Impact of Blip in Growth

 

 

As I have mentioned in my blog before also, these are some very interesting times. There are different ways to look at the current fiscal. One set of opinion might say we are in a slow down, yet another would point to the fact we are yet amongst the 3 fastest growing economies globally. 7-8% growth in slow down times is something many economies would take without blinking an eye.

 

Now that apart, it means some interesting set of things:

-   At the very outset, its time for them to look more inwards than outwards

-   Organizations would be under pressure for margins. Cost structures in many cases are aligned to higher growth which may not happen for an indefinite future. Several organizations might shift their priorities from top line growth to margins

-   Cost management would become paramount as a consequence of above point. Slow down in hiring and salary increases is an immediate visible impact

-    While in absolute terms everyone would gain, in relative terms most of them would be in red. Increments less than inflation, business growth less than planned etc

-    Its time when many organizations would carry out internal consolidation initiatives, which otherwise were not able to find time in tight management calendars. Since many of these organizations have over grown their systems, processes and structures, these will be times when some of these will be very closely looked at

-    From HR point of view, tightening of Structure and Performance will find prominent presence in corporate agenda for majority of organizations

 

Let’s take Real Estate industry as an example.

In times of exponential growth in past 3-4 years, several organizations grew more than their internal capacities. In case of real estate they small and mid players would often exhaust their internal capacities in acquisition phase of life cycle itself. Just launch of project itself would result in booking of sales and in process creating resources for moving the project forward. It was almost that they were making money for project management skills. Taking money from consumer to create what they need was fantastic.

 

However in times like this many of them would struggle. They will struggle to make meet ends and would be under severe pressure for resources. These are times that will push them to do the following:

-          Align growth to internal capabilities and not external opportunities

-          Sell out for players who simply can not finish projects which are in work in progress stage

-          For large players it would mean concentrating on setting the house in order

 

 

In end like they say nothing is white or black…there is a lot of grey. Basis how an organization had planned in the past in terms of solidity of that plan, and basis how they plan now, different organizations will go through very different set of motions.

 

~~Rohit~~

Circus of 360 Degree for Performance Evaluation

  

Now it is very uncommon to come across learned professionals talking about 360 degree evaluation mechanism as the way to go “once an organization reaches maturity” as they would say.

 

For non HR professionals like me, it’s something that is really astonishing. This is a system I have seen been deployed by some of the most “mature” organizations who are seen as thought leaders in their respective verticals.

 

So 360 degree is a “open system” wherein one receives feedback on their performance against set goals from peers, subordinates and seniors. Unlike the evaluation been done by just your manager, everyone directly working with, gets an opportunity to impact and hence reducing any manager bias. The system in itself is very good and mature indeed…but for performance evaluation?

 

Shouldn’t performance by evaluated automatically by the databases and MIS instead of “opinions”. One can understand there are possibly measures for which numerical data does not exist (typically that is what MIS and databases support), but does that mean a Performance Management System that primarily runs on 360 degree.

 

How many times do you come across such quantifiable and established “beyond doubt” measures that do a merry round in a 360 degree environment for rating on a scale by multiple people. Some interesting real life examples are follows:

 

Objective: To achieve defined sales for Product X in the next 12 months

Objective: Ensure desired level of profitability

Objective: Collections of all debtors outstanding in time

 

What purpose does it achieve by having people give ratings on these when you don’t need any individual judgment really? At the end of the day manager will get feedback from 5-6 individuals with different ratings, he will then in all probabilities take the median and finalize the rating. My bet is in these “mature organizations” this final rating with then also go for normalization…..I guess its only god who knows if there is any sense in whatever comes out of this circus J

In the end what could have helped in measuring “some” qualitative measures and help largely in developmental needs, has become “the system” in several organizations.

 

 

~~Rohit~~

Consulting Network

 

Some of us who have been attached to consulting in various capacities for a long time now have started a community called Consulting Network. This was initiated by young and energetic Mohit few months back through Linked In and few of us joined in later.

 

This is an attempt to create a networking and information exchange for consulting community (existing and aspiring) in India. In last few months the idea seems to have clicked quite a few other folks and we have very quickly got almost 1000 members and members from various business schools joining the bandwagon.

