Guide

Situation 1: He is gazing through the French window that provides scenic view of the sea from his top floor office. Not one, but millions of thoughts have cluttered his mind and no amount of physical comforts around him are able to provide him mental peace. Some really troubling emotions that he is struggling with - how to break open the news about the impending mass retrenchment to his next line management team. He clearly sees host of his colleagues who he will have to let go. In more than one ways, these people have stood by him in difficult times in the past.

He is also grappling with how to handle the Analysts’ meet that is round the corner where he is expecting the toughest questions ever.

And on a different plane altogether, he doesn’t know how to inform his aging parents that the time has come for them to be relocated in a housing complex, built specially for the senior citizens, where he has bought a home for them and it is now ready for occupation.

He has no one to talk to. No one to get advice from. His problems are his alone.


Situation 2: He just missed the promotion that he thought he already had in his pocket. He is still figuring out – why? With this promotion lost, he has lost his face to his family – his children were eager to go to the new country of his headquarters and the wife was not less excited. There are some in his staff who share his grief and some others are actually pleased. In short, Loss of face there as well.

He has no one to look up to for advice. He has no one around him to talk to.


My wise readers must surely have figured out by now that they know this person. Yes, he indeed is a CXO of a business organization – as lonely as others of his breed.

It’s a fact that every level you scale up on the corporate ladder, you leave behind a set of friends – or at least people who can relate to you, participate in your moments of joy, sorrow or otherwise. Arguably, business managers have both inducted and acquired professional training to effectively handle such roller coaster rides, however one cannot deny them the status of an emotional being. They too require emotional support, compassionate listening, active guidance and aids to cope up with emotional upheavals. They unfortunately have no peers who can do that job because they are sitting at the organizational pinnacles, away from the crowd and in very lonely states.

We need to create an institutionalized approach in providing the right kind of emotional and decision making support to these folks. Several approaches have been (and are being) tried by various people so far. They literally range from an executive coach, who is properly trained to do this specialized job, to a spiritual guru who shadows such senior executives wherever they go. It’s very interesting to note that, at one end of the pendulum is a formally educated business –aware executive coach who is trying to provide the same service that a spiritual guru at the other end of the pendulum is trying to offer! And different models and different personalities have clicked differently in varying circumstances. But the fundamental fact has already been established that there is a need for such a support system and to put it more precisely, such support system is needed in the form of a human being.

Without getting into semantics and for want of a better word let’s call this support system (person), ‘guide’.

So, what is this guide supposed to do?
Simply put, the guide is supposed to be available to the CXO when the CXO wants him. The CXO may want to toss an idea across or confide in with some information or may just vent out emotions and feel light at the end of such interactions with the guide. The guide will be available to the CXO to facilitate either the thinking process or the decision making process or just help him to maintain his emotional balance by staying connected with him at the heightened emotional plane. The range of issues that the CXO will address with the help of the guide will literally be undefined, thus creating a very free and un-inhibitive relationship between the two. The underlying principle here is to install a solid one person support structure for the CXO to stand by him/her in the thick & thin of his professional life. And the reason for not restricting the interactions to only profession centric issues is obvious – we all (in different measures) voluntarily/involuntarily allow personal issues to influence professional ones and vice-versa!

And what is he not supposed to do?
Given a requirement of absolutely highest level of trust between the two, the guide is not supposed to either share with anyone or leverage any information that he becomes privy to in course of this relationship. Confidentiality of information is a backbone of this relationship.

Is the idea really workable?
Of course, Yes!
As we saw above, a need definitely exists.
There are relationships of this type that have been institutionalized for ages e.g. doctor & patient, lawyer & client etc.

What should be the proactive safeguards to ensure that this works?
The guide should be willing to bind herself/himself to a formal confidentiality agreement signed between him & the CXO. We, however know that, usually moral contracts work better than the legal contracts. Therefore, a thorough checking on the guide’s capabilities to execute such sensitive jobs as well as his/her sound track record(past record indicating highest display of ethical behavior on part of the guide) will be a must before any formal appointment to this crucial role is finalized.

