Social Disaster : 5. The Boss-Employee Relationship

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Social Disaster : 5. The Boss-Employee Relationship

 

 

The Boss-Employee Relationship

 

If an employer and an employee are undisciplined and do not cherish harmony in the workplace according to the teachings of the Six Directions, the harm that will come to the employees and society can be concluded on three levels.

 

Loss of respect for one’s own Human Dignity

 

If a boss or employer lacks the self –discipline according to the teaching of the Biddha, the first disaster coming to him is that his employees will have no sense of responsibility for their own human dignity, producing at least the following three character traits:

 

- Breeding seriously erroneous core values: Those who work as workers and labourers are mostly of limited education, from poor families, lacking knowledge of positive core values, and likely to have little conscience. Their minds may be vulnerable to temptation because erroneous core values might be deeply engrained in their minds. If these labourers have the chance to work with a responsible boss who has positive core values and takes special attention to train their subordinates in positive core values, they may be able to enhance their qualities as a True Friend. They will be grateful for their boss and try to return that debt of gratitude by working with diligence and loyalty. Should the boss die, they might even be willing to work for their successors. On the contrary, if the boss lacks positive core values themselves, failing to perform their duties to their employees, with erroneous core values, misbehaving in the things they do and say, such a boss will creates only resentment among his employees. Bosses that are False Friends tend to worsen the erroneous core values of their employees, which might exacerbate to the point of violence harming both boss and employees. It can be said that bosses suffering from erroneous core values in their minds not only create unwholesomeness themselves, but also indirectly force their employees into unwholesome behaviour, making an unending circle of vengeance;

 

 

Use the company assets wastefully or intentionally damage them

 

- Gossiping about the boss behind his back: Employees who have a grudge against the boss because of their erroneous core values might avenge themselves anonymously. They might gossip behind their boss’s back, spread rumours to create conflicts among the company’s board committees or to damage the image of the company’s products. Some might divulge trade secrets to competitors;

 

- Sabotaging the boss’s interests: Subordinates lacking conscience have many ways to get their own back on bosses lacking sound core values. Depending on the degree of their bitterness, they might:

 

- Take industrial action;

 

- Take physical reprisals sgainst the boss or supervisor who fires them;

 

- Divulge the company’s trade secrets to competitors;

 

- Use the company assets wastefully or intentionally damage them;

 

- Steal company property.

 

Although aimed to damage their bosses’ interests, eventually the damage done by employees will come back to themselves.

 

Loss of respect for others’ Human Dignity When employees have no sense of responsibility for the human dignity  of others if a boss or employer lacks the self-discipline according to the Six Directions, the second disaster coming to him is that his employees will have no sense of responsibility for the human dignity of others, producing at least the following three character traits:

 

- They become biased: Employees may bring bias with them to the workplace from their previous negative social experiences. Once they work with selfish or biased boss, it is sure to cause them to become biased further. Impulsive employees might let their erroneous core values run riot, behaving badly with no fear of law or morality. The less impulsive might deflect their prejudice into cold-blooded or merciless revenge;

 

 

Breeding seriously erroneous core values

 

- Using words as their weapons: Employees might express their disatisfacton for the bias of their boss by going on strike, reprimanding their boss or demanding excessive tights. If their demands are not met, they may try to discredit the bossesand the company. Others may have grudges against colleagues better favoured by the boss. If that colleague thinks he has protection from his boss he might strile back against those who wish him ill the conflicts in the workforce will expand without end;

 

- Indirectly destroying the company: Such wars of words among the employees are hard to curtail because the main perpetrators are ones who are disobedient to the boss. The dissent may worsen further to the point of injury or even death. If the number of people at the heart of the conflict is only two or three, however, a compromise is not too difficult to achieve but where the conflict involves many employees each with their own groups, it will be difficult to mend the cracks. This is part of the disaster resulting from bias of both boss and employees. In case of employees being treated unjustly, they may try to give their bodes a hard time by showing reluctance to work. They might go further to damage assets or use sub-standard materials, mixing contaminants with products, or conspiring with other employees to ask for sick leave at the same time, or resign all together without advance notice. Some have such erroneous core views as to go as far as to set fire to their workplace.

