Management Of Family Resources

Lesson 12 : Indian Traditional And Contemporary Value

Management Of Values In Indian Context

The basic feature of Indian culture is its joint family system and caste system. Family in India is essentially patriarchal, that is, authority rests with the oldest male member who is considered as the head of family and guides all the decisions. Younger members of the family do not have much say even in the matters that relate to them. All the members are supposed to obey the head of the family. Also the membership to a caste, creed or a group is considered permanent.

A leader is expected to be nurturing in character towards his subordinates and punitive towards his enemies. The nurturing role of Indian leader is highly praised as is his personal integrity and exemplary behaviour.

Traditional Indian Values:

Chakraborty studied Buddhist, Vedantic and Yogic psychology, as well as derivative epic and Pauranic literature to distill the values rooted in the deep - structure of Indian culture and society. He summed them up as follows:

• Individual Must be Respected: This is based on the belief that the divine is enshrined in him or her, whether good or bad, older or younger, rich or poor.


• Cooperation and Trust: The divine inner being of all individuals is unity. Deception or deprivation of others is deceptionss or deprivation of self.


• Jealousy is Harmful for Mental Health: Just as cigarette smoking is harmful for physical health, indicating that any negative values such as jealousy, hatred and anger are like double edged swords which injure the communicator of these values as well as the person on the receiving end. All lead to a stressful mental state and thereby detrimental in terms of group behaviour and performance.


• 'Chitta-siddhi' or Purification of the Mind: The noble thoughts of compassion, friendliness, humility, gratitude, etc. lead to refine and accurate perception of human relationship, contributing to sounder relationships and happiness in the environment of home or work.


• Top Quality Product or Service: It is primarily a function of the quality of the mind or consciousness of the doer and only secondarily of quality circles or statistical quality control.


• Work is Worship: The best way to approach the divine through secular life is to offer each piece of work to the Lord. The guiding principle of Bhagvad Gita is work without seeking rewards. This results in complete humility and pure feeling of contentment.


• Containment of Creed: Whether of tangible like inoney or intangible like praise as it stresses and robs the individual of wisdom.


• Ethico-moral Soundness: Every action or karma is a cause for subsequent effect. Ethico- moral soundness gives peace of mind and promotes mental health thereby improving work performance.


• Self-discipline and Self-Restraint: They conserve energy, strengthen will-power, create trust and confer dignity.


• Customer Satisfaction: Customer is the divine come 'upon us in human grab.


• Creativity: Human creativity is an integral component and extension of cosmic creativity.


• The Inspiration to Give: Giving is more fulfilling, it adds more meaning to work and life and giving with humility is more dignified than petty needing.


• Renunciation and Detachment: Renunciation and detachment from selfish results or rewards and egotistic demands in the workplace, from the lower unregenerate ego and its vanity and not from duties and responsibilities.

Contemporary Indian Values:

However the contemporary Indian management has evolved through the development of Indian civilization and Western influences originating from industrial revolution. The basic features of Indian management today, are as follows:

• Ownership and management are not differentiated; they are overlapping, in the first instance. This is primarily an extension of agrarian and artisan base of Indian society. The farmers own and tilt the land while the artisans own the equipment and manufacture pots and pans, baskets and cloths, furniture and carvings etc.


• Management in traditional Indian context was centered on the family or religious head. Today the chief of an organisation and the head of the institution play this role. The chief in Indian society has mana (Inner value) a benevolent spirit where insight makes him all­ powerful. He is considered pure and sacred. He is the custodian of what is good and what is desirable. He must behave as a parent- figure, supporting all the members of the (family) organisation accepting good with the bad, competent with the incompetent, seldom differentiating between social and work roles.


• In its traditional style of decision making, the head is the unquestioned leader and manager who manage with the consent of those who depend on him. This consent is obtained through consultation with them.


• Hierarchy is the key to management coordination in the Indian context. Horizontal peer-level coordination, so typical of Japanese society is almost missing here. Interventions by persons in the hierarchy are often resorted to in dealing with issues involving horizontal co-ordination. Hierarchy means existential inequality.


• The emphasis is on lifelong employment and job security. There is a societal assumption that membership in a family, caste or corporate group has to be permanent. Unless employees have job security, they are not sure, stable or motivated. In contemporary management, there is a lot of debate about the efficacy of traditionally valued security and life long employment.


• The belief that there is no substitute to learning on the job prevailed. There is a definite preference for job experience as against job knowledge. Nowhere in Indian history does one find any account of administrators receiving professional training. Being a manager necessitated learning on the job. This underlines the value of personal grooming and experience.


• Indian management has a short-term orientation. Past is past, future is uncertain; therefore the present is the most important phenomenon for the manager to deal with. In traditional India, because of seasonal fluctuations, floods, droughts and famines, the farmers and artisans had to focus on the present. Coping with an uncertain demand, markets made the long- range economic planning difficult. The approach to economic activity has, therefore, always been short- term and seasonal.


• There is over-concern with job identity. An Indian derives his identity from the social group to which he belongs and the occupation or job he holds. Manager is most comfortable if his tasks are clearly stated and his boundaries of work well defined. There is a preference for job specialisation, not job rotation. This characteristic explains the interrelationship of value of ability utilization and self esteem.


• Another feature typical of Indian management is centralization of power and authority, and decentralization of activities, often without the delegation of authority or responsibility. Even in organisations, which have decentralized authority, one' finds that people do not exercise their delegated authority and power and often refer back to their superiors. Thus authority is more valued than autonomy.


• Indian management values individual excellence. It recognizes individuals who make distinguished contributions in whatever field they work. Collective wisdom is a value in Indian society. Teamwork always commands attention. But there is always confusion in Indian organisations between the reality of teamwork, and the practice of rewarding individual performances.

Thus one can conclude that modem Indian management practices and values differ from those preached in Vedas and Pauranic literature. This difference is due to the fact that management is no more centered on spirituality but is influenced by materialistic, competitive, and other forces in the environment in which it is now practiced.