An Experience!

A few days ago an erstwhile colleague of mine (from my shipping days) called me up with anxiety loaded in his voice. He was distraught. His daughter had been selected, from campus, by one of India’s iconic IT firms with its HQ in Bangalore. The issue being that his daughter had received an offer letter from the organization’s HR (E-Mail) with another new joiner’s name on the offer letter. Considering that my friend has little idea of the IT industry or Bangalore, the anxiety was justified. Since I lived in Bangalore he inquired if I could assist?

I called up another friend of mine who holds a very senior position in the said organization and posed the problem to him. In turn he put me across to HR, all in quick succession. To cut a long story short, the right offer letter was rolled out shortly and the HR got back to me , saying that there was ‘systems error’ and that they felt obliged that I had brought this issue to their attention.

I was pleased that the issue had been sorted out. The following morning as I stepped out of my home for my morning stroll, I bumped into this friend who holds a senior position. My friend inquired if the issue had been sorted out and as I nodded in the affirmative, he apologized for the mess up. I politely told him that he had nothing to apologize about, to which he simply said “It’s my company.”

I teach Organization Behavior and ‘am well aware of the concepts therein, but have rarely seen them followed. Taking ownership of your organization calls for a superbly well-established organization culture, where every employee has that sense of belonging and pride in his/her organisation. They value the organization as a whole. Individual commitment to a group effort is what makes an organization work and Organization Commitment Behavior is that behaviour displayed, which is not called for by his or her Job Description. 

It is discretionary behaviour which emanates from a deep seated and well established value system which has a strong organizational culture as its bedrock. 

"I continued on my way with a spring in my step and with a belief that what I taught made sense to some people after all!