 

The more employees hired in a company or the more domestic help hired in a household, the more potential troubles bias can cause if it becomes engrained in the boss’s values and may ultimately lead to company bankruptcy or disaster in the household.

 

 

Loss of respect for one’s own Human Dignity

 

Loss of respect for Economic Fairness

 

When employees have no sense of responsibility for the human dignity of economic fairness if a boss or employer lacks the self-discipline according to the Six directions, the third disaster coming to him is that his employees will have no sense of responsibility for the human dignity for economic traits:

 

- Increasing vulnerability to temptation: As previously mentioned, employees and those in domestic service are usually of limited education, coming from peasant families. They seek work in the cities after the ploughing season and return home when the ploughing season around again. Those who do not have their own land may settle down in the big cities. The experience of the extravagant and permissive city life may mislead these employees to believe it is a better way of life than their own. Unfortunately, this sort of lifestyle is always mixed up with Roads to Ruin, such as drinking. Drugs, night-life, entertainment and gambling. All these fritter away money, and for employees who already have little income, once involved with Roads to Ruin will unavoidably suffer debt and other economic problems. However, if they are lucky enough to work with a boos who is a True Friend to them, enlightening them as to moral ways, to have, they will not be enslaved by Roads to Ruin. They will be better able to fulfil their purpose of coming to work in big cities. They can collect enough money and invest it to improve the life of their family in the provinces, Unfortunately not all meet with such scrupulous employers. Employees who are vulnerable because of their ignorance, and whose minds are vulnerable to temptation, may fall even deeper. They will be enslaved by the Roads to Ruin. The subsequent erosion of their wholesome intentions will force them to behave and speak in an immoral way;

 

- Unwholesome speech: Drink is a major problem amongst employees, especially men. Being drunk makes people unaware and unable to be responsible for themselves. If something irritates them, they will be insulting. Which will lead to quarrels. Being constantly drunk, will not only destroy health and wisdom like some sort of dementure, it also leads to debt problems and crime.

 

 

Gossiping about the boss behind his back

 

Endebtedness is also another big problem of both male and female employees. Lying and saying bad words are, therefore, used by these employees in deferring debt repayments. Because of this, employees suffer unending debt. They become used to lying, breaking promises, gossiping, being belligerent and quarreling as ‘quick fixes’ for every problem. They lower the already down trodden status and dignity of the working class;

 

- Total immersion in Roads to Ruin: Gambling ironically seems to be low-income employees’ favourite means to solve debt problems. It promises to bring them large amounts of money, with low investment in a short time. Therefore, this kind of employee gambles almost every day. When they lose they think they are just having an unlucky day and look forward to a luckier one, while carrying on with their gambling in the meantime. If they win, they will celebrate with indulgence in the Roads to Ruin. These sort of assumptions make them easy prey for the casino managers who are the only ones to get richer. They resort to deception to squeeze money from those who have low threshold of resistance to temptation, (which usually means the working class). It can be said that all involved with Roads to Ruin, whether it be suppliers or consumers all revolve around the circles of greed, hatred and delusion. They have no time or thought for how to improve or elevate the level of their hearts to become a nobler person;

 

As a result, it is imperative for the wise [pandita] and Good Friends [kalyanamitta] to join hands in bolstering the threshold of resistance to Roads to Ruin in the minds of themselves and others, especially those from the working classes, which are the largest group in any country, as fast as possible, in order to lead our societies out of crisis.

 

 

Sabotaging the boss’s interests

 

Loss of Respect for the Environment

 

When bosses and employees lack self-discipline and don’t fulfil the minimal responsibilities to each other as prescribed by the Six Directions, the fourth sign of harm will be that they will lack any sense of responsibility to the Six Directions and to the natural environment – this being expressed in two main ways by their behaviour.

 

- Lacking responsibility for their duties in the Six Directions: especially lacking a good interaction with the social groups in each of the Six Directions, will cause a employees and bosses to misbehave in at least three ways:

 

- Having no trust in others: Employers who lack positive core values, besides failing to treat their employees properly, take advantage of others, lacking mercy and justice. Employees’ bad behaviours breed bad attitude not only towards themselves, but to the other five social groups, especially those wealthier than themselves. This is one kind of erroneous core value for employees caused by working for bosses who are False Friends.

