A friend of mine has been having a problem with her driver. This is interesting to me only because I'm reading "The Ethnic Theory of Plane Crashes," in Gladwell's Outliers. This chapter is so interesting, so apt and so necessary that I wish I could reproduce the entire thing here - as a public service. But go read it yourselves.
Anyway, my friend is a 26-year-old American woman. Her driver is a 50-year-old Indian man, married with kids. You'd think the difference in their gender or age would be the issue - India famously elevates men above women and the old above the young - but it's not.
Here's the situation: my friend works 12- to 17-hour days, then goes out with friends for dinner. After work, she'll often ask her driver if he's tired and wants the rest of the night off. Without fail, he'll refuse. But during the day, when she goes into an appointment that'll last an hour or two, he'll take her car and sneak off - he says to his house - or to run random errands. He won't tell her that's what he's doing, and on the occasions she's caught him she's been furious.
There are several problems here, but I'm interested in differences in culture.
Let me give another example.
I had been working in India for six weeks when I realized that I was the only person in our office who didn't call our boss "Sir." At the time, I was the youngest and newest member in our bureau. Our boss was the second-youngest and second-newest. People older than him were calling him "Sir."
Americans who sat in on some of our meetings might have been baffled at the amount of "sir"-ing and agreeing with the boss that went on. I know I was.
In a moment, though, we come to the root of the Indian-American cultural clash in the workplace. Indians come from a culture of consensus where hierarchy is sacrosanct. My friend expects her driver to address her as an equal. We're Americans - it's a culture where a barista will dress down a businessman without worrying much about it. In India, nobody is anyone's equal. Before speaking to his/her boss, a subordinate will ask herself not "what do I want to convey" but "where does this person fall on the hierarchy?"
A subordinate will never question a boss' decision in public. Often not even in private. A subordinate will never assert his/her opinion. She'll never use language like "we have to do x." She'll never even say "x might be a good option." If she messes something up, she will never admit it to her boss, instead she'll privately agonize over it, try to fix it and distance herself from it when the shit inevitably hits the fan.
In a somewhat morbid essay on Delhi's rampant consumerism, Rana Dasgupta interviews a psychologist who refers to Indians as "a damaged race" because of their colonial legacy. Dasgupta brings out a valid point, but not in the way he intended. Of course, the United States was also once a colony, but the colonists stayed and founded their own nation, so culturally it doesn't compare with the colonial legacy left behind in other parts of the world. The British saw Indians as less than human, unworthy of being listened to. The Indian frenzy for foreign and particularly British education several years ago was really a result of the desire to have a voice - to feel like you deserved to be heard. But the end result was to continue "invalidating" Indian-ness. People with certain accents, certain mannerisms. Today, foreign-returned Indians look down on traits that - whether they admit it or not - are inherently Indian.
There is nothing more Indian than a fear of authority. Whether this originated in the British time or was merely encouraged by it, I can't say. The British were also not the first invaders to move through India. India has probably been conquered and subjected more than most nations, perhaps the result of that has been a wary attitude towards figures of power. The other result, of course, is a rigidly hierarchical society.
But to return to the driver, my former boss and the fictional subordinate. What are the consequences of this Indian approach in the modern workplace?
I'd argue that the effects are pernicious. MUCH of the inefficiency and even corruption in modern India is the direct result of the untouchability of the upper classes. When a subordinate calls her boss by name, she does something far more subtle: she sets them on an even footing. She asserts her right to hold him to account.
In India, nobody holds the highest figures of authority to account - not truly, not on a widespread scale. Not in the workplace, either. Because subordinates - who are often in a better position to observe problems as they occur - prefer to keep their silence, problems snowball from minor inconveniences into massive headaches. Organizations regularly shut down because of errors that could have been fixed painlessly if someone had just spoken up sooner.
What's the solution? A culture of equality has to start at the top, obviously, counter-intuitive as that may seem. People have to call each other by their first names. They have to be encouraged to politely point out mistakes, even to superiors. They have to know that if something goes wrong, they'll be praised for finding a solution rather than criticized for a mistake that might not even have been their fault. They have to feel like they can assert their right to a quality of life - take the time off that they need in order to be at their best.
A few months ago, the famous Indian business tycoon Ratan Tata ignired a firestorm when he told some British businessmen that the British have no work ethic, compared to Indians. Indians, Tata, bragged, would work all hours of the day or night. Meanwhile, he said, if you walked into a British office after 5 pm on a Friday, the place would be empty.
Unlike Tata, I'm not sure this is something to brag about. Just going by GDP, the average British worker is far more productive than the average Indian worker. I don't think that Indians work obscenely long hours because they have so much life-changing work to do. I think they do it for the same reason that my friend's driver does it - because they're afraid of saying no to the boss, or being absent when he calls upon them.
