Hmm… hmmm….hmmmmmmm….

Basically I always start with a title in mind and then write about it. I am not one of those great writers who first write down the content and choose a title to go with it. After regressive training of all these years my simple mind work line by line. Read a book chapter by chapter -starting from first chapter. Mug up the theorems as they come date-wise. Similarly, first fill up the title column then proceed to post content. Now, the sadest part is that I don’t know what title to give. After 12 hours mind-numbling job, after facing rude comments/feedback all day long, after generating numbers which make as little sense to me as a paganist-nature- lover-tribesmens’ religion to an orthodox Christian; is it surprising that I can’t even think of a title? Won’t any educationist agree that I am supposed to lose my originality, creativity, capacity for learning/understanding after being in such an environment for so long? (so long doesn’t mean 3 months here, but a much longer time in my case)

Perhaps yes, but not today: cause I bunked office today. After a long gap in life, I bunked my duty because of frustration. 23 years of experience teaches me never such a bunk helps you. Everyone who has known me little closely, but not too closely, has given me a common feedback – “you give up too quickly”. What they don’t see is that I only stop putting in efforts after reaching my breaking limit, but my mind doesn’t stop thinking about it – ever! I knew in the morning it is going to be a long day for me – irrespective of my decision of going to office or bunking it. Hence, you can’t say it was an escapist attitude which drove me to bunk. And in fact bunking isn’t the heart of the issue. De-motivation never builds in a day or two.

Most of my friends after having read so far, must be thinking – “yeh to hona hi tha”. Hmm… well.. honestly, I didn’t think like that. And no, I am not going to resign tomorrow or anything. Fortunately, I am not alone. Fortunately, I realise this experience will add to the learnings/gyan I came looking for when I came here. Fortunately, like-minded people/friends and wisdom I gained in past few years help me recover fast, recover well. Fortunately, I would escape falling prey to the twenty-something syndrome this time.

Since gyan baatne se badhta hai, I would like to share my learnings from real life experience, coz my moksha lies in attaining the ultimate truth and the more I share my leanrings, the more they would grow and the sooner I would reach my moksha.

Enough crap, lets analyse the situation now. Who doesn’t know about the bright job scene in India? The BPO/KPO boom. There are plenty of jobs for college grads, esp if you are from a branded college. There are levels of jobs in terms of complexity involved in the nature of work. Starting from the bottom where call-centres job lie, we have highly respectable high paying jobs in Banking/financial/consultancy sector. Technical research centres also fall in the top most category. Job in Google is the dream of any tech-saavy computer geek. (Correct me if I am wrong ‘coz I hate to keep a track of hottest company on the block) Now, the problem lies at many levels:

• The job is mind-numbling. Irrespective of the level of job. Why? The reasons could be: either because of outsourcing/because of the very nature of business as it exists today (remember the pin factory description by Adam Smith)/too-long working hours in a restricted environment on a topic with which people can’t relate themselves (might seem an overlapping with Smith’s point – it is not. Also it isn’t what Taylor said about motivating people by improving working conditions. What I am trying to point here is the very idea of distinguishing between work/leisure. Work is duty and leisure is resting/having fun. You will NEVER give your best for very long time at something which you do only for duty sake.)
• The heirarchy. The competition. The insecurity. The three evils which are eating up human substance rapidly. The bi-products of present economic and social structure. And the causes of most of the problems at workplace. Not that there aren’t any good managers in the industry, but we know office politics comes as a part of the packaged deal. And most of it is driven by these three evils, if we simplify the situation.
• The switch-jobs escape-route. Get me a person who has been in industry for 3 years in the same company. Probably s/he belonged to the lower levels when s/he started and the company gave her/him the space to grow. Probably s/he is a she and she got married. Apart from this senario, the attrition rate would tell us, it is switching jobs which keep the highly motivated highly ambitious very hard-working and quite intelligent youth on their track. A hope is hard to kill. Especially at this age. Especially after having burnt night oil to pass crucial exams all life long so far. The whole value-system depends on hope. A better job – in terms of work profile, in terms of managers, in terms of working hour, in terms of career. In terms of future.
• Blinded. Talk to 10 1/2 yr old chaps in the industry, 9 would tell you there are here for “experience”. Hmm.. so what do they think they would have learnt from experience after, say, by the end of 2 years (typical period to jump into something else)? How the business is done? How the corporate world works? Some more jargon? What is it that pains them least in different kinds of jobs – consultancy/finance? What is it that they are able to pull off most smoothly? What would be the best area to be a part of in the future when the boom ends? What for? To live comfortably. To live richly. Blinded by constraints. “The basic needs”. To be able to spend a night at the Times Square in NYC, a day at the Niagra Falls, an evening in ferry to The Statue of Liberty. To be able to earn so much in the first few years when there is energy n enthu that after sometime there won’t be any need to work anymore and you can roam the world. People are basically simplistic in nature. And Blinded.
• The conscience. We all have to live with it. Not a choice. Only we have been trained not to venture in cross-questioning. We know we are responsible for creating pollution, eating-up natural resources, basically leaving the world in a bad shape for future generations of all living beings. We also know we are just a cog in the wheel. We know to live with it. We know we are in a highly unequal society, we know education of which we are so proud of is only reproducing the social structure already present (hence by no means is it contributes in bringing equality to the world), we know we are the receiving end of the circle. The conscience pangs are inevitable. The 12 hour bad job senario helps here. “We are working our asses off. Give me a break! I am already on the verge of a nervous breakdown let alone to think about the society.. blah blah… ” Couldn’t have had a faster escape.

So juntax, these are my understandings of a situation I have only been partly involved in since last three months. I would love to get your inputs/criticisms/agreements… anything on this issue so that…. moksha….blah blah…