inertia to the state of righteous action, from the state of faithlessness to the state of faith and self-confidence in the ultimate victory of Dharma (ethical action). They are the powerful words of courage of strength, of self confidence, of faith in one's own infinite power, of the glory, of valour in the life of active people and of the need for intense calmness in the midst of intense action.
When Arjuna got over his despondency and stood ready to fight, Sri Krishna gave him the gospel for using his spirit of intense action not for his own benefit, not for satisfying his own greed and desire, but for using his action for the good of many, with faith in the ultimate victory of ethics over unethical actions and truth over untruth. Arjuna responds by emphatically declaring that all his delusions were removed and that he is ready to do what is expected of him in the given situation.
Sri Krishna's advice with regard to temporary failures in actions is 'No doer of good ever ends in misery'. Every action should produce results: good action produces good results and evil begets nothing but evil. Therefore always act well and be rewarded.
And finally the Gita's consoling message for all men of action is : He who follows My ideal in all walks of life without losing faith in the ideal or never deviating from it, I provide him with all that he needs (Yoga) and protect what he has already got (Kshema).
In conclusion the purport of this essay is not to suggest discarding of the Western model of efficiency, dynamism and striving for excellence but to make these ideals tuned to the India's holistic attitude of lokasangraha -for the welfare of many, for the good of many. The idea is that these management skills should be India-centric and not America-centric. Swami Vivekananda says a combination of both these approaches will certainly create future leaders of India who will be far superior to any that have ever been in the world.
Lord Krishna - The Greatest Manager
Lord Krishna was called by Hundreds and Thousands of names and Here we will see how he is the Greatest Manager of All. The particular example we are referencing here is the battle of Mahabharat fought at Kurukshetra
Mahabharat was the biggest battle fought in ancient India between Pandavas and Kauravas, and had each and every other king/ruler fighting from either of the sides. Duryodhana representing Kauravas and Arjuna representing Pandavas, reached at nearly the same time to Krishna for calling him to fight from their side. Krishna asked them to choose between him and his complete army. Since he alone was capable of destroying the world, leave alone the opponent, he would not raise arms and play a non-combatant role. Arjuna choose to have him and Duryodhana was happy to have gained his mighty army.
What is expected from a manager and how it applies to Krishna.
1. Manager should decide on a Goal
A manager should have decided a Goal and Krishna had 3 clear cut Goals that he followed and achieved 100% targets.
a) Paritranaya Sadhunaam - Welfare for Saints
b) Vinashaya Dushkritaam - Destroy Evil
c) Dharmasansthapanaay Sambhavaami yuge yuge - To establish and strengthen Religion in every Era.
2. Manager Should have Motivational Skills
When Arjun reached the battle field he loose his determination to fight when he saw that among the opponents were many of his relatives young and old and that he was going to kill them for the sake of Kingdom. He resisted from fighting and dropped arms. Krishna motivated him by his speech later named “Bhagwat Gita” that’s still read and followed. Arjun recovered and decided to fight.
3. Manager must have skills to build Stretegies to achieve Target
Pandavas and Kauravas had soldiers and warriors strength in the ratio of 7:11, Panadvas having 1.53 millions and 2.41 millions. With this count it was clear that the battle could be won only with Effective Strategies. The fact that Pandavas won the battle proves that Krishna was successful not only in buiding stretegies but in implementing them to achieve success.
4. Good Manager must have Leadership Quality
When Krishna asked Arjuna and Duryodhana to choose between him and his army, the choice was, in fact, between a Leader and his Resources. While a Good Leader can gain from limited resources, a Bad Leader will loose even with vast resources. Knowing his excellent Leadership Qualities, Arjuna requested Krishna not only to lead the entire mission but to personally lead him by accepting to be his “Saarthi” (Charioteer), guide him and lead him to success.
5. Manager should be good in Direction and Controlling
Controlling an army of 1.53 million soldiers and warriors to fight against a bigger army was not a easy task. The 1.53 million soldiers were divided in seven divisions, led by a Commander each, further controlled by a Supreme Commander who himself was guided by the Pandavas and Krishna. This all was made possible with with help of Lord Krishna’s great Management ad Controlling Skills. Management Guru Henry Fayol says that without appropriate Role Allocation, no mission can get desired results. Team spirit and appropriate Role Allocation can achieve everything. What was Arjun’s position, what was Bhim’s role? how Dharmaraj Yudhishtir will do his work, all these matters were decided by Lord Krishna.
