From Kings, Queens, Concubines to Darwin...

Dear Co-Creators,

My comments on the posting by various participants are given below. They are based on chronological order and do not signify anything.  I must confess that there are some hilarious, but insightful and creative, postings. For example, Anup’s posting using Charles Darwin’s Theory of Evolution and Sudeep’s historical / royal touch using the analogy of Kings and Swords of Power etc.,

Shreejit, “its a golden rule for the management (both line and top) to make sure strong dependencies are not created on any single person and at least one more person knows how to take care of critical work.”

My comment: Again an important insight conveying the management principle “No one is indispensable.”  Great! But How do you do that? Any idea? (See Mukul Sachdeva's Posting)

Abhijoy, “Here I recall a definition of Theory of constraints which said “A problem precisely defined until it can be presented as a conflict between two necessary conditions”. In accurate sciences what they do whey they face conflict is to negate one option for the other. But in cases related to employment relations the spotlight is not the word “ALTERNATIVE” but on the word “ACCEPTABLE COMPROMISE”. 

My comment:  More often than not, the question is “compromise at the expense of what?”

Abhijoy, “one senior plant manager of above 20 years experienced said me “Guys the days of employment policies for years and years are over; now you are all machines which depreciates and only the instrument that will rule you are yearly contracts”. What I see is the dawn of non negotiable offers in a large scale.” 

My comment:  True! Many companies are “Distancing” themselves from the liabilities of providing regular employment contracts and moving to “contract for service” by hiring the employees as independent contractors in the pay roll of third party agencies.  For example, Microsoft is a champion of this “Distancing” practice which invited multi million dollar class-action law suites by the employees who were converted from permanent employees of Microsoft having standard employment contract to independent contractors having “contract for service”.

Akash Bansal “Real Life Story”.  My comment:  Good Reflection!

Hemant, “the moral grounds of presenting the employer with a non-negotiable offer can always be debated upon….there can be situations, when the employee is not left with any option, other than to confront the employer head-on and present them with such an offer. From Shreejit's post and the mail Darrel Hair wrote to Doug Cowie, we can say that he was in such a situation…The decision not to allow Hair to officiate any further in any international games would have been extremely humiliating for someone of his stature.” 

My comment:  I completely agree with your statement that ICC’s decision as not to allow Hair to officiate any international games would have been extremely humiliating for a person with stature that of Hair and he had no option other than to confront his employer with  the one-time non-negotiable offer.  However, I also agree with your statement that ex post facto it is to analyze the episode on the moral grounds of presenting such non-negotiable offer.

Soumyo, “"If one bus leaves, other is sure to come by in next 15 minutes. After all one should not run after trains and buses" this is what has been taught to us. As we all saw in the past, the companies used to chase candidates to join (HPS Case First Half) as would have been experienced by many of my classsmates having work-ex.

But come a recession, there is only a single bus to catch for all.”

My comment:  I slightly disagree with the last statement “but come a recession, there is only a single bus to catch for all.”  It cannot be generalized for all.  Some wise, courageous people may decide to walk to the distance too rather than looking for a transport.  I also disagree with your statement “…even in crunch time the company can't let go of its best task people, especially managers.(Hope its a respite for future MBAs)” since the best managers are not always MBAs.  Also there is a quote, no offence meant really, for MBA – Mediocre But Arrogant which may support this argument to some extent.

Partho, “I would be able to make a similar non negotiable offer to my employer at a certain point in time. This bargaining will be based on the following suppositions:- 1. If I feel that the employer is paying me less than the industry standards. 2. If I feel that I am underpaid based on the nature of the job and also the expertise needed for that job.For eg.- If I am in an IT firm and working on a niche tool in a very critical project which needs long hours of services for a considerable amount of time, then I will definitely expect some kind of incentive in addition to my package. 3. If the employer neglects or fails to appreciate the work done by me and thereby mitigating my chances to grow in the organization though fulfilling the salary demands. “

My comment:  The questions for Partho are “What do you mean by industry standards?” and how do you know them?” 

Satyajoyti Roy, “I believe making a non-negotiable offer is very arrogant and impolite. So in my career I will make negotiable offers but not non-negotiable offers.”

My comment:  A principled approach towards negotiation.  It truly illustrates the meaning of your name Satya – Jyoti! In my opinion, a non-negotiable offer is an paradox or even an oxymoron.  If it cannot be negotiated, it is not an offer but a commandment.  (See Sudip’s Views on Non-Negotiable Offer)

Swati, “Here, ICC is in the weaker position amongst the two of them because the bargaining power has shifted in the favour of the employee owing to his expertise and contractual clauses.”

My comment: What Swati? After reading so many posts you think “ICC is in the weaker position”?  Come On.. 

Sudip, “Macroeconomic Factors:….Microeconomic Factors…Notice Period..Competitor paying for the notice period…Rationale for Shorter Notice Period…There is no non-negotiable offer etc.,”

My comment: Sudip Alias Jason, you have asked for comments and feedback on your posting and requested for correction if you had gone wrong.   Good observations and great insights!  I liked the way to Macro / Micro economic factors are analyzed.  A small correction if you wish… The pressure one faces through peers and family when losing a job is usually known as social pressure and not necessarily psychological pressure.

Pratyush, “I would be able to make such a non-negotiable offer to my employer if I become a top executive in the corporate world…. If I were to receive such a onetime non-negotiable offer from my employer I would first take into account the economic conditions of the business world”.

My comment:  I think Pratyush is too obsessed with making a non-negotiable offer, he is unable to, not willing to, understand the context where he receives similar non-negotiable offer from employee. Simply, he does not want put himself in the shoes of the employer in a situation like this. Wake up, Man!

