A directive you broke that worked in your favour/saved your skin

I wrote this piece on a prompt, participating in a daily write challenge of Blogchatter for the whole month of February 2026.

This was a time when I was working in a public sector undertaking heading the corporate HR as AGM reporting to the ED (HR) who also was based out of the corporate office. After a new CMD had taken charge, he adopted a “Keeping the workers’ unions in their place” approach. Previously the unions were powerful in confronting the management particularly the union of a unit which had the largest workforce. The union representatives from three units used to come to the corporate office for discussions.

As the union reps were well known to the security guards, they were allowed inside the premises whenever they came for discussion either as office bearers of a particular unit or when they all came for joint discussions on occasions like wage revision. However, the new directive was to ensure that all leaders entered their names in a register and signed before entering the corporate office. As the CMD was proud of his image as that of a tough taskmaster, many officers were motivated to go to extreme levels of sycophancy in order to please him. As for example  although requiring union leaders to write in the register to enter the corporate office was itself  a departure from past practices of many decades, the security head went one step further and put a chain to the gate to prevent entry.

On this particular day when unions were called for a discussion at corporate office, the security head was on leave. The ED(HR) was visiting one of the units. Office bearers started arriving from the units one by one. The union farthest away in distance and the least militant of them arrived first and were extremely annoyed to see chains being put to dissuade them from entry. As more office bearers came, there was a furore and loud shouting at the gate. Under pressure, two security guards came running to me bringing along with them reps of the union in the corporate office.

They wanted a decision from me regarding the removal of the chain which was greatly annoying the union office bearers. I found myself in a very delicate situation. Asking to remove the chain may annoy the CMD for whom his image was everything. Refusing to remove the chains would annoy the unions and could have serious repercussions at a time when an important wage negotiation was due with the unions. I attempted to contact the ED(HR) who was on a visit to one of the production units. I just about  communicated the problem when the connection got disrupted before he could give a decision. In fact he seemed reluctant to give a decision which was understandable given the fact that most executives irrespective of their hierarchical level were scared to get into the bad books of the CMD. A few more attempts to contact the ED failed and time was running out for me as agitated leaders were waiting at the gate.

Finally, I decided to take a decision come what may. I instructed the security guards to remove the chain forthwith but continue with the requirement of writing down the names of the leaders entering the corporate office premises. A few days later, rumours came to my ears that I would be transferred to a district marketing office in the country thousands of kilometers away from corporate office.

However, nothing of the sort happened. In fact, later on, during the wage revision discussions the union leaders raised the issue strongly. They said that but for the appropriate intervention of the corporate HR head, there could even have been violence. Interestingly, the CMD’s response was “These foolish guys have mishandled the situation by putting chains to the main gate. There was no need for that”

When I look back, I believe that by doing ‘what I thought was right’ and giving in to my gut feeling, I was able to salvage the situation. Had the incident turned violent, the blame would have come to me for ‘not taking a sensible decision’. Yet, there was an element of luck involved. Given the style of functioning of the CMD, I could have ended up in a small district office like Sambalpur, doing low end jobs, not befitting my designation and experience.