It may sound too commonsensical for me to mention it here, however I believe it’s very important to emphasize that while on the face of it this relationship has been created in aid of CXO, the real beneficiary is going to be the organization that the CXO heads. And, in any case, it is not envisaged that this arrangement will remain tenable in the long run unless it has the organizational blessings.

In today’s highly stressful corporate world, we must continue to explore every opportunity that will help us to provide emotional support and stress relieving environments to our employees and this initiative is particularly important because the collective emotional strength of the organization is heavily dependant on the strength and charatcter of its CXOs.

HR: Strategic Business Partner

Hi,

Pls check out the link below. Express Computer has done the story on the evolving role of HR.

HR: strategic business partner
Express Computers - Bombay,IndiaAbhay Valsangkar, Senior Director, HR, Symantec stated, “HR plays a significant role in creating the right opportunity for the appropriate talent. ..."

Cheers,
Abhay

Managing attrition in the face of competitive challenges

What is employee attrition?

To ensure that we have a pre-defined framework around this hotly debated subject, it is important to clarify that attrition here means the rate of employee turnover, solely attributable to the employment termination actions initiated by the employee himself and does not include any involuntary terminations initiated by the organization. It is important to provide this context because the organizations would only like to control that part of employee turnover that they themselves did not initiate.

Organizations get really serious about attrition control only when it starts affecting their day to day efficiency. The effects can be seen in terms of cost of lost productivity (during notice period, time to recruit and induction) and cost of lost knowledge, expertise and business relationships (perhaps picked up by a competitor). However, it is important to note that these tangible losses are invariably and also inevitably accompanied by the intangibles such as low motivation, low morale, lack of sustained and mutually dependent relationships, to name a few.

Factors responsible for attrition

I know of some organizations running with annualized attrition rates of 100+%! Flip off the coin, I also know organizations that have managed to contain their annualized attrition around 10%. This is certainly no apples to apples comparison; yet, these starkly contrasting statistics give me the following leads:

Ø Attrition is a function of economic forces

It is very important for us to first understand how the economic forces at a global/regional/national level can influence attrition in specific organizations. The most powerful example that comes to my mind is that of dot com boom that took the whole world by the storm around the turn of the millennium. Suddenly the young IT professionals in India found multiple opportunities to work in their dream locations in Silicon Valley, leading to very high attrition rates in Indian IT sector.

Ø Some industries have greater difficulty in retaining employees than others

The ITeS, catering, leisure, hotel and retail industries are associated with very high attrition rates. The 100+% example is from ITeS segment. These industries are in a ferociously expansion mode trying to figure out ways of better managing demand-supply gap for human resources. The predominant workforce in these industries are young professionals who are required to work all kinds of odd hours in highly demanding work environments without any clarity on personal development/progression.

The Financial services and IT sector is also in the growth mode, although the attrition rates there are not in the same league as in case of the above mentioned industries. My example of 10% annualized attrition is from a very well-managed IT organization. Employees working in these industries are also subjected to demanding work environments, although in different degrees, when compared to the industries in the first category mentioned above. Even here the skills shortages are prevalent and the macro-level skill shortages keep on influencing micro-level attrition.

Now let’s look at the more traditional industry sectors such as manufacturing and engineering. The growth rates in these industries are moderate and the employees working there have the mindset of a lifetime employment with one organization. As a result, attrition is a non-existent issue there.

Ø Geographic location of the organization impacts average job tenure

The variation in job tenure in different locations is perhaps due to the type of industry prevalent and the labour market available within particular regions. Let’s take a specific example here. Bangalore - the IT hub of India, has attrition running at significantly higher levels when compared to other markets such as Hyderabad or Pune.

The reasons for understanding the above external factors are twofold.

