Learning Management: Leadership with Empathy - The missing piece among Indian Startup's

I have always envied the companies in developed economies for their flexibility towards work life balance and how they are open to people taking sabbaticals, but i would console myself with the fact that most people in those countries are at will employees with no job security. Now when many unicorn startups came in India and they were expanding like crazy, i started reading stories of how these companies were like those in developed economies and are the best places to work, i was really proud and happy that India was reaching to developed economy standards.

So all this pride and joy towards these great startups came down crashing when they were exposed to #COVID19 crisis. Two such companies one is OYO and other one is a relatively unknown entity to me CURE FIT.

Companies downsize and fire employees during extreme emergencies, i agree but there is something fundamentally wrong about how these companies made this decision so i am writing my thoughts about it.

Oyo is in a very tough situation and they have to take decisions to close down some operations, so there is nothing wrong about it right?, yes but they way in which they went about it and mislead some employees is what that irritates me. In UK the CEO assured that there will be no job cuts and within two days he announced job cuts. This is what heartless leadership means, companies can come together and decide to forgo some benefits and retain everyone's job or they could clearly outline a exit road map for employees so that they are ready to accept and manage their finances accordingly.

The second startup is even worse, this company has around 5000 employees, and has got new funding from the VC's , so they had the bright idea to coast through the COVID19 crisis, shut down centres and fire 1000 people, nothing wrong in this thought process they want to save the remaining 4000 jobs and keep the company intact. What is wrong is they way in which they done with the layoffs.

Firstly they did it on MAY 1st "International Labour Day" and secondly they way in which they communicated this. Many employees were asked to resign and not terminated and they were removed from the official WhatsApp group by their managers and asked to tender their resignation,

This is what a company without empathy does, there is another furore over the decision of top management which decided to donate 5 crores to various charity funds, for which the founders said it only covers a few days of their expenses and it make no sense in complaining over it. They were even very smug about it in their interviews and open letter which came after a few days when these decisions caused a huge social media uproar. Too little and too late i would say. So if 5 crore of the total donation is to be split among 1000 sacked employees it would amount to 50,000 rupees a huge amount i would say, might even help the people an additional 2 month buffer.

In their interview they were harping about how their company is looking for the future and they are right now giving free content and this means they have to run without income for a long time, and immediately within a few days they announce they plan on monetising the digital content.

So this raises a question whether all the statements they were giving was for managing the public perception and may be it was under the principle that any publicity is good publicity.

I read an article by BCG which stated that leadership which is empathetic and flexible is needed now. The more i read about the need for empathy among top leaders the more i am convinced that Indian Startups need to grow up.

This was the initial letter which was issued when they fired 1000 employees.

After much furore they have released another letter with a website which takes into account of the criticism and their rebuttal to it.

I have watched the entire interview of the founders of #curefit and also read their open letter, the only conclusion i could come was they made a big blunder in dealing with the firing and donation and were caught unaware in the social media backlash and now wanted to change the narrative so came up with this open letter and interviews.

This has reinforced my views that Indian Startups lack Empathetic Leaders and this will cause a big loss for them in future

I am attaching some excerpts open letter by the companies management below so you can comment on my thoughts.

for reading the entire letter click the link below.