Nurturing Diversity: Are We Ready Yet?

COMPANY PROFILE

ABC Corporation was a renowned manufacturing firm in India. A 30-year-old company headquartered at Pune, ABC was mainly engaged in manufacturing various engines used in the equipment industry, transport, aviation, defence, agriculture and healthcare. It also provided technical and maintenance services to its clients across geographies, sectors and types of businesses. This case is based on a plant of ABC Corporation located in Khed City, a smart, integrated industrial city near Pune (refer to Annexure 1 for the organizational structure of the Khed City plant). The plant had around 300 executives, nearly 450 non-executives in regular employment and over 700 contract labourers.

The vision statement of ABC Corporation read as follows:

Our vision is to become the nation’s most trusted brand of commercial engines. Our primary aim is to create a better tomorrow through a two-pronged approach of offering a differentiated product portfolio to our customers and leveraging a diverse and inclusive workforce to achieve superior business results.

ABC Corporation strongly believed that talent is critical for driving organizational values. Its top management claimed to value diversity based on the philosophy that different employees bring their varied experiences and perspectives to the think tank, thus helping in better decision-making. As per its annual reports, ABC Corporation strived to nurture the best of the talent by actively responding to business needs. The company manuals declared the HR goals of the Corporation as:

Our goal is to attract, develop and retain the best and the brightest from all walks of life in our journey to build an organizational culture of inclusion, whereby all our employees feel respected and are treated fairly.

ABC Corporation aimed to excel in its initiatives towards diversity and inclusion (D&I) in terms of gender, disability, ethnicity, religious affiliation, sexual orientation and other forms of diversity through hiring, promotions and talent retention. In tandem with changing lifestyles, ABC offered benefits through policies such as flexi work, paternity leaves, extended maternity leaves, sabbaticals and part-time work, so that employees could take care of their spouse/partner and family. Recognition was also slated for high D&I performance through awards. The annual training calendar of ABC Corporation included a compulsory D&I module to train the employees in nurturing gender sensitization, embracing diversity and removing unconscious bias.

This case refers to an incident that questions an organization’s capability to be truly inclusive and diverse. It discusses an employee of an establishment who faced a culture shock after serving it for a decade. Circumstances led him to consider a mid-way through which he could bypass revealing the truth about himself and conceal the reality about the organization’s closed approach to D&I, contrary to what it claimed to practise. The case throws open the question of what it takes for the internal stakeholders of any company to be genuinely inclusive and nurture diversity in all its forms.

THE BACKDROP

Mr Sundar Desai was the production head at the Khed City plant. He was responsible for plant-level planning, organizing, directing and running day-to-day operations, including various activities related to safety, quality, productivity, innovation and other deliverables.

Mr Harsh Oberoi was the head of HR in the Khed City plant. He looked after the plant-level HR operations for executives and non-executives, including training and development to implement skills matrix and contract labour management. All related legal compliances came under his purview. Apart from this, Mr Oberoi was responsible for proactively identifying and resolving employee relations issues fairly and consistently to ensure that the Khed City plant operated effectively and efficiently.

Vihaan Anand, Manager, Product Design, in the Strategy department at the Khed City plant, is the main protagonist. Vihaan joined ABC Corporation 10 years ago as an intern and had a meteoric rise within the organization. He was workaholic, competitive and a high achiever, with excellent client management abilities. Under his leadership, the project account had snowballed. Management and customers were exceedingly happy with his performance.

Vihaan reported to Deepak Singh (Head, Strategy) of the Khed City plant. Vihaan’s entire team, except Shaurya Verma, held him in high esteem for his sharp technical knowledge and excellent people management skills. Shaurya had joined ABC as an intern with Vihaan. He also served as Manager, Product Design, at the Khed City plant and reported to Deepak Singh. He was equally efficient as Vihaan and was a go-getter. Somehow, Deepak had a stronger association with Shaurya, as both had graduated from the same business school. Although they had a gap of around 10 years in graduation, their alma mater bonding was quite robust!