1. Creating an awareness that every measure around managing employee attrition does not lie within the organization’s purview.
2. Clearly establishing external factors that cause employee attrition with a view to help the organization become better prepared to manage their human resources in the wake of changing external environment.

Now comes the real challenge. Giving due credence to these external factors, how can organizations deal with internal factors effectively, so that they can still manage to keep attrition within their control. It is conceivable that within the same economy different companies bear the brunt of employee turnover very fundamentally different to each other. And conversely, it is therefore conceivable, that organizations in the same economy/geography/industry with fundamentally different employee retention strategies can manage employee attrition with varied levels of effectiveness.

So, what do organizations typically end up doing to curb attrition?

Organizations, at this stage, start closely scrutinizing various data cuts around employee attrition e.g. what are the predominant reasons for attrition, is there a pattern emerging? – are more employees being lost in a particular experience band or those working on some specific projects or departments etc. This is done with a view to create initiatives and programs around the identified patterns related to attrition. While the organizations believe, that putting such initiatives in place would eventually bring down the attrition, it does not necessarily yield results at the levels expected. Reason? – such initiatives emanate from the information gathered only from the exiting employees, leaving a much larger pool of existing employees out of its purview.

Hearing the voice of exiting employees and taking corrective actions, therefore, is just one way of overall attrition management. I would actually call it a lagging way of attrition management--simply because these attrition control measures lag the actual attritions.

What if we were to change the paradigm here and focus our efforts on creating an environment that facilitates employee retention than only narrowly concentrating on attrition control measures? If we do that effectively, (and the existing highly competitive war for talent is compelling the organizations to look at newer ways of managing this problem) then we should actually be looking at the leading ways of employee retention. By definition, these are more proactive efforts that will lead to better employee retention.

Ø Developing a system that tracks "Early Warning Indicators" around those employees who are thinking of moving out of the organization

This will enable organizations to arrest the “flight risks”. These indicators are fairly common-sensical and are invariably reflected in employee’s declining or fluctuating productivity, increased absenteeism or tardiness, rejections for internal job postings, drop in work quality, visible signs of frustration, breaking of some workplace relationships and a multitude of others. While there is no perfect science around either picking up the incidence of such behaviour or the varying intensities of the same, managers with moderate levels of sensitivity should be able to pick some patterns indicating these “Early Warning Indicators". Managers can then dig deeper to address areas that cause such behaviour, hopefully leading to better employee retention.

Ø Another way can be finding out the organization’s strengths from the employees who have stayed with the organization for longer periods. Obviously the assumption here is that some of these organizational strengths have favourably impacted their long tenure.

Ø It is important to remember that, working only on the reasons pertaining to why employees have left the organization, will help us clinch the issue that, many a time the causes around attrition are not in congruence with those around retention. An example here might help illustrate the point. An employee who is frustrated with his/her work environment may continue to work in the same organization till he comes across an employment offer that has substantially higher compensation to offer. This employee may, therefore (and in all probabilities he would), state in the exit interview that the most important reason for him/her to leave the organization was “offer of a substantially high compensation”. Now if the organization were to understand this feedback as ‘attrition due to dissatisfaction over compensation’, it will then focus its efforts on compensation, whereas, the reason why this employee looked at the alternative proposition was anything but compensation! It is, therefore, important for the organization to base it’s efforts on what it hears from existing and exiting employees continuously and not one to the exclusion of the other.

Ø People join the organizations and leave the supervisors

Clichéd as it may sound; this truth does not go away. I strongly recommend that before getting into finding any reasons around employee attrition, one should always rule out a possibility of whether it was caused by the direct supervisor of the exiting employee. Supervisor’s behaviour has a huge impact on the work climate and is a critical component in any employee engagement and motivation initiative.

Here is a summary of what workers responding to a Gallup survey said, they wanted from their managers;

· Focus on me
· Know me
· Care about me
· Hear me
· Help me feel proud
· Help me review my contributions
· Equip me
· Help me see my value
· Help me grow
· Help me see my importance
· Help me build mutual trust
· Challenge me

And what should the supervisors do?