Agreed that Lord Krishna was ‘God’ and almighty and that he could have done the task himself without involving a single person. But the Battle of Mahabharat had him in a non-combatant role and that the Pandavas won the battle is due to his extra-ordinary Managerial Qualities achieving 100% target. And thus, we can call him the Greatest Manager in the World.
Mahabharat was the biggest battle fought in ancient India between Pandavas and Kauravas, and had each and every other king/ruler fighting from either of the sides. Duryodhana representing Kauravas and Arjuna representing Pandavas, reached at nearly the same time to Krishna for calling him to fight from their side. Krishna asked them to choose between him and his complete army. Since he alone was capable of destroying the world, leave alone the opponent, he would not raise arms and play a non-combatant role. Arjuna choose to have him and Duryodhana was happy to have gained his mighty army.
What is expected from a manager and how it applies to Krishna.
1. Manager should decide on a Goal
A manager should have decided a Goal and Krishna had 3 clear cut Goals that he followed and achieved 100% targets.
a) Paritranaya Sadhunaam - Welfare for Saints
b) Vinashaya Dushkritaam - Destroy Evil
c) Dharmasansthapanaay Sambhavaami yuge yuge - To establish and strengthen Religion in every Era.
2. Manager Should have Motivational Skills
When Arjun reached the battle field he loose his determination to fight when he saw that among the opponents were many of his relatives young and old and that he was going to kill them for the sake of Kingdom. He resisted from fighting and dropped arms. Krishna motivated him by his speech later named “Bhagwat Gita” that’s still read and followed. Arjun recovered and decided to fight.
3. Manager must have skills to build Stretegies to achieve Target
Pandavas and Kauravas had soldiers and warriors strength in the ratio of 7:11, Panadvas having 1.53 millions and 2.41 millions. With this count it was clear that the battle could be won only with Effective Strategies. The fact that Pandavas won the battle proves that Krishna was successful not only in buiding stretegies but in implementing them to achieve success.
4. Good Manager must have Leadership Quality
When Krishna asked Arjuna and Duryodhana to choose between him and his army, the choice was, in fact, between a Leader and his Resources. While a Good Leader can gain from limited resources, a Bad Leader will loose even with vast resources. Knowing his excellent Leadership Qualities, Arjuna requested Krishna not only to lead the entire mission but to personally lead him by accepting to be his “Saarthi” (Charioteer), guide him and lead him to success.
5. Manager should be good in Direction and Controlling
Controlling an army of 1.53 million soldiers and warriors to fight against a bigger army was not a easy task. The 1.53 million soldiers were divided in seven divisions, led by a Commander each, further controlled by a Supreme Commander who himself was guided by the Pandavas and Krishna. This all was made possible with with help of Lord Krishna’s great Management ad Controlling Skills. Management Guru Henry Fayol says that without appropriate Role Allocation, no mission can get desired results. Team spirit and appropriate Role Allocation can achieve everything. What was Arjun’s position, what was Bhim’s role? how Dharmaraj Yudhishtir will do his work, all these matters were decided by Lord Krishna.
Agreed that Lord Krishna was ‘God’ and almighty and that he could have done the task himself without involving a single person. But the Battle of Mahabharat had him in a non-combatant role and that the Pandavas won the battle is due to his extra-ordinary Managerial Qualities achieving 100% target. And thus, we can call him the Greatest Manager in the World.
Lord Krishna: The Management Guru
The teachings of Lord Krishna are known all over world, the famous Bhagavad –Gita. Five thousand years back Lord Krishna taught Arjuna self-development which is key to leadership skills. The teachings of the Gita centuries back will be applicable to present day where the knowledge of the individual is powerful. If individual wants he can make or unmake. Many corporate can follow the teaching of the Gita for human resources development of the mangers and workers.
Modern management process and management philosophy can be found in “Sri.Bhagavad Gita” in the dialogue between Lord Krishna and Arjuna. The Mahabharatha war fought on the battlefield of Kurukshetra, Arjuna having seen the array of army of Duryodhana and Pandavas, asks Sri.Krishna to take the chariot and keep it in between the two armies. Arjuna wants to know with whom he has to fight in the battle. Arjuna sees father’s grandsons, maternal uncles, brothers, sons, fathers-in-law and well wishers. After seeing his Kinsmen, Arjuna speaks with grief. and decides not to fight the war.
