“If cat crosses your way, it is bad.” Our mind is conditioned with this superstition. There was one family staying in small village. The family had a lovely cat. The only son in the family got married. It was the time to bring bride at home. Mother thought that it is not good if cat crosses the bride on first day. She takes the cat and hides it under a big container. Due to suffocation cat dies. Mother realized that something is wrong. She notices that cat has stop crying. She checks it. When she sees died cat, she scares. It is even worse to have died cat in home, when bride comes. She takes the cat and goes out hurriedly to through it away. Exactly barat comes; bride sees that her mother-in-law is throwing the dies cat. She thinks that it must be the tradition of family to welcome the bride with dead cat.
After few years, it was a time for daughter in law. When her son gets married, she kills the cat and welcomes the bride.
We are like this daughter in law. There so many things in life we do blindly without understanding the logic. There are lots of practices in the organization which are carried forward without any question. When you ask the reason for doing something, they do not have answers. They say, “We do it in this way only.” There are many practices and customs which are not even relevant in modern days, but still that are there. Nobody knows why they are following that.
It is like government official asking the certificate from pensioner endorsing that pensioner is alive.
“Why?”
“Because we need it?”
“But, why?”
“It is a Rule”
The main reason may be we do not ask the question, “why”. Why you follow it? What is the logic? What is the outcome? If we do not follow the same, what will be consequences?
I have seen in one organization the out door duty approval process. There were two- page form with approval of supervisor (Recommended by), line manager (Sanctioned by), functional manager (Approved by), HR manager (Noted) and finally accounts manager (for expense payment).
“Why do you require so many approvals? Supervisor and HR signature is enough.”
“This is a practice.” I got the answer. The reason was everybody wanted to show their power by signing the document.
We, HR professionals are very expert in designing different procedures, forms. Can we just ask the question? “Why do we need it? Is this process adding some value? Can we make it online and save the non-value added time?
The question is who will ties the bell to the cat? (You know, after all most of the things happen around are for showing the importance and power)