Deepika Padukone is not the only one upset by the rather insensitive statement of L&T chairman SN Subrahmanyan, who is pushing hard for the Indian workforce to willingly live up to the possibilities of the 90-hour work week, week after week.
Subrahmanian may not be the only one advocating that employees somehow find the enthusiasm to come to work every last day of the week – see Infosys’ Narayan Murthy and Ola’s Bhavish Agarwal – but his approach to speaking his mind is as effortless as it gets. rude of the party. In the undated video, the L&T chairman can be seen giving a rather cheeky reply during a conversation with employees when asked to comment on the company’s Saturday working policy; he said, “I’m sorry I can’t make you work on Sundays. If I can get you to work on Sundays, I’ll be happier because I work on Sundays.’ If that statement wasn’t enough on its own, he topped it off with an unnecessary dig into employees’ family lives: “What are you doing sitting at home? How long can you look at your wife? office and start working.”
Deepika, who has long been an advocate for mental health awareness, was quick to debunk the clip as soon as it went viral online. She also did not mince words in a statement published by the company, justifying the absurd opinion with some nationalist perspective.
If Subrahmanyan’s opinion, not to mention other corporate heavyweights who follow the same ideological line, has left you, the Indian workforce, feeling down, don’t worry because not all founders feel that way. Take, for example, CEO of Emcure Pharmaceuticals and of Shark Tank fame, Namitha Thapar. In an interaction with Humans of Bombay last year, which also featured Shaadi.com founder and fellow Shark Tank investor Anupam Mittal, Namitha came face-to-face with her contemporary, sharing her very realistic take on work-life balance.
Immediately, Namita stated that the same level of dedication and time investment cannot and should not be expected from founders and employees. While this will bring solid rewards at the end of the day for founders who put almost all of their day into their work, the only thing it will leave employees with are physical ailments and mental health episodes. She said, “This is bullshit. Sorry for my language. I totally disagree. For the founders, the big stakeholders who make tons of money, go ahead. Work 24 hours a day forever, but I think for the average man and a woman needs a certain number of working hours.”Although in her view it was recognized that during certain periods of time employees could be expected to be redundant, this should only be an exception, not a rule.Namitha concluded: “If my accountant works 20-hour days, he will not get any benefits like me. Instead, he will face serious physical and mental health problems.”
How do you feel about this fiasco?
