When you are a Cost To Company

Maybe it is not as bad as it sounds, or maybe it is. Depends on how you look at it I guess. I once had this awesome colleague Mike, who has an uber-sense of humor. He wasn’t really crazy about the work culture in that company then (and he was not alone). And of course everything that transpired in there was mocked to no end. To quote M, he had termed all of us employees as “paycheck stealers”, because that’s how we were made to feel for a while, under a certain management team. Things worked out for the better there, so we were no longer paycheck stealers and transformed to ummm…well, valuable employees!

Anyway, in the Indian corporate world lingo, you are a cost to company, or CTC when you join them. That’s the esoteric term for your compensation if you hadn’t guessed already. When you join a company here, your compensation is quoted in total CTC. That includes your base comp plus various other whatevers.

Just sounds so weird, no? Just to make it even, maybe we should introduce a CTPL, Cost To Personal Life, to be estimated and put in black and white for every employee. Values could range from angry spouse, stressed out spouse, in some cases not being able to find a spouse (!), kids turning weirdos, estranged family, premature health issues, divorce, to all of the above plus some more. This world is supposedly a two way street, ain’t it?

Now, let’s take a stab at drawing the connection between CTC and CTPL. I think they should be directly proportional to each other; the higher you Cost To Company, higher is the Cost To your Personal Life as well. Fair deal in a mad, mad, mad world!

What’s your take on the term CTC?