Read - Human Capital Online

Transcription

Rs. 50
www.humancapitalonline.com
®
realising business strategy through people
Vol.18 No. 5 October 2014
HR ROUNDTABLE
DEBATE
HR PRACTICE
Pg 28
Pg 37
Pg 46
Work-life balance:
Myth or a reality?
Is India Inc. ready for a
4-day work week concept?
RCOM empowers the
youth through PRAYAG
October 2014
N
3
CONTENTS
OCTOBER 2014
VOLUME 18
ISSUE 5
COVER STORY
18
Dare to dream
Though the world has become more competitive, it isn't
always an end of the road for a mediocre. There are several
unusual careers which has earned both social and financial
acceptance, and also ensures modest to great success.
FEATURES
28
Best of Both worlds
Taking a cue from what Indra Nooyi recently said in an
interview, "Women can't have it all', this HR Roundtable
explores the challenges women employees face when it
comes to achieving the perfect balance between career
and personal responsibilities.
34
38
The nuances of the adult learning theory
Adult learners have a tendency to resist learning when
they feel that someone is imposing information, ideas or
actions on them. Therefore, it is very important for an
effective facilitator to understand how his adult learners
can learn best.
Cybercrime: are organizations prepared
enough to deal with it?
No matter how complex the nature of cybercrime is,
maintaining an attitude of awareness is the best cybercrime
prevention mantra. Companies are finding unique ways to
get the message of cyber security across, making it an
imperative to ensure that the weakest link in cyber safety
is adequately secured across the organization.
42
Why learning still matters!
Facts, statistics, practices, perspectives and more...
HR PRACTICE
46
Empowering the youth
‘PRAYAG, a Reliance Communications' CSR initiative, extends
employable skills to the youth in India for a larger economic
sustainability. Based on the very tenet of converting a societal
concern into an opportunity through systemic innovation
and creative strategy, this initiative's is an integral part of the
organization's developing business strategy.
4
N
October 2014
■
October 2014
N
5
CASE STUDY
52
The communication factor
Listening and understanding others, and being able to put
one's point across, is what effective communication is all
about. Therefore, managers must invest time and energy
to deliver clear communication to build trust and confidence
amongst employees.
PERSONA
64
The multifaceted leader !
Driven by three principles in life -things don't come easy,
work hard to succeed and work harder to stay successful,
Rajiv Dutta's multifaceted abilities has given interesting
dimensions to this HR leader's career…
COLUMNS
12
33
45
50
57
62
Food for thought by Dileep ranjekar
Gen-Y speak by Ankur Poddar
Guest column by Naveen Narayanan
Psychology at work by Manavi Pathak
Guest column by Ritika Basu
A point of view by Gautam Brahma
REGULARS
8
14
16
58
SUBSCRIPTION
(PRINT MAGAZINE)
1 year (12 issues): Rs.600
Editorial
Research
On the agenda
Life beyond work
(E-MAGAZINE)
1 year (12 issues) Rs.400
ADVERTISERS IN THIS ISSUE
Send a written request mentioning your
postal address and enclosing a cheque*/
demand draft in favour of 'HR
Information Services' payable at New
Delhi. (*Add Rs.90 for outstation
cheques)
Or pay by credit card online at our website
Opt for courier delivery by paying
additionally. (Delhi: Rs. 150 per year;
Other cities: Rs. 280 per year)
6
N
October 2014
Pearson
IFC
HRDC
41
Acumen Business consulting
3
HRDC
63
L&T
5
XLRI
IBC
Pearson
7
HR Mantra
BC
Scrum
9
Crisp
11
ODC
13
IFC: Inside Front Cover; IBC: Inside
Back Cover; BC: Back Cover
■
October 2014
N
7
October 2014 ● Volume 18 Issue 5
Editorial, subscriptions &
advertising office
HR Information Services,
F-316, Ground Floor, Lado Sarai
Old M.B.Road, New Delhi - 110030.
Ph: 29523466, 29523583
Subscription queries
[email protected]
Articles
[email protected]
Suggestions
[email protected]
Advertisement queries
[email protected]
HC TEAM
Editor & publisher: Punita Malhotra
Dy. editor: Sannita Chakraborty Saha
Advertising: Bharat Bhushan Tiwari
Priyadarshini Pegu
Sales (North & West): Anil K Pathak
Sales (South & East): Shailendra Yagnik
Customer care: Lalita Malviya
Creative & layouts: David Thomas
Subscription rates
(Print magazine) 1 year: Rs.600;
2 years: Rs.1200
(E-magazine) 1 year: Rs.400;
2 years: Rs.800
PUBLISHER
Punita Malhotra
F-316, Ground Floor, Lado Sarai,
Old M.B.Road, New Delhi - 110030
on behalf of HR Information Services.
Printing
Punita Malhotra
from Vashima Printers, A-13
DDA Shed, Okhla Industrial Area-II
New Delhi-110020.
To our readers
Thomas Frey, Innovations Editor for The Futurist Magazine,
predicts that by 2030 over 2 billion jobs will disappear, mostly
because of automation. He also forecasts several unimaginably
new skill sets that will be required for the future, including
transitionists, expansionists, optimizers, feedback loopers,
contextualists, ethicists and legalists! Not only that, he lists jobs
that don't even exist yet, like amnesia surgeons, memory
augmentation therapists, extinction revivalists, plant educators,
lifestyle housing designers, gene sequencers, currency strategists,
waste data managers, drone standards specialists, bio-waste
optimisers and guardians of privacy!!!
You always thought you needed to become an overworked CEO
or a boring investment banker to have an obnoxiously high pay
check? Think again! PayDay One, a provider of payday loans, lists
10 unconventional careers that pay surprisingly well. Orthotists
and Prosthetists: Average pay: $71,000 per year; Psychics: Average
pay: $41,000 per year; Embalmers: Average pay: $45,060 per year;
Master Sommeliers: Average pay: $80,000 to $160,000 per year;
Subway and Streetcar Operators: Average pay: $59,400 per year;
Flavorists: Average pay: Up to $100,000 per year; Ethical Hackers:
Average pay: $92,000 per year; Airplane Repo Men: Average pay:
Can earn $10,000 to $90,000 per plane repossessed; Submarine
Cooks: Average pay: Varies, but in Australia they can earn up to
$187,000 per year; Voice-over Artists: Average pay: Experienced
voice-over talent can earn $50,000 to $80,000 per year. So, what's
your calling?
Though our cover story for this month, "Dare to dream" doesn't
delve into such extreme career options, it does offer an
opportunity to reflect on how the world of work is transforming.
Who knows, we may not even be able to recognize it a couple of
decades from today. Is your organization geared up for the
inevitable evolution?
Enjoy the read....
Processing
Pre-Press Services E-9, 1st Floor Kalkaji
New Delhi-110019
PUNITA MALHOTRA
© 2014 HR Information Services.
All rights reserved. Reproduction
in any manner without written
permission is prohibited.
8
N
October 2014
■
Contractor Bills Verification for services is always a grey area, resulting in fund seepages.
TM
Labourworks is an Enterprise Contract Labour Management Software which helps streamlining
the processes using SPC MethodologyTM.
LabourworksTM can seamlessly connect to SAP, pull Work Orders and Push back the Service Entry
Sheets (SES) based on verified services. This results in a substantial Cost savings.
LabourworksTM is certified by SAP AG for integration.
Call us to today to know more about “How LabourworksTM can help you leverage your SAP
infrastructure for services verification & subsequent cost savings”
■
October 2014
N
9
MAILBOX
We've got mail!
Getting better with time!
Comprehensive in outlook
I have been reading Human Capital for a while now.
It is the best magazine in the HR magazine space and
I prefer to read it for any HR related information.
The articles are very interesting and informative. The
effort put in by your team is also commendable. I
would like to read
articles on HR
Jargons, tools and
job related
techniques that
can help
junior level
employees.
Also, please
include more
information on
recent job
openings across the
industry.
SHWETA VYAS
Assistant Manager-HR, PwC, India
Human Capital is one magazine that gives a
comprehensive outlook to all aspects in HRD. The
content is definitely very interesting and useful. We
are able to implement many practices and ideas in
our work. The December issue's Cover Story 'The
changing face of Industrial Relations' was very
informative. In fact, I have shared the article with
many of my colleagues.
The way the Maruti
incident was discussed
and references to the
mandates were valuable.
SUMIT SINGH
Executive-HR, JBM Auto
Limited
A true advocate of HR
I have been reading this magazine since the time it
has been launched. What I like best about the
magazine are the articles on the excellent HR
practices in different organizations. The content in the
magazine continues to be enriching as the topics are
chosen with great care. On the other hand, I think
you should give opportunities to young HR
professionals and fresh
management graduates also
to share their thoughts
and ideas, as they are
very innovative and have
a different perspective to
traditional approaches.
PREETI SHARMA
HR consultant, Solutions
Line, Mumbai
Worthy content!
I have been reading Human Capital for a long
time now. The content is rich, and helps me in my
day to day activities at work. However, I would
like to read more on employee engagement and
learn about the recent surveys that are conducted
across the industry.
SRIDEEPA CHATTERJI
Associate-People Development, Global Logic
Way ahead!
I enjoy reading Human Capital a lot. The content is
not just rich but is different. I have been reading this
magazine for many years now and want to continue
reading it. What I like best about the
magazine is the way articles are
grouped under different HR
functions, which makes it easier for
HR professional to locate articles
and read according to one's
interest areas. Overall, a very
good magazine for HR people!
KARTHIK VYAS
HR Professional, New Age Recruitment
Solutions
(Your feedback is valuable for us. Send across your views and suggestions for India's most respected HR publication at
[email protected] or [email protected] )
10
N
October 2014
■
■
October 2014
N
11
FOOD FOR THOUGHT
Going through motions
BY DILEEP RANJEKAR
W
ishing people on their
birthday is a routine something that most of
us do fairly regularly. Leaders and
HR functions of many
organizations aspire to do
something different and innovative
in their organization on
employees' birthdays. Initially,
there is a lot of enthusiasm
among employees, but over a
period of time, it becomes a
challenge to sustain that energy.
Only the employees retain their
interest since it is their birthday.
Group mails are sent to all. Many
delete the mails as soon as they
see it. Only a few close friends do
drop a line or personally wish the
birthday person.
In cultures and social classes
where 'birthdays' are not a big deal
- it is like another day. In such
cultures, if in some factory, the
factory personnel head decides to
issue birthday greetings himself the employees don't know how to
respond to it. The reactions range
from neutral to feeling happy.
I happened to be once present
in the room of a factory
personnel head, when he had sent
a message to a workman to come
to his office so that he could hand
over the birthday greeting card to
the workman. First, the workman
saw through the door glass and
was hesitant to enter - the
personnel head was speaking on
phone. I was reading something
on the opposite chair. The
personnel head motioned the
12
N
October 2014
workman in and he walked in to
stand in a corner - not exactly
knowing why he was summoned. I
smiled at the workman and he
probably felt a little assured. While
being on the phone, the personnel
head suggested to the workman to
sit on the chair. He gestured back
- saying he was fine standing. The
personnel head repeatedly
suggested the workman to sit on
the chair. Finally after almost 10
minutes, the personnel head
finished his call and was livid. He
raised his voice and asked the
workman - "when I am telling you
to sit on the chair so many times,
why did you disobey me?" The
workman was stunned with the
unexpected anger and had nothing
to say. There was an uneasy silence
for two-three minutes and finally
the personnel head seriously told
the workman - "it is your birthday
today and I would like to officially
greet you on behalf of the
organization. The reason I have
called you is to hand over to you
the birthday greeting card" - after
which he took out the greeting
card from a pile of papers and
gave it to him. The workman
thanked (through gesture) and left.
I was stunned with that
episode………….and in
amusement asked the personnel
head - "if the idea was to wish
him on his birthday - why scold
him like this and greet him in
such a mechanical manner?" On
the part of the factory personnel
head, he was serious about what
he was doing and did not realize
what he was not doing right.
A few months ago, an
employee leaving our organization
wanted to meet me and I agreed like I normally do. The employee
narrated her experiences with the
organization and elaborated the
situation that eventually prompted
her to consider alternatives. I
asked her whether she has
mentioned all this during the exit
interview. She burst into laughter. I
asked her the reason for her
laughter. She said the HR called
her and requested her to spare
some time for a few questions.
The employee said - she was busy
in something and would call back.
The HR person was insistent since
she was rather in a hurry - she
said - "it would take just a few
minutes and we can finish it on
the phone itself. At least I would
be able to tick the completion of
an action".
I was taken aback since I
believed that the 'exit interview'
was such a powerful tool with the
organization to know what really
happened. If done by a sensitive,
empathetic and trained
professional - it has the potential
to be a mini employee-perception
survey. It is an opportunity to
meet the person who has decided
to explore other options and
fundamentally understand what
led to the decision. What triggered
the action - what led to such a
serious conclusion? It is an
opportunity for the organization
■
FOOD FOR THOUGHT
to learn and act on several issues.
It is a process to genuinely
connect with the employee to
understand both the rational and
emotive part of the decision.
However, the crux is to create
enabling conditions for the
employee to think, gather
thoughts cogently and express
them without fear. You have to
plan, think, be flexible and invest
time in the process. If someone in
the HR function decided to treat
it as an activity to 'tick off' from
among the several other things it is nothing short of a tragedy.
Like in the 'birthday wishing'
episode, here too, if someone
whose responsibility is to treat
these occasions as powerful
opportunities to create an upside
for the employee, for the self and
for the organization by generating
positive energy and achieving
deeper understanding - one can
just say that the soul of the activity
is lost. The HR professional has
just chosen to go through the
■
motion without realizing the
potential of the interaction.
It reminds me of the process of
continuous comprehensive
evaluation (CCE). While the concept
has existed for long, it was more
formally introduced (and in a way
mandated) by the Right to
Education Act. Among other things
- CCE has such a powerful
potential to contribute to the
professional development of the
teachers themselves! It is not just
about the students or learners but through a continuous review of
the learner responses - also an
opportunity to know what
strategies deployed by the teacher
are working. It cannot be reduced
to mere formats and filling them
to register completion of some job.
If leaders and professionals
don't make an attempt to
understand the underlying
principles - concepts and theories
of what they are doing and don't
realize the significance of why they
are doing something - I would say
they are merely treating their roles
as that of a housekeeping person
who merely ticks the charts behind
the rest room doors without
actually doing those jobs. The
charts are made to ensure that
certain things happen on a regular
basis. However, doing those things
is far more important than ticking
the chart. If the rest room is clean
and odourless - I don't think
anyone would bother checking the
chart.
The moment you treat
interactions with people as mere
rituals to go through - devoid of
the bond, the glue and the deeper
meaning and joy behind such
interactions - you can be rest
assured that you have either not
understood your role or have
stopped enjoying your role and are
doing it to merely earn salary. HC
Dileep Ranjekar, Chief Executive Officer of Azim
Premji Foundation, is also a passionate student of
human behaviour. He can be contacted at
[email protected].
October 2014
N
13
RESEARCH
Skilling India
A look back at the progress, challenges
and the way forward
India registers
consistent
25% growth in online
opportunities
The Monster Employment Index has
been depicting a steady and robust
progress in the Indian recruitment
industry. Studying the trends of
various sectors, the media &
entertainment industry has rocketed
a 62% growth. Robust growth is
exhibited by almost all the industry
sectors monitored by the index like
IT/ITES, Healthcare, Engineering &
Construction, Production &
Manufacturing, Travel and Education
which indicates that the business
sentiment is turning positive.
According to the survey, the
Media and Entertainment industry
surges ahead with 62% y-o-y growth
and Bangalore leads with 35 per cent
growth in job opportunities followed
by Ahmedabad with 33%.
The key findings are:
G Media & Entertainment leads all
sectors by the way of long term
gain followed by Home Appliance
sector. Shipping/Marine registers
the steepest decline
G Among occupation groups, Marketing
& Communications registers the
steepest growth in demand on an
annual basis
G Bangalore records the most notable
growth in opportunities between
August 2013 and 2014
14
N
October 2014
According to a FICCI-KPMG white paper launched in New Delhi, policy
makers would need to recognize the structural strengthening of
ecosystem by introducing enabling policies such as- Minimum Wages
Act, Labor Laws, and Apprenticeship Act apart from proving required
support to key stakeholders like NSDC, SSCs, State Skill Missions,
Training Providers and others.
According to the report, the growth in the domestic Industrial
output has accentuated
the crucial need for
skilling India's working
age population. The total
projected increase in
labour force during the
Twelfth Plan period for
was estimated to be 477.9
million in 2011 and is
estimated to increase to
502.4 million by the end
of 2017. At an annual
addition of 9.25 million
per year approximately 37 million jobs are expected to be created from
2012-13 through 2016-17. Manufacturing shall roughly contribute
towards half of these additional jobs. Significant proportion of the jobs in
these sectors would require a sector and skill specific trained workforce.
The White Paper looks objectively at each of the related policies,
enabling and implementing bodies and assesses their current
performance and suggests structural and operational level efficacy
interventions. It has given some valuable recommendations to promote
skill development.
Social Conscience will
take priority in future
workplaces
India's future generation wants to
work in organisations that
demonstrate a strong social
conscience and this is regardless of
their relationship to the workplace.
Almost 75 per cent of Indian
respondents want to work for an
organisation with a powerful social
conscience, while only 26 per cent valued a job that makes a difference.
The Indian workplace will increasingly evolve into collaborating
networks of smaller organisations brought together by technology and
■
RESEARCH
social media. The emphasis will be on specialisation - professionals will
have 'personal' brands and sell their skills to those who need them. But
there will also be those who will want to work in the large, traditionally
structured organisations and value long term service with a single
organisation.
Job security is most important for 53 percent of Indian respondents
but 58 percent do not expect traditional employment to be around in the
future. Instead of any elite organisation, 42 percent respondents wanted
to ideally work for themselves and 81 percent are willing to completely
re-train themselves to remain relevant.
These findings are part of Future of Work: A journey to 2022, a
specially commissioned PwC survey of 10,000 members of the public and
500 HR professionals across China, India, Germany, the UK and the US.
The respondents gave their views on how they thought the workplace
would evolve and how this might impact their employment prospects
and future working lives.
Whistle-blowing
The latest buzzword but still lacks real
significance in India Inc.
Whistle-blowing is the latest buzzword among Indian organizations but
compliance to the policy is still low, states EY's survey, 'The whistleblowing quandary: India Inc.'s journey from oblivious to obvious'. The
survey reveals that while a majority of respondents
assented to having a whistle-blowing mechanism, only
13% were fully compliant with the
Companies' Act 2013. It also stated
that only 22% of the respondents
had implemented the
framework because they
considered the structured
mechanism integral to their
business operations. While
many organizations had a
policy in place, half of the
respondents offered only
one channel for reporting of
complaints - which is more a
'tick in the box' approach
than actually reaping the real benefits of a whistle-blowing framework.
Arpinder Singh, Partner and National Leader, Fraud Investigation &
Dispute Services said, "India Inc. still needs to make significant headway
to benefit from an effective whistle-blowing framework. Today,
regulatory measures are paving the path for sound governance practices;
there are a series of metrics which need to intelligently converge for the
mechanism's success. The vigil mechanism may only be an element in
the larger risk mitigation framework; however, our understanding of
market dynamics has helped us gauge its significance, if implemented
correctly. Going forward, it is necessary for the management to pay
more attention to the intricacies of the framework through efficient
monitoring, support and oversight and most importantly, establishing a
robust fraud response plan."
■
Top pension
fund assets hit
$15 trillion
According to Pensions & Investments
and Towers Watson research, total
assets of the world's largest 300
pension funds grew by over 6% in 2013
(compared to around 10% in 2012) to
reach a new high of almost US$15
trillion (up from US$14 trillion in 2012,.
The P&I / Towers Watson global 300
research, conducted in conjunction with
Pensions & Investments, a leading US
investment newspaper, shows that by
individual region, Latin American and
African funds had the highest five-year
combined compound growth rate of
over 16% (albeit from a low base)
compared to Europe (12%), North
America (around 6%) and Asia-Pacific
(around 5%). The research also shows
that the world's top 300 pension funds
now represent around 47% of global
pension assets1.
According to the research, defined
benefit (DB) funds account for 67% of
total assets, down from 75% five years
ago. During 2013, DB assets grew by
around 3%, compared to reserve funds2
(15%), defined contribution (DC) plans
(over 9%) and hybrids (over 8%).
