Satinder Dhiman - Managing by the Bhagavad Gita: Timeless Lessons for Today’s Managers

More information about this series at http://www.springer.com/series/15772

This Springer imprint is published by the registered company Springer Nature Switzerland AG

The registered company address is: Gewerbestrasse 11, 6330 Cham, Switzerland

The Bhagavad Gt, a philosophical poem par excellence, has been extolled as the scripture of scriptures within the corpus of Indian spiritual texts. Its unusual battlefield setting, highly practical orientation, and deep philosophical import have endeared it to people from all walks of life looking for guidance in both the sacred and secular realms. While there are many books that aspire to present spiritual truths in practical terms, perhaps, there is no other book which presents such an integral vision of attaining the ultimate purpose of life ( moks.a or liberation) while fully engaged in the activities of life.

The Bhagavad Gt is as pertinent in the boardrooms of the twenty-first century as it was on the battlefields of ancient times. Within the compass of eighteen dynamic chapters, it unfolds the whole spectacle of human drama full of challenges met, fights won, and freedom attained. It teaches us how to emerge from a state of utter apathy, gloom, sorrow, and dejection to a state of perfect engagement, understanding, clarity, wisdom, renewed strength, and triumph. The Bhagavad Gt (a part of the great Indian epicthe Mahbhrata ) can be approached as a powerful tool for management and as a catalyst for organizational transformation. It teaches us how to harmonize the needs of the individual with the needs of society, and by extension, how to harmonize the needs of employees and the organization. It employs an inside-out leadership development approach based on self-knowledge and self-mastery, the two highly important areas for practicing true self-leadership. It is a nonsectarian spiritual text with a universal message.

The Gt contains timeless management and leadership lessons for the contemporary organizations. Modern leadership concepts such as vision, motivation and empowerment, self-awareness, self-mastery, excellence in work, importance of ethical means in achieving righteous ends, attaining meaning and fulfillment at work, service before self, and well-being of all beings are all lucidly discussed in the Bhagavad Gt. Likewise, many contemporary leadership constructs such as authentic leadership, servant leadership, and values-based leadership were already discussed, albeit notionally, in the Bhagavad Gt thousands of years ago. The message of the Gt fosters holistic development of human personality within all of its dimensions (physical-psychological, emotional, intellectual, and spiritual) by providing guidance about the three essential spiritual practices: training the mind, transforming the passions, and guarding the heart.

The Bhagavad Gt teaches that only the knowers of Self are truly wise and ever free from grief. It removes sorrow by removing the self-ignorance that is causing it. According to the Gt, all our existential problems ultimately stem from self-ignorancenot knowing who we truly are. The Gt teaches that one who acts with knowledge and devotion, without desire and unattached, is liberated already. Therefore, by all our seeking, let us seek Self-Knowledge.

The Gt says that nothing can give you real happiness except your Self ( tmany evtman tus.t.ah. : BG, 2.55).

The Gt teaches renunciation in action, not renunciation of action. Renounce desire and attachment, not action, states the most important verse on Karma Yoga in the Gt (2.47). It teaches us to let go of the sense of me and mine and work selflessly for the common good. In the Gts view, serving others is serving the Divine. The sage leader outwardly does all activities like others, inwardly unattached. This is the essence of Karma Yoga of the Bhagavad Gt .

Wise leaders do everything without selfish motive, remaining equanimous in success and failure, pleasure and pain, joy and sorrowoffering their work as a loving service to the Supreme. They work for the purification of their mind (