Lesson-3 Anthropomorphism

?Today, I remembered a lesson I learnt from one of my amazing seniors. While Patni was growing into a large organization in the 1997 to 2001 period, some of our senior leaders had to undergo change of roles. He was heading a key process during that time. He was assigned a new role to head another division which would be another differentiator for the organization. After this announcement was done, I asked him, did he not feel bad that the initiative which he had conceptualized and nurtured will be given to someone else. He said, yes, I do feel bad, but that is a transitionary feeling. There was sad tone of losing something with an excitement of starting something new. I could understand from where he is coming from and empathize. As for me, I was also moved from another department to work under him. I had same feelings of being removed from the core of what I had contributed to for almost 7 to 8 years but was excited about the new role. He said lets now create something new. We did, implemented initiatives which were way ahead of time, under guidance and mentorship, changed many of my perspective.

?Couple of things that had lasting effect was to deliver the outcomes but not get attached to it. Keep changing and reinvent, not to remain status quo, experiment, take risk, fail, and start all over again. Work with conviction and deliver. I learnt how to look at the people functions from business perspective. It was with great difficulty I decided to change my role as well as organization in 2006. It was huge pain of leaving “Someone (organization) ” after working for 12 years, years that I saw my personal growth and my personality development.

It is many years later, a few days back, I discovered that this feeling of being attached to the organization, is called Anthropomorphism.? Anthropomorphism is the attribution of human features to non-human subjects. Anthropomorphized organizations acquire in the minds of their members a unique identity, which becomes capable of guiding members' motivations, with important managerial implications. It would be interesting to study if men or women have this as a predominant feeling, or if it develops when you work for a long time (which is how many years), or does the younger generations (Gen Z or Gen y) share this feeling or it is common to (Gen X) only? Interesting phenomena. Research is a wonderful area, one reads, thinks, relates, and grows.