· Provide feedback and guidance
· Make real time to discuss problems
· Seek ideas and input from everyone
· Provide the resources to solve problems or to do a job well
· Give real recognition and/or reward
· Provide opportunities for people to develop their potential
· Keep the pressure to perform and achieve more
· Provide opportunities for social interaction
· Train people how to resolve interpersonal conflicts
· Promote joy and appropriate humor within the office
· Be flexible; help people to actively balance work and home responsibilities

Ø Quite often, organizations don’t realize that the employees’ continued interest in the organization is highly influenced by the quality of employees that the organization attracts and retains. This is particularly so, in the knowledge industry like IT, and I am not saying that it is not applicable to other industries as well. But let’s take the IT example. An attriting employee will rarely say that the cause of the exit is attributed to the fact that, the organization no longer has an edge over its competitors, when it comes to attracting and retaining talent. And yet, when the same employee was not in the mental state of leaving the organization, s/he drew a lot of energy and professional stimulation by interacting with colleagues that s/he perceived had a very high skill/knowledge/professional standing. It is therefore, my case, that any erosion in hiring process has a long term negative impact on talent retention.

Ø Yet another powerful retention anchor, albeit, oft understated, is how effectively the organization has leveraged its brand internally. Somewhere, the organizations seem to work on the notion that branding dollars are best spent in creating external visibility. While that is not untrue, we must remember that strong internal branding leads to inculcation of pride among the employee constituency. An employee’s emotional ties with the brand are very important when it comes to his making long term emotional contracts with the organization. The enthusiasm, with which an employee flaunts his /her business card in social situations, is generally directly proportional to his/her pride for working with the organization.

As some closing food for thought, I will quote from Curt Coffmans and Gabriel Gonzalez-Molinas’ book titled Follow this Path 2002 - "Great organizations achieve sustainable growth and profits because they do what other organizations don't: they maximize the innate, individual talents of their employees to connect with customers. They know that tapping the resources of humans is the only remaining area where significant improvements can--and do--lead to an unlimited source of competitive advantages." –and that, to my mind, underscores the importance of retaining talent.

While practicing Human Resource Management over the last two & a half decades in a predominantly Capitalist environment, I did not realize that one day I will have to rely upon a concept that has been extensively used throughout the various evolutionary stages of development of Socialistic ideology and thought!

And that concept is none other than Dialectics.

Let me explain.

In classical philosophy, dialectic is an exchange of propositions (theses) and counter-propositions (antitheses) resulting in a synthesis of the opposing assertions, or at least a qualitative transformation in the direction of the dialogue.

And now, let me further explain how and why I have had to take recourse to Dialectics.

Understanding human beings - particularly those whom I have had an opportunity to study little more closely i.e. the employees in the organized world, require good appreciation of multi-level realities which many a time are diagonally opposite to each other.

Let’s take an example. There exists a popular belief that young, professionally qualified employees, working in new economy companies in India, possessing internationally usable & globally deployable skill sets, generally aspire for postings in any of the developed countries. And eventually when such postings lead to permanency status, then it is believed that work & life goals of such young professionals get fully met. While I can relate to this proposition about fulfillment of personal life goals of these young professionals, I think that this does not lead us to gaining a complete understanding of the professional aspirations of these folk. It only provides us partial insights. Dialectically, these young lads also want to keep themselves connected with their own cultural roots while trying to furiously pursue permanency arrangements in the developed (alien) countries. I, often times, fumble, while guiding on any career offering to such folk, because I do not fully understand their contradictory aspirations.

