23 Indian Culture and Spirituality – Lessons for Management

1. Learning Outcome

2. Introduction

3. Culture

4. Characteristics of Culture

5. Major schools of ancient Indian thoughts

6. Spirituality

7. Value oriented Holistic management

8. Main components of value oriented holistic management

9. Features of spirituality in management

10. Characteristics of Indian cultural values

11. Management lessons from ancient Indian education systems

12. Summary

1. Learning Outcome:

After completing this module, the students will be able to learn about the following:

Culture and its characteristics
Major schools of ancient Indian thoughts Spirituality
Value oriented holistic management Features of spirituality in management
Characteristics of Indian cultural values
Management lessons from ancient Indian education systems

2. Introduction

3. Culture

Culture is the characteristics and knowledge of a particular group of people as defined by everything from language, religion, social habits and music. Culture is the system of knowledge shared by the relatively large group of people. Culture is communication and communication is culture. Culture can be defined in the broadest sense as the totality of the person’s learned accumulated experience which is socially transmitted behaviour through social learning. A culture is the sum of total of the learned behaviours of a group of people that are generally considered to be the tradition of that people and are transmitted from generation to generation. It is a collective programming of the mind that distinguishes the members of one group from another.

4. Characteristics of culture

Culture has main five broad characteristics. It is learned, shared, based on symbols, integrated and dynamic. All of these main features are explained as below:

Culture is learned: It is not biological and we do not inherit the culture. Most of the learning culture is unconscious. We learn it from or families, friends, insinuations and media. The process of learning culture is known as enculturation.

Culture is shared: Because we share culture with other members of the group, we are able to act in socially appropriate manner and also we can predict how others will react. Despite of the shared nature of the culture, that doesn’t mean that the culture is homogeneous.

Culture is based on symbols: A symbol is something that stands for something else. Symbols vary cross culturally and are arbitrary. They only have a meaning when people in a culture agree on their use. Language, money and art all are the symbols of culture.

Culture is integrated: This is known as holism, or the various aspects of culture being interconnected. All aspects of culture are related to one another and are easy to understand a culture, one must learn about all its parts.

Culture is dynamic: This simply means that the cultures interact and change. Because most of the cultures are in contact with other cultures, they exchange ideas and symbols. All culture change due to the changing environment. And because cultures are integrated, if one component in the system changes, it is likely that the entire system must adjust.

5. Major schools of ancient Indian thoughts

The main and prominent schools of thoughts in the ancient India containing precious ethics and ethos are explained as follows:

The Vedas: There are four Vedas, namely, Rig Veda, Yajur Veda, Sama Veda and Atharva Veda. The primary thought in the Vedas is the spiritualist conception of the universe. The whole efforts of the Vedas are directed towards one goal, i.e. to achieve the union of the individual self with the world self.

Upanishads: The Vedanta seeks to know the ultimate reality and the cause behind everything. In this pursuit, it seeks to detach the Maya and the materialism and unite with the Brahman or God.

Bhagwad Gita: It is a poem that depicts the lessons on spirituality and ethics through a great crisis of the Arjuna’s life. The Karma Yoga, Samkhya Yoga, Bhakti Yoga an the notion of three gunas, i.e. Sattwa, rajas, Tamas have high implications on the ethical leadership, decision making and the management that we study and discuss today.

Ramayana: It portrays the Lord Rama as ideal character of mankind. It also depicts the duties of relationships, portraying ideal characters like ideal father, ideal servant, ideal brother, ideal wife and ideal king. Ramayana also teaches the temptation for lust can bring a powerful and well established man’s doomsday as well.

Buddhism: The middle path philosophy in Buddhism was propounded by Gautam Buddha, he propounded love for mankind personal salvation from sufferings and a middle path approach. Middle path theory encourages one to treads between the two extremes of sensualise and asceticism. Avoid extremities and try to have a balanced approach in life. The Buddhism is based on four main noble truths:

Sufferings exist
There is a cause of sufferings o Sufferings can be eradicated
There is a means for eradication of that suffering

6. Spirituality

The shade and shield of spirituality is a must in one’s life. This world is a combination of material and spiritual dimensions. One is incomplete without the other. So one should always advance the spiritual aspect of one’s life alongside the material one. Spiritual growth is the process of inner awakening and becoming conscious of the inner being. It means the rising of the consciousness beyond the ordinary existence, and awakening to some universal truths. Cultural factors are the established beliefs, values, traditions, laws and languages of nation or society.

7. Value oriented Holistic Management

Management must be based on values. It will boost the human growth and development in the organisation. The most valuable human possessions are health, harmony, happiness, wisdom and character that reflect the ethical and human values. When we manifest all these values in our thoughts, speech and actions, then we are valuable and enlightened person. The ideas and feelings of a person are reflected through his actions and behaviour. People not only work for name, fame, money, power and status; but also work for greater worth, for cultivating values and for building strong character. True greatness is not measured in the tangible values such as name and fame , but by pure , kind, true and selfless values in the character. A human and ethical value constitutes character. Values express the divine nature.

8. Main components of Value oriented Holistic Management

The main components of the value oriented holistic management are as follows:

Integrity: Integrity means indivisibility. It is wholeness, goodness, courage, and self discipline to live by inner truth. It can be explained as follows:

Wholeness: Wholeness means totality, soundness, perfection and completeness.
Goodness: Values that serve human beings in the true spirit is called goodness. It covers all the essential values such as honesty, morality, kindness, fairness, charity, truthfulness and generosity. We need goodness in our thoughts, speeches and actions.
Courage: To act in Holy Spirit is courage. In the world of management, courage points out acts of bravery. Courage is telling truth in the face of danger.
Self discipline: Nothing great can be achieved in life without self discipline. Self discipline and self control indicates that the soul is the bosses that control the mind and directs the mind and sense to move on the journey to reach the goal known to the master. The quality of life having self control and self discipline is the life of greater harmony, happiness and moderation. We need discipline and courage together to reach our objectives in time.

Living by inner truth: Inner voice or inner truth guides us at every step of our life. Living by inner truth which is the right instrument within us but which is not known to us unless we go within. It is the most important of all. Inner mind or inner truth communicates through faint whispers, intuitive thoughts and feelings, buried deep down within us. The voice of the inner mind can only be heard through silence. In the business world, we have double dealings and all forms of corruptions. Corruption is worldwide. Let your mind be ruled and guided by your conscious.

Dharma: Dharma is the law of right living, the observance of which secures the double object of happiness in your own life and also the happiness in the life of others. It stands for all those ideals, purposes, influences, institutions and the way of life that shapes the character and evolution of society. Dharma includes the following three divine elements:

Spirit: Man’s soul is essentially divine and dharma directly evolves from the spirit. It is the spirit that can bring out the whole sense of wholeness. It is the spirit that makes us complete. Indian ethics recognises the spirit as our boss and declares do right, do good and be good.

Righteousness: Pure and right action is righteousness. Dharma demands right action. In dharma, not mere action nut righteousness is given main importance.

Fearlessness: One who is fearless is a great saint. Gita also stresses on the fearlessness. When the divine is present within you, and you experience his presence. Dharma is the inner law of one’s life. One should follow his dharma and it will protect you or stand by you. Dharma is ethics and spiritualism combined.

9. Features of spirituality in management

Spirituality infuses the basic values of humanism in management. It enhances the effectiveness of the system. Indian system of philosophy is based on the value system. These values spiritualised the management system of any organisation. Following are some of the main features of spirituality in Indian management system:

Focus on life style: Indian spirituality enriches life. Management in Indian social environment defines a standard of living and maximises the quality of life. Quality of life also includes the quality enrichment in society and environment. Complete quality of life is a function of the way one thinks, speaks and behaves.

Focus towards business policy: Business policy should be ethical. Every political party makes policies and businesses have to follow those policies. Policies are generally made with the current business situations.

Existence of human orientation and values: Basic human values are infused through spirituality only. Human values like hard work, truthfulness, good manners and harmony are a part of Indian social and political environment.

Simple living and high thinking: Simplicity breeds spirituality and spirituality breeds simplicity in thought and actions. The essence of Indian way of living is simple living. Indians prefer to live a simple life so that they can give more energy to the development of spiritualism.

10. Characteristics of Indian cultural values

Indian culture is spiritual in nature and it is predominantly inward looking it has a socio-centric vision. The orientation of spiritually dominated culture is that of welfare and the social good. The main characteristics of Indian cultural values are as follows:

System of joint family: One of the main dominant feature of Indian culture is joint family system. The values that are particular to Indian society are extremely omportant in the context of management, where group effort rather than an individual endeavour is more important. Living in a joint family s more important.

Concept of Purushartha: Another feature of Indian culture us purushartha i.e. mission of life. Purushartha means aims, mission and purpose of life. There are four purusharthas namely, dhaman, Artha, Kama and Moksha. All these four comprises of aspirations in life of a man.

Essential divinity of human soul: We are soul not a body and soul is supreme. All actions are undertaken at the command of the soul only.

Essential owners and solidarity of universe and all life: Jeev and Brahma are connected. Universe has solidarity with all life here on earth.

Family is the basic unit of social system: Family inculcates cherished values in us right from our childhood and it remains with us in our life. In families there is warmth of relationship, closeness and consideration for others and a feeling of sacrifice for family interest.

Philosophy of integral experience: Integral means whole. Integrity is the main virtue in human beings.

System of free enquiry, tolerance and selective assimilation: Free inquiry and tolerance are the hallmark of Indian cultural traditions.

