As a wannabe manger this was always a topic of curiosity to me. Initially I thought that every boss is one and the same and believed that bosses have to be strict, unfriendly and have to carry that extra attitude in office. May be because they want the team members to take him seriously and deliver more during working hours. But I always wondered does that mean that you have to be uncaring towards your employees, speak to them only when you need to boost the productivity or promoting favoritism in the team. At one point I had actually started believing that in corporate may be it is not the human touch that is promoted and more than an employees emotions and feelings it is the productivity and deliverable that count. One part of my sleepy brain accepts it because if we think it in the terms of give and take philosophy then may be it is all right - companies pays us well for the work we do, and work is the only thing they expect from us and vice versa. I always wondered that one day if I would take on my bosses's shoes would I take on the same strategy - productivity is all that matters. No no no….. , I still and will always believe that human are not machines there output is directly related to their thought process and how good they feel about a certain things so there has to be a right mix of professionalism with human touch. How far can we push our body mechanics without reinventing it and with out giving life a new meaning?
This was the one side of the corporate culture that I had noticed. Of course I never liked it and it was a little demoralizing but then my 15 years of "out of home" experience had taught me the ways of picking myself up. I joined swimming and started playing volleyball for my corporate team.
It was here that I met new mangers from the same corporate house and got to see the other side of the story. They were at the same or at a higher level as my current boss but in different teams, but It was a completely different experience with them. They were actually interested in what I was saying. Although they were not my supervisors or had any liability of discussing things other than volleyball with me but they discussed with me my aspirations, about the working culture and even the way individuals irrespective of their positions are suppose to behave in the corporate culture. Indeed they felt the same way like I did - Value human touch. One of them was even the winner of “best boss" category and told me that every boss is unique and handles things differently. On my so many questions he blinked and with a canny smile told me that sometimes it is the matter of finding a "right boss". We both smiled at each other and topic died down but those thoughts have a deeper meaning, you see we can never ignore the luck completely.
It is a simple thing that I learned as a kid in my school. When I joined the boarding school at an age of 12 years we all were ragged and bullied by our seniors. It was all fun and masti but yes at times knowingly or unknowingly we were pushed to extremes. We all felt bad and were angry about the way certain things went and each time we were ragged and taken to extremes we made some perceptions in our young minds about the outside un-protective world and since then knew how we would treat our juniors. Will we defend them from such extremes or will we show them the new extremes????? And indeed three classes of seniors emerged:
One who pushed the juniors to new extremes.
Second who went up against their own friends to stop this.
Third who either enjoyed or were confused which way to go.
Obviously this is how nature maintains the perfect balance. So now when I am grown up and working among the most learned individuals, I still see these 3 classes existing. Wow that is my discovery of the day!
Now I know why the work experience was so important before going for an MBA. My corporate has been one of the great learning experiences because with a bad experience you know what you do not want to do next time you take on the same job.