Lord Krishna started his dialogue with Arjuna; the essence of this management dialogue was divided into eighteen chapters in the Bhagavad-Gita 1.The Despondency of Arjuna.2.The way of discrimination.3.The way of action. 4. The way of knowledge.5.Renunciation of action.6.The way of contemplation.7.The way of knowledge and realisation.8.The way to supreme spirit.9.The way of royal knowledge and royal secret10.Meditation of the divine glories. 11.The vision of the universal form.12.The way of devotion.13.Discrimination between nature and soul14.The separation of three gunas.15.The way to supreme person.16.The distinction between divine and demonical attributes.17.The separation of the three kinds of faith.18.The way of renunciation.
After completing the dialogue. Arjuna says, my delusion is destroyed and I have gained my memory through your (Lord Krishna) teaching, I am ready to fight battle, free from doubt, about my duties will be carried out at your command. This clearly shows the management and development of individual (self) in right direction taught by Lord Krishna to Arjuna which made Arjuna do his duty selflessly by fighting the historic Kurukshetra war and winning the war was his goal.
What do Siemens India Ltd., Silicon Graphics DCM Data Systems, Ambuja Industries and Times of India have in common with Federal Express, American Airlines, New York Times and General Electric Inc. The fact is that all of them have realised the role as well as importance of the individual in human resource development and that self-development is the key to development of organization. The power of individual has been realised since eternity starting with Lord Krishna to present day.
With competition hotting up between the corporate in India and around the world, Human Resources Development (HRD), for achieving a particular task, with an increase emphasis on productivity is becoming vital for corporate in India and abroad.
“We need leadership, not just brains,” says Roderick Wilkinson, Fellow of the Institute of Personal Management, U.K. He goes on to give some examples on what he means by this, “For instance it was in Great Britain that Alexander Fleming who developed Penicillin, but it was business leadership that commercialised in the U.S. It was a Scotsman named Baird, who invented the Television, but it was again the leadership in Italy, U.S.A, Japan and other countries that developed it beyond greater bounds than Britain, found possible. Hence we need to realize that even the best brains need leader who can harness their intellect and channelize it towards the productive results that will benefits us all
The four fundamental functions of management process of modern management are
(1) Planning
(2) Organising
(3) Actuating
(4) controlling
Which were taught by Lord Sri Krishna to Arjuna 5000 years back through the dialogue between Arjuna and Lord Krishna, which became the Gita –The management epic.
Gita teaches the fundamentals about the development of individuals mind, concentration, self control, development of the character, knowledge, virtues, duty, work, action, devotion, leading to liberation. The Gita teaching will help the development of human resources, which is an asset to the organisation. One of the major goals of management is to develop human resources into hard to replace assets of a firm.
As Bill Gates the Microsoft Inc. USA under the series “Ask Bill” said, “People are our most important resource”. Finding great people and keeping them is key to success. When it comes to tracking, turn- over there is two numbers to watch; one is the departure rate, i.e. the percentage of work force that leaves the company in a given year. . The other number is more important, It is known to our Human Resources Development Department as the “attrition rate” the percentage of employees that a company losses although it wants to keep them. Although our rate is low every year we lose people we really want to keep we try to look at every departure and ask why? What motivated that? Should the company has made more attractive to stay? Our company is unusual in that most of employees who are important to us are owners of the company and tend to have made a lot of money through our stock option plan. They tend to have a financial freedom not to work. We have to work particularly hard to make Jobs interesting, because pay cheques are not what motivate many of our best people. Fortunately, smart people like to work with smart people and they like to work on products that have a big impact. But keeping them is an “ongoing challenge”.
Thus Gita-teachings help the all- round development of the human resources to reach the goal of the individuals, enterprises, organisations, Governments and Societies. The teaching of Gita is eternal because it is practiced in the past, present and future for development of the individual, for the development of the moral and happy society.
So follow teachings for individual development.
