Anupam- The Dreamer

Or there is something else that really matters!

Since the Indian software giant founder Mr. Narayan Murthy advocated for 70-hour work week for young Indians to improve productivity at work and then the (in)famous L&T Chairman SN Subrahmanyan advocating for 90-hour work week even including on Sundays and then some entrepreneurs across the world suggesting something similar, the debate around the number of working hours has been gaining steam across the world, particularly in our country. This debate has to be seen in the backdrop of the evolution of the work culture in the historical time-frame and the present context and what is the future going forward.

After the advent of Industrial Revolution in 17^th century, firstly in Europe, there was a requirement of huge working class for the factories. Before that, there were workers, but the humanity mostly lived below or at sustenance level. Hence, there was no need of workers working in the so called “factories”. But, Industrial Revolution changed everything. Now, the workers were made to work in inhuman conditions, involving even women and children, for more than 12-14 hours per day in the factories for manufacturing, mines for taking out coal and iron ore, and transportation of goods from once place to another. Workers were just treated as mere cogs in the wheel. Such inhumane work culture led to the workers revolution in 19^th and 20^th century with the rise of communist movements across the major industrial economies like Germany, England, France, Russia (Bolshevik Revolution) etc. The communists and workers protested against inhumane work conditions and long working hours. As a result, the governments or monarchies had to formulate some sort of labour laws to heed to their demands.

In India also, during 1920s, some companies like TATA Steel, started the concept of 8-hour working day, well before it was adopted in the labour laws of the country after independence. Since then, 8-hour working day has been generally accepted as a norm everywhere, with a mandatory one holiday in a week. The government office timings were generally 9:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. with a 1-hour compulsory lunch-break. Private companies also followed more or less the same thing, with the difference that in the factories which required round-the-clock operations, there was a concept of 8-hour work shifts in the morning, evening and in the night. This continued till the late 1980s. But, after the beginning of LPG reforms in the early 1990s and the flooding of global companies in India, the scale of production of the domestic companies grew at a rapid pace. Additionally the level of competition between the companies and between the countries increased manifold. Now, the focus was on “cutting the costs”, improving efficiency, and increasing profits. And what better way to cut the costs than to lay-off excess workers, make them slog for 12-hours a day and getting the maximum work out of them.

Fast forward to present times. This culture of slogging for unlimited hours and considering the workers again as cogs in the wheel has announced its arrival in great measure. The global big companies across the world now care more about the profits than the welfare of their workforce. Even the CEOs and former CEOs of the big Indian companies like Infosys and Larsen & toubro have advocated for about 14-hour or even 16-hour work day (if you consider 5 day work in a week). Some entrepreneurs of the startups have even implored to work for 100-hours a week, which translates to 14-hours work week without any Saturdays and Sundays!!!! I wonder why they are talking about humans in the first place, when they can have robots equipped with Artificial Intelligence working for them non-stop 24*7*365! Oh, the humans work at far lesser cost than the robots, that’s why!! So, instead of employing robots, why not treat the humans like robots and get maximum work out of them on a salary that is peanuts as compared to the profits made by the entrepreneurs themselves!

They don’t care even if the employees die of stress and exhaustion. Recently, the death of an employee of the consultancy firm EY (Ernst & Young), Anna Sebastian Perayil sparked much debate around the working conditions. Some of the “robotic” people responded by saying that “nobody is forcing you to take up the high-demanding jobs and if you can’t handle the work pressure, you should work somewhere else”. The proponents of “free” economy argue that the employees are “free” to work where they want to and the companies are also “free” in deciding their work conditions. But the point is that, when every damn company starts following the inhumane work culture, then can you sat that the employees are really “free”??? NO!! Because they now don’t have a choice really in the job market, if they want a decent paycheck.

As I see it, earlier the bubble around the inhumane work conditions earlier bursted with worker’s revolution across the world. Now, again the same bubble has started forming with the treatment of employees as no better than the workaholic machines! In the viewpoint of some companies, it is better to call the workers as “time slaves” of such companies. There are obviously a few outlier companies with good corporate governance practices, but it doesn’t reflect the larger picture unfolding before our naked eyes. This work culture again prioritizes the profits over the welfare of the employees. The startup founders treat the people as a stepping stone to their “unicorn status” evaluation, where they are hire and fire at their sweet will, with virtually no government interference!

But, afterall it is a bubble only! And therefore it will definitely burst sooner or later! Already, we are witnessing increasing trends of talented employees prioritizing their own time over the long working hours. The FIRE (Financial Independence, Retire Early) movement has already begun, where young professionals are targeting to make huge money by the age of 40 and then considering “voluntary retirement”, albeit of a different kind. In this retirement, they will work, but as per their own choice with complete control of what kind of work they want to do and for how many hours they want to work. Recently, I saw a reel where a Gen Z girl walked out of her office at the scheduled time, even when her manager pleaded to work till late.

In this whole debate, we are missing one more point. It’s not just about the work hours that you devote, but rather about the quality of work that you can put in those hours. In my previous company, we went to factory at 8 a.m. in the morning for the general shift, then came to home for lunch at around 1:30 p.m. Then, we all slept for 1 hour and got back to work at around 3 p.m. and stayed late till 8:00 pm. After I left, the company improved the practise as lunch had to be done in the office itself and the check-out time was rechristened to 5:30 p.m. That is improving productivity at work! Also, instead of focussing only on the working hours, the focus should be on improving the skill set of the employees, rather than wasting time on redundant activities. And also give them freedom to work more, if they want to, alongwith overtime bonus! So, the person who wants to work more at his/her own will, can work more to get more money. But, the practise of long working hours shouldn’t be made mandatory.

It is well understood by everyone, that if you love what you work, then you don’t count the work hours! You are so involved in your work that you get in the “state of flow” and forget about everything else in this world. Leonardo da Vinci did not get tired after painting for hours, or Shakespeare after writing numerous plays, or Gandhiji when he was fighting for freedom, or Dr. APJ Abdul Kalam when he was working incessantly for the SLV-3 programme! Probably, this is also the case with Mr. Narayan Murthy and other entrepreneurs, as they love what they do. Even when you are pursuing your own hobbies or passion like sports, dance, music, travelling etc., then you don’t feel tired even after working for long hours continuously. And there is nothing wrong with that, as long as you are not forcing others to do what you want them to do! Ideally, everyone should be free in choosing their own profession, but that doesn’t happen in reality. So, atleast we should continue to have some regulations to have humane working conditions, if we don’t want to denigrate ourselves to the 18^th and 19^th century era. Otherwise, the millennials are the last one to tolerate that sort of stressful work culture. The Gen Z and the upcoming Gen alpha and Gen beta will definitely break through all the rules and regulations that are framed by the companies. They will not only make the reels about these but they will also break the chains of work culture that tend to curb their freedom. Actually, I have a real doubt that whether Gen alpha and Gen beta will ever know what it takes to work and earn money, as they already will have much to sustain themselves 😀

So, are you still counting the hours or counting the money that you have before you can hop on to the bandwagon of FIRE movement?