Close Encounters with an Indian Public Sector Undertaking

Interviewing Chairman SAIL

I was young and naive then and a part of a small but energetic consultancy organisation, which was aghast that the Union Budget - the single most important economic event in the financial calendar of the country - does not get the coverage it deserves on Doordarshan.

The incident relates to the era when one did not have a channel other than Doordarshan as an option. Nevertheless, Doordarshan was convinced of the importance to have a series of programmes covering presentation of Economic Survey, the Railway Budget, and the Union Budget.

The coverage of the Union Budget that year was to be made exciting, as an expert panel on Doordarshan was to discuss and debate the budgetary proposals trickling down via our contact placed in Parliament and through the the tickers of UNI and PTI. To remind the younger generation again - live coverage of proceedings of the parliament was yet to find acceptance in those times.

For the programmes leading to live budget coverage we had planned a series of interviews with eminent economists, bureaucrats and corporate leaders. In our list of potential interviewees the only public sector chief to figure was Chairman, SAIL and I was assigned the task of fixing an appointment and interviewing him.

I started my quest with a ring to SAIL PBX, which was quickly transferred to the Chairman’s office.

“I am speaking on behalf of Doordarshan. As you are aware, the presentation of the Union Budget is to take place in a couple of days, for which we would like to interview Chairman, SAIL. May I speak with him ?” I bumbled.

The voice on the other side was curt and brief “Chairman is busy right now. If you leave your name and phone number we will get back to you.”

I divulged the required information, and waited patiently for the call confirming the date and venue.

The list of questions with which I was to confront Chairman, SAIL, was reviewed and refined over the day but I did not get the call of confirmation. Next day, I repeated my call and we went through exactly the same sequence without any progress. The third day a colleague of mine tried her luck. Although she could talk much longer than I did, her attempt also failed. Ultimately, we decided to throw in the towel.

Incidentally, that year we were able to successfully interview among others Rajiv Gandhi, the then Prime minister, who was also holding the finance portfolio.

SAIL : A First Hand Experience

I was yet to become a part of the SAIL fraternity. As a part of our consultancy assignment we had to visit the steel plants. The first visits in our itinerary were Bokaro and Durgapur.

I can never forget my first plant visit. The larger than life industrial structures defied imagination. We were awe struck by the sheer size of different process centres in the steel plant. Eager to learn, we spent almost 4 to 5 days in Bokaro, visiting different shops in day time and holding discussions with the plant personnel in the afternoon.

I am reminded of an interesting incident during our visit. In one of the meetings, a young finance officer was present in the group of technical experts briefing us on the technology and economics of coke making and bye products generation. Time and again the young finance officer would contravene what the technical experts would have us believe. In the end he was brow beaten to keep mum for rest of the meeting. But we had caught on, and had a separate meeting with him in the evening to have a better grip of reality. It is only now that I marvel at his self confidence. How tough it is to speak in a dissenting note in a hierarchical organisation, can be known only after spending a few years in a corporate set up.

A Part Of The Family

As a Junior Manager I was given the opportunity of speaking to a group of 200 to 250 MTTs joining SAIL in 1988. I was to speak on the Public Sector and its performance. Although the idea of lecturing a group of such a formidable size made me nervous, I was more unsure about communicating the issues of economics to a technically oriented group.

The interaction with MTTs is one of the most cherished surprises of my professional career. In no time during my interaction, it became clear that I was interacting with a highly intelligent group. All the questions that I threw at them were answered with panache and originality. Their spark and pep was contagious. Interacting with Management Trainees is an eye opener to what a fine talent organisations like SAIL draw at the entry level. However, the public sector enterprises have yet to evolve the environment where the spark in the young is nurtured to its potential. The drudgery and the routine of every-day life takes away from young professionals their pep, and from the organisation, the voices of dissent which is such an important ingredient for any organisational break through.

In Support of Staff

“How did you reach me ?” I enquired over the phone to the friend of mine, who had tracked me down to the computer centre on my second day of joining the office.

“It is one of the biggest surprises for me too” responded my friend from the private sector. “I just told the operator that my friend Sanjay has joined SAIL. I do not know which department or which building.” my friend elaborated.

With that information, the operator rang up Corporate Planning where he knew some fresh persons had joined, and found that I had gone to the first floor computer centre. He then tracked me down on the first floor and passed on the call. Instances like this makes one think how public sector can be as good as the best in the private sector if the staff is well trained and motivated. Sadly, instances such as above are not the norm.

Another big surprise for me was the first Private Sectretary (PS) we worked with. Personal Computers (PCs) had just been introduced in SAIL, and most of the staff did not have exposure to it. The PS attached to our group - Economic Cell, was also an Office Bearer in the Union. We were unsure about how much of help we could get from him. Here again we were in for a surprise. The PS attached to us was willing to learn the use of the PC from scratch. We had entrusted to him a job which involved a substantial amount of data punching in spreadsheets. Despite his time commitment to the Union, we found that he stayed back to finish the assigned work after office hours. His quality of work had the highest degree of accuracy, and his management of various tasks at the same time, a lesson for novices like us.

“In a private sector you would have been my boss and not a subordinate,” I gushed in admiration.

Personal Planning

One area where PSUs definitely score over private sector is that of personal planning. I never knew how to calculate income tax before I joined SAIL. In my earlier organisation a Chartered Accountant used to work out all the details for us, while we continued with our level of ignorance. In SAIL I found that every officer was able to work out optimal savings and taxes according to his/her preference.

We also discovered that every one was very well informed about the pecuniary benefits available under the company rules, and acted in a shameless capitalistic fashion to optimise it. One possible way of channelling this enterprise is to link it with the organisation’s progress in a more direct way. How such systems can be created is the challenge for enterprises world over.

On privatisation

I some times wonder why the issue of privatisation evokes such strong emotions in public sector employees. The proportion of excellence in public sector would not be any different from private. The only difference is that the excellent and hard working professionals in PSUs or Government work much harder as they have to compensate for the portion of the workforce that knows that it can get away without putting in the effort due from each employee.

Seen in this light the good professionals should have nothing to fear and the majority nothing to lose except a bit of free time. It is after all generally accepted, that the work shirkers - which any way is in minority, should either tone up or leave. So why this apprehension ?