Management lessons from Vasudeo – Part 4

Vasudeo is my father’s name. In a normal middle class Indian family of 70’s and 80’s me and my siblings grew up enjoying the freedom of calling him by first name within the four walls of our house. While we enjoy his friendship - his status for us is nothing less than that of a god…. This in fact is a first lesson… you need not follow any rituals to get your natural respect….. He being a man of few words, I learnt innumerable lessons through his simple actions…though the meaning of many I was to understand much later…..these are the few moments that have always stayed with me …..management lessons learnt from Vasudeo

My brother and me had got the news that my father would be given a car by his office. This was late 80s / early 90s and cars had still to become commodities. We already had a car and with the struggle that we had seen both our parents go through, second car in the house was a luxury. The reason for our excitement was different though – both of us were in college and if father has his own car – we would have one car to share between us – we already had marked the days of the week for the ownership of a car.


During these times, once I walked into my father’s office as I was loafing around that area. He used to head Legal & Personnel (there was no HR there). It was after office hours and he was writing some notes (yes there were offices without a computer on the table!). “So, when is our new car coming?” – my father looked at me and handed me over the note that he had just written for his next meetings with the directors – “Whats this?” “Read on” I read the note and his recommendation on the car policy and was shocked – “Are you alright?? You are recommending no car policy is necessary. Is this some kind of your idea of being a hero?” I was extremely upset as it meant for me and my brother to continue our fights on the time-share for our two-wheeler! “Just cool down – I don’t need to do these gimmicks to be a hero. Read the second page”. I read the second page which had some crap about the facts and figures and some analysis which supported his recommendation. “By the way I had written the second page first” – I had a suspicion that he was actually enjoying the conversation! I was in no mood to be logical. “You keep saying that you want to do an MBA in HR – please remember that job means that you are a trustee to the organization and some of the policies that you sign will also impact you adversely. If you are not ready for that – don’t bother” He got up to leave – I knew the meeting was over!


I will be dishonest if I say that I was enlightened and impressed with his thought process. On the contrary I was very upset and did not bother to speak much to him on the way back home. He was calm as usual and perhaps little relieved that I was not in my natural belligerent mood!


Over the years as I started working in the same profession I realized time and again the value of his words. There are many a times when there is conflict of interest when it comes to some policies – you may not be exactly at an advantage yourself due to some policies that you are custodian for. Well, that’s the interesting piece of my profession and as the years passed by, I understood what my father told me that evening little better!