People Matters: Tailoring total rewards - January 2020

VOL XI / ISSUE 1 / JANUARY 2020

big Interview Dean Tong

Managing Director, Head of Group Human Resources, UOB Group

HR Tech in SEA

HR and Work Tech: The Southeast Asia Market Opportunity

Interviews Ravin Jesuthasan

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Author and Managing Director, Willis Towers Watson

Tarun Rai

Chairman & Group CEO, Wunderman Thompson South Asia

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ne of the top challenges facing businesses is about attracting and retaining the talented workforce. And employees want more than just compensation – they want differentiated benefits and an environment that offers them opportunity to grow and advance their careers. In fact, next-gen employees want to balance work with their personal lives. This makes it imperative for compensation and benefits managers to review the total rewards framework – making it holistic and in a way personalized. At the end of the day, you need to ensure that your reward strategy is motivating your best-performing employees, among other things. A winning rewards strategy – which is the right combo of pay, benefits, recognition, culture, and communication, aims to ensure two things: make employees feel valued and that impact business outcomes.

Customized pay and benefits tailored to individual employee needs is paving way into the workplace and large organizations are betting on it already. Tailored benefits programs impact turnover, employee engagement and more importantly, productivity. Technology such as analytics has a pivotal role to play here. Optimizing rewards programs warrants organizations to analyze massive sets of employer data

| JANUARY 2020

THE COVER STORY (BEHIND THE SCENE)

Christmas is over, honey!

No...

You need to stitch your thoughts.

Umm...

That don’t impress me much!

VOL XI / ISSUE 1 / JANUARY 2020

FFrroom m tth h e E d i t o r ’’ss DDeesskk 4

Your rewards program is outdated!

and make intelligent recommendations that actually drive retention, engagement.

A 2018 study by Mercer found that an organization’s total rewards philosophy is one area where brand values can shine: Thriving employees are four times more likely to work for a company that ensures equity in pay and promotion decisions (78% vs. 18%). So, it's important for employers to review their total rewards strategy to fortify their employee value proposition for both attracting and retaining employees.

Total rewards should also drive business outcomes. 95% of HR leaders see the value in integrating rewards with the broader business to increase the impact on talent outcomes. However, neither HR leaders nor total rewards teams believe that current approaches to total rewards can successfully support broader business goals, according to Gartner. So, is your rewards strategy outdated?

The cover story will dig deep into the current state of total rewards practices, how technologies are transforming the compensation programs and how tailored rewards programs can help compensation and rewards managers drive business outcomes in 2020.

For the big interview, we have Dean Tong, Managing Director, Head of Group HR, UOB Group, who talks about the people transformation agenda in the banking industry, which is at the brink of disruption with the fear of job losses to automation and AI. Also featured is an interview of Ravin Jesuthasan, Author and Managing Director of Willis Towers Watson, who shares his perspective on how to redefine leadership, build holistic skills for HR, and manage change successfully in Industry 4.0.

We have a special piece on L&D Trends for 2020 by Andy Lancaster, the Head of Learning at the Chartered Institute for Personnel and Development. We also have a piece on office dating policies in the age of #MeToo by Ronni Zehavi, the CEO of Hibob.

It's our pleasure to bring to you a special report by People Matters on HR and Work Tech in Southeast Asia.

Finally, this issue also features an insightful interview with Farid Basir, CHRO, Telekom Malaysia, who talks about how telecommunications companies can capitalize on the ongoing disruptions to attract and retain its employees.

As always, we would be happy to hear your views, comments, and suggestions regarding our stories.

big Interview Dean Tong

Managing Director, Head of Group HR, UOB Group

HR Tech in SEA

Happy Reading!

HR and Work Tech: The Southeast Asia Market Opportunity

Esther Martinez Hernandez Editor-in-Chief follow

M > @Ester_Matters F > estermartinez > ester.martinez@peoplematters.in

Interviews Ravin Jesuthasan

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Author and Managing Director, Willis Towers Watson

Tarun Rai

Chairman & Group CEO, Wunderman Thompson South Asia

Phew!

contents

JANUARY 2020 volu m e xi issue 1 expert views

cover story

46

48

A winning rewards strategy that fits all cases does not exist Fermin Diez, HR Thought Leader, Board Director, Professional Speaker, and University Faculty

50

Employees to drive the next-gen rewards strategies

Kartikey Singh, Associate Client Partner, Advisory, Korn Ferry

52

Total rewards should ultimately drive overall business success Low Choy Huat, Partner, People Advisory Services, Ernst & Young Advisory Services Sdn. Bhd.