Varna Ashram System: Indian cultural heritage has also give the Varna Ashram system.

Hence, the characteristics of the Indian culture attempt to be pervasive and enduring when applied in the management.

11. Management lessons from Ancient Indian Education System

The ancient Indian education system churns out many valuable management lessons for use.
From the ancient education system, following lessons can be drawn:
There should be religious and human touch in people.
There should be feeling of social responsibility and obligations among the people Actions should be taken to build character of the people.
Development of personality through self confidence, and self respect should be initiated.
Ethical behaviour should be promoted by teaching of ethics. Respect for old culture and heritage should be ensured.
There should be spirituality at workplace.
Decision making should be based on moral judgements and standards. Management system should be in tune with the Indian ethos.

12. Summary

Indian culture and philosophy have a very strong foundation in the ethics, ethos and values. India is a large nation of diverse cultures, religions and rituals. India is famous for its unity in diversity. Indian culture is the way of living of the people of India. India’s languages, religions, dances, music, architecture, food and customs differ from place to place. Indian culture is the amalgamation of the several cultures and is also influenced by the vast history of India. India is one of the oldest civilisations and one of the most populous countries in the world. Indian culture is highly influenced by the religious aspects they have been credited with the shaping of the Indian philosophy, literature, music, art and music. This is concerned with the spread of Buddhism, Hinduism, and other writing system in the Asia. There has been significant fusion of the cultures among Buddhists, Hindus, Muslims, Jains, Sikhs, and various tribal populations in India. There are two main principles of Indian model of management, namely human values and holism. Human values refer to the spiritual, ethical and moral values. Indian management is a spiritualistic model. It is based in the various cultural aspects and the values enshrined in the culture. Culture is the backbone of the society. It refers to the cumulative deposit of the knowledge, experience, beliefs, values, attitudes and religion. Inner voice or inner truth guides us at every step of our life. Living by inner truth which is the right instrument within us but which is not known to us unless we go within. It is the most important of all. Inner mind or inner truth communicates through faint whispers, intuitive thoughts and feelings, buried deep down within us. The voice of the inner mind can only be heard through silence. In the business world, we have double dealings and all forms of corruptions. Culture is the characteristics and knowledge of a particular group of people as defined by everything from language, religion, social habits and music. Culture is the system of knowledge shared by the relatively large group of people. Culture is communication and communication is culture. Culture can be defined in the broadest sense as the totality of the person’s learned accumulated experience which is socially transmitted behaviour through social learning. A culture is the sum of total of the learned behaviours of a group of people that are generally considered to be the tradition of that people and are transmitted from generation to generation. It is a collective programming of the mind that distinguishes the members of one group from another. There are four Vedas, namely, Rig Veda, Yajur Veda, Sama Veda and Atharva Veda. The primary thought in the Vedas is the spiritualist conception of the universe. The whole efforts of the Vedas are directed towards one goal, i.e. to achieve the union of the individual self with the world self. The Vedanta seeks to know the ultimate reality and the cause behind everything. In this pursuit, it seeks to detach the Maya and the materialism and unite with the Brahman or God. It is a poem that depicts the lessons on spirituality and ethics through a great crisis of the Arjuna’s life. The Karma Yoga, Samkhya Yoga, Bhakti Yoga an the notion of three gunas, i.e. Sattwa, rajas, Tamas have high implications on the ethical leadership, decision making and the management that we study and discuss today. It portrays the Lord Rama as ideal character of mankind. It also depicts the duties of relationships, portraying ideal characters like ideal father, ideal servant, ideal brother, ideal wife and ideal king. Ramayana also teaches the temptation for lust can bring a powerful and well established man’s doomsday as well. Management must be based on values. It will boost the human growth and development in the organisation. The most valuable human possessions are health, harmony, happiness, wisdom and character that reflect the ethical and human values. When we manifest all these values in our thoughts, speech and actions, then we are valuable and enlightened person. The ideas and feelings of a person are reflected through his actions and behaviour. People not only work for name, fame, money, power and status; but also work for greater worth, for cultivating values and for building strong character. True greatness is not measured in the tangible values such as name and fame, but by pure, kind, true and selfless values in the character. A human and ethical value constitutes character. Values express the divine nature.

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Suggested readings

Pramod Sharma, “Business Ethics and Corporate Values: An Indian Perspective”,Ravintanaya Publications, Shimla
S.K. Bhatia, “Business Ethics and Corporate Governance” Deep & Deep Publications,New Delhi
A.C. Fernando, “Business Ethics and Corporate Governance” Pearson Publications
SB Gogate, “Human Values & Professional Ethics”, Vikas Publishing House, NewDelhi.
Harris & Hartman, “Organizational Behavior” Jaico Publication House, 2002