What an Idea!

Microsoft has launched an internal drive, called Garage, asking its staff to come out with unique ideas that could make life of women easier and simpler.  Employees have been encouraged under this initiative to develop mobile apps exclusively for women. Teams, each comprising 2-3 employees, comes out with ideas that could be converted later into solutions – both standalone and those that could be intertwined into the enterprise applications. Shopping App, Immunization Tracker (that helps smart mothers keep track of their kid’s vaccination schedule) are some of the new apps on the horizon.

Engagement of employee through formation of ideation and innovation drives in the organization is one of the best forms of engagement. The sense of fulfillment and of contributing much more then one’s own work in a creative way has far-reaching consequences, both for the employee and the organization. Google developed many of its classic products, like Google News, in the same way. At a time when some companies in US are attracting new employees by encouraging them to become entrepreneurs and also proposing to fund their projects in future, innovation-involvement may be a good way to engage with the employees.

The catch is however that if culture of innovation does not prevail in a company, such engagement is next to impossible.

Rural Employee Engagement

Companies faced with a shortage of hands in service-oriented, labour-intensive sectors such as retail, marketing, construction and primary healthcare are heading to the rural hinterland to hire workers, with a bit of help from the government.

In a public private participation (PPP) arrangement with the rural development ministry, India's largest organised retailer, Future Group, will train and place 32,000 below-poverty-line youth from rural areas in 19 states over the next 18 months.

And Future Group is not the only one hiring from rural areas. Many companies such as the Aditya Birla group, Hindustan Unilever , Reliance Telecom , McDonald's and Adidas have sourced staff trained by government-assisted rural placement agencies to meet their requirement for skilled and semi-skilled workers.

Companies like IL&FS and organisations like the Apparel Export Promotion Council that need people with manufacturing and construction skills have also entered into agreements with the government and put up training and placement departments for rural youth.

The government has backed such initiatives with a special projects scheme under the Swarnjayanti Swarojgar Yojna, re-launched recently as the National Rural Livelihood Mission , under which it extends 75% support to companies to build training infrastructure and placement facilities for rural youth.

"This has picked up in the last two years and we are looking at ways to increase such facilities in backward districts. In two years, 2.5 lakh people have been placed in various companies and it will pick up," said T Vijay Kumar, a joint secretary in the rural development ministry.

The reason companies are warming up to the idea of investing in rural human resource is the unwillingness of urban youth to take up these jobs.

According to Muralidhar Rao, chief executive officer of Future Human Development Ltd , Future's requirement is also matched with the enthusiasm of the youth in rural areas. "These people are untouched by the urban retail revolution. They are enthusiastic and have aspirations. This creates tremendous potential," he says .(Source: Economic Times)

HCL: Engagement for Real

It is always a pleasure to meet my students who have or are crossing the altars of their Alma-mater and are stepping into the corporate denizen. They have interesting experiences of their first encounter with the corporate world, which are mixed at times. One of my such students Malvika working as a management Trainee in HCL walked upto my office on Saturday. However what was just a courtesy call turned-out to be a very interesting first-hand account of the HCL famed 'Employee First, Customer Second' policy. Vinnet Nnayar the brain behind this mantra has re-defined the HR's way of functioning in HCL. Curious about its real worth and whether such statements are plain rhetoric or there is some amount of depth and reality in practice, I quizzed and probed her experiences as a fresh recruit in the company. Often the company's HR policy is defined by the way it treats it new recruits. Research suggests that maximum percentage of engagement happens at the on-boarding stage.

Malvika was gung-ho about her new company. She told me that in a place like NCR, where the safety of women is a major issue, the company's 6:30 p.m. closing policy comes as a huge relief. Her manager himself ensures that she is not working beyond the closing time and this is same for all employees. The company never short-changes with the safety of the employee especially women. She compared this to experience of one of her friends in a competing firm where they are made to stay up to 10 p.m. on many days and the company refuses to provide any cab facility for dropping the lady employee back. She has either to hitch-hike with her boss or arrange for her own transport. Ridiculous, I thought... As a management trainee she is not treated anyway inferior to her senior counterparts and is looked after well. The company's HR is a dedicated team dedicated to the holistic wellness of the employee. As a company HCL values its clients but makes sure that they value their people equally who create the winning experience for their clients.
Fascinating and more believable as this is a first-hand account. She had no reasons to lie to me and I had not told her that I shall put all this on my blog when she started narrating me her experience. That's what you call real engagement... No doubt, the best brand-ambassadors for a company are its own employees.

