Prudence-the need of the hour...

The incident that happened with the employee of HP Bangalore has left most of the IT fraternity shocked. The repurcussions could be felt in my city as well, as most of my female teammates have added reaching home by 8pm to their list of new-year resolutions and I have been receiving email forwards on the importance of being "safe" and tips to avoid mishaps. Every time an incident like this happens we suddenly awaken to the fact that we are not living in a safe world.

I would not make the mistake of trying to be a judge here of who was wrong in letting this happen. But I am definitely reminded of one incident which puts things in perspective. I had to work from my company's Bangalore office one day and was waiting for a cab there for home-drop at around 8pm. There was one lady with me and the cab arrived after a wait almost 15 minutes and patience not being one of my virtues, I goaded the driver to start immediately. His reply was_"Sir, we have to wait for the escort". I was shocked-why the hell do we need an escort at 8pm in a bustling city like Bangalore. Anyway since it was decided that way we had to wait for 30 full minutes before the burly guy with an ominous stick in hand entered the vehicle and we were ready to go and before this there were so many formalities like the coordinator nothing down each vehicle's passenger details, driver's name etc.

When I think back about it, all of it starts making sense. I somehow think it has more to do with the culture of the organisation-whether it is being thorough in every detail and every aspect of the employee's work-life. I can bet my salary on finding atleast 10 other companies in Bangalore which have never paid attention to this detail. It is just that one of them is involved in this unfortunate incident. Now I am sure there will be a flurry of safety activities in each of these companies and things will improve-but at what cost? Reminds me of the road near my college in Chennai where the divider was built after a lot of non-fatal accidents when a student finally lost his life on the road in one of the most horrible ways imaginable!

If you are reading this and are an employee of some company, start asking yourself what things could go wrong with the system that is present in your company and raise your voice before something goes wrong-dont think it is too much to ask-it is your right! Though you might not get the credit, you could end up saving a life!!