 

- Being foul-mouthed: Commonly, people who lack respect for others will find ways to vent their feelings about them. They might gossip about their boss’s faults, speaking out against their teachers, answering their parents back, finding fault with teachers and monks, insulting their children, spouses and friends. In short, they like to blame others, making mountains out of molehills to gain others’ support. This kind of person does not see goodness in anyone. At the same time, no one wants to make friends with them.

 

- Blinded by their own arrogance : Thinking they are superior to everyone else, they will have no respect for anyone. They start living up to behaviours that were formerly nothing more than foul-mouthed threats. Some of their degradation might come like lapses of insanity or from the pressure of being manipulated by False Friends to destroy their opposition. Sometimes they seek to make money through such craziness;

 

 

Take industrial action

 

Lacking responsibility for the natural environment: lacking responsibility for the natural environment may cause bosses and employees to misbehave in at least three ways:

 

- Lack of vision concerning the natural environment: Because they are vulnerable as a result of their ignorance and erroneous core values, if they work for employers who fail to teach them anything about the value of the environment, they will lack any sense of responsibility for the natural environment. They will not even want to cooperate in caring for their immediate environment;

 

- Beconing habituated to filt in the environment: Manual workers might have grown up in make-shift shelters or sub-standard housing. Some may have grown up in a slum. Some might have grown up on the waterside or a houseboat. Their home might have consisted of nothing more than a single room where mother, father and child have to live together without any privacy. It would be hard to maintain any sort of cleanliness or hygene. Even the toilet facilities might present a problem. The water supply of substandard housing, particularly in remote areas might be unreliable. They might have to go to the toilet in the open. For those who live over the water, the water might be their toilet as well as their bathwater. What sort of environmental perceptions do you think these will build up for a person? They will certainly see no necessity for keeping the environment clean. They take no pride in the neatness of clothes or the hygiene of their food. The grossness of their perception of the surroundings will carry over into the habits of the way they work, eat, speak and behave. In brief, shoddy-mindedness is the mark of everything they do. Once they are forced by their bosses to correct these behaviours, they think their bosses are just being pedantic. Given the chance they will gossip behind their boss’s back. If they fail to adapt, they will be moved or fired, and the bitterness goes on.

 

 

Divulge the company’s trade secrets to competitors

 

- Causing pollution: There is hardly any kind of environmental pollution that is not the work of man. Employees lacking responsibility for the natural environment can cause pollution in many ways. They might dispose of waste into the waterways. Rivers and creeks will consequently take on an evil stench, polluting the water and the air. Failing to maintain road vehicles properly will increase emissions of carbon-monoxide and noise. Dumping untreated water and poisone into the waterways also cause extensive damage. Some employees causing pollution may do it intentionally or just because of their shoddy-mindedness. Some do it to just to cause resentment to their bosses and friends.

 

Bosses need to understand their employees’ background and carefully, gradually educate and train them to underatand the purpose of environmental rules and regulations. The boss must not forget to elevate the quality of their employees’ minds. Bosses should not just see their employees as wage labour or see their duty as ending with a salary payment.

 

Summary of Social Problems Caused

 

We can conclude the social problems originating from the relationship between boss and employee under two head ings:

 

1. Manifest problems: When the quality of manufactured products suffers as the result of tension between management and workforce, then the product will lose its competitivity and the whole company suffers. If it cannot be exported, the whole country suffers.

 

2. Covert problems: Covert problems mostly originate from lack of self-discipline on the boss’s part. If both boss and employees co-operate to ensure responsibility on all three levels, together with the self-discipline to fulfil the reciprocal duties in the direction of the nadir-with the initiative being taken by the boss, firatly by ‘pulling his own socks up’- then delegating trainers to explain to employees how they can do the same-then improvements can be made on the basis of mutual compassion and understanding until success is reached. To wait for the government or another third party to intervwene fro the outside and solve problems in

 

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