Reuters photo

By

Siddhartha Rastogi

The phenomenon of the West has bitten the East. You can blame digitization, quarterly pressure to deliver numbers on the street, new CEOs’ greed or changing global relationships amongst countries.

Some headlines which have been making a mark in recent times:

Digital push sees HDFC Bank record highest-ever staff cull in a quarter

The bank’s staff strength has fallen by 6,096 or 7 percent to 84,325 in the quarter ended March 2017 from 90,421 in December 2016.

Trump effect? Infosys to lay off 2,000 employees, says firings an annual process

Verizon expected to cut 2,100 jobs at Yahoo and AOL after merger closes

The world is changing at a faster pace than one can think of, but the perception, behavior, instincts and nature of humans have and will remain unchanged for centuries.

We humans perform the best under safety and freedom and we humans tend to save and protect fellow beings, who we think are loyal to us or will stand by us when bad times will embark or people whom we are fond of.

When a human meets another human, he or she essentially can only have four feelings:

1. Friend
2. Foe
3. Stranger / Indifference
4. Mating / Carrying for offspring

In the corporate world, work space is shrinking, joint activities and collaborative action common. Under such a scenario, employee, whether it’s peer to peer, or senior to subordinate, interactions is bound to increase. As these interactions increase, so does the judgment and formation of perception. Once this perception is formed, it is difficult to change irrespective of the work one does until the other person is methodically working towards changing it, which happens rarely.

Then one fine day, a catastrophe hits the organization which can be a merger, an acquisition, corporate fraud, major global downturn, regulatory change or notification which makes the company redundant, etc.

It can be anything, it doesn’t matter but the outcome is straightforward. Save costs through job cuts and layoffs.

Who goes first and who stays till the end.

Obviously management states that layoffs are routine and poor performing employees are asked to leave. Sometimes management gives innovative excuse like these employees are not open to change. Even more hilarious ones include that guys with particular skill sets are not needed any more and these people cannot learn or adopt new changes.

All these are just reasons like a smoke screen which is far far away from reality.

Why do I say so?

Let me explain it by using an example. You are in the middle of the sea and your boat is caught in the storm, who will you look to for support? The guy who knows swimming right? But, fellows in the management are saying that skills which were relevant for 3 -5 years have all of a sudden become redundant with no scope of these guys learning the new skill.

Surprising! Isn’t it?

Also imagine if the swimmer is the person whom you hate most as you have fought with him in the past and you know for sure that he will take revenge. In such a scenario, what is the probability of you letting him go off the boat if the chance comes? Very likely, for sure.

Exactly the same thing happens in the corporate world and real life. You burn bridges to boost your ego and when the wrong time descends upon you, the person pulls out the anchor allowing you to drown, portraying a straight face that the person never knew how to swim.

The bigger question is how to get along with people in a corporate setting where the power center swings much faster than the director of the breeze.

I will cover that in my next note on how to get along effortlessly in a corporate setting.

Till then, remember to make friends and not foes as you never know who you need to walk over making a bridge when the storm strikes the road.

Siddhartha Rastogi

Siddhartha was born to a learned middle class educated family in Semi Urban India. His father was an extremely honest man who because of his honesty had to pay the price in corporate world. Mother is a determined woman who ensured that children are being well taken care off. After a few years of birth, doctors called Siddhartha, a slow child having flat foot. He would fall more than he could walk. Determined mother ensured all therapies for her son to come out strong to fight the world. Siddhartha joined swimming when he was in 6th standard. Seeing other children of his class, he jumped in 10 feet deep pool and learnt swimming on his own, the very same day.

From that day there was no looking back. He topped his city in 12th and went to score highest in his B school exams. During his profession as banker, he became youngest branch manager of a MNC bank managing their biggest wealth branch in the country. There he found love of his life and got married. His love of his life emerged in the form of his daughter who completely changed him for good.

Siddhartha Rastogi is Director for a boutique Investment bank in India.

Siddhartha is a forward looking thinker & writer who has written a book on decision making. 8 Simple steps to effective decision making.

He writes on various social and current issues via his blog and can also be found on twitter.