54

What if there were no rewards at work?

Abhijit Bhaduri, A coach, author and one of the most followed

writers in the area of Talent Management

C O N TE N TS

56

Why you need to revamp your total rewards programs Clinton Wingrove, Director of www.WantToBeGreatManager. com and www.ClintonHR.com

How tailored rewards will help compensation and benefits managers drive business outcomes in 2020

By Mastufa Ahmed

58

A winning rewards strategy augments business success

Janani Ravishankar, Leader of Global Compensation & HR

Analytics at Cleartrip

26 If we think like a machine, we will soon be replaced by a machine the big Interview

interview

Leading from the edges Ravin Jesuthasan,

Author and Managing Director, Willis Towers Watson

Dean Tong, Managing Director, Head of Group Human Resources, UOB Group

By Ester Martinez and Vallari Gupte

By Yasmin Taj

Editor-in-Chief

Features Writers

Senior Editor

Assistant Managers, Content

Esther Martinez Hernandez Yasmin Taj

Anushree Sharma | Bhavna Sarin

Associate Editor, Print & Online

Mastufa Ahmed

Manager, design, photography, and production

Marta Martinez

Drishti Pant Neelanjana Mazumdar Design & Production

Digital Head

Jerry Moses

Prakash Shahi

Associate Editor

General Manager, Sales

Abid Hasan

Senior Features Writer

6

Senior Associates, Content

Shinto Kallattu

Manager, Content

Shweta Modgil

Manav Seth | Vallari Gupte

Rubi Taj rubi.taj@peoplematters.in +91 (124) 4148102

| JANUARY 2020

Manager, Sales

Saloni Gulati saloni.gulati@peoplematters.in +91 (124) 4148102 Manager, SUBSCRIPTION

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Mahesh Kumar on behalf of People Matters Media Pvt. Ltd. Owned by

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This issue of People matters contains 100 pages including cover

contents

17 w or k c ul t ure

Reducing employee stress to improve performance

By Ashish Shah, Leads the day-to-day operations of Apttus India, and supports strategic initiatives, as a member of the senior team

HR TECH IN SEA

78

18 ne w s f ea t ure

Status: Unemployed

The Southeast Asia Market Opportunity

20 Wor k Cul t ure

Can a four-day work week amp up worker efficiency?

22 Fu t ure o f w or k

50 and going strong:

The journey from ‘mid-life career crisis’ to ‘mid-life career opportunity’

By Drishti Pant 25 N e w A g e R e c rui t m en t

C O N TE N TS

The recruiter’s dilemma in the digital era

By Venkatesh Ganapathy, Associate Professor (Marketing), Presidency Business School, Bangalore 30 L earnin g & D evelo p m en t

L&D Trends for 2020:

Moving learning in the flow of work

By Andy Lancaster, Head of Learning at the Chartered Institute for Personnel and Development (CIPD) 38 Peo p le Pra c t i c es 5 counter-intuitive people practices from the world’s leading innovators

By Pavan Soni, Founder and Innovation Evangelist, Inflexion Point Consulting

42 in t ervie w Have an agile mindset, not just an agile workspace

62 in t ervie w

High-performance culture starts with high employee self-awareness

Dudi Arisandi, Chief People Officer at Indonesian OTA player Tiket.com

By Shweta Modgil

64 Wor k - li f e b alan c e

Dying for a better pay cheque?

By Jeff Pfeffer, Chair-professor of organizational behavior at Stanford University; and M Muneer, Co-founder and chief evangelist at the non-profit Medici Institute Foundation

66 Wor k p la c e Poli c y

Office dating policies in the age of #MeToo

By Ronni Zehavi, CEO of Hibob, a people management platform 68 in t ervie w

How telcos can take a leap in 2020

Farid Basir, CHRO, Telekom Malaysia

By Anushree Sharma

04 From the Editor’s Desk

60 Wor k p la c e Poli c y

12 Quick Reads

Why 2020 is the year to go global with your talent strategy

By Steve Black, Chief Strategy Officer at Topia - an award-winning global mobility management platform

| JANUARY 2020

Change management: The more things change, the more they stay the same

76 in t ervie w

Every business will have a virtual workforce

Matt Barrie, CEO, Freelancer.com

By Bhavna Sarin 84 W O M E N A T W O R KP L A C E

PoSH Act in the #MeToo era

By Vikram Shroff, Leader of the HR law (Employment and labor) team at Nishith Desai Associates 86 H R S t ra t e g y