 

Visit and register at the following link if the same is of interest to you…We are soon going to be out with our website which is under construction J

 

~~Rohit~~

Demand and Supply of HR Professionals

 

I am back after a long hiatus for the past month or so J

 

CII conducts a national seminar on HR Challenges each year……representing knowledge partner for this year, Hewitt Associates, as well being member of CII committee, I have been a bit occupied lately. However the forum gave several of us opportunity to talk about interesting times ahead and people challenges in wake of such scenario. The theme of the forum was aptly “The Winning HR Strategies”.

 

While in some of my later blog I will talk about summary of the discussions, one interesting challenge is demand and supply situation of HR Professionals themselves. Unless there is enough of this community (in terms of both numbers and skill sets), several of larger people challenges will remain unaddressed. Let’s have a closer look at this aspect.

 

Supply View

1        If we look at all Tier 1, Tier 2 and decent Tier 3 Business schools together and the number of HR professionals they are churning out, the number is likely to be in the range of 600-800 at best.

2        Worse if one looks at number of people with skill sets adequate to match the challenges of current environment, its likely to be 150-200. The reason I say so is because most of the others are still in traditional HR/IR mindset/skill set mould.

3        Given the reality that several of these students comprises of women, there is a drop out rate of about 10-15% out of this from active work life post marriage or children

4        Almost 15-20% of these go on to join recruitment firms or open their own recruitment/training firms

5        In nutshell we are left with about not more than 60-65% of the total 600-800 overall population and 150-200 of what you can call as premier mass available

 

Demand View

1        The demand per organization is atleast an average of 8-10 HR professionals for the Top 100 companies on BT 500 list (Top 500 organizations of country by various financial parameters), in addition to what one can probably classify as administrative staff

2        Demand for the next 400 on the BT list is likely to be around 3-4 on average

3        Demand for the next 1500 organizations is likely to be atleast 1 HR professional on average

4        At the moment it’s probably a safe assumption in organizations over the Top 2000 list, Promoter/CEO mostly or in some cases Finance person assumes HR role as well. HR in these organizations is mostly about salary increases and promotions.

5        In addition to this domestic market there is a huge demand created by multinationals operating in India. That number is likely to be close to 3-4 for around 500 multinational organizations given their more organized set up.

6        Hence purely speaking demand is influenced by Top 2000 domestic organizations and about 500 multinationals in market today.

7        By assumptions above we are talking about a demand for about 6000-7000 professionals

 

 

The overall situation looking at numbers above does not look too good for sure. Perhaps the most important element of this demand and supply situation is the fact this demand is maximum at the middle and senior level in most organizations. Gap is even more acute at that level.

 

One of the solutions to this problem in my view is “HR for Non HR”. We need more and more business and cross functional people to be trained on aspects related to people challenges. In my view not only will that improve the situation, many of these ‘inside business’ guys will go on to become more successful HR professionals J

 

What are your views on the current demand supply situation and means of improving the same?

 

~~Rohit~~

Engaging a New Employee

 

Recently I came across this interesting article/practice at Patni Computers:

 

On his first day to work at Patni Computers, 23 year old Arshad Shaikh had sweaty palms and an itchy neck. The mild apprehension of how his first day at work would be was worrying him. But, surprise surprise! A badge with a smiley face and ‘Just Joined’ stamped on it was given to him. “I can’t tell you how good I felt that day. There were unknown faces coming up to me and offering help. This practice we have, called ‘Just Joined’ is a great HR practice,” gushes Shaikh, senior analyst, Patni. “Moreover, all the process related information was shared with me right on day one to make things easier. I felt settled from the first day itself,” he adds.

 

There are numerous reports that would tell us how 70% of employees leave within the first 1 year of joining. People who stay on for more than a year have a high likelihood of completing a good run with the Company. Knowing this fact the entire period of pre-joining formalities, induction program and post joining first 1 year of engaging employee becomes extremely important. Having said that most of the companies have a ‘standard’ induction manual that’s delivered like work as usual in first week of joining etc and else everything just operates as usual for all employees. There isn’t much to differentiate between programs or ways of engaging employees as far as new employees are concerned.

 

While I have come across some very interesting practices in various organizations, I found this something very interesting….small initiative but interesting. Might be bordering more on a IT/ITES (BPO) environment though.

 

Have you come across any interesting practices in Service Industry in particular….???

 

~~Rohit~~