Small and medium enterprises in India have never had any qualms about bringing religion into the workplace - most people here start the day with prayers, if not an elaborate puja. Large corporates, on the other hand, have tended to look askance at religion, discouraging, if not outright forbidding overtly religious behavior in the office. But that seems to be changing, with many Indian CEOs now prepared to make room for religious discourse in the office --provided it is in the form of management philosophy. We discuss the trend withIndian Institute of Management Kozhikode directorDebashis Chatterjee, who has recently authored a book titled Timeless Leadership: 18 Leadership Sutras from the Bhagwad Gita:
Why are Indian corporates so interested in Hindu philosophy these days?
It's a world-wide phenomenon and it is largely because they find that the management theories don't work as well as they had imagined. The search for alternate models had led to interest in the insights provided by texts like the Ramayana, Mahabharata, Bhagwad Gita. I've lived and worked in the USA and even there, the rule of separating the church from the state is b r e a k i n g down. There is a view that faith should be integrated with work and people are looking to the Bible and Torah for insights. These texts don't provide tips on how to make money, but they do teach us how to align our selfish, personal will to a larger will.
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