6 ms·

What makes so many Indian shops terrible places to work?

JoeAltmaier 12y ago
Many folks in India are used to working far harder than Westerners. So we call it a sweatshop; they call it a day at the office.
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]
  - JoeAltmaier 12y ago
    Everybody plays the 'racism' card when talking culture, for some reason. Clearly there is a norm when talking about large populations; behaviors are not the same everywhere in the world. So its appropriate in a discussion to bring that up when talking practices across the globe.
    - thisGuysAccount 12y ago
      It's true. It's been my experience that Indians, the few hundred I've worked with, are willing to put in long hours. Many of which were spent playing ping pong, talking, getting coffees. They also were working, but, the long hours in the office weren't all work. They also held the belief that they were harder workers than non-Indians, and preferred greatly to talk in native languages, likely unintentionally excluding non-Indians. At some level, race is a factor.
      - JoeAltmaier 12y ago
        I think more likely, culture. For instance, even across India practices may differ. That would map more closely to culture than race (genetics), right? In fact a child of Argentina raised in that culture could be expected to behave as raised, not according to some genetic plan. Again, its all about culture, not race.
        thisGuysAccount 12y ago
        We're kind of talking about two different, but very similar, topics. One is that Indian work culture is long hours, 6 day weeks, get it done and do it inexpensively. This is true, it's cultural. Some of their practices prefer manual and repetitive work over a style which requires a drawn out preparation involving planning and automation. If you're paying $15/hr for highly skilled labor, that can make sense. The other is racial, the belief that can become a part of that work culture, where people who do not work like that are inferior workers. Given the rarity of Indian work culture and cultures similar to it, it's still cultural, but more racially limited. Someone of Asian descent, used to working in sweatshop style conditions, sees someone who doesn't look like they're used to it, and they assume the non Asian is an inferior worker, then it's racial. It's anecdotal, but I've been on the receiving end of both unspoken and spoken racism, veiled as cultural differences, about how North Americans are lazy and cheat their employers. That said, I'm typing this out well aware of how this looks. It's important to note that I know not all Indians are like that. It's just a hard habit for people who spent 5, 10 years working long hours like that to break, and it's not always easy for them to look at a worker creating equivalent output with different methods in less time and say "yeah, that person works as hard as I do."
yummyfajitas 12y ago
Indian employers and bosses often raise their status by disrespecting and imposing onerous work requirements on their underlings. A few years ago I worked at a place with a lot of mechanical turks - ladies tagging pictures day in and day out. The expectation they had, and which took me a while to break, was that they were to be subservient. Make me tea, not speak up when I make a mistake, etc. They all considered it unusual that I would engage with them socially, share lunch, or laugh when they played pranks on me. In software the situation is certainly getting better. In the past few years, I've run into considerably more places that seem like good places to work. Some foreign shops with a local presence, and a number of startups. But being a good place to work and treating employees with respect is still a big competitive advantage in hiring.

Many folks in India are used to working far harder than Westerners. So we call it a sweatshop; they call it a day at the office.

deleted 12y ago
[deleted]
- JoeAltmaier 12y ago
  Everybody plays the 'racism' card when talking culture, for some reason. Clearly there is a norm when talking about large populations; behaviors are not the same everywhere in the world. So its appropriate in a discussion to bring that up when talking practices across the globe.
  - thisGuysAccount 12y ago
    It's true. It's been my experience that Indians, the few hundred I've worked with, are willing to put in long hours. Many of which were spent playing ping pong, talking, getting coffees. They also were working, but, the long hours in the office weren't all work. They also held the belief that they were harder workers than non-Indians, and preferred greatly to talk in native languages, likely unintentionally excluding non-Indians. At some level, race is a factor.
    - JoeAltmaier 12y ago
      I think more likely, culture. For instance, even across India practices may differ. That would map more closely to culture than race (genetics), right? In fact a child of Argentina raised in that culture could be expected to behave as raised, not according to some genetic plan. Again, its all about culture, not race.
      - thisGuysAccount 12y ago
        We're kind of talking about two different, but very similar, topics. One is that Indian work culture is long hours, 6 day weeks, get it done and do it inexpensively. This is true, it's cultural. Some of their practices prefer manual and repetitive work over a style which requires a drawn out preparation involving planning and automation. If you're paying $15/hr for highly skilled labor, that can make sense. The other is racial, the belief that can become a part of that work culture, where people who do not work like that are inferior workers. Given the rarity of Indian work culture and cultures similar to it, it's still cultural, but more racially limited. Someone of Asian descent, used to working in sweatshop style conditions, sees someone who doesn't look like they're used to it, and they assume the non Asian is an inferior worker, then it's racial. It's anecdotal, but I've been on the receiving end of both unspoken and spoken racism, veiled as cultural differences, about how North Americans are lazy and cheat their employers. That said, I'm typing this out well aware of how this looks. It's important to note that I know not all Indians are like that. It's just a hard habit for people who spent 5, 10 years working long hours like that to break, and it's not always easy for them to look at a worker creating equivalent output with different methods in less time and say "yeah, that person works as hard as I do."

yummyfajitas 12y ago

Indian employers and bosses often raise their status by disrespecting and imposing onerous work requirements on their underlings. A few years ago I worked at a place with a lot of mechanical turks - ladies tagging pictures day in and day out. The expectation they had, and which took me a while to break, was that they were to be subservient. Make me tea, not speak up when I make a mistake, etc. They all considered it unusual that I would engage with them socially, share lunch, or laugh when they played pranks on me. In software the situation is certainly getting better. In the past few years, I've run into considerably more places that seem like good places to work. Some foreign shops with a local presence, and a number of startups. But being a good place to work and treating employees with respect is still a big competitive advantage in hiring.