Talent Swallowing

With Shortage of talent and a booming It/ITES sector there is a major problem of Talent Swallowing leaving the R&D companies grasping at Thin Air for precious talents.

I believe in India we are facing a dynamic issue of anyone for any role and not the right person for the right role. This is happening because of

(i) Lack of time
(ii) Unclear view about roles
(iii) The desperation for a job

All these factors make a major problem and the accusations from most of the Brick & Mortar companies are that they do not have people for R&D work. We want to enjoy the best vehicles with the best technology but we do not have the adequate labour force to create that possibility which shows us a daunting challenge of increasing our systems o equip more people to graduate focusing on niche domains and places like R&D need to be given special impetus.

Till then its a war for talent and unfortunately like the jungle the big hunter leaves very little for the smaller ones.

Cheers !!

Arvind

My interaction with Exchange Students

Recently i had this wonderful chance of interacting with a group of very sweet ladies from Finland who had come to India as Exchange Students and it was wonderful to share ideas and thoughts which resonated and projected the problems faced by a Country with a population less than the City of Mumbai.

We discussed on issues ranging from Economic and Monetary Stability to Social and family relations

The major points i learnt from them were

* The ageing population of Finland is a challenge where Productivity is Slumping

*People like to follow rules and instructions and if they don't their neighbours care to inform the authorities ensuring they are forced to follow

*Quite like India there is a growing divide between the Rural and The urban or the City and the Country Side

*Unlike India which has Bollywood,Food varieties and IT as it's Soft power Finland only possessed Nokia but even that is taking a backseat incidentally

*The World is not looking towards them as they are not in news unlike India or China which is generating new news everyday

*The government is becoming more right wing which is making the rich happy while its making the poor Unhappy

*The social Subsistence scheme is one of the best and allows a person to cover all his needs

*The income for this Subsistence comes from taxes which is high on rich people and thus they want this rate to be decreased

*The students get an income for studying

*Social Problems in Finland thanks to the Rules Compliance

and Finally Indian Spicy food is India's Biggest draw to lure other country nationals


Cheers

Arvind !!

LPG of Today's generation

For the Generation X and to a large extent for our academic purpose LPG stood for Liberalization, Privatization and Globalization in Economic terms, Which has put India on the Global Map as a force to be Reckoned with.

For the New Generation i.e. Gen Y the LPG Concept is an internal and an integral component for their Career but here the LPG is Modifies and it stands for

L- Learning

P-Pay

G-Growth (Professionally)

This has become the Mantra for today's graduating generation who look at a job and see if it fulfill these three criteria's to the desirable extent and this has became the continuum in which any job is measured by assessing the

i) Learning opportunities in terms of working in variable locations and variable departments/operations,creation of a bigger role offering wider challenges and newer perspectives, Ability to work with varied teams and also the authority to lead a team could be the major factors of interests.

ii)Pay- While this may not be the most important factor it's vitality can never be underestimated and this is displayed in terms of the situations where people have stepped down a position to go for a bigger better paying organization and also the structure of pay in terms of the variable pay is it linked on Individual's performance or on Company's performance about which i had previously written about and finally the

iii) Growth - This is the most crucial aspect and i had once heard a veteran HR expert Mr. Ravishankar of Mahindra Group put forward a point of great notice. He said that "The majority number of people who switch organizations regularly are mostly from the tier 2 B-Schools who often feel that they don't get treated on par with the Tier-! colleagues and thus take the effort to get the recognition"

What he has said is absolutely true and i guess organizations may need to re look at the way they rate institutions and the profile they offer to students

Growth is the most important aspect everyone looks for and infact one of the often repeatedly asked question during Inductions is "How long will it take me to reach the Board"

long hierarchy do not help the cause and similarly organization with a Big workforce also thus these aspects need to be kept in Mind while the career planning process of young associates who join organizations

It is essential you have a proper career management plan which could be depicted to them if not it dents your organization's image

Cheers

Arvind !!

Choose your Boss

Often i have wondered about the term "Organizational Democracy" and people trying to change the structure of an organization so that it appeals to the newer generation.

I recently had a thought about the whole hierarchy based system followed in most organizations in which the Bosses can select their subordinates but why not vice-versa? It is most often said that "People join Organizations but leave because Bosses" and we are always discussing ways to curb attrition in a economically booming scenario. This is when the idea of Boss selection came into mind. This can work very well in a particular type of situation i.e.

When the team which is going to work under the person is set and works like a well oiled Machine knowing their roles and duties at that point if there is a need for a new boss for the team why not also bring them into the foray and allow them to be a part of the process giving critical inputs as ultimately they will be the people working under them regularly. And this will be a component which will enhance employee ownership as he has selected a person to work under this, Making him more accountable.

This is Inspired from democracy where we vote for our leader but the subtle difference being once we vote we forget them till next elections but that is not the case in an office. Though this may have grave repercussions and may not fit in all organizations i believe this will fit very well in conservative organizations because

(i) Concentration of senior employees at junior and Mid level Positions
(ii) They need to accept a young turk in their midsts
(iii) They cannot be forced into corners
(iv) They hold a huge reputation inside the organizations and they may be like Father figure to many new people.

Thus considering all this factors it could work well in a conservative traditional organization and the new entrant will also know the methods he needs to use to get the work efficiently done and not clash with them which happens in many cases as there is an Age difference


Cheers

Arvind !!

The Josh factor

On the outset my New year wishes to everyone hope this new year brings you success and happiness.

The first post of 2011 is on my favorite area of Employee morale and engagement and in particular to the ideas contributed by Ganapathi Subramanian of Britannia, One of my foremost Mentors and Gurus in HR, Interactions with him have widened my horizon and knowledge base and am deeply grateful to him for that

Over the past week we were discussing about employee engagement and i was a staunch supporter that the best way to raise the morale of an employee is through having proper office environment and good boss subordinate relationship and other concepts like family day-out and group trips din't make a great difference. But his thoughts cleared up the air and showed me how these extra acts do help in creating a morale which is in a primary stage called the "JOSH" which needs to be tapped on and it will ultimately increase the performance

The Josh and performance are like the science concepts of potential and Kinetic energy which are both inter-dependent and can transform into each other. The science connection can be seen with the help of a swing which has a highest potential energy when it is kept on a height and gains kinetic energy when it is dropped towards the ground as all the potential energy gets transferred into kinetic energy.

In the regard with an employee a simple act of wishing him on a birthday by the top boss or celebrating his achievement will increase his morale and thus his Josh which can be built up by similar activities. The key concept comes in on how this Josh can be converted into high performance and eventually into number crunching results when its possible.

Riding on the back of the Josh and keeping on emphasizing about good work will surely help in the conversion over a period of time. It is also essential that this Josh needs to be built up as the lack of it will be a Hara Kiri act.

Cheers

Arvind !!