Modern management process and management philosophy can be found in “Sri.Bhagavad Gita” in the dialogue between Lord Krishna and Arjuna. The Mahabharatha war fought on the battlefield of Kurukshetra, Arjuna having seen the array of army of Duryodhana and Pandavas, asks Sri.Krishna to take the chariot and keep it in between the two armies. Arjuna wants to know with whom he has to fight in the battle. Arjuna sees father’s grandsons, maternal uncles, brothers, sons, fathers-in-law and well wishers. After seeing his Kinsmen, Arjuna speaks with grief. and decides not to fight the war.
Lord Krishna started his dialogue with Arjuna; the essence of this management dialogue was divided into eighteen chapters in the Bhagavad-Gita 1.The Despondency of Arjuna.2.The way of discrimination.3.The way of action. 4. The way of knowledge.5.Renunciation of action.6.The way of contemplation.7.The way of knowledge and realisation.8.The way to supreme spirit.9.The way of royal knowledge and royal secret10.Meditation of the divine glories. 11.The vision of the universal form.12.The way of devotion.13.Discrimination between nature and soul14.The separation of three gunas.15.The way to supreme person.16.The distinction between divine and demonical attributes.17.The separation of the three kinds of faith.18.The way of renunciation.
After completing the dialogue. Arjuna says, my delusion is destroyed and I have gained my memory through your (Lord Krishna) teaching, I am ready to fight battle, free from doubt, about my duties will be carried out at your command. This clearly shows the management and development of individual (self) in right direction taught by Lord Krishna to Arjuna which made Arjuna do his duty selflessly by fighting the historic Kurukshetra war and winning the war was his goal.
What do Siemens India Ltd., Silicon Graphics DCM Data Systems, Ambuja Industries and Times of India have in common with Federal Express, American Airlines, New York Times and General Electric Inc. The fact is that all of them have realised the role as well as importance of the individual in human resource development and that self-development is the key to development of organization. The power of individual has been realised since eternity starting with Lord Krishna to present day.
With competition hotting up between the corporate in India and around the world, Human Resources Development (HRD), for achieving a particular task, with an increase emphasis on productivity is becoming vital for corporate in India and abroad.
“We need leadership, not just brains,” says Roderick Wilkinson, Fellow of the Institute of Personal Management, U.K. He goes on to give some examples on what he means by this, “For instance it was in Great Britain that Alexander Fleming who developed Penicillin, but it was business leadership that commercialised in the U.S. It was a Scotsman named Baird, who invented the Television, but it was again the leadership in Italy, U.S.A, Japan and other countries that developed it beyond greater bounds than Britain, found possible. Hence we need to realize that even the best brains need leader who can harness their intellect and channelize it towards the productive results that will benefits us all
The four fundamental functions of management process of modern management are
(1) Planning
(2) Organising
(3) Actuating
(4) controlling
Which were taught by Lord Sri Krishna to Arjuna 5000 years back through the dialogue between Arjuna and Lord Krishna, which became the Gita –The management epic.
Gita teaches the fundamentals about the development of individuals mind, concentration, self control, development of the character, knowledge, virtues, duty, work, action, devotion, leading to liberation. The Gita teaching will help the development of human resources, which is an asset to the organisation. One of the major goals of management is to develop human resources into hard to replace assets of a firm.
As Bill Gates the Microsoft Inc. USA under the series “Ask Bill” said, “People are our most important resource”. Finding great people and keeping them is key to success. When it comes to tracking, turn- over there is two numbers to watch; one is the departure rate, i.e. the percentage of work force that leaves the company in a given year. . The other number is more important, It is known to our Human Resources Development Department as the “attrition rate” the percentage of employees that a company losses although it wants to keep them. Although our rate is low every year we lose people we really want to keep we try to look at every departure and ask why? What motivated that? Should the company has made more attractive to stay? Our company is unusual in that most of employees who are important to us are owners of the company and tend to have made a lot of money through our stock option plan. They tend to have a financial freedom not to work. We have to work particularly hard to make Jobs interesting, because pay cheques are not what motivate many of our best people. Fortunately, smart people like to work with smart people and they like to work on products that have a big impact. But keeping them is an “ongoing challenge”.
Thus Gita-teachings help the all- round development of the human resources to reach the goal of the individuals, enterprises, organisations, Governments and Societies. The teaching of Gita is eternal because it is practiced in the past, present and future for development of the individual, for the development of the moral and happy society.
So follow teachings for individual development.
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