I enjoy writing for the New Indian Express for two reasons. I like readers who agree; but a few disagree, and I like that too. One such correspondent enquired whether the twin ideas of a company as a community and the promotion of a person’s development for the company have outlived their relevance. Why not just buy in the required skills and pay suitably because young people no longer pursue a one-company career? They see employer variety as a virtue. Perhaps I am old-fashioned. I believe that if a company demonstrably cares for people, it creates unique value through its own botany and biochemistry. I have anecdotal experience, though not the perfect proof.
I served Unilever for three decades and a bit. In recent weeks, there have been three social gatherings of Lever alumni, branded as ‘xleverbuddies’, in Delhi, Bengaluru and Mumbai. Former executives of Hindustan Unilever— with service ranging from a few years to a life-long career—pay to have lunch and enjoy camaraderie. The company and current employees have no involvement, financially or emotionally, in these events. Each event is organised by volunteer Lever alumni; incidentally, they compete by active marketing for the largest number of participants. Taken together, these lunches have attracted 1,000 participants, including many wives.
Several executives have worked together earlier; recognising former colleagues is sometimes challenging with the passage of time. There are adivasis, who joined Hindustan Lever directly, while some came through acquisitions of Brooke Bond, Lipton, Ponds, Kissan or Kwality Ice Creams. Most have aged gracefully and healthily. But, what on earth do they talk about when they meet each other after parting from the company? Why do several fly in for the day from other cities?
I did some informal market research to understand the motivations to attend. There seemed to be five: first, recounting moisturising nostalgia during employment, second, memories of the strong acculturation within the company; third, the deep focus on training and socialisation; fourth, the unbending commitment to honest business, whatever the external pressures; fifth, growing to be personally competitive, but professionally collaborative. There were, of course, occasional references to missed promotions and postings, but these were without any visible rancour. All things considered, the enthusiasm of the executives is understandable, but what is most intriguing is why do the spouses attend these functions? They had no logical reason to feel like a family.
Almost every participant also had work experience of non-Hindustan Unilever companies. Many served in Unilever subsidiaries in foreign countries. Surely other companies must have similar characteristics, I persisted. The answers were an eye opener—other companies did have some of these characteristics, but the presence and rigour of all these together was a rarity.
In integrative systems in biology, botany and philosophy, individually valuable factors are called emergent factors. Occasionally, they occur simultaneously but when in resonance, they are hugely synergistic. Hindustan Unilever has a distinctive combination of emergent social factors. How did these executives feel, how did they communicate? Perhaps Botany could guide my curiosity about culture.
During my Kolkata school days, I had read about Acharya Jagdish Chandra Bose’s findings about plants having life. The Peter Wohlleben book, titled The Hidden Life of Trees: What they Feel, How they Communicate, provided some insight. I am stunned to learn that trees share food and communicate because they need one another. Hence trees stay connected through a ‘wood’ wide web, leading to the idea of a ‘wafa’ wide web among Lever folks.
Trees live as a community because they derive advantages out of doing so. If a giraffe eats the leaves of an African acacia, the tree releases a chemical into the air that drifts and warns other trees that there is a predator around. If one tree is chopped, then the stump that is left behind may get nutrients from its neighbours. How? For one, the roots may be invisibly interconnected below the ground. Alternatively, nutrients may be delivered from tree to stump through fungal networks at the root tips called mycorrhizae. On its own, a tree is at the mercy of wind and weather. Many trees together, as in a forest, fight for survival and growth through interdependency and supporting one another. Trees seem to know the oft-quoted management maxim: Nobody is smarter than all of us together.
Xleverbuddies have their own mycorrhizal networks. Could it be that, like trees, they stay together as a community because they benefit through their ‘wafa wide web’? They ask one another questions like, “I have a brand X machine but it is not working and I get no response from the company, anybody with a senior contact at Company X?” or “My son wishes to take drama or sport as a profession, is there anybody who can mentor and guide him?” or “My wife and I are planning a trip to Tierra del Fuego. Does anybody know how we can get the best out of the trip?”
Other institutional communities are also known to create and nurture their own glue, for example, the defence officers, railway families, Citibank, and McKinsey. Companies are not inanimate legal entities as envisaged by laws. They are alive and social entities. It is the task of leaders to nurture this socialisation. Hindustan Unilever executives do it in their own way. Others do it differently.
Imagining that building companies as communities is wasteful, or that culture is soft stuff and transient, may ignore a powerful, though hidden, social glue.
R Gopalakrishnan, Author whose new book, Embrace the Future: The Soft Science of Business Transformation, is due in February
(rgopal@themindworks.me)