The fast and demanding corporates or people?

Corporates or his greed?

Nowadays, it is very common to see complaints about corporates as they push people to work in extreme conditions. These messages can be found in regular news, but especially in our social groups; real or virtual. Probably social media along with power of pattern matching makes it easier to spread it by highlighting similar messages. Maybe it was the case always, just that today with ever increasing volume of digital messages, it gets more visits than before. It also does not matter, if you work in a corporate or not, private or public. You can find these discussions among members/employees of non-profit or even volunteering organizations. It is almost as global a feeling as much existence of air.

Some of the common examples in which we come across such complaints are as below.

• These big corporates make you work long hours with no time for yourself.
• I am working even weekends for some projects.
• Why did these companies agree to such hard timelines. We are going sleepless for months.
• With these companies, it is all about money, money and money. They do not care about humans
• You work all the time and one time you miss a deadline, you may be fired. 

These are just few common examples you can hear among your groups, unless you were not too busy talking yourself. I am not talking here about that poor guy in 3rd world country who lives under USD 2 per day neither I am including those “especially-in-need-african” countries where all the corporates and social-welfare and award-winning documentary makers go to get some “benefits”. No, my focus is on the complaints of those well-to-do people who can earn a decent living, have an apartment/house, cars, travel around for holidays and spent some money on spa and resorts. These are the complaints coming from this group of people. All you need is to collect few of such people and take them for a coffee or a drink. Five minutes later, you can hear all the complaints; independent of the level in the corporate ladder. Just the extent of complaint may vary as the amount of their annual bonus vary.

But what is this corporate that makes life so hard for all these people to complain constantly? Well, in one way it nothing but a writing on paper, created by some people, who probably also complained about this or that. With the help of this paper, they collect some people to work for them who start writing some more papers, that will help some more people raise complaints. It is like a self-sustained engine running on the fuel of complaints. More the volume of complaints against a corporate usually bigger the corporate is. Of course the volume of complaints is not just about the numbers. But includes other factors e.g. intensity, sensitivity etc. On the other hand size of corporate can include monetary value, global footprint, number of employees etc. Maybe google or facebook has some algorithm to calculate those as well.

Dilbert explains good…

In one way it is just another entity that we as a species has created ourselves. It helps to achieve some of our objectives on the cost of some other. One of those objective is to release ourselves from our failures/mistakes/laziness or other “negative” behavior. It does makes it easy to say,” This company is making me work in stressful environment”. What would it need to get out of that “stressful” environment, do something else? But that is the problem, isn’t it? We jump from one to another to keep on going with the same complaint or just say that all are the same! But what are we doing when we are not complaining? Are we not helping the same corporates to create conditions so that more people can complain? It would be really hard to think otherwise, but easier to say what choice does one has. Of course, this is much easier said than done. But, then picking the easier option is the problem at first place, isn’t it?

Independent of the corporate culture, just watch people behaving on streets, in shops, at train stations, at airports at a traffic signal. In my understanding at that time no corporate is influencing that behavior. If you have not done so, just stand in a street or a small bridge or a crossing. Basically anywhere you can see people walking by, but not where there are just 2-3 people walking all the time :). Have you ever noticed how people feel the need to walk parallel to each other, not in a single file or double, but parallel. To the extent that they fill up all the width of side road or bridge. Is it not backed by the group’s need to capture the whole strip or the peer-competition not to lag behind? Maybe friends walk together, but their friendship bond seems to be really special. Observe when two such “strongly bonded” groups cross each other. It would appear that they just went blind. No one notice each other till they are so close to each other that it would appear that they are going to have an old style fight. Suddenly, they see each other and none of those group would like to split in two lines. They would try to squeeze each other and would cross in a way that their shoulders or half of the body at the cross-junction would collide. It does not happen only because people like to have their “private zone” around them. So they bend their shoulders and twist their backs to avoid that disgusting touch of another person who was reluctant to give them space.

Maybe this is a socially complex situation and people can behave strange. Let’s take an example of traffic lights. Some damn corporate made those lights and conspired with politicians to setup those lights to control rest of the general population. I believe this is the thought running in the back of the mind of everyone who stops at the “red” signal. In some countries/cities you can observe that traffic actually never stops. People keep on moving their cars inch-by-inch or cm-by-cm if you prefer metric system. Whenever possible they would even cross the zebra lines meant for pedestrians. If you have time then wait a little bit when it is about to go “red”. You can even hear the driver throttling the engine so that he can cross in that yellow zone or at red, but still before the other side becomes “green”. If it is not for the fear of police or to be captured by a camera, nobody would like to stop. Please do not think, that it happens only in some under-developed or developing countries. Developed countries have cameras and other modern ways to penalize that keep people in control. But people are still the same. You just need to watch them when they cross the border to other country. It is easily possible to observe in Europe when people from the “more developed and controlled” countries cross the “free border” to “wild” countries like Italy or other east-European countries. It is not just Italians or east-Europeans who are crazy, the well organized people of developed countries also goes wild. And does it not make life easier to say,” what can we do, we have to drive here this way!”. What makes these people to behave this way? What will they gain by a minute? Why don’t they have patience to wait few more seconds? Is it the corporate culture to blame?

Same is the case when people are waiting in line for their coffee, to pay the bill, for a post, for security check-in. If a friend does not answer your call on the first or 2nd ring, then we conclude he is too busy for us. Everyone wants to be the first and to be served fast. If a person walk slow in front of us, we get frustrated. But it is ok, if we are totally ignorant to the ones walking behind us trying to find a gap to pass. I see the same in my circle as well; often with simple things. Friends ask me to check their computer or for some other problem. Before I listen to the complete scenario, take over the computer or application, they would like to know the solution. After a minute, “oh, if it takes long then leave it or lets call someone or some other day”. Reasons may be many, but is the behavior any different from the big corporate trying to get things done faster, be the first and be completely ignorant of others?

There are people who cannot let anyone takeover them on the road, people who wants to be the first when they go to emergency, people who want to board a flight without lines. Isn’t it that some of those people who wrote the documents that created “the corporate” and rolled the stone for others to follow. But probably life may become so much boring if we took away all that bitching that goes not just to point how some corporate, some group, some company, some political group or just about anyone but us has messed up everything. People would be too much silent in bars or smoking corners, at a coffee table or at the group lunches. It may also take away work from a lot of people who run their businesses on this particular human behavior.

Well corporates or people, this may go on, but I just hope that all this gossip do not lose all the jokes that it has managed to create. Be it management jokes or engineer jokes or tavern jokes. I hope that people start to connect more with the smiles and laughter that they shared than the feelings that they like to express about each other.

Keep smiling

Love
Arundeep