A model to predict and improve industrial relations climate

By Paul James, Managing Partner & Principal Consultant at P S C S - A HR Consulting Firm 88 T h e road less t ravelled

Music and management

By Visty Banaji, Founder and CEO of Banner Global Consulting (BGC)

92 L eaders h i p

A wide-spectrum image of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs

By Praveen Sinha, Ex Head – HR Centre of Excellence, Corporate HR, Escorts Ltd & Co-founder, People n Planet Fora

regulars

Tarun Rai, Chairman & Group CEO, Wunderman Thompson South Asia

By Yasmin Taj

8

74 Mana g in g C h an g e

By Abhipsa Mishra, Consultant – Change Catalyst, OCM Practice, LTI

By People Matters Editorial

By Dhruv Mukerjee

Building competitive advantage through people – A leader’s role

By Dr. Mrityunjay Kumar Srivastava, Vice President, L&D, HR, Wipro Limited, Bangalore

By Manav Seth

72 L E A D E R S H I P

10 Letters of the month

16

Rapid Fire

94 Knowledge + Networking 96 Blogosphere

Featured In this issue DEAN TONG DUDI ARISANDI FARID BASIR FERMIN DIEZ HARKIRAT SINGH JANANI RAVISHANKAR

KARTIKEY SINGH LOW CHOY HUAT MATT BARRIE RAVIN JESUTHASAN TARUN RAI

CONTRIBUTORS to this issue Abhijit Bhaduri Abhipsa Mishra Andy Lancaster Clinton Wingrove Jeffrey Pfeffer M Muneer Dr. Mrityunjay Kumar Srivastava Paul James

Pavan Soni Praveen Sinha Ronni Zehavi Sivakumar Palaniappan Steve Black Venkatesh Ganapathy Vikram Shroff Visty Banaji

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Letters of the month

l e t tqeur isc okf r t heea m d os n t h

Big shifts for 2020

All the leaders and experts who contributed to the cover story raised pertinent people trends and challenges. Our workplaces are changing rapidly, and we need quick-response systems to solve the critical human capital management issues that we are facing today. I am particularly glad that employees and the workforce will become an even bigger priority for businesses in the coming year and that organizations will continue to focus on employee well-being and upskilling. The developments of the last decade have intricately tied the talent agenda to the business agenda, and in the next few years, we will experience more radical DECEMBER 2019 issue changes in the existing paradigm. The time has come for HR leaders and professionals to rise to the occasion and create discernible Stay connected to the changes in the world of business. Young and aspiring HR leaders people that you are leadwould do well to go through the insights offered by experts and ing: Nigel Vaz design their talent agenda for the next year accordingly.

Nigel Vaz’s interview beautifully encap- Gurpreet Singh

Are our employees emotionally intelligent?

In an increasingly digital world, it is no longer a luxury but a necessity to retain human touch and interaction. We need to find ways to ensure that intelligent machines and software systems work seamlessly across industries to bring out the best qualities of humanity. The writer is absolutely correct in suggesting that skills like persuasion, social understanding, empathy, and problem-

solving will become integral to businesses very soon. This is a part of the broader skill shift that will take place in the near future, wherein individuals will need both technical and soft skills to succeed. To help the workforce adapt to a digital-first workplace, the need for emotionally aware and intelligent leaders is only going to increase in the future. Thus, the faster we move towards a machine-driven world, the more urgent is the need to become emotionally intelligent.

- Nitin Sethi

The state of digital skilling

The research on digital skilling identifies some of the biggest challenges and opportunities in the L&D function today. While most organizations realize how important it is to provide continuous training to their employees, the reality is that most do not have dedicated and effective learning programs. Worse still, many organizations continue to rely on obsolete training approaches, like classroom training, to ensure that their employees are adequately trained. Clearly, despite the rising demand and awareness regarding the need for digital skilling, organizations lack a clear roadmap for training. Similarly, due to the increasing pace of digitization, the need to align business and learning strategies has never been higher. As suggested by the research, we need a blended approach towards learning and broaden the scope of assessing the impact of learning by measuring job-readiness, retention, and engagement as well.

- Tarunima Goyal

10

| JANUARY 2020

sulates the journey and learning of an experienced, able, and successful leader.

His astute observations of leadership, employee experience, upskilling, entrepreneurship, and the future of work contain several vital lessons for business and HR leaders. I agree with him that the customer experience and employee experience are closely related to each other, and only engaged and motivated employees will be able to engage customers successfully. I also think that most organizations have not been able to comprehend the exponential progression and transformation that is currently underway, and they continue to operate linearly. Nigel’s take on how businesses can move past these roadblocks was very informative. Also, learning about Sapient’s culture and the transformation was remarkably insightful.

- Keertana Gupta

Interact with People Matters

The power of being a deep generalist

- Raunak Sapra

The McDonald’s debacle

Corporate India’s mental health crisis The mental wellness of Indian working professionals is a pressing challenge that needs to be tended to urgently. While many factors prevent employees from seeking the help they need, I think the biggest one, as pointed out by Visty Banaji, is the stigma surrounding it. As he rightly suggests, Indian workplaces do not accord the same importance to mental health as they do to physical ailments and disabilities. Our current priorities, systems, and processes in the workplace - that discourage a healthy work-life balance - are surely to blame. Business leaders and HR managers need to do a lot more than they are currently doing to combat a challenge what could soon become a global epidemic.

Kudos to Banaji for eloquently discussing a critical people challenge and providing a practical roadmap to start remedying it.

- Shashank Kaul

It is a ‘hit refresh’ scenario

Every organization must have a clear policy on romantic relationships between its employees and clarify whether dating a colleague is acceptable or not. Many organizations have couple-friendly policies and encourage employees to refer their partners as well. Retention of talent and higher loyalty of couples towards the organization are two reasons that are given to support this perspective. On the other hand, increasingly, organizations have strict no-fraternization policies in place, and with context to the #MeToo movement, even organizations that were ambivalent towards consensual relationships have moved towards outrightly banning them.

Indeed, a relationship between two employees in different roles and levels leads to a lopsided power equation, allegations of favoritism, and instances of bullying, but, many workplace relationships end in a life-long commitment as well. I agree with the writer that forbidding consensual relationships in the workplace is the easy way out to prevent claims of sexual harassment, and not addressing the real problem.

Manu Wadhwa’s lessons on leadership are critical for new and young leaders to succeed in today’s unforgiving business world. I agree with her that ultimately, leaders need to have an ear to the ground, listen to people, and take care of their needs. They must also be, as she suggests, compelling storytellers, consistent communicators, and inclusive. The leaders of today and tomorrow will need a radically different set of skills to thrive in a digital-first world. They must be selfaware, emotionally intelligent, and have a collaborative approach to work to succeed.

We must recognize the idea that rewarding the right behavior to reinforce the right values in the workforce is as important as rewarding high performance or results. To successfully refresh, rewire, and reimagine the way we work, leaders must find innovative and fresh approaches to the challenges of talent, engagement, and productivity by challenging the existing norms of people management.

- Khyati Sharma

- Nupur Thakkar

Anne Chow @TheAnneChow Replying to @attJOBS. According to @ PeopleMatters2, some lesser talked about challenges include: Facing Stereotypes & Bias; Workplace Safety & Security Challenges; Career Progression Opportunities; and Lack of Industry Mentors & Networks. #WomenInBusiness #ATTBusiness #LifeatATT HRCurator @HRCurator RT @robertascandro1 Thx4RT fr @HRCurator: 2019's top 10 trending stories on People & Work by @PeopleMatters2 Xpheno @Xpheno_ The Japanese technology major plans to hire 14,000 employees to support growth in India, writes @ShwetaMod @PeopleMatters2 Priya Goutham @priya_goutham Replying to @hr_shapers @PeopleMatters2 Thank you, the event was very well curated and met some amazing people.

Lionel Paul David @LionelJDPaul Replying to @PeopleMatters2 @ekincaredotcom it was a seamless hosting effort as usual. I enjoyed the conversation with Dr. Noel and Sirish. Thanks for having me!

