Of Indian IT Industry - Part 3

Part 1 , Part 2 .

Over the last few weeks, the world witnessed the crisis at India's 4th major Outsourcer. As I write this, I am happy that in the revival efforts, the new management has got at least it's basics right. As I stressed in Part 2, Indian IT is about it's ppl, the technical talent. If you loose your workhorses, then well no amount of polishing your cart is going to get you anywhere.

But as the events unfolded , It was interesting to say the least, how lot of varied entities reacted to it. I would try to make my understanding of the issue & reaction through some analogies below. Not an expert at these complex money manipulation things, but yes my 2 cents :) Go figure out the analogies if you can.

Analogy 1 : The issue , big deal for the company - really ?

There lived a happy family. Father, mom and 50 (k) kids in Agra. Kids worked serving foreign tourists in and around the Taj & naturally earned in dollars. Dutiful kids used to give over the entire dollar amount to mom for expenses & mom in turn used to give what was enough (or what she thought was enough) for the kids to show off to other kids in the neighbourhood that they were better off. (All kids in the neighbourhood too were tourist guides you see). Now Mom used to manage the house expenses brilliantly & saved quite a huge amount every month. She used to put all the money in a piggy bank and kept it safe in the loft of the house & yes , as is natural in Indian households, left the key with her husband. Now, the husband was a saint, or at least people in the neighbourhood thought so of him. Highly respected guy. He told everyone how strong his wife & kids were with finances that he ne'er had to do any work himself and could just boss around.So things were going just cool as mom ne'er used to touch the piggy bank. Actually she had no idea why she was saving in the first place as she ne'er needed the money , the cash flow from the kids was so good every month that she couldn't imagine when she would need the money. But since saving is good in our culture & every big family in the neighbourhood seemed to do it, she too did.

And then it happened one day. Husband vanishes leaving behind a letter saying that he doesn't know where is family is going. There is actually no piggy bank at home & I was actually feeding the boys with my money all this time. Can't do that anymore, I am off. Vroom @!

Neighbours went shell shocked, kids were devastated & mom really had no clue what was happening around. She knew the piggy was there, she also knew she ne'er told the kids the reality as she thought they were too small to know all this.But she also thought there was actually no problem as she ne'er touched the piggy anytime. But hey, who was listening. She had the kids to go to work everyday and they would just do fine.

The media reaction :

Oh my god, what happened ! How could the saint take me, the self declared guardian of the Indian society for a ride, No way. I am going to give it back in full measure. And moreover I am the one who has the sole right to create sensations by 'breaking' news. I can't take it anymore when someone tries to get ahead of me in that by writting a letter . Be him a saint or a blogger.

So he goes...
1.The chaiwallah near Taj ('who refused to be named') said the saint was always like this. Never to be trusted....Blah blah
2. 'Unidentified Sources' said it's very difficult for the family to survive, they actually lived their day with the help of the piggy, I don't know if they can eat this month's food with the piggy gone.
3. 'Unconfirmed' taxiwallahs near the Taj said the game is all over for the kids now. They have no idea how things will shape up.
4. And yep, the Indian blogosphere is not to be left far far behind. I was the self declared intelligentsia, he could have taken the entire world for a ride , not me ! So here I go .... ' The whole family should either commit suicide or consider selling off the kids one by one to neighbours, or yep better , the mom should get re-married. That would for sure solve everything.Period.

On Competitor reaction:

One neighbouring family which as a matter of principle never used to drive a car, but only 'drive on values' said.... Oh we are not going to get the family...tainted folks. (It's worth noting that they both shared the same room when they went to the temple festival last year). And yes, you know what - The kids ne'er used to make any money in real, they just went to the Taj, roam around when our kids worked and returned home empty handed. All this thing about kids giving money to mom & saving in a piggy is just crap. We always knew 'it. After all we are not the self declared morale keepers of the 'tourist guides' association for free.

As with any industry in the world, the true maturity of the Industry, the company & the supporting environment (read the media , the govt and other stakeholders) would be reflected only in the time of crisis. The problem with Indian IT has always been a little effort-high return business environment, the moment that started falling apart, the rot is coming out for everyone to see especially like kids fighting for the broken coconut in Vinayaka temple.

Life is indeed like a high speed race most of times. But when you see that the guy in the track next to you has hit a stone and falls down bleeding, it's upto you to set the priorities...you either take him to the hospital , or decide to run ahead to finish the race & claim the trophy. Or like many others, stand near the fallen guy and watch to say ' I won't take out anything voluntarily from him, but if the blackberry falls down from his pocket, Ah well, I can' help running away with it.