Freedom at Work !

Some of my MBA (HR) students are offered an internship in ‘Policy Making & Administration’. They look a little puzzled. Isn’t Human Resource Management all about Performance Appraisal, Compensation and T & D. Where did policy making come into the picture?
HR Policy making is one of the toughest areas to be in these days, particularly when dealing with white collar knowledge workers and highly unionized blue collar labor. It becomes particularly important when employees are ready to take employers to court at the drop of a hat.
Look at this story!
Walt Disney Co. is locked in a big ticket fracas with an employee who claims the entertainment behemoth is restricting her right to practice her religion at the workplace and in that sense restricting her freedom.
Imane Boudlal, 26, a hostess at the Storyteller’s Cafe in Disneyland’s Grand Californian Hotel & Spa, claims that her employers are discriminating against her by forbidding her to wear the head scarf that her Muslim faith requires her to don.
Interestingly, Boudlal made this request after two years of working with Disney and adhering to Disney’s dress code. She says that a religious awakening has caused her to make the request. Disney for its part, first offered to modify the employee’s costume to incorporate the hijab and further to shift her back office. Boudlal has rejected these offers.
The case raises the question: What is an employer’s obligation to support its employees’ desire to express their religious beliefs through dress and physical appearance?

Disney is clearly caught between a rock and a hard place on this one, but have decided to fight it out to preserve, what they say is the Disney culture and costume.
The case is interesting because it deals with freedom of expression on one hand and an employer’s right to conduct business in a way that they see fit, as long as it is legal and ethical. Factors that conjure up a potent mix, when it gets to court and also the decision would have long standing implications.
Disney’s policies are well thought out and articulated and they are confident of winning the day…………………………having said that HR policy making is a tough nut!

On dogs and competition!

On my morning walk today, sensing the coolness of the air and twirling my baton, I marveled at how fortunate I was to live in a part of Bengaluru, surrounded by trees. The sense of well being was heightened when joined by an acquaintance with his dog on a leash. We got talking about our respective families and why we had chosen to live in 'an out of the way place'?
Well, the reason for him was that he wanted his kids to study in the 'Valley School', which is a stone’s throw away from us and a well talked about school, particularly for returning exapatriates. Knowing the answer I asked him -'Why Valley School?'He said that it kids are kept away from the mundane competition that kids in other schools face.
Which brings us to the fundamental question, is competition bad? Why does one Sachin Tendulkar, still run around a cricket field, in a creaking body, thrilling us with his genius? Why does, an all time great like Rahul Dravid, have to be advised by a bowler like Shane Warne, on his batting ( He took it in quietly )?Does Bill Gates work for the money? Behind a calm facade, the guys are competitors and will compete with you to the death, if you throw them a challenge! The world celebrates these guys.
Which brings us back to the point, as to whether competition is bad? The fact is, in my opinion, we should be teaching kids to deal with success and failure in life with equinanimity and grace, because the world is neither a fair place nor life one rollicking party! Shying away from competition is like sending our soldiers to fight at Siachen in sneakers. Ill equipped the battle is lost even before it begins.
Australian Keli Lane, a golden girl who was a water polo star was recently convicted in a court room filled with drama, of murdering her baby daughter in 1996, because, she feared that the young kid would jeopardize her chances in the 2000 Sydney Olympics! She has been jailed for 18 years!Can you think of anything more horrendous? Did her competitive spirit lead her to murder or was it a lack of values?Was it poor upbringing? As collective Australia, scratches its head, one can only wonder.
As our conversation was warming up, we were surrounded, by a bevy of dogs, in all shapes and sizes, threatening the little dog on the leash, causing us to beat a hasty retreat.The little dog, did not attempt, to show aggression even once. Not very competitive...............
Street dogs are not something we can talk about with pride in Bengaluru, I reflected!

A word, here and there!

