MUMBAI: The third instalment in Urban Company and Talented’s ‘Dignity at Work’ series aims to challenge traditional perceptions of the workplace. Urban Company said that over the past year, it has been on a mission to bridge the respect gap between white-collar and blue-collar workers in India. The third instalment, after ‘Chhota Kaam’ and ‘Chhoti Soch’, speaks to this subtle yet insidious prejudice, brought to life through a conversation between a father and daughter.
At this time every year, LinkedIn is awash with chatter about workplace leadership: good managers, bad managers, toxic managers, managers who give out little in the name of raises, etc. Yet the very same employees discussing leadership styles, work-life balance, and mental health often don’t make the best employers at home.
Kartik Ahuja, Senior Brand Manager, Urban Company said, “Over the last decade, Urban Company has been committed to reshaping access to blue-collar services in India. We have two constituencies – customers and partners – and to create a mutually beneficial platform, dialogue on dignity of work is not just a communication platform but a business necessity to ensure consistent year-on-year revenue growth for our partners, safety net in the form of insurance and health coverage. Over 57,000 Urban Company professionals have benefited from our skill training programs and certifications, climbing the ladder to upward mobility in society. Through this initiative, it is our intention to encourage the society to see our partners as professionals just like us.”
Through hours of interviews with UC professionals, Talented’s creative team gained insight into the many ways in which the respect gap between blue-collar and white-collar workers is pervasive. This set of biases highlights how the limiting “glass shed” view of the workplace excludes the environment in which millions of UC professionals work every day: our homes. Thus, regardless of status or the nature of work, mutual respect, which is the foundation of dignity, does not permeate these glass boundaries.
Aakash Desai, Strategist, Talented, adds: “We all speak passionately about mental health in the workplace and what we expect from our managers within the Indian corporate paradigm. We have a rich vocabulary to talk about what makes a ‘toxic’ work environment, but we often forget that our homes are the workplaces of UC professionals and other support staff and we are their managers. How do our actions at home relate to our idea of creating an environment for someone to do the best work of their life? With the third film in the series, we seek to bridge the respect gap between white and blue collar workers to reflect that UC customers are on the side of UC professionals.”
“The film depicts an everyday conversation between a father and daughter which takes an unexpected turn, forcing the father to confront his own implicit bias. Our prejudices against blue-collar workers are rarely put into words; they are complex, rooted in class-based ‘othering’ and passed down through generations. Hence, the only way to break the cycle of intergenerational bias is to pause, recognise and question it,” said Kopal Naithani, director and founder of Superfly.
You can watch the film here:
