Volume I || Issue I ||September’ 17
Team HRenaissance Magazine heads 1. Sanhita (Left) 2. Shruti (Right)
Content Writers Clockwise(Top) 1. Aishwarya 2. Jackson 3. Akriti 4. Apeksha 5. Richa 6. Nisha 7. Prachi 8. Shruthi
Design Team Clockwise(Top) 1. Shruti 2. Shivani 3. Apeksha 4. Suraj
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Contents
1
Editor’s Note
2
TRANSFORMING HR ---BLEND OF OLD & NEW
7
HR Outside In
11
HR thankful yet thankless
14
Technology trends in HR
17
Great places to work( cover story)
22
AI in HR
26
Great leaders in HR( call for articles)
29
HR In startups
32
Internship diaries
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Faculty’s Note Dear Readers, Welcome to the new edition of HRenaissance. The magazine is aimed at connecting the student and corporate for discussion, information sharing and some trivia. I am tempted to write on rising diversity challenges of today’s organizations with reference to millennials (also known as gen Y).The millennials are inching their way into the workforce hierarchy, bringing in their set of expectations and needs. Being connected to an Internet-enabled environment of computers throughout childhood and early adulthood has changed everything for Millennials and also for those who lead, communicate, or market to this generation. For the first time in history, there is an emerging generation that has knowledge and skills that previous generations do not possess.This generation grew up teaching mom and dad how to troubleshoot a computer, how to download apps, or how to use Facebook. They are the first generation that has entered the workplace ready to contribute using their unique skill sets. Millennials through their connectedness with technology offer the appropriate data points to powerfully influence future decisions. The skill of gen X manager is how to skillfully use the uniqueness of the millennials in making the organization agile and open for change. Making a business case for diversity makes the concept very relevant in today’s times. Thank you Prof. Preeti Rawat
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Editor’s Note
Dear Readers, It gives us immense pleasure to welcome you to the first edition of HRenaissance, The HR Magazine of KJ SIMSR! We bring to you the latest from the world of Human Resource. HR continues to be an enigma to most of us. And hence we come with our first issue to clear the myths. So join us in this issue of HRenaissance, as we explore the topic, “Decoding HR” and help you figure out the role of HR in businesses! In this edition, our cover story is, “What makes these companies the best to work for in India?” Talks about great companies in India and their work culture which makes them unique. We would like to congratulate our CFA winner (Aman Banka), who brings to us a nicely penned prospective on the topic (First, break all the rules) We thank you for all for your enthusiasm and hope to hear more from you! Till then, Happy reading!!!
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Transforming HR-Blend of Old & New Today’s world of constant evolving technology demands for HR to move beyond the conventional norms of Invites and Emails. HR data is everywhere and is very crucial to manage, integrate and analyze. Many HR decisions about hiring, onboarding, rewards and retention rely on professional instincts. This fails to challenge common workplace injustice. This could be dealt with various tools and technology namely, HR Analytics, Gamification for HR, and EPMS.
HR Analytics Problem:HR processes are generally physical driven; there is hardly any far sightedness in terms of right leadership mapping, retention of employees, recruitment of the candidate, and training them with the required skills to perform the job.
analyze. Companies for years have collected employee history, performance and demographics. This data broadly is being used to retain talent actively, recruitment sources, and to drive performance. HR analytics can help us understand how and what could improve our employee performance, create a team determined to reach targets, evaluate capabilities of managers and predict who is likely to succeed. So how and where do we use HR Analytics? To predict talent and leadership gaps – What are the current loopholes and how the gaps could be minimized in future, this means that the company needs to have a clear analysis of succession planning as and when a position demands one.
Solution:- HR Analytics, also known as People analytics, basically revolves around data mining and business analysis techniques which can be beneficial in providing insights for effectively managing employees. This will help meet the business goals quickly. However, the challenge here is that what data to capture and September 2017| K J SIMSR | Page 2
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Employee retention – what makes employee engaged and retained for a longer time. HR analytics helps in predicting the employees who are at risk of leaving the firm and having this data at hand can help the company retain the employees better and have less attrition rate. Recruitment – Which candidate will eventually be best fit for a required job and where will they be found. Training and Development – What training needs does the employees have and how fulfilling those gaps ensure growth of the company This eventually helps to make our Human resource systems efficient and robust in terms of results.
up with more creative and involving activities. Solution: - Gamified approach to address complex situations are becoming norms in organizational processes. Organizations nowadays are using Gamifying approaches to make work more fun for employees. Gamification is a process which makes everyday scenarios and task creative and fun. This however is not a new concept, we already have system like employee of the month, target based bonus, sales leaderboard. Gamification basically is digitization of these techniques and using it to influence talent retention, development and attraction. Many companies are undertaking these gamification techniques to create more engaging workplace for employees motivate them and Gamification for HR Problem:- Employees generally lose boost their productivity. interest in a mundane job. The . company uses bonuses payout, awards and recognition as a medium to motivate and encourage employee, however it does not motivate the employee in the long run. To keep the employees interested, retained and involved in the firm’s operations company nowadays need to come
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Companies like KPMG, Deloitte, PWC and Marriot are using Gamification to achieve the above mentioned goals. • Deloitte for example carried an activity to increase participation of busy executives in training program. The feedback on the 12 competencies was given to them for a clear learning path. The employees once completed the missions they could showcase these earned rewards on their profiles and also compare it with other colleagues. Employees were eventually ranked among top 10 that were most competitive with themselves rather than overall top 10 list of employees. The result of the activity being that 37% more retention of people was observed. • Deloitte used gamification to identify potential candidates, where the prospective candidates had to play various games which eventually helped in mapping candidate personality with the company. • PWC wanted to engage prospective candidates more on their careers page as they September 2017| K J SIMSR | Page 4
believed that more engaged candidate pool yields better prospective employees for the company. They launched ‘Multipoly’ a 3D online game which assesses candidate’s readiness for working in the company. This game stimulated one year internship in 12 days. Candidates are allotted teams, given different tasks in different virtual offices after they passed an entry level exam. According to the company candidates who played Multipoly were better equipped to handle face-toface interaction with clients. Thus identifying the right talent and training them before the job is assigned was achieved successfully.
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Employee Performance Management System Problem: - Performance management is the key resource of employee engagement and retention exercise in • a company. In today’s scenario many companies have adopted performance management systems • but are still not efficiently using it. It is mere a talk between the manager and the employee which eventually does not result in anything fruitful. Instead of helping one build career it makes the employee demotivated to some extent. Solution: - This is where robust Eperformance management system comes into picture. The employees need to be better informed and involved in their performance assessment. The system is build such that it benefits and ensures worker engagement by highlighting low zones of the representatives. The benefits of having a robust EPMS system could be as follows, • The EPMS system helps the employees feel greater alignment with the organizational mission • Ensures that employee actively participate in their evaluation process Example- Accenture By prompting people to
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document and adjust their goals and learning constantly Accenture hopes to improve the formal process discussions Helps to demonstrate the weaknesses and strengths of the organization to the Executives Allow Employees (Assesses) to easily understand key result areas and how they are to be managed by themselves on what metrics that will be measured.
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Data from performance management technology is critical in identifying and tracking high-potential employees as this data consists of performance of employees over projects and not highlighting over all achievements of an employee. This eventually helps to better map a skilled person to a type of project and generate a pattern which could reduce time and effort drastically the next time similar skilled project is received by the company.
To stay relevant in today’s competitive market, retain employees, engage them effectively, recruit the best talent available, and train them with required skills a company needs these automated technology and tools. Automation reduces the effort at the same time increases the efficiency of the processes. These technology and tools of automation are the future of Automation yet simplification of HR processes which will result in robust and effective system.
-- NISHA BUCH September 2017| K J SIMSR | Page 6
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Are we there yet ? The next step In HR The field of Human Resources has undergone numerous transitions since its inception. It all began around 1930’s when the primary task of HR was focussed on merely managing administrative function. Shortly after the focus shifted towards developing a set of practices with staffing, compensation, organization design and development as priorities. It is in only in last 15 years that HR has started being linked with strategy. Dave Ulrich is one of the most renowned faculty and management guru for HRM. He is a professor at the Ross University at Michigan as well as a co-founder of the RBL group: a consultancy firm focussed on helping organizations and leaders value. An author of many books, articles and journals based on Human Resources have been published by him. Some people from the organization design and strategy fields conceived the idea of looking at strategy from a rather different perspective, one September 2017| K J SIMSR | Page 7
that would help in creation of HR systems. This thought triggered a chain of reactions that led to the conclusion that the next step in HR is to go outside, not just to look at strategy as a mirror but as a window and go outside the company to explore how the job of HR can be done in a better way.
Dave Ulrich
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Context: The circumstances that because the individual is a source a firm operates in, is of utmost importance. One needs to be well versed with the country and industry, moreover to work from the outside in one must be aware about the work setting, political, social, economic and demographic trends.
Stakeholders: Both internal and external stakeholders need to be taken into consideration. It is necessary to ensure that apart from satisfying employees, is HR being able to stand its ground and deliver to the customers, investor and to the community. On trying to understand HR from the outside in perspective good reward systems are good not because they have internal criteria, but because the customer gets through the incentive system, the behaviours that satisfies them. Elaborating further, one seeks to not only be the employer of choice but to be the employer of choice to the employees one’s customers would choose.
for talent. It is imperative to find the right people as finding the right people will lead to having right talent in the organization
Organization- It is only when there is a right organization does the talent get platform to work and contribute as a team. Right organization is formed when we harness the synergies of culture as well as of capabilities, basically incorporating things one is good at. To become the right organization key capabilities such as, innovation, service, collaboration and efficiency need to be managed. Let us consider a situation, how many times does the team playing with its best player win? Surprisingly individual talent succeeds only 20 percent of the time, it is the team that succeeds rest 80 % of the time.
Focus:
It is essential to understand the three factors that will drive HR: Individual- Firstly there is focus on an individual September 2017| K J SIMSR | Page 8
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Leadership: It is the integrator Right HR Department: Every between the right organization and right talent (competence, commitment, contribution). Leadership is not only restricted to the individual, but also has roots embedded deep inside the company. If one were to understand leadership, it has a few dimensions to it, one aspect being purely generic in nature as it involves all basic things that leader has to perform and the other aspect is the brand. To be an efficient leader one must be able to develop a differentiated offering, i.e. is the leader should be capable of making himself/herself stand-out in a crowd. The next step in leadership is sustainability which is the capacity to adopt individual and collective leadership behaviour in a company.
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organization faces a dilemma of the trade-off between having a centralized vs having a decentralized hierarchy becomes a crucial element in determining the future of the organization. When you take the decision to centralize HR, you have one HR head and several other heads under him reporting to him taking care of different functions like staffing, training, compensation benefits. The other option is to decentralize when you put a HR department in every country or in every business unit without a structure. The third option is a midway between centralization and decentralization which is shared service organization or a matrix of both.
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Practices: Four buckets around Analytics: As an organization it is practices are as follows: moving the flow of people, i.e. people staffing, training, development, career management. The second one is around performance rewards and compensation. The third one is around communications and finally the last one is around work which includes facilities, organization design, managing the work flow. These practices need to be aligned with the outside customer and investor they need to be integrated with each other and at the same time be innovative.
imperative to find out whether or not success is measured. Measurement quantifies and informs the decisions made in retrospect. Tracking performance always counts.
The point is that the HR structure of the future may be here today but it needs to be integrated with strategy and processes for it to be effective. HR professionals will have to play that crucial role to align people, performance, information and work. Implementation of the same is expected to increase the integration of organizational capabilities as well as People: It is necessary to ensure foster innovation in the organization that HR professionals have the pre- which will aid in generating value for the firm. requisite competencies
-- AKRITI SHAH September 2017| K J SIMSR | Page 10
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‘HR – Thankless yet thankful’ I was sitting in the office breakout area with a number of people from diverse departments and interests. Everyone claimed the importance of their respective department and how crucial their work was. Once their discussion got over I said, you all forgot to talk about one important department i.e. HR and the reaction I got was exactly the one I expected. “HR? Good for nothing”, they said. I wasn’t surprised at all. I was just taken aback once again by the attitude and ignorance of the people around. By now, I believe I’ve set the ground on which I’m going to talk. Is HR really a thankless job? Before I step in with viewpoints I would want you to think over a scenario. Imagine an organization with huge monetary assets, with the most advanced technology, with the best infrastructure; with every possible resource it needs to flourish, still all of it goes in vain if one single element goes missing. That element, the absence of which indeed makes the presence of all other resources worthless is nothing but the most valuable Human Resource. As Renee West has rightly said – “You can have the best strategy and the best building in the world, but if you don’t have the hearts and minds of the people who work with you, none of it comes to life.” This world has multitude of bright minds and a multitude of organizations that need these skilful and bright minds who could add value to their organization. But how do we choose the best of the lot? September 2017| K J SIMSR | Page 11
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This is where the role of an HR comes into picture. Does this role lie till here? Certainly not!! Take for example, an organization hired the best of talent but due to certain reasons the efforts of the employee and the expectations of the organization do not match? Should the organization in such case continue with the mismatch and waste a lot of other resources and get nothing in return? This is again a situation where the role of an HR comes into picture. The HR department aligns and prepares the employee in such a manner that instead of just becoming an additional cost, they become an asset to the organization, thus promoting their personal growth as well as the growth of the organization as a whole. Above were just two examples. Talking about the role of an HR department, it would be very unfair to say that it just involves managing the people. Starting from the planning, recruiting, training, salary negotiations, grievance handling etc. are a few of the major set of challenging tasks September 2017| K J SIMSR | Page 12
undertaken by the HR department, which if not taken care of can make the organization and its strategies and plans fail miserably. Going further on this argument and not only talking about the functional aspect, what is the toughest thing to handle in today’s fast moving and competitive world? Is it the finances or the competition or the technology up gradation and operations? The answer to it is undoubtedly human behaviour and emotions. It might sound
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very light but this is one strong hold which can either build or break the organization. Multiple studies and research have gone in this area of human behaviour and emotions not only because it is interesting to study upon but because it is so dynamic that no rule or algorithm can be used to study all of it. It is dynamic to the extent that not only different people have different attitudes and behaviour but even an individual behaves differently in different circumstances and situations. Amidst those different attitudes, various perceptions and beliefs, dynamic behaviour, unfulfilled expectations, unexplained grievances lies the HR department which in itself acts as the binding sole to keep the employees and the organization intact binding sole to keep the employees and the organization intact so that no internal or external
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grudges or clashes hamper the growth of the employees as well as the organization. It’s true that in today’s materialistic world, the resources that literally make money are valued the most. Of course, it should be. But does that mean that the efforts of all those who always back these money making resources and keep them intact should be undervalued or ignored? That’s where it becomes the need of the hour where the people with these false notions of considering HR as the thankless job, widen their horizon and look deeper into the matter. More than that, it is of utmost importance for the organizations to come up with policies that provide some recognition to the unprecedented and unrecognized efforts of the HR department. It just requires that little effort to break those misconceptions. And, if we all instead of going with the false notions of considering the job of an HR as an unchallenging one, take up this challenge of studying more about it and looking towards it from a broader perspective, then the day is not far when this thankless job would become the job everyone would be most thankful for. -- RICHA CHATURVEDI
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HR technology trends Technology has impacted every role of HR from staffing and retention to employee engagement and satisfaction. It has changed HR practices and has influenced the sector in unimaginable means Companieshave adopted several management software's such as Online learning management, team manage meant tools and Wellness and fitness apps. These platforms help the company improve their core learning programs, help easy tracking of work, enable teams to work coherently and improve performance ensuring a healthy environment.. . More and more details being analysed electronically and is shared digitally, hence higher security software are developed. Smart HR technology enhances employee efficiency, communication, engagement and improves the decision-making process Let’s delve into some technologies that are catching up in HR:
According to Bersin by Deloitte companies with recently advanced HR systems see cost savings of 22% per employee
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Social media:
Job sites, social media and mobile apps are the new job searchers. These make the search of employees easier as companies can post job requirements allowing candidates to access applications easily. It also helps in marketing of company and improves interaction between employees. Video hiring has also been in the trend which enables faster recruitment process.
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Gamification: It is the use of games and game mechanics in business environment. Business operations such as recruitment, training and motivation use it in order to engage employees, solve problems and bring innovative ideas to the table. Companies have adopted this method to improve their employee selection process. Virtual gaming helps analyze technical, conceptual and human skills according to the requirement of job posts. For example, PwC uses gamificationto simulate recruitment process and understand what it’s
like to work at the firm. It has launched a game called Multipoly, which allows job candidates to virtually assess their readiness for working at the firm by working in teams to solve real world business complications.
IoT: As defined by Techopedia and cited in a recent HR Bartender blog post, as “a computing concept where everyday physical objects will be connected to the Internet and be able to identify themselves to other devices.� For example, use of Wellness and fitness apps to improve work-life balance, employee satisfaction and fitness . Internet of things can be used for follow ups by badges, smartphones.
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Different applications for realtime feedback has also been incorporated through IoT. Digital communication helps in efficient and quick transfer of information.
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. People analytics: This involves use of big data for analysing data from company’s prospective employees. It helps to prevent wasteful spending. It gives idea about retention and attrition rates for people to stay in the company. Big data from job sites and social media helps in better and faster hiring. Performance measurement and quality hiring is also ensured by using analytics in HR.
HR cloud: Cloud computing helps in better workforce management, rapid business model innovation, better services and improve ways of controlling costs. Cloud services enables the company to install service delivery solutions quickly, without the barriers normally associated with size or geography. These solutions can then be scaled up or down easily on the cloud thus saving costs.
AI in HR: Talent acquisition uses intelligent machines for screening through software finding suitable candidates. Interviewing and figuring the right fit and the right work for a person, recruiting and engaging by following up with potential employees, talent development by enabling personalised
learning programs based on employee information skill set, experience and behaviours and maintaining employee relations through AI Chatbot are some of its functions. Real time management: this gives the HR a chance to monitor and reward the employees on a regular basis and increase productivity more than ever before. It allows continuous evaluation of employee performance, improves relationships and ensures better assessment. Upcoming Apps, different software and the provision of being available online anytime and every time through smartphones has enabled real time analysis of employee’s work. Smart and insightful technologies have helped organizations support their visions, create better policies, enhance workplace culture and ensure better administration. Keeping in trend with these will enable any organization to develop in the right manner.
-- APEKSHA TEJWANI September 2017| K J SIMSR | Page 16
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Cover Story
“ What makes these companies the best to work for in India? ” While some companies maintain the workplace with stringent policies, keeping a hawkish eye on the employees, there are some who believe in development through freedom; freedom to be yourself, and in turn becoming a great asset to the company. These are the few companies we all strive to be associated with. They haven’t achieved that status in a day or two, they have constantly innovated and discovered the best of the best policies and programmes that help the employees in every way it can. Something they all have in common is that they encourage and promote the well-being of their employees, create a comfortable environment for the employees, thereby increasing the retention rate and becoming the most preferred companies to work for. “If the employees come first, then they’re happy. A motivated employee treats the customer well. The customer is happy so they keep coming back, which pleases the shareholders. It’s not one of the enduring green mysteries of all time, it is just the way it works.” -Herb Kelleher, former CEO, Southwest Airlines
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We have analyzed an eclectic mix of companies in India keeping these factors in mind and following are the top 10 companies to work for, taking into account their HR practices:
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INTUIT INDIA PDC
GOOGLE INDIA
With a diverse workforce, differences are valued and respected at Intuit. At Intuit they follow the concept of ‘fast failing’. This encourages the employees to take risks and chances, and if they fail then they are encouraged to forget it and move forward. This gives the employees the essence of empowerment. Apart from the collaborative and encouraging environment, maternity leaves, innovations, medical benefits, Intuit also provides a unique benefit for employees who wish to adopt children, offering Rs. 50,000 and 84 days of adoption leave to allow new parents to bond with the child.
With over 1,683 employees, google tops the list as the most preferred company to work for in India. When it comes to facilities, working environment and benefits, work-life balance, very few companies can compete with Google. To nurture the creative mind, google offers its employees a vibrant, cheerful and colourful environment. To enhance the fun element to their workplace, Google hosts the TGIF (Thank God it’s Friday) event every week, where everyone works and mingles together. Google gives their employees the best of treatments and facilities. Unfailingly embracing their uniqueness, Google encourages and provides a platform to pursue passions viz. singing, dancing, musical instruments, sports etc. Women’s initiative is also something that google focuses on. Overall google provides a good holistic development that a college/school provides to a person, which makes it a place to learn rather than a place to work.
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AMERICAN INDIA
EXPRESS
UJJIVAN SERVICES
FINANCIAL
The 1921 starter employing over 10498, American Express has its practices rooted in the old and most effective ways. Creating an inspiring workplace is their top priority. Promoting talent, growth and positive relationship with employees makes American Express one of the best. Rewards and Recognition, fun activities, gender and work force diversity, and smart savings are few of the things that adds to the development of the workforce. Established in 2005, Ujjivan has 7,853 employees. It has a very different and evocative way of working. They have a ‘no job title’ policy. To everyone’s surprise, their CEO has no secretary or assistants. Ujjivan’s people are motivated by the very nature of their jobs. Never deviating from their original mission, Ujjivan takes in inputs from all their employees and customers. Buy-in and involvement of the key players - staff & customers is extremely important at Ujjivan.
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TELEPERFORMANCE To the disbelief of many, Teleperformance has no HR department and yet it ranks amongst the top 5 companies to work for. Their key strength is empathy. Started in 2001 and currently having 4,653 employees, Teleperformance has come up from the rank of 15th to 4th in just one year.
GODREJ CONSUMER PRODUCTS in 2001, with an employee strength of 2,284, Godrej Consumer products falls in the top 5 of the list of companies to work, their core strength is their female workforce. With 53% of their workforce as women, Godrej believes in focusing on recruiting and retaining women to have a robust pipeline of potential leaders for the next three to five years. Their diversity and inclusion pro-grams: resource groups of working women, Maternity policy: paid maternity leave for 6 months, 100 leaders programme, Godrej LOUD (Live Out Ur Dream): a new approach to spotting and attracting talent at business school campuses in India, and Godrej’s Fellow programme: a unique programme that mentors and trains 12 young leaders from Godrej to become greater leaders, annually; these are the few attractions that Godrej has in comparison to other companies and these characteristics are what make it rise up the list.
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SAP LABS
MARRIOT HOTELS
Right from Goa trips for the new recruits to the family days, SAP Labs has it all. Founded in 1998, SAP LABS is now a 5,339-employee strength company and believes in transparent culture. SAP always encourages the need to stay in touch with one’s hobbies and interests. For that, they have 33 interest groups, each catering to specific activities like drama, music, art, dance etc. to help employees pursue an interest of their choice. SAP keeps a strong check on keeping their female workforce happy. It has various programmes and initiatives for them viz. maternity leave policy, Run Mummier, SAPling in-house crèches, Work from home, temporary part time work, business women network to name a few. They have learnt from their past mistakes and risen up the ladder year after year. An empowered and happy employee attracts satisfied customer base, which in turn results in growth; hence it is extremely important to keep the staff happy and encouraged.
Founded in 1927, Marriot Hotels has an employee strength of 8. Their top policies include a strict NO to hierarchies. A unique element about Marriot is that, it calls its employees “associates”. They say that, taking care of their associates is the heart of Marriot’s core values. It all started with Marriot’s founder, J W Marriot, way back in the early days of Marriot, where he would personally counsel all his employees on their personal problems. The managers are responsible for the satisfaction of their subordinates. Marriott strives to give its employees a nurturing work environment and a good work life balance.
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-- PRACHI SHROFF
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Artificial Intelligence in Human Resources
As the world today is being reshaped by Artificial Intelligence, it has brought to us yet another heated question of how willing are we to replace human consciousness with a data-driven decision-making process. One of the prominent focuses of Artificial Intelligence has been in the field of recruitment. Touched by the realm of digital technologies, the talent acquisition process today is stormed by an enormity of data about the jobseekers from various sources like LinkedIn, social media profiles and online applications.
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Though, this has opened up a wider pool of talent for recruiters, fishing out data and researching take up more time of an HR manager than the other crucial tasks. Moreover, scavenging through this huge amount of data to get the right hire is a draining activity. It can act as a potential mojo-killer for any passionate HR over a period of time. This is where Artificial Intelligence enters like a knight in shining armour, dazzling us with solutions to simplify a time-consuming, costly and complex process, making it a whole lot easier. Job seekers these days are well aware of their worth and the numerous options available to them. They don't prefer to linger on if not addressed with quick responses. It becomes very necessary for recruiters to respond quickly to job applications in order to save their potential candidates from being snatched by their competitors. Artificial intelligence tracks hiring trends and successful patterns combines meaning and insight from multiple data sources and produces data-driven decisions to select the right hire.
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is a draining activity. It can act as a potential mojo-killer for any passionate HR over a period of time. This is where Artificial Intelligence enters like a knight in shining armour, dazzling us with solutions to simplify a time-consuming, costly and complex process, making it a whole lot easier. Job seekers these days are well aware of their worth and the numerous options available to them. They don't prefer to linger on if not addressed with quick responses. It becomes very necessary for recruiters to respond quickly to job applications in order to save their potential candidates from being snatched by their competitors. Artificial intelligence tracks hiring trends and successful patterns combines meaning and insight from multiple data sources and produces data-driven decisions to select the September 2017| K J SIMSR | Page 23
right hire. Not only is this time-saving, but it also accomplishes another important task which humans have always found it difficult to achieve, owing to their diverse natures- it helps duplicate the best practices shared and implemented across the team to consistently get great hires and replicate success. Imagine having an amazing performer in your team. Now imagine your entire team being clones of that worker. This is exactly what AI achieves. Another important aspect of AI is; it bypasses the unconscious bias that clouds many of the decisions made by the recruiters. Humans are always prone to biases, whether consciously or unconsciously. AI saves us from those emotions that deter us from taking right decisions for the benefit of the organization
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It is very common for employees to commit errors in their over-worked trance. HRs too can fall victim to that, which would result in hiring wrong candidates or employees being dissatisfied, further leading to attrition and loss of good resources. The role of an HR is transforming. It encompasses a lot more responsibilities than it used to a few years ago. An HR today has to juggle with these various tasks that he is entrusted with and the organization is dependent on. The best part about AI is that it allows an HR or a recruiter to solely focus on the human side of Human Resource Management, empowering him to help and impact more people than he could without it.Also, another advantage is that
“The techniques of AI are to the mind what bureaucracy is to human social interaction� - Terry Winograd AI technologies don't require you to program them again and again, they are based on machine learning. They use the data from past experiences to learn by themselves. This is a huge add-on in an era where time and resources are expensive. Moreover, given the popularity of AI and cognitive technologies, it is risky for companies not to implement them. They might end up getting devoured by their competitors if they don't stay ahead in this race! Many emerging tools such as Arya by Leoforce, TextRecruit, Ari, Textio and many more start-ups are providing such solutions to aid HR managers, bringing AI to their September 2017| K J SIMSR | Page 24
doorstep. IBM Watson Talent is one of the most prominent and highly appreciated cognitive solution provider that helps augment the functionalities of Human Resource managers. Bob Schultz, Vice President and General Manager of IBM Kenexa, explains how HR can be transformed with the use of cognitive technologies, "HR leaders need to rethink their strategies and relook at their systems. They were designed for a different era, for a different need and for a different set of expectations. Today, you need to look at your employees holistically, from HR, business systems, and social aspects, to really understand what's going on with
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your employees and who are the best people. That's where cognitive systems come in. They can be a game-changer for HR.“ It is not just in the field of Talent acquisition, cognitive solutions also play an important role in Talent development and engagement. In HR operations, cognitive solutions are transforming employee engagement to create more impact. In one of their products, Discovery, IBM Watson Talent lets you identify patterns, trends and actionable insights to drive better decision-making with the use of simple queries. Conversation, yet another service of IBM Watson Talent, offers to quickly build and deploy chatbots and virtual agents across a variety of channels, including mobile devices, messaging platforms, and even robots. These chatbots are computer algorithms crafted to stimulate human conversations, recruit employees, answer HR questions and transform employee learning experiences. .
They increase the speed of talent acquisition and on boarding process. While AI technologies can never completely replace the human instinct needed in HR process, they can surely free HR managers from tedious tasks that are prone to human errors and increase their efficiency. It will create room for HR managers to explore and work on strengthening employee relationships and focus on personal interactions within the organization. The time saved can be used to come up with more innovative ways and strategies to increase employee satisfaction and in turn, contribute to the overall success of the company.
-- SHRUTI S September 2017| K J SIMSR | Page 25
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First, break all the rules Great managers are integral to the growth and evolution of an organisation which is a complex and dynamic process that requires the best out of each and every employee. Organisations and their respective HR teams spend tremendous amount of time in nurturing talent, matching talent to task and analysing individual strengths as people’s talent can be turned into performance only by putting the right people at the job instead of changing people to fit the job. Great managers possess highly developed communication skills to play their designated role of a facilitator in the growth process of an organisation. Traits like good negotiation skills, leadership skills etc. further enable them to perform varied roles and motivate employees to embrace change with least possible number of conflicts and issues. Great managers come with positive attitudes towards their task. These traits and abilities can be learnt and developed over a period of time through training, mentoring and experience. It is an evolutionary process which requires clear path, methodology, set roadmap and resources. The key to success of great managers lies in their ability to identify and deploy the differences among people besides challenging and ensuring that each employee excels in his or her own way. They know and value the unique abilities of their employees, and effectively integrate them to achieve business goals.
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Transparency is another key trait of a great manager. They are direct, factual and straight forward while speaking to their reports and managing critical situations. Their direct communication encourages solution-based thinking to promote a transparent culture and encourage their team to share meaningful feedback. Great managers realise the fact that their behaviour represents and serves as an example of the company’s values. A flexible positive attitude also differentiates them from a mediocre manager.Their ability to appreciate the fact that it is not about them but about people allows them to embrace ambiguity in certain situations and make others comfortable in dealing with change. Great managers apply different rules to different employees as they realise each employee is different. They take time out to know their reports, discover what motivates them, and find a good mixture of extrinsic and intrinsic motivators. They encourage their reports to see the big picture and explain to them how their assignments and projects fit into the company’s larger goals and overall objectives thereby motivating them to work towards the company’s goals. Great managers seek accountability from their reports. They realise that their success depends on the success of their reports and believe in motivating them to reinforce the outcomes they and their reports are responsible for. To achieve this, they promote solution-based culture and build an environment of continuous learning, thereby effectively managing accountability related conflicts.
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Great managers pursue a participatory management style and don’t just restrict themselves to sharing feedback. They go a step ahead to help the team find and implement solutions which are beneficial Talent management is another area where great managers are making huge contributions. Towards this, they contribute by hiring the right people for the right roles at the right time. They also play the role of a mentor and take keen interest in the career development, needs and desires of their reports. These steps act as a positive reinforcement for their reports and motivate them to work towards the organisational goals with vigour. To win the global battle for the best customers, it is imperative for companies to engage both its customers and employees more meaningfully and effectively. Organisations therefore must choose great managers based on their innate talent to develop and engage their employees, create enthusiastic teams that build highly successful organizations and create an overall positive perception of the organisation to effectively engage its customers. -- Aman Banka (PGDM_IMC) September 2017| K J SIMSR | Page 28
HRenaissance
HR manager in start-ups: Is it necessary? It wouldn’t be wrong to say that the current period is the golden era of the start up culture. The current ecosystem is the most favourable for start ups. A decade ago the landscape was entirely different. Lack of infrastructure, support from government and unavailability of funds made the condition of start-ups miserable. But today the start ups are rapidly evolving in India. India has the third largest and fastest growing start-up ecosystem. So what makes successful?
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Three things basically.
A product that fetches demand, a good effective team and judicious expenditure. Now not much can be done with regards to demand and expenditure can be minimised but the thing that determines if a start-up will be successful is how good and effectively you manage your team. Here is where HR comes into picture normally when it comes to hiring people who will blend well within the start-up’s culture and who shares the same up vision of the company.
HRenaissance
But is there need for a dedicated HR manager? Multitasking is a part of start-up culture where founders and employees have to wear multiple hats and take up roles and responsibilities beyond their domain of expertise. In most start-ups they are the ones who also have to double up as human resource managers. Here is where it can get tricky if you don’t have a dedicated HR manager. It was observed that in most cases where the start-ups failed it was due to mismanagement of organisational resources, be it allocating tasks, settling grievances or managing disputes between peers.
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In a start-up where the most important resource is employees it is extremely important to have a person dedicated to managing human resource. A considerable amount of time and resources are invested in recruitment of employees especially if it’s a big team you’re planning to build. Here is where having an HR manager can help by finding a perfect fit for the start up’s culture. The work doesn’t end here. Even after finding the right person for the job it has to be taken care that they don’t leave. An entrepreneur absolutely cannot lose an employee after investing in him. An HR manager can also take care of retaining the right talent within the company. For this he has to work on creating a positive work culture where employees are encouraged and given flexibility to brainstorm for unique solutions and where out of the box ideas are appreciated. This can greatly improve job satisfaction in the company and help in better retention.
HRenaissance
Apart from this an HR manager can work on leadership development. Growth should not be limited to just the start-up if it wants to survive in the long term. Employees should also grow along with it. This can happen only when the start-up includes leadership functions as a part of the job responsibility. When employees proactively assume leadership roles everyone wins. The employee has better job satisfaction, company performs well, HR doesn’t have to worry about retention and founders can finally sit back and worry about other important issues. Finally an HR manager can take care of rewards and recognition, handling conflicts and the legal issues that crop up with it.
While it is not mandatory to have a dedicated HR infrastructure while establishing a start-up , it helps a lot. Especially if the team is growing at a fast pace, it is recommended to have someone look after it. For a start up its employees are the most valuable asset and if they are taken care of everything falls into place. Investing in an HR infrastructure can pinch the start-up in the beginning but can pay off great returns in the long term. -- AISHWARYA AMBASKAR
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SUMMER INTERNSHIP AT MARSH
Jackson Jose PGDM-HR
Summer Internships are an integral part of a student pursuing post-graduation in MBA. It helps a student understand the nuances of the business and necessary skills required to work and improve in a corporate environment. I had the wonderful opportunity to intern at Marsh India Insurance Brokers Pvt Limited. Marsh is a global leader in insurance broking and risk management.
With a workforce of 60000 worldwide and annual revenue exceeding $13 billion, Marsh & McLennan Companies also include global leaders Guy Carpenter, Mercer, and Oliver Wyman. Marsh provides risk management, risk consulting, insurance broking, alternative risk financing, and insurance program management services to businesses, government entities, organizations, and individuals around the world. My project was clubbed under an umbrella – Creating an engaged workplace. The three primary projects that were handled by me during my stint at Marsh are as follows: The internal feedback process was initiated by the Senior Management Team (SMT) of Marsh in order to further improve the exiting performance of the internal stakeholders. The assessment framework created will help in capturing the stakeholder feedback and align it to Year End Performance Rating as part of Marsh’s client centric strategy. The feedback will also help in assessing areas of excellence and areas of improvement within Functions / Departments and further enhance performance appraisal process to be more objective and measurable.
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The second project that was to design a system which will auto-populate the names of winners in the category of Best Branch, Best Business Enabling Department and Best Department – Business. This involved interacting with the stakeholders to define the assessment parameters and then assigning the weightage against each parameter. Another assignment that was done was to organize a CSR activity at Marsh Headquarters in Mumbai. Under this initiative, Marsh volunteers had a chance to visit Ashadaan, Mumbai. Situated in a congested dusty by lane near Byculla, Mumbai, “Ashadaan� is an abode of some odd 400 under privileged members. Engaging activities were organized for the inmates at Ashadaan. The event was well appreciated by all the ones who were a witness to the event. As a student the theoretical aspects of an HR department were known to me but working in HR domain was a new experience. But during the course of my Internship at Marsh, I got the opportunity to get the corporate exposure of the different functions of an HR department. My project required inputs from different stakeholders across departments. The project taught me the importance of collaboration in teams and how it fosters a sense of togetherness at workplace. This not only improves the efficiency but also keeps the environment lively. I also got the opportunity to understand the employee engagement function closely as a part of my project. I got to learn how employee engagement plays an important part in keeping employees motivated which improves their productivity and helps the business to grow and this in turn helps in the growth of the organization. I learnt that team work is important for any department to function efficiently. The HR department at Marsh has taught me how the synergy in the team drives the crucial function of human resource dexterously. September 2017| K J SIMSR | Page 33
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THE HR CLUB OF SIMSR Coming up “TRANSCEND” – Mock GD and PI
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HRenaissance