Larsen & Toubro chairman SN Subrahmanyan’s comments on a 90-hour working week have sparked outrage with a host of his peers in corporate India criticising the idea of working inordinately long hours. CEOs took to Twitter and television on Friday to express their reservations on the remarks by Subrahmanyan, who has exhorted L&T employees to work even on Sundays.
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Bajaj Auto managing director and CEO Rajiv Bajaj said that most people were already working 12 hours a day thanks to long commutes. The practice of working 90-hour week should start at the top, he said, adding it was the quality and not the quantity of work that matters. “We need a kinder, gentler world more than ever before,” Bajaj said, emphasising that the quality of work was more important than quantity.
Advertising guru Piyush Pandey observed that rather than a work-life balance, what was needed was a heart-mind balance, adding L&T should be called “Lynch &Torment”. Pandey said it was important to be hard-working but not to be slaves.
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InfoEdge founder Sanjiv Bikhchandani noted that employees must meet a deadline, when there is one. However, working 12 hours a day for seven days a week was not sustainable, Bikhchandani said.
The younger generation, many corporate chiefs, believe will want a better work-life balance and companies should respond to their suggestions else they would lose talent.
Veteran stock market investor Devina Mehra observed on X: This type of recommendation of working for “nation-building or company-building is bunkum and makes absolutely no sense. Research shows that increasing the number of work hours beyond a point reduces productivity substantially. The human mind or body is simply not capable of focused, good quality work for that long – at least on a regular basis.
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Neeti Sharma,
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