Father's Day - An Opportunity to Engage

Today is Father's day. World over it is a way of saying to one's dad how much he means to them! Days like father's day, mother's day etc. are laced with emotions and sentiments. And that's why it reminds me that such days may be excellent engagement opportunities with the employees. Recently a watch manufacturing company in India came-up with a unique way of celebrating mother's day. Instead of giving some gifts for the employee's mothers, they invited the employee'smothers to the office on Mother's day. They were treated well, pampered and had fun events all day. The 'mothers' also had a chance of looking at their sons and daughter's workplace and the respect that they has earned for themselves. Such a initiative by the company created both a emotional and rational connect with the employees and their family members. Emotionally the sense of pride that both employees and their mothers would have felt must have given them a feeling of realization of all the years and efforts that they have invested in shaping their own or their prodigy's career. On the rational front, the mother and through them their families would have got a better sense of the kind of responsibilities that their son or daughter shoulders in the company and hence would have become more empathetic to them and their professional demands.
Ofcourse the same cannot be replicated today on the occasion of father's day, considering the weekend coincidence. However there can always be a special way to connect and engage with the employees and their families.
Not too long back I read a blog by the Daniel Group which impressed me a lot. Here it goes:

Today is Employee Appreciation Day March 4, 2011

We designate days to appreciate the people who shaped us and our  country.  There is Mother’s Day, Father’s Day, Memorial Day,  Presidents Day, Teacher Appreciation, among many others.
Today is Employee Appreciation Day, and it is dedicated  to the people the help make your company what it is.   You wouldn’t be  here without them, and you most likely couldn’t do what they do.
With 84% of people intending to look for a new job this year, according to a recent study, now would be a great  time to strengthen your relationship with your employees.  If you  hadn’t had the chance to do so, take this excuse to talk to your employees.  Recognize their contributions and thank them.  After all,  happy employees are a key to a successful company.

Early Engagement - 3

Larsen & Toubro (L&T) has started a 'pool campus process' aimed at catching the young enginering graduates 'early' for their growing needs. Under this process various approved engineering colleges shall be invited to create a pool out of which L&T shall recruit the best. The company strategy of increasing 40% recruits from the engineering campus goes well with the pool campus process.

This process is not a novel one, considering that other companies have done similar things in the past. However all such instances cannot be looked only from a recruitment angle. Companies like L&T are working towards creating 'early engagement' with graduates of today,who shall be their assets in the future. the companies are not trying to keep employee costs down by cutting on new hires. Rather they are trying to achieve the same by lowering redundancies and improving productivity.

Early Engagement -2

More and more companies are aiming to catch talent young, most of them while they are still in their finishing schools. This on hand serves efficient execution of their business plans but implicitly they succeed in 'engaging' these young minds to the company.Nissan's student brand manager program is another  such example...

'The automobile company has invited management students from across the country to showcase their business skills, creative thinking and people handling skills.

Nissan Motor India has driven down to Bschools to promote its brands in India, especially Micra. The automobile company has invited management students from across the country to showcase their business skills, creative thinking and people handling skills as part of its student brand manager programme.

The students for the programme, who will be selected by advertising veteran Prahlad Kakkar, Harish Bijoor Consults Inc chief executive officer Harish Bijoor and Autocar India Magazine editor Hormazd Sorabjee, will be trained by Nissan’s marketing team before starting work as Nissan Student Brand Managers from July to December 2011.

“ This is the second year of the Nissan Student Brand Manager Program and we are inviting applications from 150 colleges across 15 cities in India,” said Dinesh Jain, chief executive officer ( CEO), Hover Automotive India ( HAI), which is Nissan Motor India’s exclusive partner for sales, marketing, after sales, dealer development and customer relationship in India.

“ Nissan will spend ` 1 crore on this activity,” Jain said. “ Students will get hands on experience in brand building. It will help them after they join the corporate world.

Such initiatives are common abroad. As India is growing fast, we also require a lot of such initiatives,” said Bijoor.

