Many ages ago in the sacred texts of Vedas and the Puranas, Hindu Rishis wrote down and elaborated the mythology of the Holy Trinity of Primal Gods – The Shiva, Vishnu and Brahma. Come to think of it, it is the first of it’s kind of storytelling but, its bigger than that. It’s building a mythology. This only happens when a story is continually extended to accommodate attributes and elements that establish the nature of the brand. Of course that would mean that I am taking the Hindu philosophy as a brand.
The three earliest Gods were created to serve three definite purposes. They were not elemental gods like Indra and his team. The three earliest Gods were the founders of an organization called faith or the world for that matter. The designations of the three Gods were carefully crafted and I can interpret them in context of any modern organization:
1. Brahma – The Creator of all living things or the Chief Operating Officer! He is in charge of all the operational tasks.
2. Vishnu – The Preserver or the Chief Executive Officer! He takes care of sustainability and overlooks everything.
3. Shiva – The Destroyer Or the Chairman Maybe! He definitely is the core founder but has delegated most of his tasks to the CEO and COO but he retains his power to over rule everything.
Alongside all of the drama and the plot twists in the mythology, there is always an understanding between these three Gods and although they stay in separate zones, they are constantly in touch and always in tandem. The next series of designations after the trio is of the elemental gods or deities, responsible for smaller functions. They are mostly chaotic and keep getting into trouble. When they find themselves in a sticky situation they always ask for help from either of the big three.
Goddess Laxshmi is the goddess of wealth and the life partner of Vishnu the CEO. Well quite understandably you can’t run an organization without excellent relations with the CFO!
Goddess Saraswati is the goddess of creativity and arts or rather the head of Content. Quite naturally she is the partner of Brahma the COO.
While Shiva’s partner keep changing due to some misfortune, she is always the incarnation of Shakti, the cosmic power! Well why not? The Chairman deserves the best 🙂
Kuber is a rich Yakhsa. Not exactly a god but in-charge of the money transactions. He is in-fact the treasurer!
Then there is Narada. The supreme brand evangelist. He is a sage and a master of many arts of conversation. He is rightfully the best spokesperson gods can have.
So, quite surely there’s lot of communication happening around amongst all of them and that is leading to a well sustained organization that has survived just over 5000 years maybe even more. Â This makes a perfect blueprint of an organization. Actually an organization is an evolution of a network. A network when solidifies and the hierarchies are set, it becomes an organization but it still remains a network. Sometimes, in an attempt to build an organization, hierarchies become too important which leads to friction, slowing down everything.
In today’s age organizations will have to maintain their internal network more than ever. Too rigid hierarchies and long power distances are not good for your organization. Rather the stakeholders should understand and self regulate their own roles and responsibilities. You will find that many of your members are not capable of doing that since they are too comfortable under micro-management. They need reconditioning. They need policies and they need motivation. They need to learn to accept their place within larger scope of work. They need to learn taking leadership roles and also know when to align under a leadership when a leader emerges. That is essentially why we are looking forward to a social organization.
May this Diwali be the beginning of new things! Happy Diwali to all organizations out there!
*The views expressed here are a personal interpretation of the Hindu religious texts and are not subjected to further scrutiny and the scenarios related to the gods and goddesses mentioned are in no way affiliated to the original works of Hindu mythology. Any similarities found with the original scripts and or any other derivative works is purely coincidental.Â