The ‘Closeted’ Personal Life of Vihaan

Ever since childhood, Vihaan took a keen interest in writing short stories to express his feelings and emotions that could not be shared with any other person. During graduation, he started attending theatre, which prolifically portrayed why defying categories of gender, normative behaviour and finding unconditional acceptance was still a radical idea in the Indian society. On one such occasion, Vihaan met Riyansh, an engineer by profession, who also had similar experiences and needed a person who could understand and respect him for his uniqueness. Their friendship and emotional bonding grew with time, and they accepted their relationship as that of a same-gender couple. Recently, Riyansh was transferred to Khed City plant from the Gurugram plant of his organization, XYZ Motor Company (refer to Annexure 2 for details about XYZ).

Although they were close, Riyansh and Vihaan also respected each other’s professionalism. Hence, they never shared things about their work as conscientious employees. However, they often laughed over the prevalent homophobia in their workplace. None of them ever made their relationship public. Vihaan once shared a story with Riyansh about his visit to Harsh Oberoi’s residence. Oberoi’s son came up to him and smirked audibly: ‘Are you Vihaan Uncle or Vihaan Aunty?’

Vihaan often confessed to Riyansh that such incidents left him devastated. Although he had accepted and cherished his individuality, he was apprehensive about the societal acceptance of his sexuality. And therefore, Vihaan chose to hide his sexual orientation from colleagues.

Acceptance Within the Organization

Although Vihaan was appreciated as an efficient manager, some of his colleagues, including Shaurya Verma, used to mock him for his effeminate behaviour. Vihaan felt that his team members and other staff were homophobic. One day while in the washroom, he overheard two of his colleagues commenting on his dressing sense and about his ‘closeted’ relationship status. Such comments were not new, so he did not pay much heed. For Vihaan, his job and career meant more than the insulting comments, jokes or demeaning looks for his attire at work. These experiences had made him more tolerant with time.

It is not that Vihaan never thought of approaching the HR or the Internal Complaints Committee (ICC) of ABC to report the evident discrimination done against him on a day-to-day basis. However, he was apprehensive of whether the ICC would be open to a male employee lodging a complaint about workplace bullying. Moreover, one incident made Vihaan determined to avoid approaching either the HR or the ICC.

During a corporate lunch at the headquarters, Harsh Oberoi started a casual conversation about the recent news of introducing exclusive benefits for employees with same-gender partners by some of the big corporate houses. Immediately, others present started mocking the way such people walk and talk and how they dress up. Vihaan never thought that a person’s sexuality could affect someone’s mindset to the extent that their capability, achievements and potential would get overlooked. To his surprise, even Sundar Desai and Harsh Oberoi were passive-aggressive about the issue. ‘Such is the intolerance exhibited by the culture-bearers of this company!’ Vihaan thought. The ambience got uncomfortable and Vihaan skipped lunch on the pretext of attending a client call. Back in his office, Vihaan wondered if his sexual orientation were an issue with the senior team, someone would have approached him, or he would at least have gotten some hint from their words or actions. Giving his thought a pause, Vihaan resumed work.

The Much-Awaited Promotion

There was a culture within ABC Corporation to organize a dinner party once in six months named ‘HiPo’. At this party, the top 10 high-performing managers who had been helping drive the business and were fetching huge profits and opportunities for the company were publicly acknowledged. Mostly ‘HiPo’ dinners also featured new responsibilities assigned to the top performers. Vihaan was invited to the ‘HiPo’ of June 2019.

Everyone was in a happy state of mind during the party. Dinner started with a welcome address jointly by Desai and Oberoi. Both expressed gratitude towards everyone present for having helped the company reach all the milestones. Pointing at Vihaan, Desai mentioned: ‘He is one gem we have in our Khed City plant!’ Harsh Oberoi also appreciated the hard work Vihaan put in and his diligence. Soon after, Vihaan was invited on stage and was congratulated on his new role as the Head, Strategy, for ABC’s latest million-dollar project, InAlpha, a long-term project to build environment-friendly, high-efficiency engines. Since Vihaan had worked a lot on this project and helped bag it from paper to reality, he was the only one found fit for this role.

