Philosophy of Office

There are customarily many people of many different departments co-working in an office, each person in charge of his/her own responsibilities as well as applying task-assigning methods, but task assigning does not mean lack of mutual influence, which is shown in the way that you will sometimes probably do more than do I, and I may sometimes do less than do you.

Even though I lack experience in handling my job but on the Buddhist stance, the problem between humans and humans is not always clear and comprehensible under any circumstances. Regardless of the environment in an office or in a monastery, human exchanges are always difficult, so clashes are inevitable. Therefore, once put into those situations, to whom should you listen and to whom should not you?

This can be divided into two sides, one being the regulations of the current environment and the other being psychology and attitude of theoneinvolved. On the face of psychology and attitude of the insiders, communication between humans and humans cannot completely exclude the psychology of comparing between advantages and disadvantages, high and low. As seeing others doing a lot of good things, some people may right away speak ill of them like “It’s weird! Why are you doing those good deeds while others are not?” The reason for that person’s saying is possibly derived from suspicious, envious and calculating psychology.

Those types of talkative and gossiping people once doing more than others also feel perturbed, thinking to themselves “Everyone has the same salary, why do I have to do more than them?” If getting into the habit of comparing yourself with others, you will have difficulty contacting and getting to know more about them. Within a family, a school and an office emerge the same cases. In a family, there are some members who care, help their siblings and parents and positively do things for others without any demand. On the contrary, there are some irresponsible people who not only know nothing about sharing the working burden with the rest of the family but also cause troubles and hurt others.

In reality, in spite of any environment and situation, there are both excellent and incompetent people, so the better should help others and avoid being indifferent and lukewarm towards others’ work. Many people often finish their work before the assigned deadline, but during their free time they do not help others but contrarily look for their weaknesses and drawbacks to criticize and pour scorn on their abilities as well. There is also a type of humans who dream beyond the reality and frequently require others to work while they themselves are devil-may-care and good-for-nothing; in addition, they often find faults when others are working, which is also a huge mistake. Moreover, the type of humans who love flattering their superiors is not rare. They regularly get despised by their colleagues. It seems that their main job is to pick up the proper words to praise and compliment on their superiors, voluntarily humbling themselves in order to comply with their seniors. What is worth noticing is that most leaders commonly like being glorified and praised to the sky, remain blind about what is right and what is wrong, what is real and what is fake and also lack the ability of observing and judging people but consistently assuming that those who are flattering are actually “their loyal inferiors”. What if you were a competent person who could well accomplish the assigned work but were not so obsessed with boasting to superiors that your efforts, knowledge and achievements were all deprived, but your superior did not recognize it?

On the Buddhist stance of Karma, we had better try hard to finish our work in no need of letting our boss know nor expecting to be complimented. We need to do our best to fulfill the duties and work without any care whether others are watching us or not. When being with colleagues, we should be dedicated and devoted for the sack of our boss, ourselves, everybody and the whole company. Don’t shrug off the responsibilities and be jealous with others. The most important thing is to try our best and do not get concerned despite how others are feeling towards our actions. Once able to do so, at least you will fulfill your own duties and devote your capacity to the society.

Translated into English by Nguyen Minh Thuy Tien.

Thanh Nghiem senior monk