Exploring Managerial Effectiveness Through the Lens of the Bhagavad-Gita: What Are Your Thoughts?

Dear All,

Please give your views on "Managerial Effectiveness from the Perspectives of the Bhagavad-Gita."

Thank you.

Bhagavad-Gita and Mahabharata provide great examples to manage our daily lives. I was told that Philip Kotler used "Bhagavad-Gita" to write his books. I don't know how much of this is true.

We Indians have a wrong frame of mind to devote time to all these epics after retirement. Sitting on a balcony, watching our grandkids playing, we would like to read Mahabharata!!!!

I would differ and say that these are stories that shape our lives to face the world of competition. We should read these epics and interpret them in our lives on an ongoing basis. Just to quote:

1. Jarasandha - Who was accusing Krishna, got 100 chances to rectify. We must provide people enough scope and time (Chances) to correct themselves, then comes termination. This also shows that Krishna was counting loudly, showing that feedback was provided at every instance.
2. Bheeshma dies because of human psychology. We tend to hear what we want and not what was told. An elephant dying was heard as Aswathamma dying. Here we see how people use words to manipulate things and present what is needed rather than what is true. Just like saying, 700 Titanic passengers reached the shore safely and not mentioning that the ship was wrecked.

There are so many instances where these can be interpreted in today's context and used in our managerial lives. Since these come to us as stories, we tend to put names to faces and remember them easily.

I am planning to summarize these kinds of stories. Anyone who has similar experiences can share so that we can make this a modern epic.

Best regards,
Harsha

The glory of the Bhagavad Gita lies in its contemporaneousness over the thousand years. It has remained relevant all along and answers the quintessence of human nature. Despair and desolation are common in everyone's life. Many accept defeat and readily give up on life. How many of us can say that they have not thought of suicide as an option in crisis situations? But the Bhagavad Gita answers all those questions concerning the real existence and purpose of human life. It has had a profound influence on many leading minds of humanity.

Management as a subject is very integral to human life, so there is a lot to learn. This PowerPoint presentation is a useful pointer, and we are all obliged.

Regards,
KK Nair

Excellent study. Thanks for sharing this paper.

Many times, what we learn from Western theories is already present in our Eastern thoughts, which developed ages before. It's quite unfortunate that we haven't given importance to our ancient past, especially the thoughts and philosophy developed by our old gurus.

I am so happy that some individuals of our time are taking the trouble to study our old heritage and bring forth the hidden values and knowledge in it.

Great sharing.

Regards,
Shijit.

In this aspect, I would rather say that Bhagavad Gita is a philosophy and Arjuna is a paradigm of somebody who is in pursuit of his goals. However, in a contemporary management scenario, most of the time we face situations where we have to resort to affirmative actions rather than guidance. This is because a major chunk of the employees has already established their road map to deal with their time and effort in line with their personal agendum. Therefore, when you envision an organization, we cannot apply Bhagavad Gita holistically.