Another contemporary example is the one related to ‘vertical’ v/s ‘horizontal’ growth—and here, I mean, ‘professional growth.’ Indian society (and so are many others in Asia) continues to retain it’s hierarchical character in all it’s institutions ranging from family to biz/political/social organizations. It is the father(as a head of the family) who keeps on calling the shots at home (and that too, if the grandfather is not around). And at workplace, it’s not uncommon for the employees look at their supervisors as a ‘father figure’, and therefore, quite logically the employees get a sense of growth only when they rise the organizational ladder vertically. But, on the other hand, we see a vast deployment of horizontal or lateral growth initiatives within many biz corporations and even they are seen by the employees as very positive opportunities in their professional growth pursuits. While the vertical growth brings the person gradually closer & closer to the organizational top, the lateral growth makes him/her much richer in knowledge & skill base that helps them to reach a pedestal that they can eventually use as a launching pad to make real high leaps on their long term career track. Even visually, vertical & horizontal are two altogether different lines literally crossing each other & that’s why this becomes another example of dialectical dilemma of what people strategy in this area would appeal to the employees - and the answer that I have(at the moment!) is ‘a combination of both’--though I am not sure I have cracked this riddle as well!!

Hello Friends,

I was simply overwhelmed with the quality of debate/interaction that we were able to collectively generate after I published my first communication—or indeed a poser, on ‘India Advantage.’

Keeping in view our objective of fostering the spirit of mutual learning and creating a platform for discussing issues that are relevant for all of us, I’m publishing this next bit of communication. I know, like last time round, we all will be able to chip-in with our valuable thoughts on this piece of communication as well.

Very recently I received a mail from a friend of mine. It was a forwarded chain mail that I was about to dump into the waste-bin, but eventually did not do so. Reason? The contents looked serious enough for me and hence I got those checked for their authenticity from another friend--an expert in the field of Pharmacy. I now have his views on the contents, which have been reproduced in the latter part of this communication.

Contents of the chain mail that I received:

Hi… this is important more so for those who take medication without the recommendation of a Doc.

FOR YOUR INFORMATION AND ACTION
Pls Read Very Carefully

India has become a dumping ground for banned drugs; also the business for production of banned drugs is blooming. Plz make sure that u buy drugs only if prescribed by a doctor (Also, ask which company manufactures it, this would help to ensure that u get what is prescribed at the Drug Store) and that also from a reputed drug store. Not many people know about these banned drugs and consume them causing a lot of damage to themselves.

We do forward Jokes and other junk all the time.
This is far more important.

Plz make sure u forward it to everyone u know.

DANGEROUS DRUGS… THESE DRUGS HAVE BEEN GLOBALLY DISCARDED BUT ARE AVAILABLE IN INDIA. The most common ones are D cold, action 500 & Nimulid.

ANALGIN:
This is a pain-killer.
Reason for ban: Bone marrow depression.
Brand name: Novalgin

CISAPRIDE:
Acidity, constipation.
Reason for ban: irregular heartbeat
Brand name: Ciza, Syspride

DROPERIDOL:
Anti-depressant.
Reason for ban: Irregular heartbeat.
Brand name: Droperol

FURAZOLIDONE:
Antidiarrhoeal.
Reason for ban: Cancer.
Brand name: Furoxone, Lomofen

NIMESULIDE:
Painkiller, fever.
Reason for ban: Liver failure.
Brand name: Nise, Nimulid

NITROFURAZONE:
Antibacterial cream.
Reason for ban: Cancer.
Brand name: Furacin

PHENOLPHTHALEIN:
Laxative.
Reason for ban: Cancer.
Brand name: Agarol

PHENYLPROPANOLAMINE:
Cold and cough.
Reason for ban: stroke.
Brand name: D'cold , Vicks Action-500

OXYPHENBUTAZONE:
Non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drug.
Reason for ban: Bone marrow depression.
Brand name: Sioril

PIPERAZINE:
Anti-worms.
Reason for ban: Nerve damage.
Brand name: Piperazine

QUINIODOCHLOR:
Anti-diarrhoeal.
Reason for ban: Damage to sight.
Brand name: Enteroquinol

And here is what my friend wrote to me—Since I have not taken his explicit permission to quote his name, I’ve not disclosed his name over here:

Dear Abhay,

Unfortunately this is correct!

