Language barrier is affecting my mental health and work
My colleagues and my clients do not use English for work related discussions and speak only in Hindi and some other language. I don’t know Hindi as I am a South Indian. My manager is forcing me to learn Hindi. The project itself is quite complicated to learn. This is causing me huge mental stress for learning the project as well as language and my health started going sideways. According to TCS policies, the mode of communication related to work and other official purposes should be only in ENGLISH. My colleagues and my manager are completely violating this policy. I have proposed to my HR and manager to either release me from this project or make everyone speak in English. How can I tackle this issue further? Please help me out.
You speak in english, they will also reply in English. Try to understand with some broken words. Ask someone in project to help you, at the beginning of calls or discussions just inform that you are not understanding. Initially people will hesitate but they will start speaking in english as well. Write a mail to the client as well. So many options are there don't panic, stay bold and face the situation.
It has been six months since I joined this project. All office discussions and client discussions are taking place in Hindi. And the worse part is they are not willing to translate it to me (obviously due to time constraints). I tell my clients to speak in English and so they do. But English is spoken only when they require either me or my inputs. Whenever their business is done with me, they continue in Hindi. I have never been involved in any meetings and my colleagues are taking me as a burden. I don't want this anymore. I want to work independently without anyone's help. Thank you for replying me.
Don't give up, keep fighting; hope you get released soon but until then don't give up.
This exactly happened when I was in banglore tcs office but that time they used tamil and kanaad but I face ignore but unfortunately project end date is exhausted and not renewed
I can understand. We must start blowing whistle. Equal employment opportunity policy is getting violated.
I would suggest you to take a balance approach. Definitely escalation is not going to help you. Talk to your manager directly & explain your situation patiently. I am sure he/she will understand & help you with a way out. There are policies, but sometimes ground realities are different. If you want to learn Hindi or not that's upto you but as a quick way out you can use some hindi terms to mix with your English will somehow ease the situation :) sounds funny but I saw many south people does that. All the best. Don't get stressed. Remember there is always a middle way.
Thanks for your opinion.I knew escalation wouldn’t be helping me either. I have approached my manager and HR stating my problem BEFORE 3 MONTHS. But they blamed me for not knowing Hindi. They have told me straight to my face that they would be using Hindi or Marathi everywhere and I have to learn them. I took it as a challenge and started giving a go. But my clients and manager started escalating me as my deliverables are getting delayed. I have stated them many times as I am having difficulty in requirements understanding because they are speaking in a language I can’t understand. I would often ask my colleagues to translate me in English but they wouldn't (obviously they have time constraints and they can't put their work at stake). My manager also started comparing me with my fellow freshers who have joined along with me as they are interacting well with their clients in their mother tongues and giving proper deliveries. This is literally SENSELESS. This has already started giving me mental anxiety issues. So I decided to take action and drafted a mail to them to give me release or make everyone use English as common language. Today I am supposed to take part in a meeting with my managers and HR. If this doesn’t work out, then surely I would escalate, posting a complaint in Grievance and Employee concern.
Bro what happened in the meet today ?
English should be the medium when you are interacting with TCS colleagues. But if client medium is some other language then you have to learn it. We have learnt French and Spanish for different clients. Yes but ofcourse TCS should conduct a language training.
Thanks for your opinion. If fluency in Hindi or Marathi is important, then they should have asked me at the first place during project onboarding. As you have told they should also offer a language training.
No tcs have policies to even Interact with client in English. You don't have to learn french and spanish unless you want to kiss their ass. Official meetings are always in English. Everyone in my team speaks and understand hindi, but our meetings official communication is always English.
Hanji betaaji aaoji chapathiji. Say this repeatedly. Congratulations. You have learnt hindi
Just raise a grievance. Warn your manager and Hr that you will raise a grievance for Harrasment at this point. What can those Mofo's do. Nothing. The earlier they release you the better fr you. I don't think they will even be considering you fr a good appraisal so as well keep their ego's in check. I think you might not have been bold enough from the get go. Cheer up and I'll suggest you to leave Tcs itself.
Thanks for your opinion bro. I joined this company as a fresher and this my first project. Leaving TCS right now probably wouldn't be a good idea. And as of what you have told, I would raise a grievance on these people. I have joined this team only as a developer but not to please my clients or manager.I am starting to realise that my HR is nothing but a puppet of my manager. She keeps on continuously postponing the meeting. Thank you bro, this meant a lot to me from you.
I assume you’re deployed in northern part of India. Try to learn a little, it doesn’t hurt to learn a new language. Even if it doesn’t help you here, maybe can be useful near future. And for your work environment, ignore them if they chit chat in Hindi, until you familiarise with few words, if any official meeting happening in Hindi, do not interrupt, let them close the meeting, once done, speak to your manager to summarise the agenda in English, do it for few meetings, then they will begin the meeting in English afterwards…
It has been six months already. Since then I literally 'beg' them to even translate in English after meeting, but they wouldn't saying that they have time constraints. Learning Hindi ofcourse would be beneficial, but it demands time and dedication to learn it. My manager would call me to his cabin all the time saying I am not working properly, the real reason behind is not understanding the requirements which is being told very partially in English. Do I deserve this?
I didn't know this exist in corporates... If there is a single person in call who does not understand Hindi, we switch to English even if it is casual discussions... This behaviour has nothing to do with policy but common sense
Well.. these people are not considerate enough