Anyway, my friend is a 26-year-old American woman. Her driver is a 50-year-old Indian man, married with kids. You'd think the difference in their gender or age would be the issue - India famously elevates men above women and the old above the young - but it's not.
Here's the situation: my friend works 12- to 17-hour days, then goes out with friends for dinner. After work, she'll often ask her driver if he's tired and wants the rest of the night off. Without fail, he'll refuse. But during the day, when she goes into an appointment that'll last an hour or two, he'll take her car and sneak off - he says to his house - or to run random errands. He won't tell her that's what he's doing, and on the occasions she's caught him she's been furious.
There are several problems here, but I'm interested in differences in culture.
Let me give another example.
I had been working in India for six weeks when I realized that I was the only person in our office who didn't call our boss "Sir." At the time, I was the youngest and newest member in our bureau. Our boss was the second-youngest and second-newest. People older than him were calling him "Sir."
Americans who sat in on some of our meetings might have been baffled at the amount of "sir"-ing and agreeing with the boss that went on. I know I was.
In a moment, though, we come to the root of the Indian-American cultural clash in the workplace. Indians come from a culture of consensus where hierarchy is sacrosanct. My friend expects her driver to address her as an equal. We're Americans - it's a culture where a barista will dress down a businessman without worrying much about it. In India, nobody is anyone's equal. Before speaking to his/her boss, a subordinate will ask herself not "what do I want to convey" but "where does this person fall on the hierarchy?"
A subordinate will never question a boss' decision in public. Often not even in private. A subordinate will never assert his/her opinion. She'll never use language like "we have to do x." She'll never even say "x might be a good option." If she messes something up, she will never admit it to her boss, instead she'll privately agonize over it, try to fix it and distance herself from it when the shit inevitably hits the fan.
In a somewhat morbid essay on Delhi's rampant consumerism, Rana Dasgupta interviews a psychologist who refers to Indians as "a damaged race" because of their colonial legacy. Dasgupta brings out a valid point, but not in the way he intended. Of course, the United States was also once a colony, but the colonists stayed and founded their own nation, so culturally it doesn't compare with the colonial legacy left behind in other parts of the world. The British saw Indians as less than human, unworthy of being listened to. The Indian frenzy for foreign and particularly British education several years ago was really a result of the desire to have a voice - to feel like you deserved to be heard. But the end result was to continue "invalidating" Indian-ness. People with certain accents, certain mannerisms. Today, foreign-returned Indians look down on traits that - whether they admit it or not - are inherently Indian.
There is nothing more Indian than a fear of authority. Whether this originated in the British time or was merely encouraged by it, I can't say. The British were also not the first invaders to move through India. India has probably been conquered and subjected more than most nations, perhaps the result of that has been a wary attitude towards figures of power. The other result, of course, is a rigidly hierarchical society.
But to return to the driver, my former boss and the fictional subordinate. What are the consequences of this Indian approach in the modern workplace?
I'd argue that the effects are pernicious. MUCH of the inefficiency and even corruption in modern India is the direct result of the untouchability of the upper classes. When a subordinate calls her boss by name, she does something far more subtle: she sets them on an even footing. She asserts her right to hold him to account.
In India, nobody holds the highest figures of authority to account - not truly, not on a widespread scale. Not in the workplace, either. Because subordinates - who are often in a better position to observe problems as they occur - prefer to keep their silence, problems snowball from minor inconveniences into massive headaches. Organizations regularly shut down because of errors that could have been fixed painlessly if someone had just spoken up sooner.
What's the solution? A culture of equality has to start at the top, obviously, counter-intuitive as that may seem. People have to call each other by their first names. They have to be encouraged to politely point out mistakes, even to superiors. They have to know that if something goes wrong, they'll be praised for finding a solution rather than criticized for a mistake that might not even have been their fault. They have to feel like they can assert their right to a quality of life - take the time off that they need in order to be at their best.
A few months ago, the famous Indian business tycoon Ratan Tata ignired a firestorm when he told some British businessmen that the British have no work ethic, compared to Indians. Indians, Tata, bragged, would work all hours of the day or night. Meanwhile, he said, if you walked into a British office after 5 pm on a Friday, the place would be empty.
Unlike Tata, I'm not sure this is something to brag about. Just going by GDP, the average British worker is far more productive than the average Indian worker. I don't think that Indians work obscenely long hours because they have so much life-changing work to do. I think they do it for the same reason that my friend's driver does it - because they're afraid of saying no to the boss, or being absent when he calls upon them.
No comments:
Post a Comment