Of Hard Work and Mules

THE CONSTANT DEBATE in India today is whether people need to work long hours. Not one worthy has ever discussed the aspect about working smart. Not one of these corporate honchos who lead privileged lives has ever spoken about the need for us to be innovators, for us to be people who imagine a new world. None of this has happened. The debate is seized around the old concept of Indian societal evolution, which is mired in the fact that unless people work hard, they won’t succeed.

The question that needs to be asked is: What has hard work actually done for India? We keep saying we are a very hardworking country, our people work tirelessly, and yet we bemoan the fact that we are not amongst the world’s finest innovators. We are today proud of the fact that we have 120 unicorns. We have nothing to take home in terms of manufacturing excellence, something that we have, or could have, adopted. So the question that I keep asking people who are in this game of engagement, qua the number of hours people need to work is: How much has hard work resulted in? What is the quantum of so-called hard work? And how do you define hard work?

I have always believed that the reason man is a different mammal from the rest is that man is able to determine smarter ways of solving problems. That is the initial step. Next, we create through lateral thinking devices that are both innovative and imaginative, and that can actually help humanity. Steve Jobs may have worked 18 hours a day, but that was smart working. No one said Steve Jobs became who he was because he worked 18 hours. So does the petrol pump attendant, so does a security guard, and I’m not diminishing the value that either of these professions brings to society. But the fact is that hard work per se doesn’t get us anywhere. We have been a nation of toilers forever. We have sunk pens of people who have worked under kerosene lamps and under public lights. But what has that resulted in? How much has it actually helped India come to the high table of economic prowess across the world?

The imagination with which some of our corporate leaders today are talking is sad. It is almost pernicious because they seem to suggest that by punishing people into work, you will create a great company. Great companies are created by people who work smart. That’s the definition of great companies. Great companies are those where people are happy. You cannot be happy whether you stare at your wife or not if you are working 90 hours a week. It is slavish to say the least.

I was on a television panel discussion where a professor suggested that people who are in the Army work seven days a week and they don’t get a day off. The comparisons themselves are odious. We are not comparing security establishments, paramilitary forces to people who are doing a so-called nine-to-five, or in this case, nine-to-infinity jobs. Therefore, we need to recognise that if we have to create rounded citizens, if we must create a society which is harmonious and happy, that society must be allowed to live a life beyond its offices and factories and work. The tragedy in India is that, because so much of onus was laid on hard work, people have no hobbies, which is why Indians only work. The tragedy is that most of them don’t want to see a play. They are not interested in music. They are not even interested in their own civilisation and legacy. Even when they travel, the only work they do is walk to a mall and back. You will never see them, or most of them, at museums or art galleries or appreciating how the world has come to be, whether in its art forms, whether in its creative expressions. That is why hard work per se, as a phrase itself, is dangerous. It almost insulates human beings from having hobbies that are not only worthwhile but embellish and add value to them.

Any society which sacrifices liberal thinking and the liberal arts at the altar of this so-called hard work will become a cookie-cutter society, which sadly is what most of India has become. We don’t have many interests. If you tell someone that, oh, you are taking time off to rehearse for a play, they will say, oh, you have got a great life, almost suggesting that you do no hard work.

I, for one, have never worked hard in my life, and I wear it as a badge of honour. Being a good Punjabi, but born in Bengal, I have always, every day of my life, taken an afternoon siesta, because I think that’s very important for me to rejuvenate. That’s my call. I cannot be told that I must sacrifice everything that interests me and only work and work and work. To what end? Then there is the question of the median salary versus the average salary, or the salary that CEOs get. Now, if you see how India and Indians are behaving, you will observe that there is a situation where corporate chairmen and CEOs get salaries which are 7,000 to 8,000 times what the lowest-level employee is getting in that company. So it is very easy for a chairman to say oh, I would like people to come and work 90 hours. I would like them to come and work on Sundays. That bloke doesn’t realise that people do not have the benefit of domestic help like he does. People have to do basic chores like laundry and cooking. There are people living in homes populated by a larger extended family. That needs succour, that needs maintenance, that needs help. Not like the corporate chairman who has a private jet. These people are relying on local transport. Local transport over the weekends is in a miserable state because people are out.

You cannot allow your company’s interests to be always over and above the interests of your employees because then you are creating an unhappy company. People don’t want to be unhappy and be productive. It’s an oxymoron. You cannot be unhappy and yet be productive. You cannot be unhappy and then believe that you are doing a great job. And all this bunkum about national service and building India is rubbish. No one thinks of the country first, no one. It’s fashionable to say they do, but they all think about themselves first. Then they think about their family, their community, their societies, and then the country. So I would imagine a more reasoned debate would be: What is the quality of work we are doing in India today? Across sectors, tiers, and levels? And then we should decide what kind of country we want to be. Do we want a robotic, manacled country which goes to work every morning and then has no finite time to return? Or do we want a country where people can actually enjoy the lives they lead, no matter what station of life and income levels they are?

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