Our DCGI in Delhi is far less stringent than even a country like Bangladesh! Most of these drugs have gone off the shelves in Bangladesh years back as the Government banned them!

MNC drug lobbies as well as some big Indian players have a lot of clout and are able to prolong the Product Life Cycle in India. The usual gyan given to the public is that the continuation is justified in view of the cost benefit analysis. (the so-called pharmacoeconomics).

Thanks and regards,


Sounds scary!---to say the least!

See you later,

Cheers..Abhay

Hello Friends,

Welcome to Abhay's den. "Den", as you can imagine, can evoke several and disparate imageries for different people. It could mean an ‘expression of power’ to some, an ‘example of territorial supremacy’ for some others or just a ‘personal space’ to some--and so on.

To me, it simply means "my world"-- howsoever limited it may be!

As an integral part of my world, you are reading this blog.

Through this blog, I am attempting to accomplish few things -- I wish to foster a spirit of comradeship, encourage mutually (or indeed collectively) beneficial interactions, share knowledge and valuable experiences and some times simply indulge in sharing pure fun.

My den is ‘liberal’ in thinking. Friends with diverse views (sometimes they can even be 180 degrees apart) are actively encouraged to participate in this wonderful journey of collective interaction. This is a platform that encourages total ‘freedom of expression’.

By now, you must have noticed that I have chosen Taj Mahal as an icon to define my den.

Why Taj Mahal?

Taj Mahal represents the core values that will prevail in my den. It did not take me more than a minute to choose this icon as it signifies several things to me and I am sure it will to my friends as well. While this glorious monument presents before us a heavenly beauty at a physical level, it offers a much more richer gift to the humanity in general and to us, the Indians, in particular. It’s an icon that has put India on the global map of artistic excellence and the sentiments behind its creation signify eternal values such as love and dedication. To me it has always been a symbol of inspiration.

And now, turning on to the first interactive invitation to you, my friends.

Is ‘India Advantage’ diminishing?

The context of this debate is predominantly centered around the industry sectors such as IT, ITeS, Retail and other similar ‘new age’ industries.

While the current boom in the new economy Indian industry was originally triggered by the ‘cost arbitrage’ considerations, there were some other compelling growth-enablers such as the availability of large talent pool, emergence of affluent middle-class etc.

Right from the turn of the millennium, all we have been hearing about and witnessing is growth and more growth. And all the futuristic economic/industry studies are predicting this trend to continue. Great going—so far!

I have no opinion that is contrary to what these various studies are pointing about the future scenario, but certainly have some apprehensions. Of late, and often times, I get a little worried when I see certain happenings around me. Many of these incidents/happenings, albeit solitary, seemingly trivial, make me nervous. Sometimes so much that I feel that they almost overshadow and have a potential of adversely affecting the current ‘India advantage.’

Now let me just illustrate by enlisting a few such happenings/incidents, before I invite you all to share your opinions on ‘whether the India advantage is diminishing?’

*Quite off and on we have read examples of criminal behaviour on part of the BPO employees, where they fraudulently used the customer information that they were privy to as an integral part of their job!

*The salary packages in these industries are sometimes becoming almost unaffordable for the relatively smaller businesses and for those who can afford today are finding it tough to manage the future.

*We have started witnessing ‘unionization’ in the most recently emerging industry sector -‘Retail.’

*There have been more than one examples of such collective efforts by those who work in the fringe functions around the IT/ITeS industries. Flash strikes by the drivers of company vehicles are not uncommon.

*The infrastructure development (at best) is lagging the heightened economic activities in the cities
- Bangalore is the biggest example today
- We still don’t know when & where will the new international airports for Mumbai & Pune will come up
- McDonalds & Pizza Huts of this world cannot make India an international destination but ruly traffic, better roads and a much better collective civic sense on our part can do it.

Folks, please chip-in with your views.

Cheers..Abhay