However, one person was unhappy with the announcement and the appreciation on the stage. It was Shaurya Verma. He started feeling restless and frustrated. After all, he was equally, if not more, competent! He had been handling some other critical projects for ABC. Then why Vihaan and not Shaurya? Unable to resist his feelings, Shaurya finally reached out to Deepak Singh and whispered to him, ‘Gem! Really!! Do you know what Vihaan has been up to?’ It was Deepak’s turn to be curious. Without much coaxing, Shaurya started: ‘I stay in the same apartment as Vihaan. I have seen him sharing his flat with an employee of XYZ Corporation. Sir, he is not normal like us! Look at the people around you; they are murmuring about his persona.’

Singh glanced around and quietly told Shaurya to provide him with all details the next day. He then got busy with the other people at the party. A bloodless coup that would change Vihaan’s life thus began, and he was completely unaware of all this.

Later that night, Vihaan thought that meritocracy was still respected in the company, despite whatever his top management believed about an employee’s personal life and preferences. He felt confident about the system. His next task was to work on the review and plan of action report for InAlpha and submit it in the next two weeks. The company was supposed to put forward proposals for raising capital and attracting investors soon after.

The next day, Shaurya reached Deepak’s office and, without much delay, started with his gossip.

Shaurya: So, as I was telling you last night, Vihaan is staying with his partner!

Deepak Singh: See, I could not pay much attention to you last night. Partner? As in business partner?

Shaurya: No, no! It is a kind of live-in relationship! I am sure you have no idea about this, but they are a couple. His neighbours also keep commenting on the live-in status of these two men.

Deepak Singh: Hold on! Is this your jealousy speaking, or were we utterly ignorant of it all this time?

Shaurya: I am telling you what I know. The rest is up to you. I guess it is my responsibility to remind you that Vihaan’s partner is from our rival firm XYZ.

Deepak Singh was visibly disturbed. He told Shaurya to gather more information about how Vihaan was managing his personal life. Shaurya happily agreed and left. Deepak decided to discuss all this with Sundar and Harsh over coffee.

The Balancing Act

Over the next two weeks, Vihaan worked rigorously on the review and plan of action report. He put long hours into preparing the report, attended several meetings and worked on weekends to meet the deadline. Due to this, he could not spend time with Riyansh, who was shifting and adjusting to the new region.

Since the last weekend, Riyansh was not feeling well and was detected with a severe stomach infection. As Vihaan was nearing the completion of his report, he thought to execute the last phase of work at home. This would allow him time to also take care of Riyansh. After getting permission from Mr Oberoi, Vihaan worked from home for the next four days. All this time, he took good care of Riyansh, monitoring his medicines and diet. They also spent time talking about their daily routines, colleagues and watching television shows.

THE STORM BREWING

Riyansh had started showing signs of recovery. Meanwhile, the deadline to submit the review and plan of action report was approaching. Hence, Vihaan decided to visit his office only to give the hard copy of the report to his assistant Mac to put up in the Board meeting slated the next day at the headquarters in Pune. Vihaan was in a good state of mind. He felt that everything had finally been settled; he could meet the deadline for report submission, and Riyansh was planning to get back to his work next week. Vihaan was quite eager to know what would happen in the Board meeting.

The Board Meeting

The Board meeting had started sharp at 10:00 am. Vihaan was working in his cabin at the plant. At around 11:00 am, Mac came running to his office. He said that Vihaan was asked to report at the Pune office soon.

Vihaan left the plant immediately and reached the headquarters just before lunchtime. He hurriedly entered the meeting room to find five members present for the meeting: Sundar Desai, Harsh Oberoi, Deepak Singh, Vidya (Head, Operations) and Raunak Chawla (Head, Sales). The Board members offered him to sit. Vihaan was clueless and was startled to see the members staring at him. Harsh Oberoi started the conversation.

Harsh Oberoi: Good morning, Vihaan! How are you?

Vihaan: Good morning to all of you! I am good!

Harsh Oberoi: Well, I must say, the report you made is comprehensive and well-structured!

Vihaan: Thank you! I did whatever I could!

Sundar Desai: Okay, Vihaan, what about your personal problem?

Vihaan: What? I mean, what exactly?

Sundar Desai: The personal problem for which you chose to work from home last week, right?

Vihaan: Oh, yes! Things have fallen in place by God’s grace. I have joined back today.

Deepak Singh: Well, let us come straight to the point. Vihaan, I deal in numbers, and I only understand profits. I went through the report twice and found it financially stable in the long run. But we all have a different concern here.

Vihaan: Oh! I got you now! I am so sorry about yesterday! Mr Singh, I had no idea about your meeting with our potential investor Zofo Corporation for InAlpha. I came to the office yesterday only to submit the hard copy of the report before the deadline. After giving the necessary instructions to Mac, I was about to leave when I got a call from your secretary to email her the soft copy for the meeting. I mailed her immediately. Also, I called her after the investor meeting, and she told the meeting went well, and the investors were happy. I sincerely apologize for the inconvenience caused to you. Had I known about this earlier, this problem would not have occurred at all!

Deepak Singh: You know what, Vihaan? After this response, I feel that you also have an attitude problem. First, you show negligence and then casual behaviour to settle things, and on top of everything, disloyalty to the firm!

Vihaan: I apologize, Sir, if anything I have said has hurt you. I did not mean to be casual in any way. But disloyalty?

Harsh Oberoi: Vihaan, let me explain what Mr Singh is trying to say. I understand that there has been some communication gap. Thus, the report was sent to him at the last minute. Right?

Vihaan: Yes, probably! But…!

Harsh Oberoi: Vihaan, even I feel that you have an attitude problem. You seem to shy away from day-to-day conversations at the plant. You also do not bother to talk openly, even in informal meetings, and people feel uncomfortable around you.

Vihaan: Attitude problem and me? That is surprising. I mean, who would say that? I have worked with you for all these years! Do you think I have not been behaving like others?

Sundar Desai: It is not a single person. I think it is about others also. You visit the same canteen, washroom and office space with the others. Have you ever noticed that others get conscious of your presence?

Vihaan: I do not understand this. I know I am an introvert and prefer not to be social with everyone, but how is this connected to disloyalty?

Harsh Oberoi: Are you raising concerns about what the Board is trying to say here? Also, you are questioning us for everything. Should we expect this kind of attitude from you?

Desai quietly pressed Oberoi’s hand, indicating him to pause. Vihaan was shocked to see Oberoi’s behaviour, and he sat cold before the Board members.

Sundar Desai: Well, we all know you have brought business to this company. But after your recent act of hiding things and betrayal, we feel that your prospects in the company are now limited.

Vihaan: Hiding things and betrayal? Me?

Deepak Singh: Honestly, investors were happy till yesterday’s meeting. When I got a call from Zofo, I was surprised to hear that they had received the same proposal from another company. Since Zofo already has a good association with that company, it might prefer to invest there. On enquiring further, I learned that the other proposal also contains blueprints, strategy and financial models identical to our proposal. Now tell me, how is this possible, and that too just before the last round of negotiations with Zofo?

Vihaan: Mr Singh, I have no idea about this. How can this happen? I gave only one physical copy here and mailed it only to you. How can the report get leaked in just a few hours?

Raunak Chawla: Vihaan, if you have done anything, just admit it! You possibly feel that your prospects are not that well at ABC. Hence, you might have leaked it to our rival! Simple!

Vihaan: Rival? Which company? And why would I do this?

Sundar Desai: It is XYZ Motor Company, and now I clearly understand why you chose to complete the last phase of the project at home!

Vihaan: Sundar Sir, you know I had personal reasons! I am shocked to know that my 10-year-long loyalty is being questioned for this! Also, Mr Chawla, even if I had to switch to any other company, I would never adopt such unethical means!

Vidya: We are not talking about which way you choose or not. We just know that the same report came to the investor from our rival. We have some clue about how it was routed there. Do you want us to explain that as well?

Vihaan: Madam, I have no idea about any route.

Harsh Oberoi: Listen, Vihaan, it is none of our business to get into your personal life. But we have got to know from some sources that you were recently seen with one of the employees of XYZ near your apartment. Your social media accounts also confirm your interactions with this person. Do you want me to elaborate further?

Vihaan: I am not sure of any of this. But if you are talking about an employee of XYZ Motor Company, then let me tell you that he is my friend Riyansh and we have known each other for the past three years. But I assure you that he has nothing to do with this matter.

Sundar Desai: Vihaan, you are sharing your apartment with someone from our competitor firm, and you think we are fools sitting here to believe that you did not share anything about InAlpha with him? Also, nobody has any clue as to which personal problem led you to work from home and that too at such a crucial phase of report drafting.