Sweta Parekh has been able to successfully convert the forum discussion into a question answer session. Kudos to you madam!

Mukul Sachdeva, “Organizations always prefer to have more than one person to know about the job and through Knowledge transfer, Shadowing and Training sessions they attempt to create sufficient backup for a key resource…. character certificate and background checks are also a source of power that employer possesses..”

My comment:  Good observations Mukul, especially the relevance of Knowledge Management practices that you have highlighted in this context.  While your posting in general makes sense, we need the wisdom to revisit some statements like, “It is not wrong for employee to be opportunistic…” or “There is definitely no place for emotions in such negotiations” etc.,  If you think, there is no place for emotions in such negotiations, probably we may have to conclude that your Emotional Quotient (EQ) is very low.

Sudeep, “employee was the king…the sword of power…employer…they were the new king…”

My comment:  I liked sudeep’s optimism all through his post.  For example, the way he markets his experience “24 months…” great. Why not “108 weeks or 730 days”?   He has also given a historic / royal touch to his analysis by giving the title of kings to both employers and employees.  But I thought, employer is the king and the employees are queens…not even queens… but concubines… Suddep’s example of Steve Jobs is really worth looking at.

Amit Kar, “He can be forgiven for been straightforward, he can be forgiven for speaking his mind, but can he be forgiven for the non negotiable offer which offended the sanctity of the ever decreasing halo of umpiring profession which many felt brought the game to disrepute…legal platform…moral platform…”

My comment:  Good perspective.  I liked the way you have described the non-negotiable offer… “the demand calculated in numbers to a non numeric entity- Greed, Avarice”  and why you don’t like umpiring “not because it is a thankless job but because you have just one mate with whom you can hang out with i.e. the second umpire for the whole day” Keep it up!

Prabhash, “If you have shown your opportunistic tendency to the employer before then the life of your career in the company would be the life of your indispensability to the company.”

My comment:  I liked the equation very much. But would you tell your ethics professor honestly that If somebody has question marks on ethical or moral ground, my answer is "market doesn't understand ethics and morality”.

Anup, “Bargaining Power: A Charles Darwin Perspective”

My comment:  We should appreciate this out of the box thinking (no kidding) to approach bargaining power through Darwin’s perspective.  When I read Anup’s application of Darwin’s perspective to illustrate bargaining power in individual-organizational relationship, I prayed to Goddess Saraswati, to whom he too offered prayers couple of days back, to help him in the course of life.  For the application so was inappropriate, he remained me of Bernard Shaw’s uncle who did not mention his name in his will. 

G.B. Shaw wrote, “One day the richest and consequently most dogmatic of my uncles came into a restaurant where I was dining, and found himself, much against his will, in conversation with the most questionable of his nephews. By way of making myself agreeable, I spoke of modern thought and Darwin. He said, 'Oh, thats the fellow who wants to make out that we all have tails like monkeys.' I tried to explain that what Darwin had insisted on in this connection was that some monkeys have no tails. But my uncle was as impervious to what Darwin really said as any Neo-Darwinian nowadays. He died impenitent, and did not mention me in his will.”

Anup’s application of Darwin’s principles like Heredity (inheritance), Circumstantial Selection (Natural Selection) of Species, and Evolution is proving that Darwin has been the highly abused human being in the entire human civilization.  For example, his statement that “the employer is able to work hard and put his company in the “wanna – be” list naturally the employers say becomes more effective. Microsoft as we all know is one such elite company which enjoys this position” is the best example.

Soumyo, “employer may at times stand ground and refuse to budge. We see this often where strikes lead to no result and in fact the organization may be ready with a new workforce by the time you can be back.”

My comment:  Very pragmatic approach. 

Ashish Sharma, “companies do not consider anything when it comes to their profit, irrespective of external conditions good or bad. “

My comment:  What an insight!

Abhya Mittal, “BCCI’s Offer to Souvrav Ganguly”

My comment:  This requires a separate forum for discussion. Any way, thanks for the example.

Adersh, “I would like to quote the guiding principle of International Labour Organisation. Its guiding principle is that "labour is not a commodity" to be traded in the same way as goods, services or capital, and that human dignity demands equality of treatment and fairness in dealing within the workplace.”

My comment:  Thanks for the quoting ILO’s guiding principle

Avishek Sharma, “Ideally, negotiation results in win-win situation for both the parties. However, most of the times bargaining results in favour of only 1 party.“

My comment:  We would like to disagree sir!

Charlie, “the case where we have labour unions and employee is a part of that. There the stakes are higher for the employer as well as the treatment to the employee can trigger different reactions in the union.”

My comment: Good to see the application of the organized, collective, institutional perspectives for illustrating bargaining power.

Juhi Agarwal, “in the case of nuclear deal, the way India prioritized the givings and takings gives a very nice example of power of bargain as to how we were able to manage the Indo-US relationship and still get our share of bargain.”

My comment: Madam, the analogy of nuclear deal is much more complex than what we have been discussing in the context of bargaining power and non-negotiable offers.

Ruplai, “The Shift in the Balance of Bargaining Power”

My comment: You too Rupali! Along with Sweta Parekh, you have succeeded in converting the forum discussion into a question answer session. Kudos to you madam!

Abhilash, “See-Saw – The Balance Keep Shifting”

My comment: Thank you bringing the class analysis to the discussion Sir. Let also keep in mind that market does not always regulate itself, even if it regulates the regulation is not necessarily efficient and for the betterment of the stakeholders.

Deepak, “Faced with such kind of situation as that of Mr. Hair, I would not have any doubts in rejecting the offer if my employee offers this. But in other scenarios, I would like to bargain till I see that the cost of bargain is more than the replacement of such employee”

My comment: What is the cost of bargain sir?

With Regards,

Ganesh