Talk delivered by G. Suresh at the 6th Managemantra 2007 organised by the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII), at the PSG Medical College Auditorium, Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu, India on 24th January 2008
“Light a candle, the darkness vanishes. There is no point in cursing the darkness”, said Rabindranath Tagore. I must mention here that the CII-Young Indians (Yi) has been lighting many candles through their India Integrity Campaign. I am glad that they have chosen me to light some candles here in a group of students who have come to chant and learn the Managemantra!
The atom bomb is very powerful not because of the size of the atom bomb, but because of the action taking place inside the atom. Similarly, in the globalised world, the individuals matter the most in every thing that is happening at the macro level. Therefore, a journey from the macro level to micro level is made in this paper to understand the reality and the need of the hour.
Macro level - global
The world is rediscovering the fact that honesty is the best policy. Good governance is perceived globally as the antidote for corruption. As long as the world was divided between the two ideologies of East and West, corruption was not considered as a major issue. The two camps were not bothered about corruption. “Corruption is fine, as long as you are in my camp” was the attitude of the two super powers.
However, with the end of the cold war the countries have become interdependent. As a result, the resources started moving across the borders and today the world has become a global village and we are witnessing the process of globalisation.
Globalization necessitated liberalization and the economic reforms which started in India in 1991. The investment of government in public sector, which was once considered as compulsion, had become an option in the hands of the government with the entry of private sector and their contribution in the economic development of the nation. This has slowly pushed the private players in to the reality of competition and at the same time to be self reliant. This situation perhaps has led to the outburst of financial irregularities and scams across the world which led to the disappearance of companies from the Fortune 500 list. Enron, WorldCom, Global Crossing, Tyco International, Parmalat and Arthur Andersen are the big names which vanished from the scene due to financial irregularities and scams.
The big challenge for the private sector has been to cope up with the competition, while ensuring profit making and at the same time hold accountable to their stake holders.
Added to this factor, there was another interesting development taking place after the end of cold war. The tax payers of the donor countries and societies who provide aids to the developing countries are now very vigilant and are particular that the funds are spent properly without any misappropriation. They are very keen that the countries receiving aids are well governed. So the buzz words, governance and corporate governance have become very relevant and gained prominence in the present scenario. There is a paradigm shift in the thinking from ‘business of business is business’ to ‘business of business is ethical business’.
There are three basic parameter which are considered to determine good governance or good corporate governance. They are :
(i) Accountability – when it comes to corporate houses, the accountability is towards the Stake holders;
(ii) This accountability can not be determined unless there is transparency in the system. So, ‘transparency in operations’ becomes the second parameter which determines good governance or good corporate governance; and
(iii) Thirdly, the ethical and moral framework on which the entire transparent system works.
Thus, accountability and transparency built over ethical standards have to be ensured to achieve good governance or good corporate governance.
Micro level - individuals
As mentioned earlier, in order to ensure accountability, we need to have transparent system based on high ethical standards. Thus it becomes necessary to understand what the ethical standards are. It is very interesting to see how we could narrow down to ethical standards in individual from the global scenario. After all, the atom bomb is most powerful because of the atoms!!!!!
So there are two sets of values:
Ethical
Moral
In fact, the ethical values possessed could be demonstrated through the moral behaviour. This perhaps is the best way to understand ‘ethics’ and ‘morality’. However, supreme oneness is the rationale of all ethics and morality. The fundamental theme of ethics and morality is “Do not injure others, love everyone as your own self, because the whole universe is one’.
Practically, values can be looked at both from an individual’s point of view as well as from the society point of view. It will be worthwhile to know the factors which determine them:
Value Determining factors
Individual’s sense of Value Integrity
o Intellectual integrity
o Moral integrity
o Financial integrity
Honesty & Truthfulness
o Individual Character
Family Background
Education
Self Confidence to hold character
Societal Value From Individuality to Collectivity
How a value system develops in a particular individual is depicted in the following two diagrams with the Antakarana (inner instruments) and the five senses (outer instruments) in human being:
So it all boils down to the human behaviour and human acts based on the input that goes into the human and processing by the Antakarana. Here comes the question of integrating and holding the possessed and acquired values and so we talk about ‘integrity’.
Integrity is ‘dharma’. To bring anything together is ‘dharma’. When people come together in any form is the first pulsation of divinity. In other words, to bring people together in any form is dharma. One which holds together is dharma. For example, the solar system, the innumerable stars that are around are following certain principle or set of principles, some rules, some laws and they are subject to change that is dharma. In a family, the family members are held together; that is dharma. In a locality, in a society, various types of people following very many things, various economics, political, social, cultural, religious functionalists for a society, can pull on together, which is dharma. Dharma is a principle of life. And this principle of life is in everything. Similarly, in human beings, when the set of values are held together and demonstrated for good causes and producing harmony and peace, it becomes a dharma and which is known as integrity.
The human nature has almost got into the mode of democracy. It is the infamous words of Abraham Lincoln, which described the democracy as the government ‘of the people, by the people and for the people’. Similarly, the human nature can be ascribed as ‘of the mind, by the mind and for the mind’. This democratic way of influence of the mind prevents the human being from realizing his real nature, which ultimately leads to all the human sufferings.
Human sufferings are none other than disorderliness in human nature. One of the reasons why the disorderliness in human nature occurs, particularly in the present knowledge driven world, is undoubtedly lack of integrity. “Mind food”, to borrow the words of David J. Schwartz, has become a crucial factor which contributes to integrity and lack of integrity. Obviously, the lack of integrity, particularly, financial integrity leads to corruption and which has a direct bearing on the moral fibre of the society. When it comes to corporate sector, it has a direct bearing on the profitability and reputation of the company.
MIME Management
The situation of lack of integrity is a self-centered activity with the sole objective of satisfying the ego (bundle of desires). The solution perhaps lies in what I would call the MIME management!. (MIME stands for Mind, Intellect, Memory and Ego).
One way of MIME Management is to have ideals, particularly higher ideals. To fix a higher ideal in life, we must look beyond the self-centered boundary. One should conceive a goal beyond the precinct of the narrow mind. The intellect must aim for something higher than the mind’s pretty attachments and desires. The higher the goal, the greater the potency in action. The goals set by higher ideals produce fruitful results rather than those of lower ideals towards accumulation of wealth and indulgence in earthly pleasure. The necessity arises to man to resort to a corrupt or dishonest act because of his ideals being lower or entirely absent.
It is also true that the control of mind can be exercised only through the mind itself. So, the next method of MIME Management is: control of desire through another desire, now with a stronger and a positive one. They could be ‘organizational ego’, the desires of the organization or the ‘national ego’, the desires of the country and so on. Therefore, the act like corruption or dishonesty or lack of integrity can be eliminated only by making the individuals to imbibe the organizational or national ego, and allow it to overpower the individual ego. That way the organizational and national interest will be protected and acts like corruption and dishonesty or lack of integrity could be eliminated.
The litmus test
There is a three-point test, which is being advocated by the stalwarts who had seen great success amidst adversities to confirm whether we have integrity and our acts are ethical. It is a three-point test prescribed by Norman Vincent Peale and Kenneth Blanchard in their book, ‘The power of ethical management’. Any decision taken or any act performed has to be subjected to this test. The first test is, is it legal? If it is not legal, it is not ethical. The second test is, is it fair? Whether the decision or act is fair enough to all the parties involved in the process. In other words, it should lead to a win-win situation. Then the third test is, if our decision or act is made public subsequently, will it bring shame or embarrassment to the individual or organization. If the answer to these tests is affirmative then the decision is ethical and one can be sure of integrity intact. Else, it is a serious issue for introspection!
SIV-G : Self Imposed Vigilance for good Governance
Finally, I will be failing in my mission if I do not mention about SIV-G : Self Imposed Vigilance for Good Governance, which has now taken the shape of a movement. Those of you interested could log on to www.siv-g.org and become part of this Movement.
Now, to understand quickly what SIV-G is; here is a glimpse.
In the words of Saint Thiruvalluvar, Self Imposed Vigilance (SIV) can be understood from the following couplets:
Thirukkural (Ch.68, Ver.676)
Mudivum idaiyurum murriyangu eythum
Padupayanum partthuch cheyal
Every act is to be performed after considering the exertion required, the obstacles to be encountered and the purpose to be achieved on its completion.
The point here is, one needs to be vigilant or watchful on oneself for all his acts and deeds.
“The thief is an artist and the policeman is only a critic”, said Oscar Wilde. The real glory will come only when the thief takes over the role of the policeman to criticize his own art and reform himself. This is the utmost need towards good governance.
Wake up the vigilance officer within!
Nevertheless, there is an easy way to adopt. The story of lamb and tiger comes in handy. Moving amidst the lambs, the lone tiger behaved like a lamb, until one day another tiger made it to realize the fact that it was a tiger and not lamb. The same way, everyone should realize that they are the vigilance officers or watch dogs for themselves to watch their own acts and deeds at the first place before start watching others.
In the ultimate analysis, the best course of action to adopt is in the direction set by Swami Vivekananda, when he said: ‘Teach yourselves, teach every one, his (or her) real nature, call upon the sleeping soul and see how it awakes. Power will come, glory will come, goodness will come, purity will come, and everything that is excellent will come, when this sleeping soul is roused to self-conscious activity’. Let us wake up the vigilance officer in us and apply SIV (Self Imposed Vigilance) to make good governance and good corporate governance a reality.
Let us act and not wait for any Acts all the time!!!!!!!!!
G. Suresh
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