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The next time you hear someone recite verses from the Bhagavad Gita, pay more attention. The wisdom of the ancient Indian scriptures may come in handy in tackling issues from management strategies to corporate governance in today’s highly competitive world of business. Far fetched?
Consider this: Motivational gurus and management experts like Deepak Chopra, C.K. Prahalad, Arindam Chaudhuri, Shiv Khera and Mrityunjay B. Athreya are increasingly borrowing from ancient Hindu scriptures to cope with the modern-day business management challenges.
“Lord Krishna says in the Bhagavad Gita, yoga is excellence in action,” said leading management consultant Harish Bijoor. “We preach it as a basic tenet in our sessions that one can derive a higher state of being in an organisation by achieving excellence in action and be consistent in doing so,” Bijoor said.
Krishna may indeed give management guru Philip Kotler whose strategies on marketing are routinely referred to in classrooms and boardrooms alike a run for his money, management gurus maintain.
“Quite a few business strategies owe their origins to Hindu myths. According to Indian religious texts, ‘swa-dharma’ or self ethics can be used to achieve quality in all the functions of a company,” Bijoor maintained.
Agreed Athreya, who took the example of “Neelakantha” Lord Shiva’s epithet, when his throat turned blue after drinking the poison churned up from ocean so that the magic potion of mortality could be partaken by his followers to defeat the demons, or evil.
“This act symbolises courage, initiative, willingness, discipline, simplicity and austerity these are all the qualities that successful business leaders, as also managers, preach,” Athreya, a specialist in vedic management, said.
Such myths are relevant more than ever today as businesses the world over have begun to retrench workers and cut down on employee benefits and charity in the wake of the current meltdown, the experts said.
“It is the dharma of all organisations to focus more on corporate social responsibility and protect employees’ interests in this hour of crisis. A company should make profits during the good times and help people in bad times,” Athreya said.
“Firms should reduce prices, be content with a lower profit margin and eliminate waste.”
Quoting Yudhishthira in the Mahabharata, Athreya said, “Every day, people see creatures depart to (god of death) Yama’s abode. Yet, those who remain seek to live forever. This verily is the greatest wonder.”
Similarly, he said, people retire every day, jobs are lost, and sometimes it is seen as unavoidable as has been seen during the current economic turmoil.
“But the impact of the crisis and the consequent sense of insecurity can be contained if managements become ‘deerghdarshi’ (far-sighted), and try to evade the crisis even before it happens.”
Ancient wisdom will also help mitigate fears about competition.
“A lot of people are bothered about what competition is doing. We too advise managers to look at competition, but in a benign way. Look at them as ethical people, who are just doing their job and you are doing yours,” said Bijoor.
Some of the oldest sacred texts of Hinduism, the Vedas and the upanishads, can help in scripting an ideal corporate governance philosophy.
“The management should be ‘saatvik’, meaning balanced and orderly. They should take care of their customers and business partners, besides their employees. That is the backbone of any sound corporate governance model,” Athreya said, quoting from these scriptures.
Companies have started adopting ancient Indian wisdom and techniques like the Sudarshan Kriya, a complete body workout regime, and followed in corporate stress management workshops. Software giant Wipro, for example, has a programme dedicated to improving mental state of its employees using meditation and yoga.
Bijoor, however, feels Indian managers are still smitten by western management philosophies. “I routinely quote from texts like the Ramayana in the sessions that I hold for corporates around the world”, he said.
“But it is ironical that businesses in countries like Germany and France are adopting the wisdom of Vedas while our people are still besotted with western philosophies.” (IANS)
Hi,
This is good to note that few brave souls are taking indian scriptures to the Corporate Boardrooms.
Good effort indeed.
Regards,
Pramod
Prof Balakrishnan Muniapan from Malaysia has done extensive study and research in Gita, Ramayana, Arthashastra, etc. His presentations are lively and action orientated, he can easily quote several slokas from Gita, Ramayana related to contemporary management and leadership. I used to think that management and leadership concepts are products from the West but Prof Bala’s presentation reveals that many of the current management concepts can be found in Ramayana, Mahabharata and other ancient literatures.
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Excellent article.
Bhagavad-Gita the essence of
Vedic Literature and a complete guide to practical life. Through the
centuries, the sublime and ennobling counsel of the Bhagavad Gita has
endeared it to truth-seekers of East & West alike. It provides “all
that is needed to raise the personality of man to the highest possible
level” and self improvement which means self guided improvement in
physical, mental, social, spiritual and emotion. Its gospel of
devotion to duty, without attachment, has shown the way of life for
all men, rich or poor, learned or ignorant, who have sought for light
in life. Energy exists in all human beings to fulfil the purpose of
the aim of the life. We expect energy to get task done. The author of
Bhagavad Gita Veda Vyasa Maharishi reveals the deep, universal truths
of life that speak to the needs and aspirations of everyone which is
relevant even today. If one looks at one self carefully, one will see
that one always carries in oneself the virtue. One have a special
mission, a special realisation, and each one individually can face all
the obstacles necessary to make one’s realisation perfect. Always one
will see that within him the shadow & the light are equal: you have
ability, you have also the negation of this ability. But if one
discover a very black hole, a thick shadow, be sure there is somewhere
in him a great light. It is up to him to know how to understand the
one to realise the other.