Q2. What are your biggest fears or insecurities if at all? Are there any positives in the form of hopes and aspirations emerging from this prolonged situation?

At an overall level, there is not too much stress or anxiety felt yet but if this lockdown were to stretch on for another month or so, the fears will escalate significantly.

• The biggest fears expressed are Job Redundancy, large pay-cuts, zero bonuses and increments and resulting loss of self-esteem / confidence.
• Product Managers who manage small sized brands/portfolios feel most anxious. They believe that there could be an internal realignment or reallocation of brands between teams to save costs and these guys could be most impacted with job losses.
• Couple of participants expressed fear of efforts being initiated on “Justify-your-job” as threats of job cuts loom large. This places additional stress on them which is already high due to the never-ending work load demands. They felt bad that despite voicing their concerns, little or nothing has been proactively initiated to address them. Their line managers are also not supportive and felt equally lost as well. This is probably reflective of a deeper work culture malaise.
• It is felt by the participants that company culture decides actions and thereby outcomes. If a company truly cares for its employees in these times, it goes all out in terms of engagement with them. A few participants reported of progressive, good practices initiated by their HR like Virtual Tea Party, Virtual Lunch, Yoga/Meditation morning classes, Cooking/Bakery classes for spouses in the lean hours of the day (3:00-4:00 pm), music jamming sessions in late evenings, Kindle book readings etc. While these good initiatives were restricted to just a handful of companies, most other colleagues lamented that their employers were not forthcoming in this area. The important implication arising out of this seems to be – if my company couldn’t care less of my emotional health and well being in these times, I do not see a future with this organization. There could be movements once the situation regains normalcy.
• Unfortunately, stated positives in form of hopes or aspirations arising from the lockdown were missing. This could be attributed to the already existing high levels of stress related to managing high work loads spanning over 10-12 hours/day.