The Hindu Business Line : Middle-lane gene

THEY call him Peter, though his name is Manoj Patra. It is a fashion in modern offices to give an anglicised sobriquet to blunt the rasp of strange sounding names. He has been with the firm for over 15 years. Because of his long years he gives the appearance of a permanent fixture at his desk. No! There is nothing wrong with him. Only he is not the archetypal workaholic nor is he possessed of the "sterner stuff"... By contrast he is a throwback to a gentler and less emulous times; a living refutation of the Peter's Principle.

He is content with his middle management status. He arrives on time with his battered and anonymous suitcase and attends to all the routine with a charming timelessness — an exception in the "stasis of today's upskilled, downsized, hot-desked" work. His batch-mates who started out with him now sit on boards as executive directors or are even CEOs. He alone appears to be at a walking distance from where he began.

Once upon a time he was also a fast tracker based on a solid foundation of a brilliant academic career. At start, he too received effortless pay increases and rapid promotions up to middle-management levels.

When the visitors are shown around, a colleague who is still green behind the ears will inform the visitor, "If you have any question on treasury operations, ask Old Pete. He is a bit of an institution here." And our man who used to wince once upon a time, now smiles acquiescence. First he thought this sort of remarks was a temporary aberration but now appear set in stone.

In appraisals his reviewer has stopped asking him where he sees himself in five years time. He is competent, constructive, conscientious and at a stage where he is comfortably off by contemporary standards. He has his own modest living quarters in a relatively clean suburb, he has a time-share for holidaying in Goa, Puri or Kochi.

The fact is, he does not see much point in following the cycle of frenzied work and consumption. As a middle-manager he thinks he enjoys a life of enviable balance and serenity. Maybe, researchers are right, he may have the so called "middle-lane gene" a specific genetic mutation known to make some rats go slowly down the centre of the maze.

R. Sundaram

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