Gautham and Dipankar unpack what good contracting and bad contracting really look like on the ground — beyond paperwork and compliance. Through lived examples, they explore why worker wellbeing cannot sit with either the company or the contractor alone, but must be treated as a shared responsibility. When contracting systems are designed with dignity at the centre, they argue, the outcomes go far beyond compliance — leading to stronger impact, greater efficiency, and more sustainable growth for both companies and contractors.

The conversation closes by setting the stage for the next episode, where Gautham and Dipankar turn to gender, unpacking its many layers and how they shape the experiences of informal workers.

Certificates can validate systems — but they cannot validate lived experience.

In this episode of The Compact Lens, Sneha and Arshath take you beyond audit checklists and into the real stories unfolding across factories, worksites, and supply chains. Through deep field insights and firsthand conversations with workers, they reveal a powerful truth.

Drawing from Social Compact’s work with 65+ companies, this episode unpacks:

• Why certifications capture process partially, not people

• The invisible realities of contractual and migrant workers

• How systems can appear compliant while exploitation continues

• The role of worker voice as the true indicator of dignity

• The shift from reactive compliance to proactive wellbeing

• What companies gain when they reflect, not just report

This conversation calls on leaders, contractors, and organisations to rethink responsibility — not as a once-a-year audit, but as a daily practice embedded in culture, relationships, and listening.

Write to us at support@socialcompact.co for any queries / questions. Stay tuned!

In this second episode of The Compact Lens, we explore the idea of thinking beyond compliance. Through the lens of Social Compact’s work, we discuss how businesses have different approaches which are reactive and proactive and how that impacts them and the workers. The episode closes by setting the stage for Episode 3, where we go beyond certification to uncover what it really takes to create lasting, systemic change.