A few years ago, I chanced upon a conversation, between the Port Control of a major port in India and an American ship. The ship was to enter port and was being delayed due to various reasons. Personnel at Indian Port Control's can be obtuse and painful, and the American ships captain was clearly getting peeved. After a point there was a change in the tone of the captain and he refused to be put off until he received absolute confirmation of his docking, from the Port Control. In contrast Indian ship captains allow themselves to be routinely bullied by the Port Control.
Why does this happen? There is a fairly simple cultural explanation. Americans are a more egalitarian society and 'Power Distance' is low. In India PD is high and as we perceive the Port Control to be in a superior position, Indian ship captains are deferential, to the point of accepting a lot of BS!We are simply afraid to speak up!
Look at the following:
Avianca Flight 52 was a regularly scheduled flight from Bogotá to New York, USA. On Thursday, January 25, 1990, the aircraft performing this flight, a Boeing 707, crashed into the village of Cove Neck, Long Island, New York after running out of fuel. Eight of the nine crew members and 65 of the 149 passengers on board were killed. Investigation showed that the crew asked for a "priority" landing which, because of language differences between English and Spanish, can be interpreted as an emergency to Spanish-speaking pilots but not to English-speaking air traffic controllers. This may have caused some confusion amongst the pilots when ATC confirmed their priority status.
It is also a fact that Columbia is a high Power Distance country (See the comparison US to Columbia) and the pilot was deferential to the Air Traffic Control at New York’s, John F Kennedy airport, whose manner was blunt and aggressive. They do not understand high context niceties.
The Columbian captain could have used the words 'Emergency' or 'Mayday' and been assertive with Air Control at JFK. All he had to say was “Chum, I’m out of fuel, the plane is going to crash & I need to land now!”
Many of his passengers would have lived, with those magic few words, but then there is culture, to contend with!
(see link)

Distant Echoes

The perils of International Business are many. A case I discuss in class deals with a Capt.Rinen and his ship the Tampa, where the good and conscientious Captain picked up a clutch of Afghan refugees off the Christmas Is.
The refugees insisted on being landed in Australia, for what they thought would be a better life. The Australian government had other ideas and it turned into a huge international incident causing much heartburn in
Australia, Norway (the ship was Norwegian), Afghanistan & Indonesia.
There is yet another recent incident involving Norway again.
An estimated 30,000 Norwegians seeking justice for the rape and murder of student Martine Vik Magnussen in London three years ago have launched a boycott against Coca-Cola products. They’re protesting Coca-Cola’s business ties with the wealthy father of her suspected murderer, who has eluded arrest by British police.

The girl was a regular fun loving youngster, who is said to have had her fair share of alcohol and drugs, tragically suspected to be butchered by her Yemenese boyfriend, who fled Britain for Yemen, post the murder, in 2008, after a night long party.
Now here comes the rub. The boyfriend’s dad is a billionaire who runs the distribution for Coca Cola in Yemen, Egypt and Libya and has ties with Xerox and Daimler Benz. Pressure built in Norway and then threatened to spread to the rest of the western world against doing business with the allegedly tainted Arab family, as they refuse to extradite the suspect to Britain.
A few days ago, finally, Coco Cola severed ties with Shaher Abdulhak the alleged suspect’s millionaire father three years after Martine was raped and murdered. The point is an event in London, involving a Norwegian miss and an Arab youth has implications across several nations and lead to business realignment.
Shaher Abdulhak lobbied hard with politicians in Norway and Yemen. He threatened to sue politicians in Norway, as well, but public pressure was a little too strong. Business, politics and ethics are all wonderfully juxtaposed as this case shows you and when it goes international the going gets complicated.
Interestingly the campaign to preesure the soft drink giant was run on Facebook. Social Networking and technology. A modern day panacea for an age old crime!
Will the dead girl get justice? Martine's family belives she will and the struggle to get the young suspect to Britian to stand trial continues.

Human Touch !: Mastering luck!

Human Touch !: Mastering luck!

Mastering luck!

