Life's Little Lesson

This was a nice summer morning. Sapna woke up early today. She had her global leader visiting from Germany. This was a momentous day for her. Her manager Emilia was travelling all the way from Germany to have key meetings with Sapna and Sapna’s team.

As soon as Sapna walked out of the bathroom, her phone rang. Her maid was on the other side informing her that she would be unable to come to work today. She gave a reason that her sister is not keeping well, and she needed to go outstation to see her. Sapna gets frustrated by the anxious thought that her maid is not coming on this important day when she desperately needed to leave early for the office, Sapna shouted “You always do this Rani, I am fed up with your sudden leaves” and hung up the phone.

After few odd minutes her maid called again and informed that she has lost her ailing sister. Sapna was shocked to hear that. Sapna’s husband watching all these said to her “you should not have reacted the way you did. She had a genuine problem.” Sapna although feeling indeed guilty and ashamed did not want to accept the same to her husband and mumbled "Her sister did not die because of my reaction"

Sapna was in the office; she was delighted to see everything was in place for Emilia’s visit. She gratefully thanked her efficient team. Emilia reached in the office at afternoon. 1 PM she was with her in a conference room to discuss business area performance and key priorities for the next half of the year. While they had barely initiated the discussion, Sapna received a call, it was her son’s school. She intentionally ignored. They called again. Sensing something important, she excused herself out of conference room to take the call. Other side was the school’s principal informing that her son suffered an unfortunate accident during the sport and needed to rush to the hospital. Sapna entered the conference room terrified with the news still trying to determine what she should do; her husband went out of station today for a business trip. Emilia asked if everything was ok. She narrated what happened to her son. Emilia urged her to attend the hospital immediately and not think about her visit and things needed to be done at the office as this can planned to be done over a phone calls as well later.

Three of Sapna’s colleagues accompanied her to the hospital and left only after her son was stable.

In the night, she got text from Emilia inquiring about her son’s health. Emilia was at the airport to catch her flight back to Germany. She got calls and messages from several of her team members wishing well for her son.

She thought about her organization and felt grateful to work in such a caring, employee friendly environment. She thought about her team members and how they willingly helped her today. She thought about Emilia and felt fortunate that she was her boss, so very much understanding and flexible. Subsequently, she thought about what happened to her maid Rani in the morning. Uncontrollable tears rolled down her cheeks. She has undoubtedly learnt a Life’s Little Lesson today.