The
top B.Com colleges in Greater Noida make all out efforts to groom students
towards the achievement of career goals. This act of grooming requires more
than a laser focus on academics. At Ishan Institute of Management &
Technology, one of the top commerce colleges in Greater Noida the academic
community has deliberated upon leadership and the way it is practiced and
projected in India. Leadership has always been and will continue to be one of
the most important elements of corporate success. For that matter leadership in
India has slowly but steadily undergone a sea change in the last two decades. S
such India is a young free market economy and has not had the luxury of time to
learn leadership amidst the backdrop of economic growth having already been
achieved. Leadership in India was one of the enablers of economic growth in the
last two decades and for the economic growth momentum to sustain itself, it
shall have to be an “essay in persuasion”.
For
that matter some of the greatest chroniclers of leadership issues in the world
have agreed on the fact that the Indian way of leadership is different from the
West. A book published by researchers Harbir Singh, Peter Cappelli and Michael
Useem called the “The India Way” has listed some of the unique characteristic
features of Indian leadership. More than just leadership styles of the leaders
themselves, it is the impact of the leadership on people that is much more of a
brand differentiator in this context. Let us take a look at some of these
unique aspects of Indian leadership.
Inverting the Organizational
Pyramid
Stories
of Indian leadership are full of legends that state the inversion of the
organizational pyramid and destruction of the office of the CEO. To this
extent, Vineent Nayar of HCL Technologies and N.R.Narayana Murthy of Infosys
are both role models. N.RNarayana Murthy, one of the founders and principal
share holders of Infosys lives a very modest life. He lives in a three bedroom
flat in Bangalore with his family, travels in a family car, and spends time on
higher education initiatives of the world’s top business schools and
universities. In fact he also has been seen to do the chores of his household.
Vineet Nayar transformed the Indian leadership with his approach towards 360
degree performance appraisals at HCL Technologies. Subordinates were asked to
rate the performance of their bosses and even their bosses’ bosses. In doing so
he set the record straight by making the top management accountable to the
middle level and the middle level to the operations level.
Empowering Through Communication
India
is a cricket crazy country and it is not very surprising to note that one of
India’s most successful cricket captains, Sourav Ganguly was invited to IIM
Calcutta to deliver a guest lecture on leadership. In his address Ganguly
emphasised the practice of empowering his team mates through communication. In
his playing days Ganguly was a hand that could crack the whip and pat the back
of the boys both at the same time. First he did what he said at team meetings.
This created trust and meant that the boys took his words seriously and that
plans made were implemented. Second, he believed in communicating not passing
instructions. Again this resonates with the practice of Vineet Nayar of HCL
Technologies as well. Nayar incorporated the practice of decision making at the
point where it must take place, i.e. at the point where the corporation met the
customer. His job was to empower his teammates with resources to do the job
without interfering in their work. It was the same with Ganguly. If an Irfan
Pathan was getting whacked by an Adam
Gilchrist or Hayden, Ganguly would walk up to Pathan, talk to him, pat his
back, take him into confidence, ask for Pathan’s tactics of line and length to
allow the batsman to commit a mistake and set the field to the liking of Pathan. Bowling was Pathan’s job. Ganguly was
a resource provider.
In India Leaders are Born not Made
There
are two types of leaders depending upon whether they were born or made. Born
leaders are instinctive. Made leaders are meticulous. The West produces leaders
who rely on strategic planning, big data, team meetings and presentations and
essentially codified form of knowledge resources. On the contrary in India,
leaders are instinctive. Their decision making evolves from the coordinates of
a situation like time, space and scale. Knowledge exists in silos of
institutional memory, applications, files and personal computers. The instinct
is born out of experience and hence the Indian leader gets better with more
experience because of the learning that is involved.
People as the Source of Competitive
Advantage
In
India people are looked upon as and developed as a source of competitive
advantage by the leaders. The focus on staff development, training and
development, people engagement and the practice of going beyond professional
talk to share their personal issues affecting performance sets Indian leaders
apart. This makes people in Indian enterprises feel at home and put their best
efforts for organizational success. On the contrary in the West, leaders
restrict themselves to highly professional meetings. People do not open up to
their leaders and hence many pieces of business intelligence are lost or buried
under the stacks of files and applications.
At
Ishan Institute of Management & Technology, one of the top B.Com colleges
in Greater Noida we groom leaders of tomorrow. Our academic pedagogy is
delivered through a system designed to bring out leadership qualities in
students.
