Who do they work for ?

Ms. Madhuri Gupta the 53 year old member of the Indian IFS - Indian Foreign Service was recently arrested for allegedlly spying and providing information to Pakistan. Most Indians were aghast,and wondered how she could she have indulged in unpatriotic activities.

Ms. Madhuri claims that she did not receive any financial benefit but did it only to take revenge against her bosses in the IFS, who treated her badly.

This raises several big questions ;

1. What do we Indians understand and believe is India ?
2. What is patriotism in today's world.?
3. Who do people work for?

Here are some thoughts on the last point.

• Try to meet your elected representive in Government. Is he even approachable?
• Visit a government office, do they appear to be the servants of the citizens?
• What about many organisations, do they exist for the customer?
• Look at employees, how often do they work for their organisation?
  Legally and technically these people work for their organisation and stakeholders, but in reality they work for their superiors within the organisation i.e. people, within thier organisations.
  
  Ms. Gupta appears to be prima facie unpatriotic, but she claims she bears no ill will against her country but her damaging actions arise from her ire against her bosses and the system. Research has repeatedly shown that nearly 73% of poor morale is the result of poor leadership.
  
  Surprisingly this is not unusual as people often indulge in malicious behaviour when they believe that the system does not work and they can only sabotage, damage and discredit the people in charge for they represent the organisation and the system. To negate their efforts.
  
  Was Ms. Gupta always negative? When did she become negative and what caused her to become like this?
  
  It may come as a surprise but secret destructive behaviour where in people turn against their own organisations, is not all that uncommon. This happens nearly all the time and not all actions can be as damaging as those of Madhuri Gupta.
  
  On the other hand there are individuals who give their all to build and nourish their organisations. Many people just want to get on in life, pay their bills, reduce hassles, look after their parents, prepare for their retirement and provide for their children's future.
  
  In the positive or in the negative view taken by these people, the major influencing their outlook and hence actions stem from their superiors. In their growing up years it is family and teachers. In later years it is the person for whom they work for. In the case of the entreprenuer, they look only at themselves based on their heros.
  
  What can you do to avoid becoming a Madhuri Gupta or have someone like her running loose within your organisation or even personal life? Let me share with you our own experience.
  
  The first generation owners of our company, my uncle and father had a very rough relationship with employees. The relationship was always confrontationary.
  
  We inherited many good practices and things, but good labour relations was not part of our legacy. Soon after taking over we had a labour strike.After a very long conflict which lasted over 17 months both we and our workmen were drained out.
  
  We brothers learnt from observing our elders and from the labour strike, that there are no victors in a war, there are only losers. So we resolved to build and nurture a harmonious relationship with employees and create a positive environment to grow, not only for the company but the employees as well.

While it was the right moral thing to do,our management team did not see it that way.
Managers and staff thought we were crazy. They had developed a hardened attitude.
Their reactions were understandable. Perception always lasts longer than fact.

On the other hand inspite of our best efforts we simply could not win over our workers, they refused to believe that we had lost our taste for battle.

We followed a simple rule of advertising; 'Keep the message simple, repeat it often'. It took a good a couple of years for everyone to start believing us and our intentions. Even then it remained fragile for another couple of years before becoming solid.

With the grace of God and the support of many, our family, customers, suppliers and our employees we started a brilliant rise in our fortunes. The employees were charged when they saw that believing in themselves and their organisation we could truly become a world class organisation with win-win and all inclusive growth.

This meteoric rise gave birth to many issues but the biggest problem was getting people who shared our beliefs.

We were constantly on the lookout for managerial talent. We recruited many managers and staff members who were tested for technical competence and knowledge but we were negligent about thier people skills. In time we realised the heavy price we had to pay for this negligence.

Human beings tend to try and dominate their immedeate circle of influence. They want to be the alfa member of the pack. Some do it by the primitive way of violence and fear, others do it by persuassion and reward.

The art of good management is to seduce people to achieve rather than bully them to do your bidding. It requires significantly greater effort and patience to inspire than to drive people. We can drive people with fear or we can lead with inspiration or a reasonable combination of both.


Several staff members, managers and general managers were recruited that pretended to share our values but were actually belligerent and even abusive in their conduct with their juinor team members. Several cases of slapping workers in addition to verbal abuse were reported.

Ouput did rise dramatically as fear is a powerful driver of human action. However a year down the road, all our efforts directed towards nuturing relationships, team building and providing a sense of belonging went down the tube.


When confronted they took pride in their actions, claiming that your juniors should be fearful of the boss. Violence is the most primitive behaviour of mankind and should not be tolerated particularly in a professional organisation.

In one plant we took immedeate action and in the other we failed to take any noticable action because the managers were 'indispensable'.

Blaming urgencies many people recruit senior staff that do not share their management's or organisation's values. One bad boss can turn an entire section of people within the organisation against itself.


Sadly when faced with a dilemma, values are often sacrificed at the altar of expidiency. We too have been guilty on this count.


When running under extreme pressure there is a tendency to take shortcuts or shoot from the hip decisions. We soon learnt that a shortcut is the longest distance between two points.

Exploitive relationships can be developed in an instant , but there are no shortcuts in building genuine relationships. They have to be developed and nurtured over time, yet they can be destroyed with a few stupid words or thoughtless actions.


Eventually we got our act together and changed our approach and we were amply rewarded by the love, commitment and hardwork of a magnificient team.

People work for other people before they work for organisations and nations.

We should not be surprised if we continue to see many more Madhuri Guptas emerging in Government and within business. Effective mangement of people and relationships, productively and positively is the hallmark of great nations and institutions.