If you are one of those who has your favourite Ganesh or a Feng Shui plant or Sai Baba or Laughing Buddha on your office desk to help you make your work a success you are not alone. You are part of the 62 per cent of employees in India, who do the same.
While Vaastu Shastra and Feng Shui are the most common practices followed at the workplace, the personal favourites are lucky charms like stones, colour specific items etc.
Managements in India don’t mind the various superstitious beliefs of employees — many particularly at the top have their own superstitious beliefs — as long as it does not have a negative affect on productivity.
This was revealed in a study Superstitions@ Workplace by TeamLease Services that is trying to understand India’s new World of Work.
More than 48 per cent of the respondents felt that practicing superstition at workplace has had a positive effect and organisations impose fewer restrictions on such practices.
Genderwise 80 per cent of female employees were happy with superstitious practices followed in their organisations as compared to 68 per cent of the males. When asked who follows superstitions more at the workplace between men and women, 63 per cent of the respondents felt that female workers are more superstitious than their male counterparts.
The survey covered 800 companies across the top eight cities — New Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai, Kolk-ata, Bengaluru, Hyder-abad, Pune and Ahmed-abad.
Employees in Ahmeda-bad and Pune have reported to be less superstitious, whereas it was higher in Bangalore and New Delhi.
Surabhi Mathur Gandhi, senior vice-president and co-founder, TeamLease Services, said, “While keener business focus and stringent performance metrics has set the pace for our work force today we observe popular practices like fengshui or vaastu being discreetly incorporated by all and sundry as a good measure of support.