The Times of India, created a virtual storm, by stating that MS Dhoni had blundered into the finals by not playing R.Ashwin, on what was a slow turning track at Mohali, in the World Cup Semi final between India & Pakistan.
MSD was smart enough to take cover by saying, in a post match interview, that he had misread the wicket, but hadn't Ashish Nehra bowled brilliantly. The general hoi polloi tore TOI to pieces, calling the reporter a nitwit, a scumbag and various other names, including his competence to comment on the issue.
I wonder why? Because, India had beaten Pakistan? I find the logic strange. It is Dhoni's business to read wickets correctly and make tactical decesions.Dhoni has admitted that he erred and I hope he does not err in future because against a more determined and focussed opponent it would spell curtains for the Indian team. At Mohali it was Pakistan's incompetence rather than anything else that got India victory. Imran Khan says that his team’s loss to the west Indies in 1983 in the SF in England rankles less than the Pakistan loss to India at Mohali a couple of days ago. Why, because in 1983 the Pakistani's were baeten by a far superior team, at Mohali they committed hara kiri.
Dhoni is a wonderful and regular guy. No questions there. Is he the best captain that we have seen? I reserve my comments. Dhoni leads a team built by Ganguly & Dravid and tended in a crucible of fire called Australia by a certain Anil Kumble. Dhoni's test will come, when the likes of Sachin, Dravid,Lakshman, Zaheer and Sehwag move out of the Indian team. The day is not far.
Many say Dhoni is a lucky captain.
Napoleon, the French Emperor and military genius, when told the virtues of a new General, eg. the man's heroism, bravery, skill in battle and so on - waved his hand impatiently. "That's all very well," he said, "but is he lucky?"

In the present euphoria you might replace Napoleon with the Indian public. Napoleon’s luck finally ran out at the famous Battle of Waterloo, where the French were decimated by by a combined Anglo allied army lead by the Duke of Wellington. That is the issue with luck. It deserts one at the most inappropriate of times and history changes for ever.
I hope Dhoni's luck holds, because he will need a lot of it, unless his decision making is sounder and his team's cricketing skills better!

Grist to the Mill!

A few days ago, in discussion with a visitor to the Alliance University, the topic of training for Cross Cultural Management came up. The visitor a man from the corporate world said that many of these training sessions are a hoax because the trainer has rarely if at all travelled to the countries he/she talks about and the end result is that when the trainee really travels overseas they find themselves shortchanged and wanting to strangle the trainer!
Following this, I said, that we are probably the only nation in the world whose history has been written by foreigners and in that context we as a nation have been shortchanged.Our discussion was short and a little vague, but this is what was in my mind........................
John Mills produced his magnum opus 'The History of British India', in 1801, which propelled him to stardom, post a very ordinary career. Mills made his name by severely attacking Indian's in general and talking about their general lack of culture and 'backwardness'.

This is what Mills had to say, on the subject:

A duly qualified man can obtain more knowledge of India in one year in his closet in England than he could obtain during the course of the longest life, by the use of his eyes and ears in India.

If you are wondering what a 'closet' is, Mills, is talking about his toilet in England. The further question is why did Mills, make this statement? Was it to cover up the fact that he did not visit, India, once, or the fact that he knew no Indian language, unlike say the German 'Max Mueller'. The greater tragedy is that, the tome he produced was embraced by the British East India Company and used as a training manual for their India postings, causing their officers to set foot in India with a jaundiced eye.

Mills, for some reason, concludes that Indian history began in 4000 BC, so everything pertaining to Indian history has to be accommodated in this time frame. If archeo-astronomical data seems to indicate, that the Ramayana dates to 7000 BC, Mills will not accept it and it is labelled a 'myth' because it does not fit his straight jacketed model of India and Indians. The myth story, has perpetuated to our times because Mills, said, in 1801, that Indian's are a backward lot and the British were here to civilize Indian's.

A nation's self esteem comes from its history and achievement and it is interesting to see that Mills had not a single nice thing to say about India? Was he the head of a 'propaganda' machine working for the East India Company? If so, he did a great job, but if he was masquerading as a historian, his tome should have been consigned to the waste paper basket a couple of centuries ago, beacuse as far as I'm concerned you should have been there and done that, before talking!

Loose Cannons!

A week ago the Indian Navy, struck a body blow for shipping, world wide, by sinking a pirate vessel in the Gulf of Aden and capturing the fleeing pirates.With this amazing operation the Indian Navy has clearly established its reach & prowess.
For me it was a redemption of sorts seeing the INS Khukhri being part of the operation, because in 1971, the INS Khukhri was a ship the Indian Navy lost to the Pakistan Navy, in a sea battle.
In a move to take on piracy, our Defense minister is toying with the idea of having 'Sea Marshals' or armed security men on board, merchant ships to protect them.The issue is, ships unlike organizations cannot have 'matrix organizations', where the reporting structure is loose and not clearly established. The point is, will the 'sea marshal' work under the command of the ships captain or will he/she operate as an independent entity answering only to his/her call? On board an Indian ship the authority of the captain is supreme and is established by the Constitution of India ( Merchant Shipping Act 1958 ). This debate has been raging in western Europe and the USA for a while now and no answer has been found.No ships captain would like to see a loose cannon running around his ship.
Another idea is to have a 'fortified' area on board, where crew can secure themselves under attack from pirates and wait to be rescued by a rescue force. Assume this scenario played out on a crude oil carrier with 100000 Tons of crude oil? What would prevent the pirates from blowing up this floating bomb, before the rescue force arrived?
While the Defense Minister's zest is commendable, his lack of domain knowledge is painfully evident and eventually like all conflicts the solution to this vexed problem as well, will have to be found by diplomats on land rather than by guns at sea!

Choices we make...............................

Every time I watch Fredrick Forsyths classic 'The Day of the Jackal' there is a nuance of life that I see, afresh.
To fill you in, the story is about, France in the 1960's, having about lost its last colony in Africa ( Algeria ). The architect of this surrender is their president and WW 2 hero General Charles De Gaulle. A miffed group of army personnel feeling betrayed decide to bump off the president and so hire the 'Jackal' a shadowy Englishman to do the job. Now begins the cat & mouse game, between the French police & Jackal.
The defining moment for me in this superb thriller, is the point where the Jackal gets to hear that the police are on his trail and as per the terms of his contract can ditch the assignment. As he waits, in his 'Alfa Romeo', at a fork in the road one taking him to Paris and the other on to Italy, he you can see his mind ruminating over the choice that he is to make. Flee to safety in Italy or press on to Paris? Take up the challenge and kill De Gaulle or choose safety and admit failure?
The Jackal, chooses the challenge, drives on to Paris, fails to kill De Gaulle and is shot, to be buried in an unmarked grave by the wayside..............Had he fled? Did his arrogance get in the way of his judgement?
He made a choice and paid the price. Fleeing to Italy would have been a different price to pay, maybe being caught at the border and jailed, for life.
Choices in life are killers, you pay a price, for every choice you make, one way or the other and ergo there are no absolutely rights or wrong choices. There is that element of grey in an inelegant world, which creates success and failure, opportunity and threat.

Like Charles De Gaulle would have said:

Faced with crisis, the man of character falls back on himself. He imposes his own stamp of action, takes responsibility for it, makes it his own.

What he did not say, was the price that you pay!

Mad Monkeys and Dictators!

The freshly minted Indian parliament saw a strange language being spoken. Hitherto the only other tongues heard there were Hindi, English & Hindustani.Curious parliamentarians were told that this language was Kannada and spoken in what was called Mysore. The gentleman who spoke this language further made a strange request, he said that the President of India should alter between the north & south!
The same year, a north Indian city saw a strange problem. A rabid monkey was at war with mankind and had bitten about a hundred people. The monkey could not be put down, because in this land, for Hindus, the monkey embodies the God 'Hanuman'. The Prime Minister of India shot off a furious letter to the Chief Minister, asking if he planned to hand over the city and eventually the state to monkeys? Sanity was restored and the mad monkey met its end, whatever its standing might have been.
The year I'm alluding to is 1950! One can see the attempt at inclusiveness and rationality, since which we ( India ) have bungled along, from one crisis to another, even while saying that we are growing to be an economic power.The inclusiveness that the gent from Mysore proposed has all but disappeared even as the disparity between the rich & poor widens and rationality went out of the window with the Babri Masjid & the burning of passengers at Godhra, in Gujarat.
Greater wealth has brought about a strange myopia and lassitude in handling issues which require urgent attention. The politician in India as well as the general well heeled population feel that we will not have an Egypt like uprising here because we go to the polls every five years and elect a motley crew of politicians, to run our ship. Absolute hogwash! The Indian poor is a patient animal but one can feel that patience running thin and when it eventually wears, it is going to be a day of reckoning for many.Unfortunately these kind of revolutions are rarely directed and have tragic consequences for the innocent as well.
Has the Libyan dictator Col.Gaddafi met his end? Amidst increasing chaos the dictator says his people love him? Do they, after 200 or more protesters have been killed and exapts of all hues flee Libya? Shades of a mad monkey?