Works and Controls

काम हमारे बस में होना चाहिए, हम काम के बस में हो, यह हमें नहीं चाहिए ... such a profound statement but I heard this from the most unlikely source. A carpenter! Incidentally, he is well-read and a University Graduate from UP. I might sound prodigal with the exclamation mark but let me say that I do not underestimate people due to their occupation but our education does tell us, we don't have to expect profound philosophy from such occupation. I mean what philosophy can a Carpenter, Electrician, Plumber, Garbage Cleaner, Milkman, Driver, Maid or any such physical workers can spew knowledge to school-college-university graduates or PhDs like us? Right? WRONG!

Lessons that we learn is pretty systematic and on some level as everybody keeps talking about it in today's social media ("influencers", "podcasters" and Gen Z in general) there has to be work-life balance or why work if you are not happy? and to a greater extent why work on aspects you are not comfortable or have to learn for nothing? or even better is to question the work culture itself. But the pre-Covid or 2010 era Graduates had notions of do as directed. In fact, me being the 90s graduate, we even had questions in School as do as directed. How absurd it sounds now that in the name of test of exam, all we were tested was how good we memorized somethings and regurgitated in the exam time and how good we are in doing what is being asked to. Like if there has to be an essay, it has to be less than 200 words (I wondered whether the person who checked the answer sheet read the essay written or just counted the words to use his/her scalpel to cut marks...). Then we had answer in one word and one sentences with the dreaded answer in brief. If there were answers in one word/one sentences, what more in brief we required to be expressed? But then it was all about answering the questions, right? Match the following, fill in the blanks, true or false etc all took their header position irrespective of subjects importance. I remember there was True or False even in Mathematics. Then there were proofs in Geometry and Polynomials in Algebra with solid rigor of formula to be used wherever required. Science had its chemistry with equations to balance, physics with math spices and biology was full of jargons to be memorized.

Later at an age where we were supposed to prepare for entrance examinations, we were introduced to a special type of question elements - MCQs. MCQs had probability element for few lucky instances but otherwise, they encouraged not to write much but you can scribble around and pin point the answers. So question and answer both are given to test your ability to find the correct answer via solving it correctly. The intermediate steps or details were not supposed to be checked by the examiner or they are least bothered. It promotes a culture of ends justify the means or it does not matter how you arrive at the solution. Corporate India thrived on this policy for over 5 decades that I know of and thanks to American philosophy. 

Overall, our education prepared us very well for everything the capitalists want. They (the capitalists) do not want long explanations, dislike protocols, despise essence but love content and check the presentability, shareholder appeasement is their only moto and whether you cheat for their profit and give results or not, they did not care as long as it is keeping them out of botheration. IT Industry to a very big extent relied on boiler-plate codes and no original works. The rest of the industry has its own nuances to keep you occupied that the best education has given. But that is not what I wanted to write about since it is a subjective discussion and too large to manifest here.

Why don't we stop to think about the nature of work? Our education and the economy has installed only one type of thinking - We will do whatever you ask us to do if you are ready to pay. Isn't this the only tenet that Engineers leave their core branch and switch to something else as lucrative (read money)? Same happens to many other qualified people but even if we be in the same line of work as our qualification, are we really "in control"? Do we control the work or does the work control us? Why do we subject to a "control" in the first place? What sort of pleasure we get on forsaking our control to someone or to the work itself? The incentive must be absolutely greater than the freedom or passion we can have for the 1/3rd of our day we spend in for. 

The idea that your work can turn into a separate, independent power that controls you is a core part of Marx’s theory of alienation. He argued that instead of work being an expression of human creativity, it becomes externalized. You create the tasks, you create the system, but then that system turns back on you and begins to dictate your life. Hence I feel, "Work" is literalized as a giant entity that you built with your own time and effort, but it now sits in the big chair controlling your movements. The never-ending stream of "Deadlines," "Inboxes," and "Tasks" mimics a boulder being rolled up the hill, only to watch it roll back down. The absurdity comes from dedicating our lives to a cycle that has no final completion point. 

Me being into NRE (Non-Recurring Engineering) services, none of the works in my line of business ever get completed on-time. What seems to be a 3 month job, stretches for 5+ month draining the cost of the project. Our project plan, our GANTT charts, our KANBAN, our JIRA, our standups are all to ensure that we "do as directed" by the client but, (big but!) some point of time our Engineer loses the control or the Client deviates the flow with new requirements or not satisfied with what we delivered as milestone. Add to this a grueling travel time, hardware costs, cost of human capital (people leave the work mid-way), competition, references that look easy on paper or online but an inch does not happen as per the knowledge and experience we have. The best minds too miscalculates the end time and so goes the control over the work. 

Governments to Large Corporate Houses including the Small and Medium Enterprises, all have been consistently bound in this Well of Death going at super high speed. We all are puppets in this grand design and though the puppet master is not a malicious villain it is a faceless system constructed entirely of tasks and deadlines. You have to fall-in-line come what may with only one objective that efficiency is above well-being. The forever struggle to optimize, ameliorate, be out of comfort zone, hands out the control to the work from you. Why is it that the Carpenter or the Rickshaw Driver do not get compelled like us (the educated ones)? Part of the reason is, their work is less intellectual and more physical. Physical work can be rerouted or kept on back-burner if needed. Consider a simple act like bathing, a physical work which can be avoided and we lose nothing out of it. Same goes for brushing your teeth or watching a TV or going out. Any physical activity can be paused out of laziness or by choice. Can be addressed if there is urgency. While we evaluate the importance and relevance to judge the activity to be paused or continued as educated blokes, the carpenter, plumber etc have a life which is physical only. Hence they can and they do. 

So rigorous physical involvement is more in control of the work being done than intellectually stimulating like ours. For the sake of money we want to spend, we handover the leash to the work and indirectly to our bosses or clients or superiors.
We bow to these physical workers too because we are afraid of them since their work cannot be done by us and this is often used by our maids or drivers or others to arm-twist us. A cab driver if he refuses to ply, we are the weakest being in front of him with literally nothing to oppose his decision. So not just work, we are not even in our control of facilities that we are ready to pay through our noses too. 

So? What has this education or white-collar jobs or businesses led us to? Answer is self explaining.