Harsh Oberoi: What Sundar says is true. I think you are incompetent to handle the new role. As Mr Chawla meant, you rightly believe that ABC Corporation is not for you.

Vihaan (losing patience): Sir, when it comes to my incompetence, I must remind you that you were a part of the system which identified me capable enough to lead the InAlpha project. I beg your pardon, but I disagree with being called incompetent.

Sundar Desai: Let us end the conversation now. We have done our bit of exploration, and then we have come up with all this. As for the InAlpha project and Zofo, we are here to take care of them, and we will certainly not require you.

Vihaan: But this is injustice! What about my turn to explain things? Is this what I should expect out of my decade-long loyalty to this firm?

Harsh Oberoi: What is done is done. All proofs are against you. We never expected this from you, and now, unfortunately, we have to terminate you with immediate effect on the grounds of the misconduct you committed during your course of employment. You shall receive your termination letter, and my secretary will help you through the process until your full and final settlement.

All the Board members left the room while Vihaan sat clueless and confused. It was a bolt from the blue, and he was yet to grasp what exactly happened. He was equally shocked to see how Sundar Desai and Harsh Oberoi had responded and how they were curt with him. People who once considered Vihaan as a gem were the same ones who did not protect him. Surprised and anguished by the series of incidents, Vihaan decided to leave for home, dropping a message for Mac asking to contact him through email.

Back at home, Vihaan checked his mobile, and there were multiple missed calls from Mac and a text message to call him back at the earliest. Although he did not want to talk to Mac, still Vihaan called him back out of courtesy.

Vihaan: Hello, Mac. Sorry I missed your calls! Tell me!

Mac: Good evening, Sir! I know it is a challenging situation you are facing. I am sorry I could not be at the office to meet you in person, but I must tell you that all this is only an outcome of some conspiracy!

Vihaan: Wait! What? Conspiracy?

Mac: A few weeks ago, I just overheard some office gossip regarding a conspiracy against you. I chose to ignore that, but what happened today proved me wrong.

Vihaan: Mac, can you be more specific?

Mac: Sir, not on call! Please can we meet at the Ring Road Chai Point at 9:00 pm tonight?

The Conspiracy Theory

At the café, Mac was nervous. Initially, he was hesitant to disclose the conspiracy. After some coaxing, Mac finally spoke up. He told Vihaan that one of the senior employees was probably involved in leaking the proposal document to XYZ and passing on the blame to Vihaan. Of course, such a sensitive document could not be passed on to any outsider without the support of key executives.

Now Vihaan could not hide his despair. Seeing his condition, Mac decided to reveal what all he knew. He told Vihaan that, as instructed by Deepak Singh, Shaurya Verma kept a vigil on Vihaan and Riyansh. Several times Shaurya had tried to extract personal information about Vihaan from Mac. Upon getting clarity about Vihaan’s sexual orientation, the top management felt insecure about his presence in the office. However, there had to be a reason good enough to remove him from the job. The circumstances were favourable in his absence. Mac suspected that it was Shaurya only who leaked the report to the management of XYZ, so that Vihaan could be charged with disloyalty and thus be terminated.

Vihaan wondered why the Board put up the false allegation of passing on documents to a competitor. It was probably a bloodless coup driven by his alternative sexual orientation! Also, Riyansh’s association with XYZ and InAlpha’s timing seemed to have gone against Vihaan. He got even more frustrated after Mac told him that his termination letter might mention misconduct as the reason behind his termination.

Mac left the café, and Vihaan sat devastated and helpless. Surprised and anguished by the series of incidents, he was flooded with multiple questions: Did he commit a mistake by hiding his sexual orientation from his colleagues? Was there any basis in the conspiracy hinted at by Mac? Should he accept the termination or take legal help?

Annexure 1. Organization Structure of the Khed City Plant of ABC Corporation.

Annexure 2. About XYZ Motor Company.

The main line of business of XYZ was manufacturing automobiles, spread across plants in suburban India. It was a market leader in its methods for large-scale manufacturing of engines, batteries and commercial vehicles and was reportedly a potential competitor of ABC. XYZ also had a manufacturing unit at Khed City that produced internal and external combustion engines primarily used for commercial vehicles.