October 2014
N
15
ON THE AGENDA
GLOBAL DIARY
Oct - Nov 2014
Enhance your cross-cultural
management skills
Organizer: INSEAD
Fees: • 8,500
When: Oct 20-24, 2014
Where: Fontainebleau
Details: www.insead.edu
Human Interaction Laboratory
Organizer: NTL
When: November 9-14, 2014
Where: Leesburg, Virginia
Fees: $3,450
Details: www.ntl.org
Interpersonal Skills for Leadership
Success
Organizer: NTL
When: October 19-24, 2014
Fees: $3,450
Intervention Strategies
Organizer: NTL
When: November 3-7
Fees: $3,450
Theory and Practice in OD
Organizer: NTL
When: November 16-21
Where: Seattle, Washington
Fees: $ 3,750
Program for Leadership Development
Organizer: Harvard Business School
When: 21 July-2014 - 30 Jan 2015
Where: HBS Campus, Boston, MA, USA
Fees: $43,000
Details: www.exed.hbs.edu
General Management Program
Organizer: Harvard Business School
When: 28 JULY-14 NOV
Where: HBS Campus, Boston, MA, USA
Fees: $61,000
Details: www.exed.hbs.edu
Negotiation Dynamics
Organizer: INSEAD
Fees: • 6,250
When: 27 - 29 October 2014
Where: Paris
Details: www.insead.edu
16
N
October 2014
Financial Management
Leadership Competency for Star
Performance
Location: Jamshedpur
Dates: 5 - 8 November
Human Resource Management
Decision Making in Teams
Dates: 03 Nov 2014 - 5 Nov 2014
Human Resource Management
Professional Sales Management
Dates: 21-31 October
General Management
Human Factors and Workplace Safety
Location: Hyderabad
Dates: 10-12 Novemeber
General Management
Organizational Leadership for the
21st Century
Location: Ahmedabad
Dates: 27-30 October, 2014
Strategic Management
Innovation, Corporate Strategy, and
Competitive Performance
Location: Ahmedabad
Dates: 3-8 November, 2014
XLRI
Administrator
Circuit House Area (East)
Jamshedpur 831 035
Phone: 0657 - 398 / 665 3329 / 3330
Email: [email protected]/
[email protected]
Website: www.xlri.ac.in/mdp
XLRI
Administrator
Jamshedpur 831 035
Phone: 0657 - 398 / 665 3329 / 3330
[email protected]
XLRI
Administrator
Jamshedpur 831 035
Phone: 0657 - 398 / 665 3329 / 3330
[email protected]
ASCI Hyderabad
Administrative Staff College of India
Bella Vista
Raj Bhavan Road, Khairatabad,
Hyderabad -500 082, India
Tel: +91-40-66533000
E-mail: [email protected]
Website: www.asci.org.in
Manager, MDP
IIM Ahmedabad
Vastrapur
Ahmedabad 380 015 INDIA
Ph: 91-79-6632 4071-7 / 6544 9057
Website: www.iimahd.ernet.in/mdp
Website: www. fsm.ac.in
Manager, MDP
IIM Ahmedabad
Vastrapur
Ahmedabad 380 015 INDIA
Ph: 91-79-6632 4071-7 / 6544 9057
Website: www.iimahd.ernet.in/mdp
Website: www. fsm.ac.in
■
ON THE AGENDA
General Management
Creating Competitive Advantage
through Service Quality
Location: Gurgaon
General Management
Building High Performance Team
Location: Gurgaon
Ved Alawadi
Chief Administrative Officer (P)
MDI Gurgaon
Mehrauli Road, Sukhrali,
Gurgaon 122 007,India
Tel : +91-124-4560004
Website: www.mdi.ac.in
Ved Alawadi
MDI Gurgaon
Tel : +91-124-4560004
NEWS ROUNDUP
SHRM India’s 3rd
Annual Conference
& Exposition 2014
We take immense pleasure in inviting you
for “SHRM India’s 3rd Annual Conference
& Exposition 2014”, India’s premier HR
event catering to the most prominent HR
and Business leaders. The event is going
to be held in the India's millennium city Gurgaon, Haryana on 25th and 26th
September, 2014. The two-day conference
presents a great opportunity for you to
network with over 650+ Delegates, 250+
Organisations and 60+ Global Attendees.
Brief about event
Human Behaviour and OD
Conflict Management and
Negotiation Skills
Location: Gurgaon
Strategy & General Management
CXO Program: Building Business in
Emerging Markets
Location: Bangalore
Dates: 3 November, 2014
Strategy & General Management
Learning from Corporate Failures
Location: Bangalore
Dates: 27 October, 2014
Financial Management
Finance for Non-Finance Executives
Location: Kozikode
■
Ved Alawadi
MDI Gurgaon
Tel : +91-124-4560004
The Administrative Officer (EEP)
IIM Bangalore
Bannerghatta Road
Bengaluru - 560 076
Karnataka, India
Tel: +91 - 80 - 2699 3264 / 3475 / 3742
Website: www.iimb.ernet.in
The Administrative Officer (EEP)
IIM Bangalore
Bannerghatta Road
Bengaluru - 560 076
Karnataka, India
Tel: +91 - 80 - 2699 3264 / 3475 / 3742
Website: www.iimb.ernet.in
Indian Institute of Management
Kozhikode
IIMK Campus P. O.,
Kozhikode, Kerala, India,
PIN - 673 570
Phone: +91-495-2809100
Fax: +91-495-2803010-11
Website: http://www.iimk.ac.in
The agenda for conference is based on the
theme ‘Connect, Inspire and Grow’ offering
a platform that empowers and enables HR
personnel across all industry verticals to
stay in line with continuously evolving HR
industry. Apart from this, the conference
will have 20+ Knowledge Sessions, 6+
Concurrent Sessions on Industry Trends and
8 National & South-Asian Awards. The
Keynote speakers will present you with
stories and viewpoints that will bring
various facets and viewpoints on human
resource management from across the
world.
Please find below the details for the event.
Also, attached is the event agenda for your
reference.
Key Speakers
RON KAUFMAN- NY Times Bestselling
author, Founder of UP Your Service, DR.
KARI STROBEL-Director, HR Competencies,
SHRM, SUNITA BHYUAN-Violinist and
Training Professional, WAYNE F. CASCIORobert H. Reynolds Chair in Global
Leadership, Professor of Management,
University of Colorado, ASHOK
ALEXANDER- Director at Antara, Lead at
Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation in India,
Ex-Director at McKinsey & Company, India,
RAJEEV DUBEY-President (Group HR,
Corporate Services) & Member of the Group
Executive Board, Mahindra & Mahindra Ltd,
ABHIJIT BHADURI-Chief Learning Officer,
Wipro Group and VIRENDER AGGARWALCEO, Ramco Systems.
For more details :
http://annualindia.shrmindia.org/
October 2014
N
17
COVER STORY
BY SANNITA CHAKRABORTY SAHA
Dare to
dream
Though the world has become more competitive, it isn't always an
end of the road for a mediocre. There are several unusual careers
which has earned both social and financial acceptance, and also
ensures modest to great success.
F
or many of us who were born in the
70s and 80s, career options were very
limited. All one could pursue were
either engineering or medical. Some
would be little far-fetched and would
try their luck in the civil services. In
fact success in those times meant scoring good
marks in exams and getting through the
competitive examinations which eventually
spelled a secured future both socially and
financially.
In fact, a mediocre had to struggle hard to
find a place in the employment sector.
Touchwood! This isn't the case anymore.
Academic success isn't the only route to a
secured and successful career.
Today people can achieve the basic
parameters of success through unusual careers.
People can earn immense wealth, fame and
prosperity even being a photographer, a florist,
a designer or an ad film maker.
On one hand, the cut-off marks at colleges
has steeped to its highest level and the
18
N
October 2014
competition is fierce, but even then, those who
are not academic achievers can also hope to
have a bright future for themselves.
A big change that has happened is that
different unusual careers has got social
acceptance. Being a photographer, a flight
attendant or a bell captain at A luxury hotel is
no longer a social taboo. The mindset especially
in the metros has undergone a drastic change.
There are many more career options that can
pull in a pretty penny just as much as any other
traditional career would. For those who were
born in the pre-90s era, were all fed with the
belief that certain careers were ideal and hence
should be obvious career choices. This is why
many of us are still stuck with mundane jobs
even though the interest level is low.
Welcome change
A successful career is indeed an integral part of
one's identity. If you ask any Baby Boomer or
a Gen-X how they chose their career, most
people would say they didn't. They relied on
■
COVER STORY
■
October 2014
N
19
COVER STORY
Forensics Science
Sandeep Dhupia
Partner and Head of Forensics,
KPMG in India
Does investigation excite you
Forensics Services offers very promising career opportunities
for diverse skillsets. Forensic services have evolved from
investigating financial statement frauds to corporate intelligence,
anti-money laundering work, contract compliance services, IP
Advisory, software license reviews, verifications, etc. Most
importantly technology is the new enabler (not only to commit
fraud but) to investigate fraud, thus bringing to the fore the
need for forensic technology experts.
Bundle of options
Forensics offers opportunities for multiple and diverse skill
sets. MBAs and Chartered Accountants, technology and
telecom graduates, individuals with law enforcement
experience, people with technology and
engineering backgrounds,
ethical hackers, banking
professionals, people with
experience in Internal audit,
regulatory and compliance.
Our team at KPMG comprises
a healthy mix of accountants,
management graduates,
engineering graduates,
telecom graduates, those with law enforcement experience,
lawyers, economists, graduates, cyber and forensic technology
experts etc.
Sea of opportunities
The growth prospects and opportunities are tremendous. Forensic
services are still at a nascent stage in India and therefore trained
forensic specialists are scarce and hence very much in demand
by consulting firms offering forensic services. Many large
corporates are also building in house Forensic teams especially
in sectors such as Banking, Telecom, Pharmaceuticals, etc.
Forensics also offers the foundation to embark on careers in risk
management, systems and risk process designing, compliance,
etc. For forensic technology professionals, with the increased use
of cyber and technology to commit frauds, the scope of being
involved in preventive and investigative roles has largely increased.
Experienced forensic professionals may also develop a
career as expert witnesses in litigation and appear in
depositions in courts of law.
Nothing glamorous about it
The challenge of forensic science is whether the job is
in academia or the civil service, one thing graduates
and post-graduates must bear in mind is that the work
isn't as glamorous as what they see on TV. Like other
areas of science, work in forensics involves a lot of
painstaking laboratory work, and colleagues don't
always look as good in their lab coats as the forensics scientists
on TV.
others to choose their career without
considering what the consequences were in
letting someone else direct their path. Their
teachers, parents, neighbors, and peers did
by telling them to tread pre-designed career
paths and they followed suit.
In fact, a joint survey by PARADE
magazine and Yahoo! Finance of 26,000
Americans reveal that almost 60 per cent of
the respondents accepted that given a
chance they would choose a different career.
It's not unusual for people to start out their
careers in one direction only to end up
finding where their true interests lie. No
doubt happenstance can play a role in your
career. However, when it comes to the cost
of an education or happiness there has to
20
N
October 2014
be a better way in choosing your career.
Times have changed. The tribe of young
professionals strives to do what they are
convinced about, choose to pursue careers
that give them the 'kick'. And this is
increasing becoming a trend. In fact, looking
at the way educational institutions are
expanding their courses and curriculums to
accommodate new age courses only
reiterates the fact that it's time we open our
arms to new age careers and welcome
innovative ideas and minds.
From passion to career
The new breed have the courage to explore
unusual career streams, face the initial
hiccups head on and turn hobbies in to
■
COVER STORY
lucrative careers. This is why despite the
challenging economic scenario; people want
to work off the beaten track to pursue what
they are passionate about. Besides, business
mindsets have also undergone a
transformation. Investors are open to put
their money in to innovative ideas; venture
capitalists are helping young professionals
spread their wings.
Galore of stories of IIT and IIM
graduates leaving aside their degrees to do
something that they strongly believe in has
inspired many to follow their heart. These
young professionals opt to do interesting
things leaving behind comfortable, cushy
and high paying jobs. Few months back,
two highflying IITians quit their lucrative
jobs in the US and joined hands to start a
tea cafe chain 'Chaayos' in the NCR region.
A decade or so back, people would have
laughed it off as the most juvenile thing to
do….start a tea stall…huh! The decision to
make a living out of the tea business hit
headlines and many speculated on this
business decision. However, the IIT Bombay
graduates were confident on their decision
and were looking for VCs to fun their
business. They mentioned the USP of
Chaayos as flexibility for customers to
customize their chai the way they like it.
Nitin Saluja, one of the founders spoke to
the media and highlighted the USP of their
product as the flexibility of the customers
to be able to customize their chai in over
12,000 ways depending on the various addon choices they make.
There are many like Parul Gupta who
have dared to tread the unexplored path
and also achieved a modest success. Making
a career a florist was unthinkable in the
Voice Over
Lending your voice
Voice Over as a career requires skillsets that are either Godgifted or cultivated to an extent. It offers great variety of work
because the context and content of each Voice Over is different
and hence the approach towards each is also different. More
than anything else, it is the sheer pleasure of listening to your
own voice in different tones and textures in a wide spectrum
of work - whether it is commercials, promos, documentaries or
explainer videos. The thrill of being told
that the commercial will be voiced by
you is the biggest high. Yes, people
might not know it is you, but the person
inside you surely will get the biggest
kick.
Voice modulation is must
I doubt if a lot of youngsters are aware of
this as a career option. A few established
names rule the roost in this profession and I would be delighted
to see new talent showing up. But in the last five years, I have
not seen too many newcomers in this profession. For a career
as a voice over artist, one has to have the skill to convey all kinds
of emotions, through the voice and that has to be seamlessly in
■
sync with the visuals. In addition, one should be a great voice
modulator to bring out life in the voice over.
Ample opportunities
As a Voice Over Artist you are self-employed. Most Voice Over
artists also have a day job and they take up Voice Over as a
second career option. The opportunities depend solely on the
individual's talent, the market and the relevance of his/her voice
to a certain project. Income is again
dependent on the quality of voice and
star value of the artist like in any art form
Sailing through
The biggest challenge is to identify
whether one has the talent and drive to
be an artist. Even if you have a good
voice texture and quality, you still need
to reach out to the right studios,
producers and agencies to make a living
out of it. It is a tough and competitive market and one should
have the patience and perseverance to keep trying all the time.
Subha Chatterjee
Voice Over Artist
October 2014
N
21
COVER STORY
past. Gupta, a Floral Artist by profession
whirled into the floral world more than a
decade ago. Her natural flair for creativity,
her intense passion for flowers and
endurance for perfection set her out on the
path of an unusual career, something which
was unheard of some 10 years ago. In spite
of being a Political Science graduate from
Lady Shri Ram College, her sense of
inquisitiveness and eagerness to explore
different things, brought Parul to the world
of flowers and helped her carve out a career
out of it. She has managed to carve out her
niche in floral designing and her designs
reflect ancient traditions of craftsmanship
Floral Artistry
When flowers pave a career
Floral Artist is the one who create floral set ups that embody
our emotions perfectly through the language of flowers. Today's
floral designer is one who can balance a business, market his
or her brand, and create unique and stylish designs that sets
them apart. To be a successful Floral Artist, one needs to be
creative, service oriented, efficient in communicating both
visually and verbally and be able to react to changing local and
international trends
Becoming a floral designer allows an artist to connect with
nature, create beautiful art, and to be commercially valuable to
clients in their area. Floral designers can specialize in weddings
or events or open their own floral boutiques. The options are
endless, and the demand for talented
and unique eye for floral visions is high
in many cities across the globe.
Lots to expect
Growing at a compounded annual
growth rate of about 30%, India's
floriculture industry is likely to cross
Rs 8000 crore mark by 2015.
Government of India has identified
floriculture as 'sunrise industry' and accorded 100% export
oriented status. So there is a lot of potential in this career.
22
N
October 2014
in a contemporary vocabulary. She believes
that innovation is beyond qualification and
never requires a technical or educational
degree.
While for some, doing unusual things
and making a living out of it may have been
well accepted, for some, it's met with
objections and sarcasm. Life coach Suzy
Greaves in an article in The Observer had
said, "We are encouraged to be successful,
to go for money, status, the big car, the
title, but when we get all that, we may not
be happy. Family and friends pressurize
young people toward options that avoid the
risks of a hard grind or minimize the chances
Parul Gupta
Floral Artist,
Kalikaar Design Pvt Ltd
Passion for floral art & design
One should opt for this career for one's passion for flowers,
creativity and innovativeness. It is not a monotonous job. Every
time you work on a floral project, there is something new that you
are creating with it. So, there is a challenge to create something
different every time. Moreover, in this cut throat competition,
Floral Artists can create their own niche customers. A combined
knowledge of floriculture and some management tips, one can do
incredible things and earn a good income.
Floral Designer or Florist
The art of creating beautiful and unique
designs can be challenging, yet a rewarding
career. Working with flowers and plants is an
extremely challenging craft that requires
patience, tenacity, and a keen artistic eye.
One should be prepared for long hours, hard
work and not so attractive stipends. But once
he is trained under a Floral Artist and she/
he is able to develop new décor ideas, his
remuneration may vary from five figures to
six figures per assignment. Moreover, in India,
there are hardly schools that provide formal trainings for this art which
itself is a big challenge.
■
COVER STORY
Digital Marketing
Kapil Ohri
Planning Director (Digital),
OgilvyOne Worldwide [India] Author,
The Curious Digital Marketer book series
Being a digital marketer
Digital marketing is a wonderful career choice for those who are
hungry to 'learn' and 'innovate'. The ever-evolving nature of the
digital medium--in terms of technologies and platforms--inspires
one to constantly pace up with the dynamic digital world and
create new ways of reaching out to consumers via innovative
formats of digital advertising.
In India, digital media is growing rapidly. The increased usage
has led marketers to strongly consider digital medium for
marketing. As a result, digital media now accounts for 7 to 8 per
cent of the total ad spend compared to 1 per cent in 2003.
Wanting to go digital
'Accessibility', 'Comfort' and 'Affinity' are the three key factors
leading youngsters to choose this career. Thanks to smartphones,
tablets, laptops and economical internet access, digital medium
is now accessible to one and all, anywhere
and at all times. Because of high
accessibility, youngsters these days are
much more comfortable in using the
medium for various activities like social
networking, online shopping, movie ticket
booking, gaming etc.
Their affinity with digital medium is
remarkably high and thus prompts them to
convert their obsession into full-time career.
of landing a perceivable inappropriate job.
Unusual careers are born when some of
these talented people, trapped in artificial
casks, break out of them."
The power to decide
Greaves, who runs a coaching business called
'The Big Leap', had also pointed out that an
astonishing 80 per cent of people end up in
the wrong job because most are unable to
decide what they actually want to do and
tend to follow the herd. "We finish school,
and go through our 20s conforming to what
other people want us to do. That's often a
solid career with a professional qualification.
But most people aren't maturing until their
■
Incredibly competitive industry
In terms of career opportunities, digital media offers a vast array
of options. Professionals can either choose a niche within
digital media or can pursue it as a generalist. For instance, one
can focus on particular beat like Social Media, Mobile
Marketing, Web Analytics, Search Engine marketing (SEM) etc.
or opt for overall digital marketing roles, which cover all parts
of digital marketing. Apart from choosing streams, youngsters
can also choose the type of companies they would like to work
for within the digital media ecosystem.
Looking beyond the Internet
One key factor, youngsters should keep in mind before they opt
for this career option is that digital marketing is not about
loving the Internet space. It's also about deep understanding
of various aspects of marketing while
integrating the best of digital media
practices. There are two key challenges
of the digital marketing career according
to me. One is dearth of training institutes
imparting quality digital marketing
education. And, the other is lack of
understanding of digital marketing
amongst marketers.
early twenties, and before that we tend to
listen to other people's opinions of what
we should do with our lives, rather than
our own. 'We are encouraged to be
successful, to go for money, status, the big
car, the title, but when we get all that, we
may not be happy. Often it hits people
around 33, when they decide they have
done it all in their career and they want to
find fulfillment instead," she says.
Some take decisions early in life and so
reap the success. For one, RJ Raunac, the
radio jockey with RED FM, Delhi is a
management graduate and also worked
with a retail firm in the early part of his
career. But an opportunity to have a tryst
October 2014
N
23
COVER STORY
Animation
Vivekananda Roy Ghatak
Co-founder and Director,
Rocket Science Animation
The animator's paradise
Animation is broadly divided into three categories. Animation
for advertising is exciting, fast paced and the focus is on
innovation and creativity along with technical prowess. The
work in this category is super fast paced, with deadlines tied
to broadcast/launch dates. Hence the challenge is how to
creatively use limited resources to get maximum output in terms
of quality as well as not use up too much time. In animation
for feature films, seemingly the best animation can happen,
since the deadlines are not so tight especially for pre production.
Animation for animated series has similar timelines and skill
requirements as features, but because of higher volumes of work
and lesser budgets, the focus is on optimization of resources.
On path of expansion
The animation industry is growing at a massive rate and with
the new initiative of online content featuring more and more
videos rather than still image based ad campaigns, etc., the
scope of work has further opened
up. Employment opportunities
range from small boutique
production houses to big studios
engaged in feature and series
production. The Hotbeds of the
animation industry are Bombay- for
all kinds of animation production,
Hyderabad for mostly series work,
Pune for predominantly flash
animation studios and Bangalore for a lot of high end Outsourced
production houses.
Boundless scope to create magic
One should opt for a career in animation only if they are passionate
about creating magic through animation. Drawing skills are not
a deal breaker, they can always be learned but an interest and
affinity towards the performing arts, movies and storytelling in any
form really helps. In animation, we have to create and build our
own actors and actresses and locations from scratch compared
to live action where it is mainly a mega people-managing enterprise
for the director and the producer.
Looking beyond the drudgery
Animation seems like a fantasy. And, that's why kids want to go
in for it. Animation is a huge and complex process and each
stage needs a different specialization. There is
storyboard artist, character designer, BG artist,
animator, modeler, compositor, the list is endless.
It is important to realize that there is drudgery in
this career, be it 2D, 3D or any kind of animation
or any category of animation. But once you get
hooked to animation the funny thing is it stops
feeling like work. You sit for hours on end
tweaking one particular curve in the graph of an
animation and not even realize the hours go by.
with radio at All India Radio changed his
life. At that point of time, people would
have found it crazy to have opted for a
career which was frivolous when one had a
job in an organized sector. As the private
FM regime unfolded in the country,
opportunities opened up for RJ Raunac as
well. From AIR he moved to Red FM
Lucknow and then to Delhi. Today, he is
glad to have made the right choice when he
looks back. Probably, he is more successful
and the growth much faster than he would
have had as a marketer in the retail space.
However, the degree in management
24
N
October 2014
certainly did not go waste. His learning at
the business school has helped him
understand his consumer better. In radio,
one needs to serve the content as per the
target audience. and identify the listeners,
step into their shoes and then frame the
content accordingly. This is where his
management degree comes to play, however
the learning continues as one progresses in
his life.
This why carefully choosing your career
stream is critical as it ultimately determines
what you will be doing for a good deal of
your professional life and will also define
■
COVER STORY
the number of opportunities you will have
to branch out. Also, do not ignore the fact
that one needs to make a living too. So,
while it is an imperative to follow your
passion, it is equally important to choose
wisely and select a field that encompasses
as many of your talents as possible, allows
you greatest freedom , along with a good
dose of solid confidence in your worth and
abilities. Moreover, it is essential to look at
the things you are good at. These will give
you a very good indication of what you are
likely to enjoy doing by way of a career.
Through this phase, it is important to
maintain a positive outlook and to be ready
for change, difference and shifts in your
comfort zones. This is the real world and it
moves rapidly; it is important to keep up
with changes and to take a positive approach
by making opportunities out of challenges.
Education remains a dominant
factor
Having said that academic success is not
the sole route to success, we must all admit
that good education does and will remain
the training ground for perspectives to be
formed and ideas to unravel themselves. So
a solid educational background is a must,
as it teaches you the way to approach your
problem, appreciate the solutions and apply
the logical imperative.
Stanford University professor, John
Krumboltz, an eminent figure in the field of
Radio Jockey
RJ Raunac
RED FM, 93.5
Jump start your career as an RJ
A career in RJing career requires enthusiasm, rationality, creativity
of mind, good sense of humour, excellent communication skills
and ownership of a live appealing voice. As a Radio Jockey, one
gets to present shows and programs, and entertain the listeners
over the radio.
As a career, it is fulfilling and challenging at the same time. It
entails a lot of responsibility and one needs to be informed about
what he is presenting to his listeners. Half information will leave
a very bad taste and experience in the listener's mind.
Do you have an ear for music?
A majority of the youth today is attracted towards Radio jockeying
as a career because of the glamour quotient that comes with it.
However, I would like to clarify that it requires
great dedication to be a good RJ and deliver
a good show. Glamour comes with serious
hardwork. If one thinks that he is creative and
hardworking, he can definitely opt for this career.
It's lucrative and quite fulfilling. Also, in this
job, one gets to interact with different kinds of
people, earn special perks for holding great
show.
Ample options to choose from
Radio is one of the most booming industries in the country right
■
now and offers great career prospects. With the third phase of
radio coming in it is only expected to expand further. There is
ample opportunity in the radio industry for people who wish to
showcase their talents in this industry. There are various leading
FM channels and private radio ventures offering job opportunities.
RJs can find jobs in AIR (All India Radio) and other independent
radio stations. RJs can do voice-overs for television and radio
advertisements.
Learn the trick
Always remember, the performance of the RJ is responsible for
bringing in listeners to the radio station. So having a passion
for music and the listeners is vital. Also, it is critical that you
have a good command over the
language that you choose to
communicate in. As for challenges, if
you don't get the basics right, it will
create problems. If you are on the right
track, things will remain sorted. Unlike
television and movies, what is spoken
in Radio is live and is instantly
transmitted to the listeners. It is
important that your opinions and
statements are neutral and not biased, as it may offend any
listener. Be sensitive to your listeners.
October 2014
N
25
COVER STORY
counseling psychology, feels a common
mistake is to assume that career decisions
happen "naturally." He feels that most young
people never make a career decision but
simply follow a path of least resistance. He
feels that a career decision that affects
everything in our future - not just how we
spend eight hours, 50 weeks a year. How much
time do young people spend planning it and
considering options? Unfortunately, many give
more thought to choosing a new pair of shoes
than on choosing their career.
For Rita Mehra, an intelligent, smart 20
something, in spite of being an IIM
Ahmedabad graduate, Rita was not keen on
a 9-5 job and wanted to venture into
something that would give her creative
Law
satisfaction. While her friends were taking
up lucrative job with world's top financial
firms, she was out to make a career out of
what Indians loved the most 'weddings'. She
became a Wedding Planner. Her knack for
efficient management of parties and events,
networking, budgeting, quick thinking while
sorting problems, time management,
negotiating, organizing and systematic
planning at college gave way to a full-fledged
career. Today Rita Mehra is a noted wedding
planner, and is her own boss.
New age careers are finding success and
acceptance along with name, fame and wealth
and hence, more and more people are
breaking barriers and daring to do what they
want rather than following age old careers.
Tarvinder Singh
Senior Partner, Kochhar & Co
Law an honorable career
Over the last 15 years or so, the profession of law has gone
through an immense transition. The practice of law is not just
restricted to the traditional areas of litigation. Young lawyers can
now choose from a wide spectrum of legal fields such as
Corporate Law, Litigation, Taxation, Real Estate, Labour Law,
Cyber Law, Intellectual Property Law etc. with each vertical
having its own areas of specialization. Even from an academic
perspective, aspiring students now have the option to either go
for a three-year LL.B program after graduation in any discipline,
or for a five-year integrated BA LL.B program after passing Class
12, which was not available earlier.
Is this the right career
for me?
Opening up of the Indian economy has
presented new and exciting
opportunities in the field of law. The
profession needs young and energetic
lawyers to cater to the challenging
assignments from foreign companies
investing in India which range from corporate law to litigations.
Also, the prospect of good salaries from large law firms has
made law a good and rewarding career option.
26
N
October 2014
Climbing the ladder
Law has become one of the most prestigious career streams now
due to the change in business environment and foreign investments
coming in. I would say that law offers immense growth prospects
and employment opportunities. Upon completion of LL.B, one
could appear for judicial services or JAG Department, join a law
firm/corporate house or even start his/her own independent
practice.
Also, a lawyer never retires, one can practice law till he or she
is fit to do it. Also, good and capable lawyers are in demand by
prestigious companies and law firms. This
profession is almost immune to financial meltdowns and depressions.
The lowdown
The challenges would depend on the practice
area one chooses. A young litigating lawyer for
example may have to struggle for years before
he/she can establish a financially sound
practice. Most corporate lawyers enjoy good
remuneration from day one but have to adhere to the challenges
of long and erratic working hours and constant work pressure
from clients.
■
COVER STORY
Tarot Card Reading
Dr. Madhu Kotiya
Senior Tarot Mentor and Life Coach
Mshezaim Institute of Tarot and Divination
Reading the future
As people continue to get impatient to learn about their future,
career of palm-readers, numerologists, astrologers and tarot card
readers will continue to flourish. Tarot reading as a career is a
24x7 job. People from all walks of life flock a tarot reader's
studio seeking readings for stress management, meditation,
healing and solutions to their problems. Today, Tarot card readers
are needed everywhere, from television and radio to events, cultural
programs, social gatherings, kitty parties, and so on. Besides, the
corporate sector, event management companies, sports, appoint
tarot card readers before a new launch, event or game.
Inclination towards
mysticism
If you are looking at Tarot card
reading as a career, it is vital
that you have strong
communication skills. Having
a sixth sense is considered to
be an advantage; however, this
skill is completely dependent
on the power of intuition. It is
basically the inner calling, which decides your ability to excel.
By opting for this career, you can help many people who are in
trouble.
Also, the mysticism of his field is drawing their attention.
As we go ahead
As prospects increase, new mindsets evolve,
people with innovative bent of minds will
continue to blaze unusual career paths. The
evolving economy and new paradigms are
sanctioning professionals to introspect and
discover what they actually want to do, and
if they have it in them to pursue careers
that satisfy their passions. As some beckon
the courage to dare the world, we get to
watch newer dimensions in a professional's
life. While there will be pitfalls along the
way, but then it's like the saying that goes:
the greater boxer is not the one who throws
more punches but is the one who is able to
take punches and get up each time he is
■
No dearth of opportunities
Tarot card reading offers good scope for those who are inclined
towards helping others through their elusive art. This is complete
employment; it offers great flexibility to schedule work timings
according to one's convenience and one can even work from
home. Tarot definitely has a lot of potential. Apart from money,
it also helps in spiritual awakening. You have the option to work
for a telephone-based or Internet-based company who will route
their clients to you. Or, you can go freelance. A website and
business cards are essential to start with. You can also place
ads in local newspapers/ print pamphlets for oneto-one interactions or Internet advertising for
phone/online interactions.
Not an easy task at all!
While making a career out of tarot reading is not
an easy task. As a Tarot reader, do not allow your
clients to take advantage of you. When people
start talking, they often can't stop. Set a timer
when the client sits down. And do usher the
client out if they are rude or disrespectful. Resist
the urge to be available at your client's beck and call as that
is the surest path towards burn out. Also, if you have your
market in mind and some healthy boundaries in place, you'll be
setting yourself up for a sane and profitable business model.
knocked down. Life is ultimately about
knowing your strengths, something that we
often spend a lifetime to discover.
I have often wondered, do people stumble
upon sudden interests that compel them to
give up their careers or do they make
conscious decisions. We will scan though the
career choices of few professionals who have
taken the decision to pursue a different kind
of career, who had the courage to look at
unconventional career paths and stick on to
it, in spite of challenges. It will reflect how
every individual goes through a trial phase
where he introspects and decides what is
best for him, and then makes a conscious
HC
decision to take it forward.
October 2014
N
27
HR ROUNDTABLE
Best of
Both worlds
Taking a cue from what Indra Nooyi recently said in an interview,
"Women can't have it all', this HR Roundtable explores the challenges
women employees face when it comes to achieving the perfect balance
between career and personal responsibilities.
...Continued from last issue
O
ur expert panelists Anita Sinai Guha, Regional Delivery Manager - Americas,
ANZ, ASEAN, Korea, & Japan, IBM Learning, Padma Rajeshwari Nandi, Senior
Director, Head - Learning & Talent Development, Dr. Reddy's Laboratories,
Aparna Sharma, Country Head- HR, Lafarge, and Manika Awasthi Menon,
Director- People Success, Sapient India, and Dr. Sujaya Banerjee, Chief Learning Officer,
Essar Group discuss integral aspects of maintaining work-life balance, ponder on how
to strike an equilibrium and making the right work-life choices.
Do you think workplace biases compel
women employees to approach work more
aggressively
vis-à-vis
their
male
counterpart?
ANITA SINAI GUHA: I don't agree that
women approach work more aggressively.
But I would contend that on average, women
probably need to work harder than men to
get to the same level in the workplace. A big
part of it is that a woman is working both at
the office and at home so, assuming she has
the same expertise as her male colleague,
she may require more time to complete a
task because of her other responsibilities.
PADMA RAJESHWARI NANDI: "A women
has to work twice as hard as a man in order
to achieve the same thing." I would relate
this aspect to 'aggressiveness' mentioned in
the question rather than getting into the literal
meaning of the word 'aggressively'. Given
this context, I agree that workplace biases
compel women employees - at least those
who are ambitious - to approach work more
28
N
October 2014
aggressively. Some managers hesitate to hire
women employees as they feel that women
would be burdened with other priorities and
will not be able to take up challenging work
or fully commit themselves to work. These
managers may have formed such bias either
through their prior experience or listening to
other's experiences. Some women will no
doubt fit into this frame. However, managers
tend to put all women into the same
stereotype. This in turn forces women,
especially those who want to build successful
career, to adopt a more aggressive approach,
making more personal sacrifices in order to
achieve the same level of success. Though
the scenario is gradually changing, the
workplace biases continue to linger and
continue to impose a negative start for
women employees.
APARNA SHARMA: I have always believed
that work environment must be gender
neutral wherein a woman doesn't have to
prove her worth by adopting the so-called
■
HR ROUNDTABLE
masculine traits of being aggressive. Women
are intuitive by nature and must use their
emotional intelligence to grow in their roles.
This will also help them in multi-tasking and
preempting concerns or roadblocks if any,
with best of their abilities.
MANIKA AWASTHI MENON: Yes there are
classic work places biases that exist which
compel women to become more aggressive
not only about their work but also about the
way they approach their work- adopting
behaviours that they see are successful. For
example, in an organization if assertiveness
stereotypes and biases make some women
act like feminists. I believe our Gender
Diversity challenges are both individual and
to do with our gender. We must rally around
other female talent and provide support both
officially and personally. However, I have a
serious concern regarding this movement
turning into one that reflects cynical feminism
or male bashing. The aggressive, anti-male
stance is detrimental to the movement of
women getting counted professionally and
making a mark as leaders, driving excellence
in their respective fields.
and aggression is a valued trait, then women
shed their natural behaviours to adopt these
to succeed and compete with their male
counterparts. My view is that women should
be aware of these biases, should let them
surface openly and address them instead of
shying away from the real issue and focus
on coping mechanisms to survive in an
environment that is biased.
DR. SUJAYA BANERJEE: I do believe the
"The most important factor in determining
whether you will succeed isn't your gender,
it's you," argues Angela Braly, CEO of
WellPoint. "Be open to opportunity and
take risks. In fact, take the worst, the
messiest, the most challenging assignment
you can find, and then take control." Do
you think it is easier said than done? Please
justify your answer.
ANITA SINAI GUHA: It is definitely easier
■
October 2014
N
29
HR ROUNDTABLE
said than done but there is a very important
truth at the kernel of Angela Braly's
statement. While there are elements in the
environment that create obstacles in the
path to a woman's success, there are also
elements within us that can hinder our own
progress. We need to take responsibility for
those elements and make conscious efforts
to overcome them. The quote, "it's not the
glass ceiling but the sticky floor," comes to
mind in this regard. In addition to fighting
the prejudice that may be "out there," we
need to recognize how we may unwittingly
sabotage our own careers - like when we
don't speak up because we don't believe
our voice is worth listening to, or when we
don't take our place at the decision making
table because we're not confident that we
belong, or we hesitate to volunteer for a
PANELISTS
ANITA SINAI GUHA, Regional Delivery Manager - Americas, ANZ, ASEAN,
Korea, & Japan, Global Segment Leader for First & Upline Managers, IBM
Learning, is a graduate from Harvard University. She has 20 years of
experience in training, organizational development, learning and knowledge
management fields. Her global experience spans a range of industries
including the public sector, pharmaceutical, shipping, beverages and IT.
PADMA RAJESHWARI NANDI, Senior Director & Head - L&D,
Dr Reddy's Laboratories Ltd. Over the past 20 years (15 years out of which
have been dedicated to talent development), Padma has enabled
organizations and individuals build capability across frontline, managerial
and leadership levels. Prior to joining Dr. Reddy's, she has worked with
Infosys and Larsen & Toubro, among other large organizations.
APARNA SHARMA, Country Head-Human Resources at Lafarge India, is
at the helm of Human Resources function for Lafarge, a French multinational.
She persistently and passionately values freedom, authentic relationships
and realization of potential of people. With 18 years of experience, she has
worked in different roles in the HR function in organizations like Monsanto,
Novartis, UCB & Deutsche Bank.
MANIKA AWASTHI MENON, Director- People Strategy, Sapient, India.
She has close to 14 years of experience across several domains in Human
Resources in a global context spanning Business Unit Level HR partnership,
Setting up and running HR Shared Service Centers’ (for employee life
cycle processes, policies and compliance), HR functional expertise and
Corporate level HR.
DR. SUJAYA BANERJEE, Chief Talent Officer at Essar, has been a Human
Resources professional for over 24 years and has transformed the HR
functions in several leading organizations during her career. She is a
passionate HR professional having set up world class Performance and
Talent Management programs through her assignments at ADNOC.
30
N
October 2014
new assignment because we are not sure we
can cope with the challenge. We need to
take more risks and we need to trust our
own ability to transform challenges into
opportunities.
PADMA RAJESHWARI NANDI: I would
disagree with this point. Gender does make
a difference, at least up to a certain extent.
Several women are ambitious, are open to
take risks, pick up challenging assignments
and prove themselves. However, not
everyone is lucky enough to get a senior
employee who is willing to provide them the
opportunity and challenging assignments. Not
having a mentor (who is willing to invest
time and effort in them, willing to take risk
with them) is probably one of the most
significant disadvantage that women
employees face. Several women who have
reached senior levels have either been lucky
to have got good sponsors or have been able
to cultivate good mentors.
APARNA SHARMA: Success is 90 percent in
your thoughts and 10 percent in your actions.
The results that you desire in your life will
always depend on the way you think. The
quality of your life comes down to the quality
of your thoughts and not from physical
power or physical actions. Even the highest
caliber athletes usually have the same skill
sets as each other. What separates the best
from the rest is the quality of their thoughts.
We are all created equal. What makes us
different is how we use our minds and our
hearts. The achievers of the world will always
have a mental edge over their competitors.
They always have, and they always will. The
reason for the successful to succeed is
because of their unstoppable will to win.
Truly, it is all about mind over matter.
MANIKA AWASTHI MENON: I agree and
don't believe it is easier said than done.
Regardless of gender, it is important for
people to have an aspiration- a purpose and
take actions that will help realize the purpose.
It is at the end of the day about "You" - who
you are and what " You" want to achieve for
yourself. If a woman aspires to be a CEO of
a company then she needs to have the
aspiration, build the capability and have the
support within and outside of work that will
help her get there. I think the same would
apply for a man.
DR. SUJAYA BANERJEE: No it isn't, its
completely right. I agree with Angela Brady
- I have personally taken on the toughest
transformation assignments and delivered
them successfully to leave a mark on the
organization, its culture, brand, etc. I believe
■
HR ROUNDTABLE
my success stories have created a space for
other women within the organization to
believe in themselves and my success has
made me a role model who encourages
women professionals to find their north and
believe in their abilities to succeed.
The skills that make a good business leaderorganization, drive, trust, delegation and
compassion-also go a long way to balance
the responsibilities of work and family
life." How can women transfer skills from
home to office and vice versa and work it
to their advantage?
ANITA SINAI GUHA: Theoretically, it makes
a lot of sense to consider the skills women
develop at home and transfer them into the
workplace. But practically, it doesn't work
that way. We can be super assertive with our
kids, bark out orders to our servants, even
act fairly authoritatively with our husbands
(!) when it comes to the home turf; and yet,
we struggle with applying the same behavior
to influence our teams and peers in the
workplace.
Perhaps, it has something to do with our
(women's) need to be liked! From our
childhood, we are socialized to provide
service, to help others, and to make them
happy, and somehow, we find it hard to
relinquish this mentality at the workplace.
In her book, Lean In, Sheryl Sandberg shares
a study that shows how success and likeability
are strongly correlated for men but inversely
proportional for women. Women have the
competence and capability to be great leaders
but as they become more successful, they
are less liked. This inverse proportion adds
some ambivalence to the Pursuit of Success
- an ambivalence that men do not share.
Women may hesitate to be assertive even
when it's warranted, because we think we
will not be liked for our behavior.
PADMA RAJESHWARI NANDI: I have seen
few women successfully transfer skills from
their home to office. For example, my exboss spent first few years of her married life
in a joint family, which included her motherin-law and great mother-in-law (husband's
grandmother). During these years, she learnt
the art of influencing family decisions without
having any authority. And I have seen deftly
use this skill at workplace. Similarly, I saw
another lady pick up concepts of operations
management in the way she designed her
kitchen. Time management and organizing
skills is another aspect, which learnt in one
sphere can be well applied in another.
APARNA SHARMA: Listening is a big deal.
■
You learn to listen better at home. At office,
you're ready to cut people off and get onto
your next task, where you don't obviously
do that at home - you're always listening to
your children or to your husband.
A system of rewards characterizes a
manager's efforts to encourage her team to
reach goals and do the best job possible.
The same idea applies to parents who are
attempting to inspire their children in
learning new concepts. While the specific
rewards and consequences may differ, the
general idea behind the execution of it is the
same in either situation.
As a good manager, one of your roles is
Work/Life Balance:
why women really leave
If high-potential women are leaving their careers to care for their
families, they’re not doing it on purpose. That’s the conclusion Hunter
College professor Pamela Stone drew from a study of 54 female high
achievers, recruited mostly from alumnae of four selective colleges
and universities. The women
pursued their careers an
average of 11 years; 60%
worked well past the birth of
their second child. None was
pushed out. Fully 90% left
not to care for their families
but because of workplace
problems, chiefly frustration and long hours. Two-thirds of those who
left tried part-time work but found it problematic; since they’d been
putting in long weeks, part-time tended to mean 40 hours of work for
20 hours’ worth of pay. Factoring even more into decisions to opt out
entirely, though, was the inability to work part-time without being
marginalized. (HBR)
to help members of your team grow
professionally. At times, that will mean that
the person will develop in a way that leads
them to leave your group for a promotion.
Parents do the same thing with their children
- they talk with them about what their
interests are, give them opportunities to learn
different skills and determine which ones
they want to pursue further, and, ultimately,
support them in reaching their goals so they
can have the lives they want as independent
adults.
MANIKA AWASTHI MENON: There are skills
that a woman uses at home in a variety of
different roles that she plays which can easily
be transferable to a work place. Multi-tasking
October 2014
N
31
HR ROUNDTABLE
and juggling different roles (mother, wife,
daughter, daughter in-law, sister), to team
work (sharing responsibilities with a spouse/
significant family member to bring up a
family) to negotiations and team management
while managing her staff which is a common
factor in today's Indian family. Women are
known for their compassion and sensitivity
and I believe all of these skills help women be
more successful and have an edge over others.
All of these experiences at home or at work
help hone their skills which make them better
professionals.
DR. SUJAYA BANERJEE: Women have the
unique ability to bring communal behaviours
to the workplace. Women leaders, especially
those handling homes, children, families bring
A LinkedIn survey entitled "What Women Want @ Work" revealed that
women are more motivated by finding the right balance between
personal and work life than they are by a high salary. Sixty-five per
cent indicated that a flexible working arrangement would better allow
them to manage
career and family. A 2013 Pew Research Centre
poll on modern
parenthood found
that half of mothers
would prefer to work
part-time and 11 per
cent would prefer not
to work. The higher the
socio-economic status,
the more likely the
woman did not want to work
full-time: one-quarter (25
per cent) of women with
annual family incomes of
$50,000 or higher selected
full-time work as their ideal,
compared to 75 per cent of
fathers.
humility, wisdom, team spirit, credit sharing
and high integrity and work ethics to the
workplace. Besides presenting an alternate
perspective Women are often the voice of
balance, compassion and high EQ, no matter
which level they operate at. I know of male
leaders who prefer female co-workers as they
have a reputation for being highly committed
and excellence driven.
Women are inherently better multi-tasker
than men. Do you think taking
responsibility for the dynamic around them
can to a great extent help in tackling the
issue of life-work balance?
ANITA SINAI GUHA: I don't like to generalize
about any so-called inherent skills of each
gender. I believe men and women both have
a mix of different skills and there are probably
as many excellent male multi-taskers as there
are not so great female multi-taskers.
Personally, I'm in the latter category. I use
lists to keep track of my multiple tasks but I
need to tackle them one at a time. So multi-
32
N
October 2014
tasking is a good skill to develop for both
men and women. I've worked from home
for almost 14 years but I still need to close
myself into a room and demand quiet from
the kids when I'm on one of my conference
calls. I've learned to delegate things I cannot
do well (like cooking and homework support
for the kids and making nice looking ppt
presentations) and I try to do the best I can
with the rest - one task at a time!
PADMA RAJESHWARI NANDI: It is
commonly believed that women are good at
multi-tasking. Pictures of working women
juggling between multiple tasks are widely
displayed. Certain studies have also indicated
that women have an advantage over men in
multi-tasking, at least in certain situations.
However, it's important to understand that
multi-tasking is not necessarily good. It
results in more mistakes and lesser efficiency.
So, multi-tasking may not really be an answer
to better work-life balance.
APARNA SHARMA: Over the years, I believe
that there is too much of emphasis to prove
that women are better than men in so many
things. I feel that questions like these make
me feel part of a regressive society which
just wants to pit men against women and
vice versa. I feel, it's collaboration between
men and woman together that makes the
work environment not only friendly but also
brings out the best in both the genders.
By being sensitive to each other's needs
and supporting each other will help
individuals to have better work life balance.
Both men and women have inherent abilities
that they can use to deliver the best and
create a cohesive work place for one and all.
An ecosystem where all can coexist!!!!
MANIKA AWASTHI MENON: It has been
widely accepted that women are better at
multi-tasking than men. If you look at the
key capability that would drive work life
balance, it is the ability to juggle items with
different priorities while ensuring the
required outcomes is created. By taking
responsibility women would put themselves
in charge and therefore set the frame for the
narrative. By doing so they would get a
chance to set the balance leveraging the
multi-tasking capability. This would ensure
that the team as a whole gets to benefit from
the balanced approach instead of running
hard and maximizing only on one dimension.
DR. SUJAYA BANERJEE: Yes, women must
use their ability to multi-task, listen and
influence emotion to manage the conflicts
and biases arising out of their gender and
their need to manage multiple priorities. HC
■
GEN-Y SPEAK
Career progression:
Decoding Gen-Y's aspirations
BY ANKUR PODDAR
I
t is well known that Gen-Y
associates are demanding in
nature and unrelenting in
attitude when it comes to career
progression. They value
commitments over assurances. This
is one segment which not only
craves for continuous learning but
also expects fast track career
progression.
Some of the common dilemmas
organizations face while crafting
career graphs for millennial are:
G
Promoting meritocracy while
maintaining batch parity among
Gen-Yers
G
Crafting customized roles in
addition to traditional roles for
enhancing exposure and learning
G
Looking at avenues and
opportunities for providing early
empowerment to this brigade which
is more than keen to take up
additional responsibilities early in
their career.
G
Continuously reinventing and
revisiting their career management
framework to meet the ever
increasing expectations of the
millennials.
The Gen-Y employees are very
well networked and connected and
tend to keep a close tab on each
other's career movements. The
biggest challenge is to handle
external parity and comparison
when it comes to awarding
promotions and advanced roles.
Ravish who came from a modest
background had worked hard to
make his way into one of the top
most NITs. From his school days, he
always inspired to make a career in
■
electrical engineering.
During campus placements, he
gets an opportunity to join a well
known manufacturing company as a
Graduate Engineer Trainee. Within
one year of joining, he is promoted
as Assistant Manager. It's almost
three years and he is happy and
satisfied. During his recent
appraisal, his supervisor shared with
him that considering his
performance and potential, he can
look forward to the next level which
was a Manager grade in about 12 to
18 months' time.
Today, he comes to know from a
Linkedin update notification that
one of his engineering batch mate
and close friend, Vijay who also got
placed along with him from campus
in another manufacturing MNC
company has been awarded a
promotion and made a Manager.
Ravish starts reflecting on the
day when his company had visited
their campus for the pre-placement
talk and the career progression
chart that they had shared with the
students. Though he has been one
of the top performers, he knows
that promotion in his current
company would take at-least
another year.
However, the thought that his
immediate peer has already moved
one level up made him restless.
Conflicting thoughts started
crossing his mind. Some of them
are:
G
Did he make a mistake by joining
this company?
G
At the current pace, will he fall
behind his peer group in terms of
career growth over a period of
time?
G
Should he look for newer
opportunities which can offer him a
managerial role immediately?
G
Should he speak to his
supervisor and share his concern?
G
Should he speak to HR?
More than compensation and
work responsibilities, it was the
designation which was worrying
him. He was also concerned about
what other people would think
when they know that in spite of
passing out from college together,
Vijay progressed in his career much
ahead of Ravish. He was simply
unable to understand that in spite of
both companies operating in the
same industry and domain, and also
without any significant difference in
hierarchies and roles, where is it
that Ravish had gone wrong?
This classic example reflects the
batch parity challenge which lot of
companies are currently grappling
with. This scope of this subject is
not limited to maintaining internal
parity but also calls for an extensive
and continuous benchmarking of
career management framework
with external companies to keep the
Gen-Y brigade engaged and
associated.
If you want to be in the race,
your career management
framework has to continuously
HC
evolve with time.
Ankur Poddar is Division HR Manager (N) at
Marico Ltd
October 2014
N
33
LEARNING & DEVELOPMENT
The nuances of the
adult learning theory
BY V RAVI
34
N
October 2014
T
wenty five years ago, on a hot
summer afternoon, I was motivated
into taking a training session on Work
Study, at SAIL's Bhilai Steel Plant, for
a group of over 40 recently designated
executives promoted from the nonexecutive ranks across the Plant.
This session covered one of the
several topics of a detailed, monthlong training module. Being a
qualified, professional Industrial
Engineer, my boss delegated the task
to me assuming that my good
communication skills would suffice.
The average age of the class was
above 40 years with experience
varying from 20 to 30 years and
qualification from Matriculation,
Diploma in Engineering to
Graduation in Science, Arts or
Commerce. I elaborately prepared
on the topic and made several OHP
transparency slides with coloured
marker pens. With prayers on my
lips, I entered a noisy classroom
which quickly turned pin drop silent,
witnessing a 28 year old walking in
with the Training Manager cum
Course Coordinator, an elderly
gentleman. I was soon introduced to
a group of 'unique' adults, who were
all set for the training to begin.
As I started off, I felt confident.
However, as I moved to the second
slide, I heard murmurs which turned
to giggles and guffaws. While placing
the third slide on the projector, I
observed five leaving the class! Half
way through, I noticed the Training
Manager pass by the classroom.
Somehow, I managed to control the
commotion among the participants
by speaking out loud. In the end,
amidst the din of a relieved clap of
hands, I rushed out of the room only
to see him beckoning me to follow
him.
He offered me a glass of water as
I reached his room, which I gulped
down my parched throat. In the
tirade that followed, I went through
one of the most admonishing but
learning experiences of my career,
which helped me to eventually
become a better trainer. I inferred
few valuable tips, which I realized
■
later were actually the principles of
adult learning. I have tried to
recollect and recount what he
specifically told me based on the
feedback he probably received from
some of the participants of my
session.
The six principles
The following points will help not
only trainers but also managers to
deliver presentations or even chair
meetings. The six principles of Adult
learning that Malcolm Knowles, an
American practitioner and theorist
of adult learning, postulated lays
before us a perspective that every
trainer or manager involved in
training should imbibe in their
training sessions.
I have tried to relate each of my
errors and lessons learnt during
training sessions to the six principles
to correlate to the adult learning
theory.
1. "Learning is not one-way traffic;
you can't expect others to enjoy a
topic what you yourself may or may
not like!"
Once I was training a new bunch
of employees. They were enthusiastic
and most of them looked excited to
learn something new. However, I
failed to recognise this spark and
neither did I try to capitalize on it.
These fresh minds like any other
adults wanted to learn. I should have
facilitated the session to find out
their perceptions on the topic before
or after listing out the definitions.
But, I neither attempted to develop
rapport nor lead the participants
towards the topic.
The sheer joy of learning comes
when participants get completely
involved in the session. It is ultimately
the trainer's ability to involve them
through different methods to keep
them engaged and glued. Also,
keeping pace with the changing
expectations of the participants is an
imperative for an effective facilitator.
Over the years, I learnt to structure
my session by first asking them what
their expectations are and make
them responsible for their own
learning and sharing. This tends to
motivate those adult employees who
may be getting bored or easily
■
distracted.
Note:
Adults are internally
motivated and self-directed.
2. "You are telling them what you
know or want to tell; did you ask
them what they know?"
I plunged directly into the topic
without any background or context.
Considering the experience of the
participants, had I brought out
several examples from them in the
area of Method Study and Work
Measurement and what Industrial
Engineers do on their shop floors, it
would have been easier to judge the
group.
theories and examples, which were
not related to their work area.
Instead I should have rather
provided real case studies as a basis
from where they could learn about
the theory. I did not ask a single
question during the session that
could motivate reflection in them.
It is not what one knows but what
one does with that knowledge that
counts. It is important that people
be given experiences of successes
on the application of learning onthe-job. I realized as an adult myself,
when I am goal oriented and know
what I want to accomplish, I need
Adult learners have a tendency to resist learning when
they feel that someone is imposing information, ideas or
actions on them. Therefore, it is very important for an
effective facilitator to understand how his adult learners
can learn best.
I could have asked their views on
their work, family, previous education
and link that to the topic to give the
session an interesting and engaging
start. People tend to be apprehensive
towards any information unless they
are able to identify and relate to it
and the individual disseminating that
information. With time, I make it a
point to have tenured or well
informed employees to guide and
mentor younger employees during
the sessions and tasks.
Note: Adults bring life experiences
and knowledge to learning
experiences.
3. "They have to pass a test at the
end of the program take up a small
assignment on the topic you have
taken!"
The participants were not
expected to apply the principles of
Work study directly in their jobs.
However, they need to relate to why,
when, where and how it is applied in
the organization and how as
employees they can directly or
indirectly contribute to it.
In fact, I realized that I was more
inclined towards dwelling over
an environment that is organized
and has clear learning outcomes. I
as a facilitator, therefore I must show
how training will help them reach
their goals just the same way as
engaging adult employees can lead
to achieving productivity goals!
Note: Adults are goal oriented.
4. "You explained what you wrote
on the slides they could not
understand much!"
Most of participants had studied
in vernacular schools or colleges.
Barring those working in the staff
departments, those from the Plant
area lacked the ability to read and
understand English, which was the
medium of instruction and hence
were unable to connect to the topic
Work Study. I was oblivious of all
this as I took the session.
I could have asked the
participants to reflect on their
experiences even during the session
on how they might apply or meet
their learning goals through an
assignment.
For the adult learner, learning
must be applicable to their work or
other relevant responsibilities.
October 2014
N
35
Takeaways
G
G
G
G
G
G
V Ravi
Vice President & HEAD - L&D (RPMG)
Reliance Industries Ltd
In a career spanning 29 years, V Ravi
currently heads the learning and
development function for Reliance
Project Management Group. Prior to
Reliance, he was Head of L&D at L&T
Hydrocarbon and Voltas. His interests
include TQM, value engineering,
individual and organizational
learning. He is an engineer with postgraduate qualifications in industrial
engineering, management and
training & development.
36
N
October 2014
Adults are internally motivated and self-directed.
Adults bring life experiences and knowledge to learning experiences.
Adults are goal oriented.
Adults are practical.
Adults are relevancy oriented
Adult learners like to be respected.
Concepts and theories should relate
directly to their interests and be
useful to them in their work. I, as a
facilitator need to take the time to
explain what they are doing-and why,
their role in creating that product or
service, explaining how the training
will be useful to them on the job, or
how, what is being learned can be
implemented by deploying one or
more of several appropriate training
methods.
Note: Adults are relevancy oriented.
5. "You are taking a theoretical
subject in an afternoon session; you
are handling a group which has
returned to the classroom after
decades. Could you have not thought
of a better way of engaging them…?”
The course coordinator was not
prepared to listen to my appeals of
defence or ignorance. When I said
that time was a big constraint, he
said that he was willing to give me
another session if needed. Soon I
realized that I should have given
some opportunity to practice.
For adults, an opportunity in
trying out things, assessments and
intervention
processes
with
repetition help certainly to promote
development of skill, confidence and
competence. To develop people into
effective managers and leaders, just
'teaching' isn't going to be enough!
The learners as well as the trainer
are equally accountable for
accomplish the learning objectives,
take initiative to solve problems and
nurture ideas. Trainers have to
assert against demands for crash
training courses if that is going to
jeopardize the learning objectives.
Note: Adults are practical.
6. "They may be sitting in a
classroom; but they are not school
children!"
As school students, we were
talked at, and rarely encouraged or
involved in the learning process. The
more experience we gathered, the
less that experience was used. I
considered the topic as something I
had to share with them as part of
their syllabus and a session, which
the newly promoted executives had
to attend whether they liked it or
not, just as I was compelled as a
school boy. What dawned to me was
that I should have taken interest and
acknowledged the wealth of
experiences of my colleagues and
peers.
Adult learners attend work and
training with certain expectations. If
this lot is explained, both logically
and practically, that the course will
benefits them in the long run, they
will be motivated to learn and
implement that learning at work,
thereby
improving
their
performance. It is important that as
a trainer, one should encourage
expression of ideas, teach them to
reason and invite feedback at every
opportunity.
Note: Adult learners like to be
respected.
Being an effective trainer, facilitator,
manager or even a leader, involves
understanding how adults learn and
perform best. It is apparent that the
same principles of equality,
collaboration, problem solving, etc.,
that work well for an effective
manager will also enhance the
process of learning for a trainer or
a facilitator. These six adult learning
principles, which I indirectly learnt
from my own experiences and
practices, could prove to be a useful
tool for any manager to understand
and apply the adult learning theory
HC
better.
■
DEBATE
4-Day Workweek:
Is India Inc. ready?
Do you think the 4-day workweek concept will work in India Inc.
or do we have a long way to go?
Has the potential to work
Less hours will impact productivity
With the rising working women population, specifically in
an industry such as wellness where the ratio of women to
men employee is 80:20, a 4-day work-week concept will
give them the liberty to balance their professional
and personal lives. A 4-day work week
concept has long been a subject of
discussion in the West and may work in
India for certain sectors to help strike a
healthy balance of employeeorganization relationship. This could
potentially result in higher productivity
and positive morale as the employees
will be less stressed and more upbeat
about their work. Organizations too will
face reduced overhead costs with increased
productivity and higher retention. In addition,
it will add to employees being happier as it will
allow them to spend more time with their family, friends
and gives them the opportunity to pursue their hobbies
and interests outside work.
However, certain thing that needs to be considered is
that on an average after 8 hours of work, productivity
goes down. Hence, employees' output quality may get
affected if they are putting in extra hours on 4 working
days to compensate for 3 days off. Implementation of
the concept may face problem in sectors such as, retail
where consumer demand is never ending especially in
terms of service industry where physical presence of the
employee is essential. Also, in India, where the cost of
labour is cheap, the advantage of the concept might
dissipate if the number of hours are reduced, resulting in
demand for higher wages.
In this evolving era, we often tend to get swayed away
with the paradigm practices of different geographies,
however, application of any concept would vary from
place to place depending on the maturity of its
economy. And, this concept tends to work
well in developed economies.
There is a need to critically evaluate India's
current positioning with respect to few
vital areas. How far have we been
successful in embracing technology?
Undoubtedly, a great potential exists in
many corners across sector, especially in
the manufacturing sector. Needless to
say our industry operations are still labour
intensive (also due to lack of technology &
innovation). Other critical factors include lack of processes and system orientation; high
level of uncertainty & ambiguity; Manufacturing setups
with poor infrastructure; need for suitable labour law
reforms, etc. Therefore, we must seriously ponder on all
the above matters, as we attempt to move forward to
imbibe progressive practices for good reasons.
The shorter working week would also mean working for
longer hours each day, which also has its own repercussion
like increased fatigue, pressurized thinking process, etc.
In addition, it is challenging to reduce the work hours as
productivity remains a big concern in the Indian context.
It is agreeable that India needs a comparatively
shorter workweek; however it has to happen gradually,
in a phased manner. Perhaps, at each stage, the impact
can be analysed for further progressive action. Ultimately,
it definitely calls for a 'change in mindset'.
RUHIE PANDE
VP & Head - HHR & Training
■ Kaya Ltd
Ruhie Pande is the Head of Human Resources
at Kaya Ltd. With over 15 years of experience,
as a Human Resource professional Ruhie has
worked in leading retail brands like ITC
Lifestyle Retail and Reliance Brands before
joining Kaya Ltd.
■
PRAVEEN PUROHIT
Group HR - Sesa Sterlite
■ Vedanta Group
With over a decade with the Vedanta Group,
Praveen Purohit has significantly contributed to
all the core HR verticals such as Leadership &
Talent Development and performance
management, employee engagement and
continuous improvement initiatives, etc.
October 2014
N
37
HR & BUSINESS
A
s businesses, governments,
and individuals become
increasingly dependent on
technology, they also tend
to become exposed to
cyber threats. Cyber fraud/crime is
a range of illegal digital activities
targeted at organizations' in order to
cause damage. The impact of such
damage can be financial, operational,
reputational, or all of them together,
depending on the nature of attack.
It goes without saying that such
attacks are not only targeted at large
corporations and government
institutions, but also against the
common man, as long as the attacker
has something to gain from it.
To gauge the awareness and
perception of cybercrime in India,
KPMG conducted an online
Cybercrime Survey 2014 with over
170 respondents across the country
including CIOs, CISOs and other
senior officials from corporates in
India. Our findings indicate.
Cybercrime trends in India and
their impact on organizations
Cybercrime in India has
dramatically evolved in nature and
scope in the last few years. Organised
crime syndicates are now using tools
of online deception - malware and
spam emails to hack into corporate
sites, etc., to siphon off funds.
While organizations think that
cybercrime is something that
happens to other companies outside
India, our survey indicates that 49
per cent of respondents experienced
cybercrime in the last year alone.
Our survey further reveals that 48
per cent of respondents suffered
disruption in business processes and
damage to reputation as a result of
cyber-attacks. Cyber-attacks have
often led to financial losses (direct
or indirect) as indicated by 45 per
cent of our survey respondents.
The fact that nearly half of the
respondents have been victims of
cyber-attacks in the last year alone
shows that the numbers of
cybercrime incidents in India against
organizations and businesses have
been on the rise. While organizations
are busy passing the buck on who is
to blame for the impact of the
cybercrime, very few are taking the
cybercrime threat seriously at senior
management levels.
Cybercriminal and the
organization
Anyone with access to a computer,
an Internet connection, a motive,
and sufficient knowledge can
become a cybercriminal. With
knowledge freely available on the
web, hackers are getting younger and
younger. High profile cybercrimes in
the recent past have, in fact, been
perpetrated by teenagers. From an
organizations stand point, the typical
cybercriminal is a person who is
closely associated with the company,
i.e., they could be someone like
employee in the office, vendors,
BY SANDEEP GUPTA
CYBERCRIME:
ARE ORGANIZATIONS PREPARED
ENOUGH TO DEAL WITH IT?
No matter how complex the nature of cybercrime is, maintaining an attitude
of awareness is the best cybercrime prevention mantra. Companies are
finding unique ways to get the message of cyber security across, making it
an imperative to ensure that the weakest link in cyber safety is adequately
secured across the organization.
38
N
October 2014
■
HR & BUSINESS
contractors and customers or they
could even be someone sitting
thousands of miles away who can
invade organization's defenses to
steal private information at the click
of a mouse.
The 2014 cybercrime survey
conducted by KPMG in India reveals
that 47 per cent respondents
indicated that the risk of cyber-attack
is perpetrated by both internal and
external sources, while 37 per cent
of the Survey respondents believe
the risk of cyber-attack comes from
an external source.
What is the motivation for
employees to turn cyber criminals
and target their organizations?
As in cases of all crimes/fraud, the
root cause of cybercrimes is always
a mix three core elements namely,
opportunity,
pressure
and
rationalization that influences the
cybercriminal. Perpetrators of
cybercrimes have varying motives
targeting specific value gains.
From our above survey, it is
evident that nearly half of the
respondents feel that cybercrimes
can be perpetrated by either external
people or internal personnel. The
danger remains in the fact, that
■
organizations are still not taking
serious cognizance of the possibility,
that company insiders could very well
be the source of cybercrimes and
this threat from internal sources
should not be discounted. The
testament to this is that, increasingly,
internal employees are being seen
involved in cybercrime. Some
cybercrimes that are typically
committed by internal employees
include:
G
Data ransom: Employees steal
sensitive corporate data demanding
ransom for secure destruction of the
same, failing to pay the ransom
would either lead to the employee
releasing the data in the public
domain that can either lead to the
employer facing penalties on account
of confidentiality breach or fines
from regulators.
G
Online
banking
frauds:
Employees having authorizations to
approving banking payouts siphon
off payouts meant for genuine
vendors into their own personal
account.
G
Business disruption: These kinds
of attacks are engineered by
disgruntled employees who leave the
organization (especially from IT
departments). The exiting employees
usually set up the IT systems to fail/
crash either at a particular date or
attack their ex-employers systems
remotely to disrupt daily operations
of applications such as emails, ERP's,
assembly line equipment control
systems, etc.
The KPMG Cybercrime survey
report 2014 reveals that 71 per cent
of our respondents feel that
cybercrimes are targeted at accessing
confidential
information
of
companies. The confidential data so
obtained is either sold by the hackers
to business houses to support their
industrial espionage activities or to
other criminals for perpetrating
crime. Other value gained from
cybercrime as indicated by the survey
also includes disruption of business
operations and embezzlement of
money.
With the growing ease of
transacting technology, users
increasingly use their computers and
mobile phones to carry out banking
transactions, to avoid the hassle of
long winding queues and travel. While
people leverage technology to the
maximum, the same cannot be said
about them using technology in a
secure manner. From sharing
passwords, to working on malware
October 2014
N
39
HR & BUSINESS
Sandeep Gupta
Partner - Forensic Services
KPMG in India
Sandeep Gupta is a Partner in KPMG's
Forensic Practice with over 18 years of
experience. He leads the Forensic
Technology services group which
includes Digital Evidence Recovery
(DER), E-Discovery, Mobile Forensics,
Cyber Forensics and Data Analytics
Solutions. He has extensive experience
in Cyber related crimes investigation
and cyber security.
40
N
October 2014
infected devices to do banking
transactions, people make silly yet
serious mistakes that make them fall
prey to cyber criminals.
Cybercriminals thrive on three
key elements that people in general
ignore, firstly, people not securing
their digital devices, secondly, people
sharing/insecurely storing access
credentials and lastly peoples
willingness to share personal data
information with unknown people.
Due to these aspects, cyber criminals
are able to successfully pull off social
engineering attacks, website spoofing
and phishing attacks.
The KPMG Cybercrime survey
report 2014 reveals that 55 per cent
of our survey respondents perceive
that the 'general staff' is most prone
to cyber-attacks and requires tighter
security, followed by IT staff (39 per
cent) and then managers (37 per
cent).
Cybercriminals exploit the above
three key elements to the hilt, by
uploading infected movies. An
example of an indirect attack is
where the cybercriminals upload
songs, games files in file share sites,
which are then downloaded by
general staff into their office
computing equipment. This simple
act of download can unleash a tirade
of malware into the corporate
networks these malware can be
information stealing malware, logic
bombs, spyware and ransomware
(programs that lock out your
computer till a ransom is paid to the
cybercriminal).
A form of cyber-attack that is
now trending is the targeting of
Indian exporters, where their
international customers are sent
emails requesting bill payments to
be made to bank accounts other than
that of the exporters. These emails
are made from spoofed ID's
created by a global cybercriminal
cartel. Payouts made, land into
the accounts of the cyber
mafia who clear the
account and close it,
there by vanishing
without a trace.
Some vulnerability
that lead to such
attacks are:
G
Lack of basic cyber safety
knowledge by the internal staff
G Usage of dubious email service
providers
G Usage of unsecure systems for
carrying out transactions
Dealing with cybercrime: What
should organizations do build an
effective cyber defense?
While organizations do have
processes and procedures to help
manage risks in the conduct of
business, HR process controls and
soft controls in business are one of
the key elements in cyber crime
prevention which are clearly ignored
by most organizations. Some
controls that organizations these
days are beginning to follow are
categorized as under:
People checks
Deep background checks:
Companies have begun to go beyond
the
education
credentials
verification, to police verification
and background checks of proposed
candidates.
G
Background
checks
of
temporary/contract personnel and
vendor personnel: Vendor personnel
and temporary personnel are the
weakest link in cyber safety chain.
Cyber criminals are known to
masquerade as temporary/contract
employees (janitors, maintenance
personnel) so that they have access
to all sensitive systems at nonbusiness hours to help them do their
deed. With this in mind, corporates
have now started seeking back
ground checks on contract
personnel having access to key
facilities.
G
People awareness
Many companies lose the plot by
confusing
cyber
awareness
campaigns with long drawn
mandatory cyber awareness tests
which employees compulsorily have
to take annually. For cyber awareness
campaigns to be active and effective,
they have to be short and
meaningful. Some effective ways of
enhancing cyber defenses from a
people standpoint are:
G
Cybercrime
awareness
■
HR & BUSINESS
campaigns: Companies are finding unique ways to get
the message of cyber security across, gone are the days
where posters and screen savers used to be sole medium
for communication, these days companies use ambush
communication as a mode to get their message across.
An example of this would be where the Information
Security team tests the resolve of sample employees by
organizing some free gifts from vendors (like pen drives).
When the employee plugs the pen drive into the system,
they are informed by flash message that quotes a
company policy which prevents them from using
external devices on corporate networks.
G
Cyber-crime prevention contests: Employees
awareness is enhanced by asking them to participate in
online quizzes with attractive prizes, to ensure that
there is active participation and some extent of forced
learning.
People monitoring
Employee exit forensics: This is a kind of pre-emptive
forensics assessment where laptops of key employees
who are exiting are forensically examined to obtain
indications of cybercrime.
To ensure effective application of the cyber safety
policies many companies also translate their long
winding cyber safety policies to thumb rules, for
example, cyber safety thumb rules can be five point
agendas such as:
G
Ensure only genuine software/apps are installed on
your systems/mobile devices and avoid installing all
freeware absolutely necessary (after verifying the
credentials of the application).
G
Ensure all systems have anti-virus and anti-spy ware
G
Don't store sensitive passwords of bank accounts
and emails in files
G
Avoid opening unsolicited emails and attachments
G
Don't submit any banking passwords/card details
over emails
Silver lining in the dark cybercrime cloud
A positive development in this grim situation is that
while cybercrime has increased multi fold, there is now
a high level of demand for cyber security specialists to
help governments and corporates in securing their assets
against cyber security. This development has led to a
large number of experienced technology professionals
and college graduates opting for cyber security and
forensics as a preferred career choice, which bodes well
for the national cyber safety initiative.
To conclude, no matter how complex the nature of
cybercrime adopting a philosophy of 'prevention is better
than cure' and maintaining an attitude of awareness is
the best cybercrime prevention mantra. While there
may be many techniques to ensure that cybercrime is
prevented from a technical stand point, boards/senior
management of organizations must take cognizance of
the internal threats in their organizations and adequately
lend support to their internal departments in building
their HR soft controls to ensure that the weakest link
HC
in the cyber safety is adequately secured.
G
■
HRConsultant’sTreasureisopenforSale..!!!
HR TOOLS - PRICE LIST
Meticulously Designed, Applied & Proven,
Ready to use HR Tools (Hard Copy)
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
20.
21.
22.
23.
24.
25.
26.
27.
Inter company Executives Salary
Survey Questionnaire
Inter-company Workers Wages
Survey Questionnaire
Set of 35 Techniques for Training
Needs Assessment
Climate
Survey
/
Employee
Satisfaction Survey Questionnaire
Recruitment Procedure
Goal/KRA & Competency based
Performance Management System
360
Degree
Feedback
Questionnaire & Procedures
Set
of
10
Total
Employee
Involvement tools
Induction Scheme
Survey Procedures with Illustration
for calculating Workers
Need
based Fair Wages
Set of Job Descriptions for 233
Positions
Competency Mapping Procedures
& Instruments
Exit Interview Procedure
Toyota Performance Management
System
Performance
Linked
Wage
Increment system for Factory
Workers
Establishing Assessment Centre
Performance linked Promotion
Policies based on defined Norms
Procedure for Disciplinary Actions
and Domestic Enquiry
with
Illustrations
Workers Will & Skill Mapping
Procedures & Instruments
Measuring Impact of Training in
Terms of Learning, Application,
Results and ROI.
Implementing Balanced Scorecard
Implementing Mentoring Scheme
Implementing 5S
Ideal Draft Standing Orders
TQM Tool Kit
(packed with 127 TQM Tools)
Model HR Policies & Systems
Stay Interview
Rs. 2000/Rs. 2000/Rs. 5500/Rs. 2000/Rs. 2000/Rs. 5000/Rs. 3000/Rs. 3000/Rs. 2000/Rs. 3500/Rs. 5500/Rs. 5500/Rs. 1000/Rs. 5500/Rs. 5000/Rs. 5500/Rs. 5000/Rs. 2000/Rs. 5000/Rs. 5500/Rs.
Rs.
Rs.
Rs.
5500/5500/2500/2500/-
Rs. 7500/Rs.25000/Rs. 3000/-
Payment to be sent in advance along with your purchase
order by Draft /At par cheque in favour of Human Resource
Development Centre payable at New Delhi to:
Human Resource Development Centre
D- 88, 2nd Floor, Lajpat Nagar, PART - 1, New Delhi-110024
Phone: + 91-11-29816980 / 81 / 82 www.hrdc.in
M : +91- 9818300668 (Dr R.K Sahu) +91-7827633469 (Pragya)
E-mail: [email protected] [email protected]
October 2014
N
41
GLOBAL HR
Why learning
still matters!
Facts, statistics, practices, perspectives and more...
RESEARCH SAYS…
I
I
I
I
I
42
A Louis Harris and Associates poll reports that among
employees with poor training opportunities, 41 % planned
to leave within a year, whereas of those who considered
their company's training opportunities to be excellent, only
12 % planned to leave.
A Hackett Benchmarking and Research report
shows that companies that spend $218 per employee
on training have more than a 16 % voluntary turnover,
while companies that spend over $273 per employee
have turnovers of 7 %.
A 2014 report from Bersin by Deloitte, The Corporate
Learning Factbook 2014: Benchmarks, Trends, and
Analysis of the U.S. Training Market says that
businesses increased training budgets by an average
of 15 % in 2013, reflecting the highest growth rate in this
area in the last seven years. It's also likely that as the
economy continues to mend, organizations are able to
reinvest in areas that experienced significant cost
cutting during the downturn.
At Great Place to Work, organizations on the Fortune 100
Best Companies to Work For list invest significantly in
training and development programs. In 2013, companies
on the list offered 66.5 hours of training annually for
salaried employees and 53 hours of training for hourly
employees, with close to 70% of those hours devoted to
employees' current roles and nearly 40% focused on
growth and development.
Research shows an explosive growth in technology tools
N
October 2014
I
I
to train people today. Self-authored video, online
communication channels, virtual learning, and MOOCs
(Coursera, Udacity, Udemy, edX, …) are all growing
rapidly as training tools. People still need formal
classroom education, but
this is now less than half the
total "hours" people consume
in training around the world.
And among the highly
advanced companies, as
much as 18% of all training is
now delivered through mobile
devices. (Forbes)
I According to a study
conducted by the ROI
Institute, a Birmingham, Ala.based research and
consulting organization, 92
out of 96 Fortune 500 CEOs
said that they are most interested in learning the business
impact of their learning and development programs, but
only 8% see that happening at their companies now.
A recent survey indicates that 40% of employees who
receive poor job training leave their positions within the
first year. They cite the lack of skills training and
development as the principal reason for moving on.
According to the American Society for Training and
Development, investment in employee training enhances a
company's financial performance. An increase of $680 in a
company's training expenditures per employee
generates, on average, a 6 % improvement in total
shareholder return. Based on the training investments of
575 companies during a three-year period, researchers
found that firms investing the most in training and
development (measured by total investment per
employee and percentage of total gross payroll) yielded a
36.9 % total shareholder return as compared with a 25.5 %
weighted return for the S&P 500 index for the same period.
That's a return 45 % higher than the market average. These
same firms also enjoyed higher profit margins, higher
income per employee, and higher price-to-book ratios.
■
GLOBAL HR
Who's doing it!
C
ompanies like GE, Motorola, Philips , and others are
extending their training budget to reach 2-3 times the
audience through the use of easy- to- use training portals
and virtual learning experiences.
Companies like Accenture, Deloitte, IBM, Boeing, UPS,
Qualcomm, and many others invest heavily in corporate
training to help build key skills such as supervisory and
technical skills internally.
Companies like Maersk (big shipping line) and even BMW
pride themselves on their internal development,
apprenticeship, and certification programs.
Deloitte launched a $500 million new education center
focused exclusively on providing world-class education
and training to its global consulting workforce.
PeoplePulse is an Australian built online feedback and
survey tool used extensively by Australian and New Zealand
based organizations to conduct online staff skill audits and
training needs analysis surveys. The tool can also be used
by HR to conduct cost effective staff climate surveys, exit
interview surveys, and new starter / onboarding feedback
surveys to name a few popular uses.
Who is spending
and who is not!
O
n average in 2013, businesses across the United
States spent $1,169 per learner. This amount varies
by company size and industry, with tech firms leading
the pack in terms of amount invested per learner
(spending an average of $1,847). In 2014, US spending on
corporate training grew by 15% last year (the highest
growth rate in seven years) to over $70 Billion in the US
and over $130 Billion worldwide.
Companies which fall into the "high-impact" categories
spend significantly more on training than average. So
companies who invest in a total L&D strategy spend more
per employee than those who are inconsistent. This
shows that L&D spending pays off. (Forbes)
According to the 12th edition of The Conference Board
of Canada's Learning and Development Outlook,
between 2010 and 2012, Canadian organizations
increased funding for training, learning and development.
Spending was up $17 per employee, a modest reversal
of the downward trend of the past two decades. The
Canadian organizations surveyed spent an average of
$705 per employee compared $688 per employee in 2010.
Despite this modest increase, overall learning and
development spending is down nearly 40 from its historic
high of $1,207 in 1993.
Motorola calculated that every dollar spent on training
yields an approximate 30 % gain in productivity within a
three-year period. Motorola also used training to reduce
costs by over $3 billion and increase profits by 47 %
(source: Tim Lane et al., "Learning to Succeed in Business
with Information Technology," Motorola).
■
More on e-Learning
stats for other parts of the world
®
®
®
Self-paced e-Learning's growth rate in the Middle East is 8.2%,
and its revenues are expected to reach $560.7 million by 2016.
The self-paced e-Learning market growth rate in Western
Europe is 5.8%, and it's estimated that their revenues will be at
$8.1 billion by 2015.
Africa's compound annual growth rate for self-paced
e-Learning is 15.4%, and their revenues are expected to reach
$512.8 million by the year 2016.
Source: http://elearningindustry.com/top-10-e-learningstatistics-for-2014-you-need-to-know
October 2014
N
43
GLOBAL HR
cutting BENCHMARK
EDGE P R A C T I C E S
Greeley and Hansen, a Chicago-based
environmental engineering firm, uses its training
partly as a way to retain its
engineers, professionals who
are difficult to recruit even in a tight job market.
At Agilent Technologies, a Santa Clara, Calif.based measurement company, examining the results
of its leadership training
is part of its DNA. The
company does pre-training exercises which include
assessments, interactive webinars, e-learning and
readings to let staff know exactly what business
results it seeks. Agilent then organizes 10-week
post-training sessions where employees focus on
how an individual course aligns with the company's
business goals.
TOP 5 e-Learning
S T A T I S T I C S
½ The rise in e-Learning's popularity isn't showing any signs of
½
½
½
Source: Fortune.com
Starbucks recently announced what
must be a coffeehouse first: low-cost
college degrees for its employees,
including part-timers. The caffeinated
beverage giant is rolling out a program for employees
who work at least half time to earn an online degree
from Arizona State University. The tuition is deeply
discounted, and employees can choose from a
number of educational tracks. What's more,
Starbucks does not require workers to remain at the
company upon completion of their degree.
(Huffingtonpost)
Google has formalized
learning in the company in
an entirely new way, relying on data analytics and
other measures to ensure it is teaching employees
what they need to know to keep profits humming.
Google is offering more classes to more employees
than it ever has before, with about a third of its
33,100 + strong global workforce going through the
in-house program. It cut classes that didn't work and
retooled others. Ever data-obsessed, Google uses
statistics gathered from current and former employees
to recommend certain courses to managers at
different points in their career, say after a move to a
new city or joining a new team.
Amazon.com's employee development program,
"Career Choice"
program, a tuition
reimbursement
program lets any Amazon.com employee with more
than three years of service receive up to $2,000 per
year in reimbursement for accredited courses in career
and vocational skills. Amazon's hourly workforce often
works under very high stress conditions, so adding
this benefit gives Amazon one more tool to help recruit
and retain these people.
44
N
October 2014
½
½
slowing. In fact, judging by the following Top 10 eLearning statistics
for 2014, the future of the e-Learning Industry is brighter than ever:
In 2011, it was estimated that about $35.6 billion was spent on selfpaced eLearning across the globe. Today, e-Learning is a $56.2
billion industry, and it's going to double by 2015.
e-Learning is also eco-friendly. Recent studies conducted by Britain's
Open University have found that e-Learning consumes 90% less
energy than traditional courses. The amount of CO2 emissions (per
student) is also reduced by up to 85%.
The world's most rapidly growing e-Learning markets are Malaysia and
Vietnam. In fact, the estimated 5 year annual growth rate for the
Asian e-Learning market is 17.3%. That is the highest compound
annual growth rate of any global region.
According to a report released by IBM, companies who utilize
e-Learning tools and strategies have the potential to boost
productivity by up to 50%. For every $1 that company spends, it's
estimated that they can receive $30 worth of productivity.
According to a recent study conducted by The Research Institute of
America, e-Learning has the power to increase information retention
rates by up to 60%. That means that, not only is e-Learning more
cost efficient, but also it's also more effective (in terms of how
much knowledge is truly acquired during the learning process).
DID YOU KNOW
When Phillips consulted for a large financial services
firm, the company measured the relationship between
leadership development, employee retention and
revenue by determining whether its sales staff opened
new accounts, how much revenue each account
generated, and comparing that data to the cost of training.
IBM, the international firm, did a study to examine the
percentage of capabilities that companies lose over
time. When internal and external turnover, new
technology and changes in businesses were factored
in, the results were staggering. The study found that a
company loses 10 to 30 percent of its original
capabilities every year. Within three years, each
company loses 41 percent of its staff. By year six, only
24 percent remain. Any business that doesn't believe
in training, evolving, and moving their people forward
is paying a much steeper price than its realizes.
■
GUEST COLUMN
Talent management
Viewed from a multi-generational lens
BY NAVEEN NARAYANAN
T
oday's workplaces are filled
with diverse groups, in terms
of cultures and more
prominently, in terms of
generations. A mix of generations
prevails at the workplace: Veterans,
Baby Boomers, Gen- X, and Gen- Y
or Millenials. Each of these
generations have different triggers
that keep them motivated, as a
result of which employers scramble
to find the right talent management
formula.
The rapid advent of Gen-Y into
the workplace has increased the
complexities and competition in the
workplace, and employers need to
quickly respond to it.
From a talent management
perspective, the best way forward is
for employers to understand and
engage with Gen-Y as important
stakeholders for organizational and
business growth, as they do bring
with themselves a hunger and energy
to learn and perform and deliver
results. The other side of the coin for
Gen- Y to recognize is that they have
a lot to gain from working with more
experienced and institutionally astute
employees who by virtue of their
several years in the workplace are
able to view developments and
events, which may even personally
affect their careers, more holistically.
Older generations could also focus
on seeing things from the point of
view that will help them understand,
adapt, and imbibe the positive
cultural aspects of Gen-Y.
Managing multi-generational
talent in any organization is tricky
but essential.
■
Talent management tips to
retaining the mixed employee base
in an organization
G
Focus on self-development
Employers need to nurture
employees' with opportunities to
develop and grow and a challenging
work environment. Putting candid
feedback in front of them is
constructive but not enough;
guiding them to develop specific
skills sets through on-the-job
training would work well. If they can
take the feedback in a positive spirit
and use it as a yardstick to groom
themselves, both employees and
employers stand to gain.
G
Recognize and address
For the most part, the aspirations of
millennials are fairly transparent.
The urge to move up the ladder at a
rapid speed is what motivates them.
Recognition in terms of promotions
and career growth is one thing GenY is sensitive about. Managers need
to understand their aspirations
completely while managing them at
work. It is important for employers
to recognize, on the other hand,
that older employees look to get a
sense of respect, trust, and equality
from their employer.
G
Communicate regularly and
clearly
Continuous assessment is the next
best practice to retain talent. These
assessments need to be executed
with immense accuracy; millennials
in particular, rely on the outcome
and align it with their career growth.
Competitive spirits are high among
millennials and they are keen to
create a unique mark in their
respective fields. Organizations that
recognize these nuances amongst
this and other generational groups
and set clear goals accordingly for
them and measure performances
based on parameters unique to
them will be successful.
G
Focus on diverse workforce
Diversity has become a key
requirement to drive business
strategies and also maximize
productivity and creativity. By
including diverse cultures and
generations, organizations have a
better access to a variety of talent.
Employees will be naturally
supportive of colleagues and work
environments that embrace
diversity, because, simply,
employees want to work with
companies having a positive
reputation on the diversity mix.
G
Be tech enabled
Gen-Y has grown up with constant
access to technology. Organizations
with or without a millennial
employee base must be
technologically and digitally sound
as all generations have a lot to gain
in terms of working collaboratively
should they embrace new
technologies. It is the responsibility
of the organization that employs all
four generations to adapt and adopt
talent management practices that
are conducive for each while
focusing on common organizational
HC
goals.
Naveen Narayanan is Global Head - Talent
Acquisition, HCL Technologies. He is responsible for
driving HCL Technologies’ worldwide strategies
around talent, culture and organizational
effectiveness.
October 2014
N
45
HR PRACTICE
Empowering
the youth
‘PRAYAG, a Reliance Communications' CSR initiative, extends employable
skills to the youth in India for a larger economic sustainability. Based on the
very tenet of converting a societal concern into an opportunity through
systemic innovation and creative strategy, this initiative's is an integral part
of the organization's developing business strategy.
I
ndia's increasing unemployment
challenges and industry specific
skill gaps despite the abundance
of employable youth in the
country highlights the sorry state of
India's employment scenario. A lot
of it can be accredited to the absence
of a focused and coherent approach
towards the issue, and the country's
obsession with textbook education
as a means to groom the young
population. Further the unavailability
of trained facilitators to coach this
section of people aggravates the issue.
However, the country's decision to
take decisive action to meet this
increasing unemployment challenges
is being narrowed by India Inc.'s
initiatives to tackle the problem.
Reliance Communications' new
initiative "PRAYAG -Providing
Grassroot Advancement to Youth
Aspiring Growth" is a platform
designed to empower school and
college dropouts from areas
adjoining the company's operations.
46
N
October 2014
This initiative is taken to train
unemployed youth between the age
of 18 to 35 years, make them
employable and fill the ever-growing
Retail and ITES industry with skilled
manpower. These learners, un or
under employed youth, women and
differently abled youth, are trained
in different aspects such as
personality development, spoken
English, computer basics, which will
help them to find the right
opportunities.
Amit Das, Chief Human Resource
officer, Reliance Communications (R
Com) asserts, "An in-depth study led
us to arrive at the hypothesis that an
educated workforce does not imply
employable workforce particularly in
growing sectors such as retail,
hospitality, and information
technology enabled services.
Therefore the company decided to
extend employability skills to the
unemployed or under employed
peri-urban and urban slum youth in
India, in an effort to help curb the
problem of unemployment."
The inception
PRAYAG is an initiative that has
made an attempt to fill the every
growing employability gap among
the youth owing to the visible lack of
skillsets predominant in the country.
Having started in the year 201112, the program has now spread its
network of Chapters across seven
states in India such as Maharashtra,
Bihar, Jharkhand, Karnataka, Tamil
Nadu, Madhya Pradesh and West
Bengal, with a combined training
capacity of 3100 youth per annum.
Although the program is based
on the tenet of converting a societal
concern into an opportunity through
systemic innovation and creative
strategy, its predominantly addresses
three key problem areas, lack of
quality training providers vis-à-vis
the number required, un/ under
employability of youth and lack of
■
HR PRACTICE
career paths for dropouts or rejected
youths. "PRAYAG pertains to upgrading the skillsets and earning
potentials of urban dwellers, and
making them job ready through
thus giving an impetus to their career
graph. "Reliance Communications
envisages nourishing and sustaining
the ecosystems in which it operates
by aiming for growth through
opportunity through systemic
innovation and creative strategy. With
a standardized curriculum deployed
across all our chapters, facilitators
and program /chapter- in- charges
focused classroom learning sessions
across two months," asserts Das.
sustainable development and nation
building. "We believe in extending
employability as well as digital skills
as one of the key areas of our
business intervention. One may call
it as a business mandate or as CSR
but the agenda surely is to extend
employable skills to the youth in India
for a larger economic sustainability,"
quips Das.
are groomed to address the concern
for quality of delivery as per the
outlined pedagogy. Dashboards are
created to monitor the quality of
training inputs to the students on
per batch basis. An appropriate
curriculum has been developed
based on the inputs from the industry
experts from the education
community and by understanding
the key skill gaps that are currently
present within the earmarked
community.
Despite the standardized
Aligned to goals and
aspirations
With a vision to give millions the
power to shape their destiny, the
means to realize their full potential
and a commitment to being a
socially responsible entity, 'PRAYAG'
is helping to eliminate skill based
entry barrier, thus enabling those un/
under employed to hone their skills
based on the current industry trends
■
The unique aspects
PRAYAG is based on the principle of
changing a societal concern into an
October 2014
N
47
HR PRACTICE
curriculum, there is room for
flexibility within the program design
to address the regional and role
specific gaps. Also, the learners are
mentored during the training and
post placement by earmarked
employee mentors from Reliance
Communications.
A team of employees take on the
onus of mentoring the students
undergoing the PRAYAG program.
The mentoring goes beyond
extending the skill /s or imparting
industry level information to the
students. As part of the volunteering,
the mentors focus on individual
development and hand-holding the
youth through their transition phase.
"We invite the employers to be part
of the batch selection panel to judge
and constitute the batches," shares
Das.
Further, as part of the
curriculum, visits to Reliance
Communications' corporate partner
locations are also arranged. This
helps the learners to understand the
corporate
culture
and
its
environment. "We believe that the
walk through the premise
and interactions with the
senior officials open up the
Embedded with various facets that promote
aspirational window for our
sustainability, including:
students and motivates them
I
creating a regular industry interface and participation
to work harder to achieve
in batch planning and training , including a one day
their personal goal," Das
on-site visit.
quips. "Besides, it also helps
I
involving a dedicated specialised person to undertake
them to break the ice and be
industry interface at each of the Chapters for better
better prepared for the
coordination and outcome
selection process as they get
I
devising training modules based on the ever evolving
introduced to the various
market trends with a flexible facilitator led training
functional facets and aspects
methodology to fit the changing industry needs
of the jobs," he adds.
I
implementing the program along with an implementation
The program is further
partner through the process of co-creation.
strengthened by a team of
employees who play the role
of visiting faculty and extend
discussions with the core faculty to
knowledge base on special functional
reduce or negate placement
aspects. This team is given the key
concerns.
This
is
further
role of ascertaining the quality of
strengthened by inviting guest
delivery of the program and growth
speakers from companies in the
graph of the students. "This helps us
specific sector," affirms Das.
in ensuring higher pass out rate of
As part of the program
students, on a per batch basis,"
component, there is a pool of
opines Das.
employers per Chapter that on a
Post the grooming session, apart
constant basis help the core team to
from the Reliance Group, other
understand the trends, changing
employers are also given the
market skill requirements as well as
opportunity to hire the trained
extend the platform to hire skilled
resources in different functions. This
youth. The list includes big retail
helps in sustaining healthy
chains, corporate houses, educational
competitive spirit within the system
institutions,
development
and also allows the learners to have
organizations,
technology
options to explore.
companies, etc.
Interestingly, the partnering
An inherent component of the
organizations screen the candidates
program is also to focus on building
as a part of a pre-selection process.
capacities
of
the
partner
This helps to reduce the expectation
organizations and the team of
gap between the candidate and the
trainers/facilitators, apart from the
future employer thereby reducing
program management staff. Hence,
leakages, if any, from within the
every year, at least once, a six-day
system. "The candidates undergo a
extensive Train the Trainer session is
series of mock interviews and
conducted for the trainers and the
Sustainability
Reliance Communications decided to
extend employability skills to the unemployed
or under employed peri-urban and urban slum
youth in India, in an effort to help curb the
problem of unemployment.
Amit Das
Chief Human Resource officer, Reliance Communications (R Com)
48
N
October 2014
■
HR PRACTICE
Chapter Heads from across the
PRAYAG Chapters. This is primarily
to standardize the content delivery,
build capacities and competencies of
the team at the Chapter level. This
further helps for a better program
execution and outcome. Being an
annual event, it is further
supplemented by Chapter-specific
development of the facilitators.
"A lot of effort goes in
ascertaining the skill demand at the
market/employer level in order to
ensure that the grooming/skilling
which takes place at our Chapters
meets the profiles at the demand
side, and hence making the youth
productive on the first hour first day,"
asserts Das .
The criteria
Since the program pertains to upgrading the skillsets and earning
potential of urban dwellers and
making them job- ready, it involves
focused classroom learning sessions
for about two months, which
translates into 180 to 200 hours of
delivery in a specific area like
Customer Care, Sales or a CSR role
in a Call Centre. The candidates can
be of either gender, however, he/she
must be above 18 years of age, from
underprivileged
communities
residing in urban slums or peri-urban
sections of the society.
The minimum qualification varies
between Inter/12th standard to
graduation,
with
basic
comprehension of the English
language. The urge to work post the
completion of the program and
consent from parents in support of
it, is critical to get an entry to the
Chapter. Besides, they should not be
pursuing a full time educational
program as the effort is to provide
springboard to un/under employed
youth. Staying aligned to Reliance
Group's philosophy, it is ensured that
a minimum of 45 per cent of those
inducted and trained are women.
Smooth sailing….
"We have been evolving over the last
few years through various mitigation
measures to extend a solid and sound
program on ground. Overcoming
challenges and attaining a shared
■
value for the community at
large
including
their
placement, post placement
guidance was a priority for
us," asserts Das.
The success of the
program can be measured
by the fact that more than
85 per cent of the trained
youth
have
found
employment and are earning
on an average 11000/- per
month.
At the industry level, the
initiative has built ties with
industry partners to engage I The rigorous pedagogy
and
understand
the I Mentoring at all stages
industry's needs and further I Pre-training interface between candidates and company
create a strengthened I Field trips to corporate locations to gauge the
environmental understanding
process. In spite of the odds,
the program has succeeded I Continuous monitoring of the candidates by Committee
of core employee volunteers at R Com.
in creating a local resource
network by mobilising I Pool of employers for placement.
development organizations, I Creating first day first hour productive workforce.
community partners, local I An inherent component of building capacities of the
partner organisations and the team of trainers/
government bodies and
facilitators apart from the program management staff.
industry. "This ensures the
sustainability and scalability
of the program in the long run as
which further gets implied and
well as establishes a monitoring
ploughed back into the business
system
with
community
proposition," reiterates Das.
participation," quips Das. "Also, over
a period of three years, we have been
The road ahead
able to learn from the sharing of
As part of the organization's
best practices and knowledge being
mandate, PRAYAG will continue to
applied across the Chapters/
focus on eliminating the skill based
Reliance Communications regions,"
entry barrier and enable those un/
he adds.
under employed to hone their skills
based on the current industry trends,
Impact on employees
giving an impetus to their career
Whenever organizations create
graph.
impactful interventions like PRAYAG,
Das
reiterates
that
the
which focuses on outcome led
organization is not just committed to
volunteering; it tends to generate
fill the gap between policy, program
exciting opportunities for employees
planning and its implementation in
as well. It enables them to tackle
the deficient areas under education
new challenges, increase employee
and employability, but is equally
objective and retention. Besides, such
involved in building human capital
engagement practices help to
within the country. "Reliance
strengthen the societal development
Communications has taken the steps
mandate amongst the employee
to integrate its business processes
base. It brings objectivity in their
and the huge talent pool of human
mindset and compels them to look
resources to lay the foundation for
at the concern from a different
a responsible sustainable corporate
perspective. "Working as crosscitizenship. Over the next few years,
functional teams, platforms like
the organization as part of PRAYAG
PRAYAG bring out diverse and
intends to extend this platform to
innovative
perspective
and
20,000 youth across India,"
approaches of problem solving
HC
concludes Das.
Processes that
differentiate PRAYAG
October 2014
N
49
PSYCHOLOGY AT WORK
Low performers:
Is it a good idea to ignore them?
BY MANAVI PATHAK
P
erformance management
make up a significant part
of every manager's job and
this means managers are required
to deal with low performance.
Managers too often view this as
one of the less desirable
responsibilities that come with
their job because too often the
perception of managing poor
performance is clouded by
thoughts of tense, uncomfortable
situations that may result in
blame, anger and denial.
Engaging staff around their poor
performance is tough, however
organizational survey data tells us
that not managing poor
performance is one of the biggest
gripes for employers.
Performance has two
dimensions: skills and attitude. A
high performer is someone who
has great skills and great attitude.
High performers are your go-to
employees. At the end of the
spectrum are the low performers
who can present themselves in
many different ways: some low
performers have poor skills and
lousy attitude, and there are
others who have great skills and
lousy attitude. What about the
lowest of the low performers in
the organization - the bottom 10
per cent? Every organization has
them, the bottom 10 per cent
who are not meeting the
expectation of performance. They
50
N
October 2014
are problem - for themselves, for
their managers, for the
organization and for the
customers. Too often we ignore
them, we shut them out and we
don't spend time working with
them.
Low performers could be the
result of bad hire. However, after
those people quit or are asked to
go, talent development leaders
may still be left with some low
performers who do just enough
to get the job done, but should
be doing better. While companies
don't want to reward low
performers by giving similar
compensation and recognition as
the high or mid performers in
the organization, ignoring them
isn't a good idea. Poor
performers in an organization
could be the result of lack of
knowledge, skill or talent - they
may be the result of mismatched
skills. Talent managers need to
Reasons for low performance
G
Employee doesn't know what is expected because goals and
standards or workplace policies and consequences are not clear
G
Interpersonal differences
G
Mismatch of capability and job
G
No feedback on performance
G
Lack of personal motivation, low morale
G
Personal issues
G
Workplace bullying
Poor performance is exhibited in the
following ways
G
Unsatisfactory work performance, i.e., failure to perform the
duties of the position or to perform them up to the standard
expected
G
Non- compliance with workplace policies, rules and procedures
G
Unacceptable behaviour at the workplace
G
Disruptive or negative behaviour that impacts the co-workers
■
PSYCHOLOGY AT WORK
establish the reasons behind low
performance: Why are the high
standards not being met? Is the
employee going through some
personal crisis? Or is the
employee mismatched in the job
at hand? Also, underperformance
is not the same as misconduct.
Misconduct is a serious behaviour
such as theft or assault which
may warrant instant dismissal. In
cases of misconduct employers
should seek specific advice about
how to proceed before taking any
action.
In a recent study by
Leadership IQ, Consulting Firm
based in USA, it was reported
that in 42 per cent of the
companies, low performers are
more engaged, more motivated
and are more likely to enjoy
working at their organization. The
findings suggest that many
organizations are not holding
people accountable for their
work, allowing the worst workers
to skate by. Low performers end
up with the easiest jobs because
managers don't ask much of
them, so they are under less
stress and more satisfied with
their daily work lives. Meanwhile
it's the dedicated and the
conscientious workers who end
up staying at the office late,
correcting the work of the low
performers and making sure that
the clients or customers are
satisfied. This pattern breeds
frustration and disengagement in
high performers - and ultimately
drives them to seek work
elsewhere. To solve this situation,
managers should speak candidly
with high and middle performers.
Not allowing them to fret out the
frustration might potentially send
them looking for better
opportunities. They should also
find out what could motivate
them to stick around.
Organizations should be
worried about these findings, as
high performers thrive on feeling
involved and challenged. They
■
also act as company ambassadors
with clients, customers and
potential hires. If they are bored
and underappreciated, they will
stop talking up their employer,
mentally unplug from their work,
start looking for opportunities
elsewhere and eventually jump
the ship. As for low performers,
companies want them to become
more productive disengage and to
find work elsewhere. Companies
do not want deluded low
performers, who think they are
contributing when they are really
doing poorly, to stick around
when they are really doing poorly.
What has led to such high level
of dysfunction in the
organizations? Experts believe that
many companies are failing to
implement basic lessons of good
leadership. Bosses should be clear
and transparent about what they
want their employers to do.
There should be 'meritocratic
accountability' where high
performers are regularly
recognized and rewarded with
praise, recognition and raise.
Managers should not avoid
difficult conversations with low
performers, who should be told
how and why their work is not
up to the snuff.
Most organizations know they
should be doing these things, but
experts say that many businesses
struggle to set clear performance
standards. Outside of sales, where
achievement is measured in
numbers, it can be difficult to pin
point what bosses expect from
top performers. Nevertheless
companies must try and they
should be diligent communicating
with employees about their
performance while checking how
engaged the employees feel.
Ideally, leaders need to do a
better job at holding low
performers accountable.
Increasing accountability starts by
learning to recognize and respond
to the four stages of most people
go through before they get into
accountability. Once the manager
or leader can identify whether it
is denial, excuse, blame or anxiety
that is preventing someone from
reaching accountability, specific
actions can be directed to make
the low performer move through
the road blocks. Also, when
performance levels fail to meet
the expectations, it's also critical
to enforce accountability with real
life consequences. Not only it tells
the slackers that the free ride is
over, it also lets your best
performers, who have been
waiting for you to do something,
to differentiate them from the
slackers, know that you are doing
something to remove one of their
biggest pain points. This can do a
lot to increase engagement in
high and middle performers. Best
practice employers understand
that the issues that are not
addressed promptly also have the
potential to become more serious
over time. This can have negative
effects on the business as a whole
as it can affect the productivity
and performance of the entire
workplace.
HC
Dr Manavi Pathak is an Organizational Psychologist
and Consultant. She can be reached at
[email protected]
October 2014
N
51
CASE STUDY
The
communication factor
BY PROF. L. GURUNATHAN
Listening and understanding others, and being able to put one's point
across, is what effective communication is all about. Therefore, managers
must invest time and energy to deliver clear communication to build
trust and confidence amongst employees.
or about three months Rakesh Baweja, the Regional Head of the southern
region of BRC projects, a construction company, has been trying to
communicate with his immediate deputy about some very important
aspects relating to his job. "Chandramouli is a very sincere worker",
Baweja told himself. "But he has had a very bad year. He has over
stepped his authority a couple of times and that has brought some real
bad consequences. I, however, have never chided him till now as I always
believe in focusing on the positive aspects of an individual. However, the
time has now come to communicate the concern to him".
Actually Baweja had received intimation from his seniors that
Chandramouli should be asked to leave or relieved from some of his
52
N
October 2014
■
CASE STUDY
responsibilities, a kind of demotion,
however, without any change in
designation. This happened two
months back. At that time Baweja
ended the conversation by saying,
"Dear Chandru, the fact is that many
of your decisions is beginning to cost
us now. We have to increase our work
efforts, in fact double it and do it
really well. Hope you are up to the
challenge".
Chandramouli was as usual
enthusiastic. He always has been. "I
may not have communicated the
reality. But I did communicate the
underlying issues." Then Baweja told
him about the meeting he had in the
past.
However today, he had to be
explicit and he realized he should
get on with it. "I am not good with
bad news in general. But I know how
to mix it up", he told his friend
Harpreet about the impending
meeting.
Rakesh's Office
The door opened. In came
Chandramouli, Assistant Regional
Manager, Projects B&R Constructions
Llimited. "Morning Rakesh; you sent
for me". "Oh. Nothing Chandru; it
is just that I wanted to have a chat
with you. Come on take a seat".
Baweja greeted him warmly.
"Chandru, we go a long way together.
I remember you six years back when
you were much junior then. You took
great initiatives and also had the guts
to tell me when I went wrong, even
though I was senior to you. I always
loved and appreciated that about
you".
"Well, Rakesh, it is indeed
delightful to hear that you remember
those moments. That too fondly! I
did enjoy talking to you as I always
felt that since you had all the
authority, you should hear it first. It
was not easy to meet you those days
I was way low in the hierarchy".
"Ah! Chandru, just wanted to tell
you that we have indeed come a
long way. However, I think the way
our recent relationship has evolved,
has made the journey even more
enjoyable. As my immediate junior,
I enjoyed the fact that you took
complete ownership of the various
■
projects and have taken some critical
decisions all the while keeping me
informed".
"Rakesh! That is a lot of praise
for one day…well may be for a
week. But I think that the credit still
goes to you and I should thank you
for allowing me to take the authority
that I wanted. Anyway, is there a
reason you called me? I hear
rumours about people being asked
to leave, cost optimization, etc."
Rakesh sat up right. Gazed at
Chandru for a second and continued.
"Chandru, look at the last year alone
and you have done some
tremendous work and I have to thank
you for that. It is interesting to see
you handle labour related issues with
the same vigour as you handled the
sudden raw material constraints that
peaked six months back".
"Baweja, sometimes as I look
back, I am not sure if I really handled
them well. I am even surprised that
you are appreciating me specifically
for those achievements because the
way I handled it has only made things
tougher today. But why discuss these
issues. I have work to do. Can we
discuss why you called me? I have
just about two hours before lunch
time sets in and I…"
"Ah! Lunch! That too brings fond
memories. Your wife Vaanathi is a
very good cook. I never thought I
will like rice so much…and that too
in so many varieties. Do you think I
can have another one of your
dinners…?"
"And watch cricket! Yes, Baweja
you are right. Maybe that is what we
should be doing. Get together this
weekend? I will be on it. Now what
else?"
"Chandru, I think that should be
it for now. I just want to tell you
that we are concerned a bit about
the labour issue today and the
consequences of the contracts you
signed with the suppliers. I want to
say that you need to do a lot of
work there. The key issue that you
should handle is that from now on
I will have to review some big and
critical decisions usually left in your
hands. That .is what I want you to
know. We will catch up later. I have
to make an important call and that
Prof. L. Gurunathan
Faculty, PMIR, XLRI Jamshedpur
Dr L. Gurunathan holds a doctorate in
Management from IIM, Ahmedabad. At
XLRI, he handles courses in executive
compensation, and strategic human
resource management. He also, consults
and trains organizations in these areas.
He has trained public sector
corporations such as Hindustan
Aeronautics Ltd, NTPC, BALCO, Novo
Nordisk and Dr. Reddy’s Laboratories,
Tech Mahindra, Computer Science
Corporation, Accenture and Ma Foi Ltd.
October 2014
N
53
CASE STUDY
brings an end to this meeting of
ours. Bye. Take care"
Chandru walked out of the room.
He looked elated. "I always love these
informal chats and the dinner would
be just the thing to discuss things
that I wanted to discuss a long time.
Great!" he thought to himself.
However as he walked towards his
office he was wondering about the
last line, and what it actually meant.
As he went back to his office and
sat on his desk, he heard a ping on
his mobile phone …" I am at my
desk. Let me check it up right now,"
he thought and checked his email. It
was from his boss Baweja. It read
like this:
"I am deeply disappointed in your
performance in this organization
Chandru. Your actions during the last
one year especially the way you
handled the labour issue and the
raw material supply related
contracts has put us in a lot of
trouble. I have therefore
transferred many of the projects
that were under your direct
authority to the others. Your
designation also is changing as per
orders from the head office. The
HR team will be in touch with you
regarding this."
Chandru stared at the email.
He just could not understand what
to make of it. He failed to
comprehend it completely. He
rose from his seat and marched
straight towards Baweja's office. By
then Baweja had left. "Some
emergency and boss left", said the
secretary. She was not sure when he
would return. Meanwhile Chandru
got a call from Maneet Singh. "We
have to discuss the process sir," Singh
said. "What process?" shouted
Chandru.
"Sir, I am sorry, you did not know.
But I was told that you were
informed. Your designation and the
job description have gone through
some changes. We have to discuss
the various details relating to that",
said Singh.
Later that night at 7:30 pm at a
restaurant, Baweja was dining with
his colleague and friend Harpreet
Minhas from the Marketing division.
"I had a tough time today
54
N
October 2014
communicating a bad news to a
subordinate. I still tried to do it in
my own style and put it across subtly.
I made an attempt to mix the good
news with the bad. That is the way
to do it", he said.
Minhas looked at him. "Chandru
was upset by the way you
communicated the news".
"So you know. Good! Baweja
looked at him. Whichever way I
communicated, I would have hurt
him. But I tried to make it pleasant.
I believe it is better to focus on the
strengths than the challenges. It will
take some time to sink in. Poor
fellow! He should have seen this
coming. I am surprised at him for
being upset".
Minhas
continued.
"Baweja, I understand that
What's all this! Why could you not
say it on my face? Why didn't you
discuss all this first with me?"
Baweja looked at him and asked
him to calm down. "Chandru
whatever I told you were true. I trust
you a lot and I want you to realize
that I have tried to focus on the
positives only. However there were
some negatives and I felt that it had
to be communicated. Hence the
email."
"Baweja, I am too upset by this
decision. And I am not sure if I can
trust you anymore. "
"Chandru, I always focus on the
positive. I say the good things. The
bad things are around you and I am
not comfortable
sharing the
you focused on the
positives. I do that too. But
sometimes I think I should just
communicate the core reason
straight in the beginning. May be I
am wrong."
"Minhas, you are wrong. If I
broke the news in person instead of
emailing him, he would have tried to
defend himself and would have gone
on and on with his explanations. The
decision has been taken. I focused
consciously on his positives, I am
sure it would not have come too
hard on him. I also left office early
today and have avoided his calls all
day. I want this news to sink in first".
negatives. I still want you to
remember the little chat we had.
That is more important. You are
upset. But things will get better.
Now, let us end that on this note. I
have very important work to do".
Chandru wanted to respond but
realized that Baweja was not
interested in continuing the
conversation. He left the room.
"He is upset. But it is only natural.
Anyway he will realize that I have
been really kind to him in this
matter," thought Baweja.
That evening Minhas met him.
"Baweja, I heard that Chandru is
quitting. Are you aware about that?"
Baweja looked at him. "I do not
think he will quit. He is upset. But I
think even if he did, I have
communicated the fact to the best
of my ability".
The next day:
Sometime after 1:30 pm, Baweja
heard his office door open. In barged
Chandramouli. "You called for me?
■
CASE STUDY
R
akesh Baweja is not right at
all. He has committed the
mistake at many counts, such
as;
1. Appreciative enquiry is an
important tool for realizing the
potential of an employee into
deliverables. Focusing on the
positive elements of an employee is
great wisdom but it's doesn't mean
that if a person is about to fall, the
manager should keep mum till
either his bones or the wall is
broken. Managers must step in to
provide constructive and timely
feedback to the team members to
avoid the failure. Baweja did not
realize the lapses on his part towards
the performance gap of Chandru
till his managers communicated him
emphatically. Even after that he
conveyed the message in a much
calibrated form as if he feared that
Chandru may react and challenge
him. Baweja should understand that
output of performance review or
evaluation is not the news in terms
of good or bad, it has holistic
purpose and part of the
organizational process is to enhance
the individual and organizational
effectiveness to meet its stated
objectives.
2. Rakesh doesn't know how to
communicate
and
share
performance feedback with his
direct reports. He said that Chandru
had been informing him of all the
critical decisions, he used to take.
In such a situation, if results do not
fall in line, the first responsibility
should be owned by the manager,
which Baweja didn't. His approach
in communication to Chandru is
something like one step forward and
two steps backward. He has messed
the contents of constructive
feedback about performance by
mixing personal matters about the
choice of dinner, etc., to please him
despite the fact that it is irrelevant
at that point of time. Contrary to
Baweja, Chandru appears to be
more focused on the objective of
the meeting and finish his task for
the day.
3. There is a big divide in his tone
and tenor between verbal
communication and written one,
■
which he sent though the mail. This
is the sign of a weak manager, like
Baweja, who lacks the courage to
share the complete message
assertively and be open for
discussion. During the last
communication, he should have had
the courage to speak out clearly and
also given fair opportunity to
Chandru to respond. It is ridiculous
that half of the message he
conveyed verbally and then the
other half through e-mail. He also
runs away to avoid facing Chandru
and also avoids his call.
This case study reflects a
situation when a manager fails to
communicate the performance
feedback to his subordinate who is
a high potential employee. This
results in poor performance and
business loss to the company.
Following are the weak linkages of
communication between the
employee and the manager;
G
Lack of common understanding
of organization's goals and priorities
G
Lack of clear expectations
between employee and manager
and agreements thereof
G
Casual approach in place of
structured method to share
performance review & evaluation
output
G
Style of communication pattern
in form of good-bad-good sandwich,
which doesn't carry any clear
message
Baweja called Chandru in his
office to communicate a certain
important
message
about
performance, which has impacted
the organization adversely and in
turn the organization has decided
to implement some corrective
actions in form changing his job
profile and designation. As a
manager, he should also convey that
he is part of this decision, being the
manager. Finally, he should have
concluded the discussion to suggest
Chandru that he needs to introspect
seriously and move forward by
accepting the reality on the ground.
He should empathize as a manager
but clearly deliver the message to
carry the desired impact.
Ravi Mishra
Regional HR Head - South Asia & Middle
East, Birla Carbon
A postgraduate in Social Work (MSW)
from J. K. Institute of Social Sciences,
Lucknow, he has been associated with
Human Resource Management in
diversified organizations such as,
Nicholas Piramal Group, Mardia Group,
Bihar Caustic & Chemicals, UltraTech
Cement. He is currently working with
Birla Carbon as Regional HR Head South Asia & Middle East, . Mishra has
good exposure of working in a crosscultural environment and capabilities
of building teams and getting the best
out of it with maturity of
understanding business perspectives,
linkages and strategic orientation in
actions in people management.
October 2014
N
55
CASE STUDY
T
Santosh Rai
DGM-HR & IR, L&T Special Steels &
Heavy Forgings, Hazira, Surat (Guj.)
In a career spanning 16 years in Human
Resources and Industrial Relations, Rai
has successfully anchored various
productivity improvements and
manpower rationalization initiatives
including job evaluations. He has also
practiced innovations in talent
acquisition.
56
N
October 2014
here
is
a
common
phenomenon wherein the
process of feedback is treated
as ritual in organizations. In general,
feedback is given in the form of
standard templates on fixed
periodicity and its effectiveness is
largely dependent on the individual's
persona. This kind of tailor made
and ritualistic approach damages the
effectiveness of the feedback process.
Feedback is an ongoing process and
it should follow the philosophy of
'Here & Now' and it should be highly
objective. In this case, Rakesh Baweja
is suffering from the generic
syndrome wherein in most cases,
while giving feedback, superiors tend
to talk only positive things about the
person, and try to establish its linkage
with
his
expectations
on
performance. In such a situation, the
employee becomes highly confused
or he feels that whether he should
continue with his present way of
working. Thus the very purpose of
feedback loses its charm.
The
action
taken
on
Chandramouli will have irreversible
effect on his performance and his
future perspective about his role.
Chandramouli, who happened to be
an empowered employee who took
decisions for the company on critical
issues, will be highly demotivated,
especially by the way his case has
been handled, He would surely feel
that he has been punished for all his
good intentions.
In my view, there are two aspects
that are going to come into the
framework of the entire issue of
communication that are the role of
the manager and the culture of the
organization. It was the failure of his
manager who was unable to give
proper direction and timely and
objective feedback to a sincere and
committed employee. Similarly, it is
the culture of the organization which
encourages employees to take risk,
learn from mistakes and to
collaborate for superior performance.
There were some inherent flaws
in the communication methodology
adopted by Baweja. The expectation
setting should be the beginning of
the communication process and it
should have taken place much before
the initiation of the actual
communication process. Baweja
could have gone for various
intermittent course correction
sessions in between wherein he could
have given constructive feedback to
Chandramouli to improve his way
of working, and this could have
helped him to maintain his
enthusiasm and performance level.
In this case, the biggest setback in
the communication process was
dishonesty in communication, which
has led to mistrust. Baweja tried to
mix-up the good and the bad news
whereas in reality there was no good
news to be shared. Further to this,
immediately after sharing all the
good things, a letter was sent to
Chandramouli with various allegation
and disciplinary actions which was
contrary to the proceedings of the
actual discussion. This only created
total mistrust between the two. In
my opinion, Baweja should have
communicated with critical incidences
of mistakes made by Chandramouli,
which impacted business in negative
terms. He should have given proper
hearing with empathy to the
perspective of Chandramouli.
Principles of natural justice should
have been applied before proceeding
for any action. This approach could
have helped the management to think
on an alternative action instead of
initiating strong disciplinary actions.
Even if the proper process of honest
communication had been followed,
it would have minimized the adverse
impact
of
the
action
on
Chandramouli and the moral of the
organization.
When we give feedback on a
regular basis, we must realize that
feedback is neither to please nor to
agonize or demoralize. Its proper
periodicity and objectivity can build
a high performing team and create
a highly productive workplace.
In the entire
process of
communication, the PDCA cycle
plays the vital role, i.e., setting of
expectations, feedback on course
corrections followed by objective
feedback on the outcome, and this
should be an inherent part of the
entire value chain of organization as
HC
it prime cultural aspect.
■
GUEST COLUMN
The introspective leader
BY RITIKA BASU
I
t's human nature, you tell
children not to stick their finger
into an electric socket and the
first thing they do is stick their hand
into the socket! It is said experience is
a hard teacher. She gives the test first
and the lessons afterwards. A lot of
lessons learnt in life are through
directly experiencing them. Which is
why right or wrong on the job
experience is invaluable. It tends to
reinforce what you may have heard
from others, studied in management
courses or read in leadership books.
Our reactions to the same scenarios
vary and we each have our own way
of dealing with situations. In keeping
with that logic, a leader who is always
learning, adapting and evolving is
likely to be a more impactful, then
one who has a singular leadership
style.
It is, but let me ask you as a
leader how many times have you
introspected about your leadership
style?
Listening and empathy is
paramount
Multi-listening is like doing
something you know isn't good for
you but continuing to do it anyway.
One of my key lessons as a leader has
been to listen, intently and singularly.
Not to what the person is saying but
to listen for what is unsaid. Unless
you really engage you will be unable
to understand and empathize. And
empathy is paramount to being a
good leader.
Handling cross functional
teams tests you as a leader
When there are teams spread across
■
multiple geographies, managing or
even interfacing with distributed
teams requires more care. As a
leader it is important to encourage
work style conversations very early
on so that boundaries are clarified
up front. Over communication in
these scenarios is always more
beneficial than under
communication.
Now let's add the next level of
complexity, you have a distributed
team and they are multidisciplinary. The digital revolution
has been the next big change to our
social fabric after the industrial
revolution. Providing digital
solutions require the unique
amalgamation of left-brain and
right-brain talent. So as leaders in
the digital world we need to
manage teams that have a plethora
of varied skills and people who are
wired very differently from each
other. Handling cross-functional
teams truly tests you. You will find
that you now need to motivate
various members of the team
differently, as their motivation
triggers differ.
The tools remain pretty much
the same, compensations, rewards,
recognitions, step- up roles. It is
when you use them and how you
tweak them to each individual need
that makes you a better leader.
Junior folks on the team are hungry
to learn and gain experience even if
that means more hours. Middle
management responds better to
predictability and steady growth.
Senior team members look for
respect and acknowledgment of the
experience they bring to the table.
Control is easy, influence is
a whole different ball
game
The final skill today's leaders need to
develop is the art of influence,
compared to the older concept of
control. The concept of having a
team reporting into you and then
driving them towards your vision of
success has morphed a bit. Your
cross functional team will have
people with not only different
skillsets but very different mindsets.
They will come together to deliver a
particular project and then move on
to new teams. So your 'control' over
them is transient. Enter, the need to
'influence'. People tend to agree
with your vision when they believe it
aligns to their own. And this can
only be done when you understand
their context and driving factors.
People tend to agree with your
vision when they believe it aligns to
their own. And this can only be
done when you understand their
context and driving factors. Being a
successful leader requires a
beginner's mindset. Unless you
learn, evolve and adapt you are
unlikely to increase your
HC
effectiveness.
Ritika Basu is a Director, Program Management at
SapientNitro based out of Gurgaon. With over 18
years of experience in managing large scale digital
& technology programs within the Financial
Services & Public Sector industries, Ritika is
currently playing the Regional Delivery Lead role
working for North American customers for the
SapientNitro BU.
October 2014
N
57
LIFE BEYOND WORK
The putter
"One can play for years and still not feel confident about the game.
It's like life," says Col. Harmit Shethi, an avid golfer, for whom
playing golf is a way to unwind and also utilize his time.
T
he work of an Army personal is a combination of missions, tasks and responsibilities - all in constant
motion. With the daunting task to ensure a secure life for the civilian counterparts, the lives of these
individuals are in a constant state of flux. Col. Harmit Sethi, now a professional having quit Army, shares his
tryst with Golf.
Initially, as a tankman, he had to spend months in the deserts in Rajasthan. It was here that he decided to try golf
as a means to beat the monotony. Well, it wasn't easy, knowing that fact that there were no greens, only desert.
"However, we procured some coir foot mats and started the process of practicing. Soon we realized that we would
also need "Greens for Putting". This was obviously not possible. As tankmen, we used to have hundreds of liters of
used oil from the tanks which was disposed of. We started using the oil to firm up some areas and made "Putting
browns" instead. Voila - we now could hit the balls using the coir mats and do putting on the browns. This is how golf
as a game started for me," quips Col. Sethi.
Now an enthusiastic golfer, the game helps him unwind after the grind. He feels rejuvenated with every game,
every put. According to him, Golf is a mind game. "It is said that if you want to close a billion dollar deal and don't
know what kind of a person you are dealing with play golf with him /her or their teams. You will understand their
ethos of life and will know exactly how to negotiate," he asserts.
Extremely passionate about the game, he draws parallel with life. "This is game where you plan from your first
shot and play. But as you keep moving the game never goes the way you had planned. You keep changing your plan
as you move," he quips. Also, he considers golf as "Work in Progress". "One can play for years and still not feel
confident about the game. It's like life. I try and catch up on whenever possible on the YouTube and other social
media sites, the best techniques available to improve my shots," he shares.
He candidly confesses that a golf course and a golf club have today become an oasis of pampering. "It is fun all
the way. The stress starts when your mobile rings "wife". Then the office and the grind and then back to the golf
course to distress. That's a cycle," he laughs. However, he does believe that a golf
buddy will go to any length to help you at your work as well.
Notwithstanding his endearing love for the game,
Col. Sethi shares how the game also help him stay
connected to the world and also offers an
opportunity to play at any place in the world.
"One can spend a whole lot of money buying
golf gear and clothes - so it keeps you welldressed. It is a competitive game and at
times friends play with stakes.
Earning a few bucks even a few is
great for your ego. Being out in the
open with the trees and the greenery
can do wonders to your health," he
affirms.
He shares a piece of advice for his
hard pressed for time fellow mates,
"Finding time is not an issue. I am
sure you must have seen Barack
Obama and other world leaders
playing golf. If he can find the time, I
am sure mere mortals like us have
enough time on our hands," he
concludes.
58
N
October 2014
■
LIFE BEYOND WORK
Correlating
business and golf
I
I
I
I
I
In golf, people of widely differing abilities
compete against each other similar to a
business environment.
People of any age can play it.
In a four-hour game, players get enough time
to talk shop as only a small portion of time
is actually spent hitting the ball.
As a sport, golf offers a good test of character.
It rewards players who are calm under
pressure, never lose their temper and think
strategically. These are all virtues in business,
too.
Golf demands scrupulous honesty. In this
game, it is easy to cheat when no one is
watching. But it is unacceptable words tend to
spread fast. This is true for business as well.
GOLF ETIQUETTES
What people can expect during a round of golf, from
beginning to end:
Getting started
G
G
G
G
G
G
A good caddie can make the round more enjoyable by giving you hints
that might lower your score.
He can provide information on yardage, club selection, reading the
greens and the layout of the course.
It's often a good idea to finish warming up by hitting a few soft wedge
shots before heading for the practice green and hitting a few putts.
Don't hit hundreds of balls and leave your game on the practice tee.
Check the scorecard to learn any local rules.
If you are playing companions suggest a match, it's a good idea to
make sure everyone is comfortable with the stakes.
The game begins
G
G
G
G
G
G
When your group is not keeping up with the pace of play of the group
in front of you:
Walk at a reasonable speed between shots.
Begin planning your next shot as you approach the ball by studying
the strength and direction of the wind.
When you reach your ball, check the lie, select your club, visualize
your swing and shot, and then play your shot.
From the time you select your club until you actually hit your shot,
you should take no more than 30 to 45 seconds.
If you aren't ready to play when it is your turn, encourage one of your
fellow players to play.
On the green
G
TIPS FOR WANNABE GOLFER
G
G
Nobody knows golf completely. Start playing and keep
improving. It's a way of life.
It is not a strength game. Old guys and lovely ladies play
it with complete ease. Learn the basics. Basics can only be
learnt once you reach the driving range.
Think. Think what you are about to do and how will you do
it in your mind. You will be amazed that your body can
understand your mind - if you have thought about it.
G
G
G
G
G
G
Start playing and show up at a golf course at least twice
in a week.
■
Don't step on your fellow players putting lines
If your ball is on a player's line, volunteer to mark the ball.
Do not stand where you might distract a fellow player and don't move.
Don't make any noise when your fellow player is preparing to putt.
Hold the flagstick at arm's length so the flag doesn't flutter in the
breeze, and make sure your shadow doesn't fall across the hole or line.
Loosen the bottom of the flagstick so it doesn't stick when you try
and remove it by pulling it straight up after the other player has
putted.
The flagstick should be removed right after the player has hit the ball.
If you lay down the flagstick, lay it off the green to prevent doing
any damage to the green.
After everyone has putted out, immediately walk to the next tee.
Source: http://www.pga.com/golf-instruction/instruction-feature/
fundamentals/golf-etiquette
October 2014
N
59
LIFE BEYOND WORK
Worried your investment is suffering because the ceo is spending too much time on the links? Don’t be. We took the handicaps of ten golfers among
the execs running America’s 50 most valuable companies and compared them with their share prices, and-surprise!-the better golfers also tended
to have better-performing stocks. The results dovetail with a 2010 study from two Spanish economists who found that CEOs who play golf earn
more than their non-golfing peers, and the better they play, the higher their pay.
GOLF ASSOCIATIONS IN INDIA
Governing bodies of Sport
1. Indian Golf Union (IGU) apex body of Golf affiliated to IGF
2. Professional Golf Tour of India (PGTI); the controlling body
for professional golf in India
3. Women Golf Association of India (WGAI); women pro golf
organization of India
4. Indian Pitch and Putt Union (IPPU); governing body of Pitch
and Putt Golf in India member of IPPA
5. Paralympic Golf Association of India (PGAI); organization
for golfers with disabilities in India
Golf Industry Association
1. Asia Golf Industry Show Hosted by CII
2. Indian Golf Industry Association (IGIA); Golf Industry Group to
develop and support different industries of Golf and allied
business
3. Golf Course Superintendents & Managers Association of India
(GCSMAI); objective is to assist all golf course developers/
owners/entrepreneurs running golf courses.
Leading Golf Event Organizers
1. Rishi Narain Golf Management (RNGM)
2. Sports & Leisure Worldwide (SLW)
3. Brandon de Souza Management Services (BDMS)
60
N
October 2014
■
LIFE BEYOND WORK
RESEARCH SHOWS
CEOS WHO PLAY GOLF AND
ARE GOOD AT IT!
John Watson - CEO - Chevron
Ian Read- CEO - Pfizer
Jay Fishman
- CEO- Travelers Companies
Jeffery Immelt - CEO- GE Electric
Steve Ballmer - Ex CEO- Microsoft
Economists Gueorgui Kolev and Robin Hogarth
at Pompeu Fabra University in Barcelona
studied the links between the golf handicaps,
corporate performance and remuneration of
CEOs. They concluded that "golfers earn more
than non-golfers and pay increases with golfing
ability". Regardless of corporate performance,
CEOs who played well earned 17 per cent more
on average than those who played poorly or
not at all.
In study in the US, it was found that 90% of
Fortune 500 CEOs played golf. Another one
said that almost a quarter of the 25 million
golfers in the US are top management
executives and 80% of the top executives
agreed that a game of golf is an important
business development tool.
DID YOU KNOW
Russi Mody's
contribution to golf has to be legendary in India. At a time the sport
was looking for messiahs, Mody embraced it and turned it into a culture of sorts.
Jack Welch,
former chief executive of General Electric, believed in
test of character. It may be the only opinion he shares with P.G.
Wodehouse, who wrote of golf that "in no other walk of life does
the cloven hoof so quickly display itself.
Mr Welch's managers were expected to play golf with clients,
and he insisted that the candidates to succeed him as CEO play a
round of golf with the board members. Backslapping on the golf
course remains a vital part of the GE way.
golf
as a
America's most exclusive club, the Augusta National
Golf Club in Georgia, addmitted its first two women
members: Condoleezza Rice, the former secretary of state,
and Darla Moore, a leveraged-buyout banker in 2012, it
When
created a lot of buzz. The National's 300 or so members currently include the CEOs
past and present of many of America's largest companies.
■
October 2014
N
61
A POINT OF VIEW
Changing jobs:
How often and for how long?
BY GAUTAM BRAHMA
W
henever senior
corporate personnel are
asked for their views on
attrition they usually say
something along the following
lines: People should approach
jobs the way Warren Buffet
approaches investments. They
should find a good company and
stay with it for a long time
without worrying too much about
immediate earnings. Good
companies give opportunities for
learning that increase a person's
worth. Job hopping may give
breadth but not depth of
knowledge. Besides, employers do
not value resumes that show
frequent job changes, as they
want people who, once hired and
trained, will stay for a long time
and pay back. Loyalty is a virtue.
Professionals who do change
jobs to build their career,
however, offer very different
advice. It usually runs along the
following lines: Companies woo
professionals only during the
hiring process. Once hired, the
employee is not compensated, in
subsequent years, on worth and
contribution but on
considerations like equity i.e. how
much can this person be paid
without causing discomfort
among the peers and seniors.
Administrative convenience is
given a higher value than
performance and contribution
while deciding compensation and
promotion. People working for
62
N
October 2014
other companies appear more
valuable than those already hired.
Companies evaluating potential
hires look for variety in
experience and feel safe if the
person has already been hired
earlier by more than one wellknown company in recent years.
Their logic is that if this person
was found good enough to be
hired by companies A and B, we
are probably not making a
mistake if we do the same. Longstaying loyalists are seen as
mediocre who probably cannot
find another job. One has to look
out for oneself as the employer is
not going to do it.
The truth probably lies
somewhere in between. As for
the first viewpoint, a long stay in
a good company may build longterm worth but one may have to
change several jobs to find that
good company. As to the second
viewpoint, there is a seasonality in
every company's operations and
unless one stays long enough one
may not only not see all the
seasons one may not be able to
confirm that one is competent to
meet the special requirements of
each aspect of one's job.
If one assumes that the job
market for professionals is a
perfect one the actual pattern of
stay durations may offer guidance
on what could be the optimum
pattern of job stays. Of course we
all know that the job market is
not perfect. Employees do not
know everything about
prospective employers, and the
reverse is also true. There are
several other distortions as well,
for instance the cost of changing
jobs (for employees) and the cost
of new hiring (for employers).
However if one persists with the
assumption of perfection the valid
question is: how long do
employees stay in jobs?
Unfortunately, as in many other
HR-related matters hard
empirical data does not appear to
be readily available for India.
There is a lot of anecdotal
material. Even that often relates
to the IT & ITES sectors which
have seen both growth and
related hiring and retention
challenges.
However we do have fairly
detailed data from the US Bureau
of Labour Statistics which, while
obviously not applicable to India,
may throw light on job change
patterns which could be generic.
The latest report released on
September 18, 2014 shows the
following: The median tenure for
people in the age group 25 to 34
years was three years while the
median tenure for those in the
age group 55 to 64 years was
slightly over 10 years. This would
suggest that people change jobs
every three years till they are 35
and then stick on for 10 years
before the next change. One
could interpret it to mean that it
takes three job changes to find
■
A POINT OF VIEW
the 'good' company that one can then entrust
with building one's capabilities and long-term
worth.
The same US-BLS data also showed that the
median stays in years doubled in the case of
professions like Management, Architecture, and
Engineering. This suggests that for highly
qualified people fewer job changes are required
to find the right employer and longer stays are
required to develop demonstrable competence in
the correspondingly more complex jobs. Of
course, these are very broad generalizations and
have to be seen alongside some other empirical
studies, though done on smaller samples, that
show that in the US employees who stay for
more than two years on an average with their
employers are likely to earn 50 per cent less, in
terms of lifetime earnings, when compared to
colleagues who have, on the average, shorter
stays (Forbes, 22 June 2014). One would tend to
lean more towards the BLS data but in any case
this is not Indian data.
One will have to wait for some smart
researcher to trawl LinkedIn data to determine
average and median job stays for professionals at
different levels in different industries before
similar conclusions can be drawn for India. This
would ideally need to be supplemented by micro
studies of stay-related data in specific industries.
An excellent example of one such study in the
maritime industry appeared this year in the
AMET Maritime Journal June 2014 issue. The
researchers, C. Peters and S. Neumann have
done an exhaustive survey and record-based
study of job durations over the years and also
determined reasons for trends. It provides an
excellent reference point for someone planning a
career in that industry. If only there were such
studies available for different industries in India,
it would help both employers and employees.
Even though conclusive hard data is not
available for India, it does appear that if
someone continues to show short stays on the
CV past her mid-30s, prospective employers
need to be circumspect and the individual
herself needs to reflect on the drivers of job
change. Maybe she is not doing the right
diligence in identifying employers. Maybe she is
not spending time on leveraging the learning
opportunities provided by the different aspects
HC
of her current job. Maybe both!
Yourr Workers constitute
c
80 % of yourr
Man
npower. The
ey can Mak
ke or Break
the Orga
anization ……..
…
Workers Traainingg
(in HIND
DI) - at your site
s
Our 45 Worke
ers Trainin
ng Module
es
includ
de:

Beha
avioral, Attitud
dinal
Prog
grammes

Train
ning on Improv
vement Tools like 5S, KAIZEN
N,
7 QC
C Tools, Quality
y Circle, Zero Defect
D
etc.

Train
ning on Cost Reduction, Wastage
W
Contro
ol,
Prod
ductivity, Quality
y & Safety etc.

Train
ning for Union Leaders
L
Development
ndly mail your Training queries
q
at:
Kin
h
[email protected]
hrdc.delhi@g
gmail.com
Dr R K Sahu
u (+ 91- 9818300668)
Ms Pragya Bharti (+ 91- 782
M
27633469)
Huma
an Resourc
ce Developm
ment Centrre
D - 88, 2nd
2
Floor, Lajpat Nagar, PART-1, New
N
Delhi -11002
24
Phon
ne: + 91-11-2981
16980 / 81 / 82 www.hrdc.in
Our 585+ clients includ
de:
■
Selff
W also condu
We
uct customized
d Training
Prog
grammes as pe
er specific req
quirements of
the organization
Gautam Brahma is a management consultant. He can be reached at
[email protected]
&
18
rs y 295000 ++Mandays
M
585 ++ Client
17Year
Yea
ars295000
Mandays Trg y585
Clientts
October 2014
N
63
PERSONA
THE
MULTIFACETED
LEADER !
BY SHILPA SHREE
64
N
October 2014
PERSONA
limbing to the top
demands strength,
whether it is to the top
of the Mount Everest
or to the top of your
career," said the APJ
Abdul Kalam, former President of
India and a very accomplished
scientific thinker. To excel in your
career, there is no doubt that one
requires perseverance. However, to
change gears and to dive in to the
uncharted waters and also emerge
successful, takes mettle.
Meet Rajiv Dutta, Director Talent
Acquisition, Convergys - India and
China, whose professional journey
has traversed several new
innovative paths to reach where it
is today. He has enjoyed being at
the helm of action when both the
country and the industry were going
through changing times. He is a
positive-minded and actionoriented professional whose
primary focus has been on the
human factor in HR practices.
“C
Dutta benefitted from the potential
opportunity in business-centric
Mumbai, which led him to win major
industrial clients such as Hindustan
Lever, Shaw Wallace and Nicolas
Piramal among others.
Success breeds certainty; Dutta
describes how this propelled him.
"This wave of success created in me
a tremendous sense of confidence
Driven by three principles in life -things don't come
easy, work hard to succeed and work harder to stay
successful, Rajiv Dutta's multifaceted abilities has given
interesting dimensions to his career…
in my team and what I could achieve
here. Twelve months was a short
chapter but it earned me a name
that I was asked to join Electrolux
as the Head of Corporate Sales for
India," he quips. His formative years
in sales were peppered with the
influences of his seniors and boss
who encouraged him to dream big.
Foundational lessons
A leader doesn't get to the top
without knowing the fundamentals
and having worked from the
grassroots level. Dutta's career in
HR came through an eventful
journey and significant stint in the
Sales. Soon after India opened its
markets to the world and businesses
began to get a true taste of
competition in a dynamic
environment, Dutta kick started his
career with Blow Plast as a costing
professional.
"The push to meet targets and
the daily grind toughened me and
helped me build my focus on what
mattered from the get go. Blow Plast
was the leader in that industry. In
the first four months, I managed to
earn amazing incentives," he
reminiscences.
His sales experience helped him
move through MNC companies and
brands from Gillette, where he
managed Braun's retail distribution
to IFB consumer durables where
he transitioned from selling directly
to consumers to selling B2B. With
the change as the Head of
Corporate Sales for Maharashtra,
■
Central America in 24 months. "I
also got the opportunity to develop
channels like campus and the "Train
& Hire" model which created a
radical shift in the way the BPO
industry hires," emphasizes Dutta.
His first foray into the IT
industry was when he took up the
role at IBM GPS in the year 2012 as
a Sr. Project Staffing Professional,
Turn right for HR
managing end-to-end staffing for
large focus accounts. During this
stint, he helped in staffing critical
positions within timing and costefficient channels.
This spell excited him enough to
seek out this industry, which
brought him to his current position
at Convergys. Drawing from his sales
experience to throw light on new
HR approaches emerging in the
Business Process Outsourcing
industry, he shares, "The BPO
industry has revolutionized the way
hiring is done today. There is a
definite shift from traditional
"Communication - the human
connection - is the key to personal
and career success," said the
pioneering motivational speaker,
Paul J Meyer. Dutta's career turns
factors in this aspect very
well. His HR chapter started
when he moved to IBM as
the zonal head for hiring,
Leadership style: Servant leadership-enables
managing frontline resource
the right people to do the right things
hiring for north and east
India. "My major push to
Current professional goal: make a difference
switch from sales to HR was
- globally
not just linked to my desire
Favorite book: Bhagwad Gita
to broaden my field of
expertise, but also to move
Favorite music artist: Kishore Kumar
from dealing with consumer
Favorite quote: Be Here Now
durables to dealing with
people," Dutta explains.
Life is… full of surprises
And the HR stint turned
Family is…biggest support and not to be
out to be a rewarding
taken for granted
experience with immensely
interesting involvement in
I strongly believe in… teamwork
new areas. He moved on to
I deal with setbacks by moving on
become resource allocation
3 things I never leave home without - phone,
and deployment leader for
IBM GPS, handling the
wallet, promise to be back soon
delivery of over 3,000
On a Sundays, I… play tennis
resources in India and
RAPID FIRE
October 2014
N
65
PERSONA
methods of headhunting to a
more volume-driven yet
marketing-influenced type of
approaches." "I feel that my
understanding of sales, targets
and the target audience will
help in this new and fledgling
world of BPOs," he adds.
Symbiotic career moves
In brief
NAME : Rajiv Dutta
TITLE : Director Talent Acquisition
AGE : 43 years
ORGANIZATION : Convergys, India and China
involved
in
HR-Talent
Acquisition such as recruiting,
HR, training and operations
increases likelihood of
success, Dutta explains,
talking about HR practices as
a whole. "Effective Return on
Investment is when the
person receives world-class
training, performs well on the
job, stay and grows a career,"
he says.
Moving from different sectors
EXPERIENCE : 20 years
in work can be an advantage
and many concepts and ideas
YEARS IN HR : 8 years
can be cross-pollinated to
Learning on the road
achieve best results feels Dutta.
Travel is valued not just for
EDUCATION : B.Com Honors, Intermediate
"Bringing in specific resultthe sights it may provide, but
Degree from Institute of Cost
oriented approaches and
to how it changes the
& Works Accountants of India
concepts such as marketability,
traveller. Dutta says that his
quality, target profiling and
travels both domestic ones
distribution components of the
and international have taught
value chain to the HR practices in
him a tremendous sense of respect
II/III cities where the retention ratio
the BPO industry is a method that
for various cultures. He enjoys
was higher.
the latter can benefit a lot," he
observing people, thinking and
Another lesson from the Sales
opines. In fact, he correlated it with
learning from how different people
chapter was to keep patience while
an instance that he recalls vividly.
react to same situations.
launching a new product with
When BPO companies were hiring
Speaking about this he says, "In
constant improvement after
from A-grade colleges in Delhi and
the ITeS space, for example, people
customer feedback. It is a practice
the offer to join ratio was dismally
in North India are more inclined to
that is crucial even for HR practices,
low. A take away from that, being
travel when compared to people
and this helped him accomplish
given the talent profile needed, it
from the North-East or the South.
many feat at IBM GPS.
was better to attract talent from Tier
This is one of the reasons why the
Getting all the stakeholders
ITeS industry has boomed in the
North. This is also partly because
the surrounding states also provide
excellent talent."
Dutta considers it important to
I
Gaps that HR organizations need to
understand the history and culture
bridge in India Inc.
of any place. He stresses on the
G Most organizations tend to have a
need to establish trust and blend in
target-driven approach and that there
before even attempting change.
is an opportunity to increase focus
"Overall, all human cultures want
on developing strategic skills relevant
to conduct business with honesty
and integrity. These form the
to what the industry requires.
underpinnings of a good business,"
G We
can benefit from more
he expresses. His love for travel
collaboration between education and
manifests in every aspect of his life
industry on the same lines as the
and is so well established among his
ones being driven by NASSCOM. India has the capacity to meet a global
friends that he is now the "go to"
demand for quality talent, but sustaining this ability requires focus, planning
person to ask for travel advice and
and partnership.
best way to deal with people.
PERSPECTIVE
Pitfalls in designing engagement practices
G BPO organizations need to continue making sustained investments in talent
development for their first-level managers - the team leaders, as they are the
ones who motivate and drive performance of the frontliners, the agents. Apart
from competitive compensation and benefits, and rewards and recognition
cycles, organizations need to invest consistently in team leader talent
development programs.
I
66
N
October 2014
Drawing
roots
strength
from
When Dutta switched from sales to
HR, he was amidst a personal
challenge, the loss of his father, who
was a source of strength for him.
Terming it as the biggest challenge
of his life, Dutta feels that managing
■
PERSONA
both the personal and
professional change took every
bit of belief and faith that he
had.
He attributes his ability to
face any such challenges to
his upbringing. Not being
pampered despite being the
only child of his parents taught
him to be grounded and to
value
resources
and
relationships. "My father has
been a tremendous source of
inspiration. He taught me life's
lessons at an early stage - that
things don't come easy, work
hard to succeed and work
harder to stay successful.
These guidelines honed my
pro-active personality I
believe," recalls Dutta. "So
don't just surround yourselves
with the best and the brilliant
keep those who believe in the
team's success close to you,"
he adds.
Dutta also managed to
keep these values in tact both
in his professional and
education life. He recalls how
during his costing days, he
would surround himself with
brilliant minds such as his
teachers and peers as he
considered it to be a sure way
to improve.
have evolved, people have not
changed much for millennia
and
have
the
same
motivations, fears, joys and
react how they would have
reacted in any time. "Keeping
business and people close to
the heart is what makes the
most impact. Happy people
make
productive
organizations," he stresses.
In a career that spans over
two decades, Dutta opines that
in
India
Inc.,
most
organizations tend to have a
A mysterious benefactor writes you a check for
target-driven
approach.
Rs 10,00,000 and said, "Help me solve a
However,
there
is
an
opportunity to increase focus
problem!" … what would you say?
on developing strategic skills
Some problems cost money and some just come
relevant to what the industry
with a subsidy.
requires.
Corporates with special
What's one thing you're deeply proud of - but
regard to the HR sector could
would never put on your résumé?
benefit
from
more
My achievements with my family
collaboration
between
education and industry on the
Is there something that people consistently ask
same lines as the ones being
for your advice on?
driven by NASSCOM, he
Where to travel and how to deal with people
reckons. "India has the
capacity to meet a global
When was the last time you astonished yourself?
demand for quality talent, but
I have stopped counting…
sustaining this ability requires
What do you value most: free time, recognition,
focus,
planning
and
partnership," he asserts.
or money?
As for BPO organizations,
I value the recognition I get in my free time,
Dutta
envision the need to
especially when I get paid for it.
focus on making sustained
Putting relationships
Are you living your life purpose - or still searching?
investments
in
talent
development for their first-level
first
Living it and loving it.
managers - the team leaders.
Being a strong proponent of
BPO organizations need to
family, he believes it to be a
more. He also indulges in outdoor
invest consistently in team leader
fundamental unit of the society.
activities with his children. "I like
talent development programs as they
Spending time with his family to help
to travel with them and take short
drive the agents who are the
them imbibe some of his values and
trips mostly on an unplanned basis.
frontrunners," he explains.
to watch relationships grow and
I also indulge in a lot of outdoor
Dutta is enthusiastic about what
mature within the family unit, is what
sports activities with my children,"
the immediate future holds for him
he gains pleasure from. "If your
he shares.
in his current position in Convergys.
family can't learn to respect you,
He is focusing on his primary task;
then any gain in any other field is
Future in basic core
to create the right conditions for
not worth it. Even the family dog
his HR team to succeed, fearlessly
can tell you how you're doing," he
professional concepts
lead, innovate and be all that they
quips.
Grandiose futuristic visions and
can be. "Goals can sometimes just
His immediate family comprises
strategies would simply be jargon if
be numbers that distract. I think we
of his wife and two teenaged
they don't value the core concepts
need to keep our eyes on why we
children; a daughter and a son. An
feels Dutta. Overhyped visions of a
do what we do and what impact it
avid traveler, Dutta likes to take
tomorrow are really not how he
makes to the business, than just
impromptu short trips with his loved
feels an HR business should be run.
meeting a number target," he
ones as he feels that these trips help
He believes that while the working
concludes.
HC
him connect to his family much
environment and expectations may
■
THE BUZZER ROUND
October 2014
N
67
68
N
October 2014
■
LAW AT WORK
Q&A
I
work in a construction company
in Chennai. The company in
which I work created such
circumstance and imposed such
conditions because of which I could
not attend come to work for a few
days. Now they are also deducting
my wages on account of those
vacations. Can you tell me if they
this deduction on their part is lawful?
Your employer company being an
establishment carrying out works
relating to construction would be
governed by the provisions of the
Payment of Wages Act, 1936 ("Act").
Please note as per Section 7(2)(b)of
the Act, an employer company has the
right to deduct wages of its employees
on account of absence from work as
long as such deductions are
proportional to the wage-period for
which the employee was absent.
However, where such deductions are
on account of conditions imposed by
the employer company, the right to
deduct wages under Section 9 of the
Act would not be available to the
employer company.
The Hon'ble High Court of
Gauhati also took a similar stance in
the case of French Motor Car Co. Ltd.
Workers Union v. French Motor Car
Co. Ltd: (1991)ILLJ107Gau. wherein it
was held that "An employer can deduct
the wages under section 7(2)(b) of the
Act for absence from duty. Absence
from duty by an employee must be of
his own volition and it cannot cover
his absence when he is forced by
circumstances created by the employer
from carrying out his duty.
Accordingly, in the event your
absence from office was not on
account of reasons attributable to you
but attributable to the employer
company, it will not be lawful on their
part to deduct your wages for the
period during which you were absent
from work.
■
I own a small company which is
currently registered with the shops
and establishment act of Delhi. I am
shifting my office to Mumbai so
want to ask you the procedure to
register under the shops and
establishment act applicable to
Mumbai.
The relevant legislation which applies
to establishments in Mumbai is the
Bombay Shops and Establishments
Act, 1948 ("Act"). You may note that
you would be in a position to register
under the Act only after you have a
physical office in Mumbai.
Nevertheless, the process for
registration of an establishment under
the Act is described below:
G
Within thirty (30) days of
commencing your business from the
office in Mumbai, you would be
required to send to the labor
inspector of the local area concerned
a statement in Form A (attached)
together with the prescribed fee;
G
The statement under Form A must
contain the details as required under
Section 7 of the Act, namely, (i) name
of the employer, (ii) postal address of
the establishment, (iii) name of the
establishment, if any, (iv) category of
establishment i.e. commercial
establishment, (v) such other
prescribed particulars.
G
On receipt of the application and
fee, the labor inspector on being
satisfied about the correctness of the
particulars contained in the
application, would register the
establishment in the appropriate part
of the register of establishment in
Form C and would issue a registration
certificate in Form C.
G
You would be required to get the
registration certificate renewed every
year by applying to the labor
inspector in the prescribed form
(Form B) accompanied by the
HC
prescribed fee.
K. V. Singh
Senior Partner, Kochhar & Co.
Krishna Vijay Singh is a senior partner
at Kochhar & Co., one of the leading
and largest law firms in India with
offices at New Delhi, Gurgaon,
Bengaluru, Chennai, Hyderabad,
Mumbai, Dubai, Riyadh, Jeddah,
Singapore, Tokyo and Atlanta (USA).
The firm represents some of the largest
multinational corporations from
North America, Europe, Japan and
India (many of which are Fortune 500
companies) in diverse areas of
corporate and commercial laws.
October 2014
N
69
LAW AT WORK
Should there be a right to
refuse unsafe work?
The Right to Refuse Unsafe Work (the
"Right") as a part of rights governing
occupational health and safety has long
been a subject matter of debate.
However, it has garnered more support
in recent times in light of the growing
awareness amongst workers and rising
worker fatalities. The Right first came
up for consideration in the report of
the Royal Commission, Ontario
(Canada) in the year 1976 on the Health
and Safety of Workers in Mines.
However, as the name suggests the
Right contemplated therein was
restricted in its scope to apply only to
mine workers. The debate on its wider
applicability to include other
workplaces as well gained momentum
in the year 1983 when the Right was
also included under Article 13 of the
Occupational Safety and Health
Convention, 1981 (No. 155), a primary
convention of International Labor
Organisation. The said Article reads as
under:
"A worker who has removed
himself from a work situation which
he has reasonable justification to believe
presents an imminent and serious
danger to his life or health shall be
protected from undue consequences
in accordance with national conditions
and practice."
In theory the aforesaid provision
appears to be absolutely fair and
reasonable. In fact, many would argue
that the Right is an integral part of the
widely accepted principle that it is a
must to ensure that the life and health
of employees comes before the work
of employers. In the Indian context,
right to life and health have been
guaranteed to every Indian citizen
under the Constitution of India. The
Supreme Court in Consumer
Education & Research Centre and
others v. Union of India and others;
(1995) 3 SCC 42, held that the right to
health and medical care to protect one's
health and vigour, while in service or
post-retirement, is a fundamental right
of a worker under Article 21 read with
Articles 39(e), 41, 43, 48-A (of the
Constitution of India) and all related
Articles and fundamental human rights
70
N
October 2014
to make the life of the workman
meaningful and purposeful with dignity
of person. The Supreme Court further
held that the compelling necessity to work
in an industry exposed to health hazards
due to indigence to bread-winning for
himself and his dependents should not
be at the cost of health and vigour of the
workman.
In India, for instance, the applicability
of such a provision could include a right
of women employees to leave their
employer's organization before it gets
dark or unsafe for them to travel back to
home, even if, the same comes at the cost
of the employer's work. Undoubtedly, the
same would put a check on the increasing
number of women harassment cases in
the country but wouldn't it
simultaneously leave scope for a major
abuse of the said provision in their hands?
After all, who wouldn't want to leave for
home early, whether safe or unsafe.
The nature of the Right carries within
itself an inherent scope of abuse by
workers/employees. The right to refuse
work on such a ground can be grossly
misused to refrain from doing many kinds
of works that a worker/employee may
not wish to carry out for reasons other
than safety hazards. The subjectivity of
'safety' or 'dangerous works' leaves scope
for multiple interpretations which can
vary between different individuals and
which would always vary between an
employer and an employee. The recent
stalemate, as reported in Indian Express,
between the management and the
permanent workers (Union members) of
the automobile major Toyota Kirloskar
Motors in Bangalore offers an example
to the said subjectivity where in view of
the workers the working conditions of the
company were unsafe and the harsh
practices of the company were
deteriorating the health conditions of
workers but not according to the
management of the company . However,
this was a case of collective bargaining
where the view regarding unsafe
conditions was taken by a union of
workers.
Perhaps on account of the above
reason Indian legislators decided to
leave the question of determining the
safety with respect to any unsafe work
on a third person, i.e., the Inspector
under the Factories Act, 1948 ("Act").
Section 40(2) of Act empowers the
Inspector to issue an order, to the
occupier or manager of a factory,
prohibiting the use of any building or
part thereof, machinery or plant which
in his view involves imminent danger to
human life or safety. Similarly, under
Section 87A of the Act, the Inspector is
empowered to prohibit the occupier of
the factory to employ any person in the
factory or part thereof that in his view
has conditions that may cause serious
hazard by way of injury or death to the
persons employed therein or the general
public in the vicinity.
Apart from the aforesaid, India also
boasts of other legislations related to
health and safety of workmen such as
Mines Act, 1952; Dock Workers (Safety,
Health and Welfare) Act, 1986; Plantation
Labour Act, 1951; Explosives Act, 1884;
Petroleum Act, 1934; and Dangerous
Machines (Regulations) Act, 1983
amongst others that have been drafted
to cover the various aspects of
occupational safety in different fields.
Further, there are two key legislations
in this regard, namely, the Employee's
Compensation Act, 1923 and the
Employees' State Insurance Act, 1948.
However, none of these legislations
postulate a right that may allow a
workmen/employee to himself refuse
work on the ground of safety. Even if
such a right existed, it cannot be
ascertained whether workers/
employees would, if at all, dare to
exercise it. The widespread poverty and
level of competition in India makes,
having a job more important than the
quality of job itself and hence a possible
theory of the opponents of the Right
that 'every employee is free to quit an
unsafe job and take a safer job' may not
hold much ground in India. NevertheHC
less, the debate continues.
1
http://www.newindianexpress.com/business/news/Toyota-Employees-Stay-Away-Refuse-to-SignUndertaking/2014/03/25/article2128453.ece
■
■
October 2014
N
71
Date of posting: 9-10 October 2014 at
PSO Kotla Road, New Delhi-110002
R.N.I. No. 66615/97
Postal Regn. No. DL-SW-1/4022/2012-13-14
Date of printing: 7th October 2014