Each student brand manager will be given ` 30,000 as stipend and ` 20,000 as marketing budget for the six- month period by Nissan to implement their initiatives. Each student will also be given a kit that will include a digital camera, visiting cards, T- shirt and jacket.

The students, if needed, will also be given a Micra during the training period, to help popularise the brand. “ This will help them conduct the marketing activities in a professional manner,” said Jain, adding that the students will play a key role in bringing brand Nissan closer to the student community.

Nissan is inviting applications from second- year students of business schools such as K. J. Somaiya Institute of Management Studies and Research, Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad and Kolkata, University Business School, Chandigarh, and S. P. Jain MIR, Mumbai.

“ We are targeting around 1,200 entries out of which 20 will be selected for the programme,” said Jain.'(Source: Nissan drives to B- schools for brand promotion by Nishi Rath - 09 Jun, 2011, Yahoo)

Trending Social Media in HR Processes

'In-house social networking platforms have done what above-normal salary hikes have not been able to do – control attrition...' Just a small byte from my column in Business Line today - The Use of Social Media in HR Processes... please Read

Early Engagement - 1

When does engagement of the firm with its employees start? The most obvious answer to this is immediately after an employee joins the organization... think again! ... could it be even before that? The answer to this is yes. Today most organization, grappling with severe talent shortage, tend to engage with their prospective employees while they are still in their Alma mater campus.
Very recently Samsung India has signed an MoU with IIM-A to offer 5 scholarships to meritorious students. The company is definitely using this platform to engage  with some very promising talent and their future 'assets'.

'Digital technology leader Samsung India Electronics Pvt Ltd on Thursday announced to offer annual scholarships to five meritorious students of the Indian Institute of Management-Ahmedabad (IIM-A), as part of industry-academia partnership and engagement...They (students) will get an opportunity to engage and interact with senior management at Samsung to facilitate better understanding and greater knowledge-sharing with the industry...'


Way forward to beat talent shortage is to identify and engage with their employees even before they come on-board.

Engaging the Gen Y

Perhaps the most exciting constituents of the Indian workforce are the Gen Y. The key is to 'engage' the most digitally sophisticated generation. However engagement challenges are absolutely different when it comes to Gen Y -

The ‘Generation Y and workplace Annual Report’-2010 by Johnson Controls is a watershed research on the workplaces for the future. The report clearly states – Generation Y is, perhaps,  who are looking for a sustainable environment offering a social structure within both a
physical & virtual environment. Generation Y is the working population aged between 18 – 25 years who are techno – savvy, diverse and demanding. The report indicates:

• Workplace is important in attracting & retaining Gen Y.
• Location of a company plays an important role in choice of a workplace.
• Workspace allocation and technological provisions contribute to productivity and creativity.
• Workplaces must be flexible & adaptable supporting both formal & informal collaborative engagement & interaction.

The report clearly establishes a link between nature of workplace and employee engagement. – ‘The workplace contributes to the level of emotional engagement of individuals with their work. The working environment of the Gen Y is a place they emotionally engage with; a space where they socialize in with other co-workers and a space which supports their health and well-being.’

Bridging Gender Engagement Disparities

'The middle level women IT professionals who had quit Mahindra Satyam are likely to be offered jobs again. The Hyderabad-based company has introduced a lateral recruitment initiative christened “Starting Over.” “The initiative taps into a highly talented pool of mid-career women seeking to restart their careers at Mahindra Satyam after having taken a break for personal reasons,” Mr Suresh Samudrala, Head-HR, Asia Pacific Mahindra Satyam said in a release issued on Monday.

At the same time, it is not just the experience that matters; candidates would be evaluated on the basis of their potential rather than their previous stint with the organisation. “Women make a significant part the technology workforce today and Starting over is a novel way of honing that talent base effectively,” Mr Samudrala said. The candidates can come from among three states of employ – internship, part-time and full time job...' (Business Line, May 31, 2011)

Source: http://www.sesagoa.com/SDR10/women_empowerment.html

Career breaks of women employees primarily due to family reasons is one of the primary reaons for lower levels of engagement among women employees. Organization like Mahindra Satyam lead the way in bridging such disparities. Recognizing women as a valuable part of the workforce and the practical realities that exist with respect to the social and family set-ups & hence the huge expectation from women on the personal front could go a long-way in making it fair for the fairer-sex. More strategically it may well serve the talent-shortage that many companies are facing today.