Abhijit Bhaduri @AbhijitBhaduri Replying to @achyutmenon @PeopleMatters2. I got a first hand view of how talent acquisition is shifting from an industry veteran. Thanks, @achyutmenon for your time.

l e t tqeur isc okf r t heea m d os n t h

Sivakumar Palaniappan raises a very important, yet often underplayed, aspect of the modern workforce. Our education and workplace systems are designed to encourage people to become experts, and this often comes at the cost of developing crucial real-world context to complex problems. The writer makes a very compelling argument for giving impetus to supporting polymaths who can apply knowledge of diverse fields to solve the unique challenges we face today. This is particularly true for businesses as professionals who are competent in two or three skillsets, instead of one, naturally have a higher chance of solving business-critical challenges with innovative and creative solutions.

Sivakumar’s suggestions on how to be a modern-day polymath are also very simple to get started upon; all that’s needed is a commitment to learning and growth.

People Matters values your feedback.

Write to us with your suggestions and ideas at editorial@peoplematters.in

Jacob Morgan @jacobm I recently had a fun conversation with the amazing people from @PeopleMatters2.

Read as we talk about #democratized learning in this world of #technology.

Priya Goutham @priya_goutham Replying to @hr_shapers @PeopleMatters2 Thank you, the event was very well curated and met some amazing people. follow

M > @PeopleMatters2

{WRITE TO US NOW BY SCANNING THIS CODE} JANUARY 2020 |

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CAREER CHALLENGE

COMPENSATION & BENEFITS

69% of women making career return anticipate pay cuts

q u i c k

r e a d s

Salary growth in India is expected to be highest in Asia in 2020: Report As per the latest Korn Ferry Global Salary Forecast, salary growth in India is expected to be highest in Asia at 9.2 percent in 2020. However, the inflationadjusted real-wage in India is anticipated to be constant at five percent.

According to the forecast, salaries are predicted to grow at a rate of approximately 4.9 percent globally in 2020. With a global inflation rate prediction of approximately 2.8 percent, the real-wage salary increase prediction is at 2.1 percent. In Asia, Indonesia is forecasted to have a salary growth

ECONOMY

Indian factories shed jobs in November: PMI

EXPANSION

Wipro to set up a cyber defense center in Australia India's IT major Wipro is planning to expand its presence in Australia's Victoria state by establishing a $1.5 Mn state-of-theart cyber defense center. The new center in South Melbourne will offer protection from cyber attacks for organizations and will generate 100 new tech jobs for locals.

According to Wipro Senior Vice President Raja Ukil, "The launch of the center in Melbourne showcases Wipro's commitment to leverage local talent and specialized expertise to cater to the cybersecurity needs of the region."

12

of 8.1 percent, whereas, Malaysia, China, and Korea are expected to have a salary growth of five percent, six percent, and 4.1 percent respectively. The lowest salary growth is expected in Japan and Taiwan at two percent & 3.9 percent respectively.

While it is good news that salaries in India continue to grow, that growth is not even. Given the tighter increment grids to stretched increment percentages, companies will continue to differentiate their top performers, high potentials, and critical talent sharply.

Young India still has more than seven million second career women who are seeking a career return despite a shift in focus among corporate firms towards developing second career women.

Motherhood Challenges (45 percent) and Maternity (35 percent) are the most common reasons for women to take a break from their careers, according to a survey by Viewport 2019, conducted on the theme ‘Second Careers of Women Professionals,’ among 783 second career women across diverse sectors in the country with an Average Work Experience of 9.5 years and an Average Duration of 4.4 years Career Break. The survey also found that Elder Care Responsibility with 16 percent remains another critical reason for women in the country to take a career break.

| JANUARY 2020

Even though India’s manufacturing activity saw a rise in November, the industry saw a decline in the number of jobs and people employed in the factories. New orders and higher outputs contributed to the rise in productivity, however, factories remain pessimistic about the future as they shed jobs for the first time since March 2018.

India’s economy is expanding at a slower pace than in the last six years and economists are concerned about the delayed recovery. If the economy is to generate enough jobs for the new youth joining the labor force, the economy needs to grow by eight percent every year.

In today’s Industry 4.0 era, driven

by AI and the Digital world, the Insufficient Support at Home (23 percent), the Absence of Strong Network (59 percent), and Skill Gap (36 percent), are the top three biggest barriers for second career women. The majority of respondents (69 percent) anticipate a Pay Cut on their career re-entry due to the prevalence of the motherhood wage penalty.

Financial Security and Putting Education to Good Use are the two highly motivating factors for women to make career returns, both recording 38 percent response as the number 1 driver. 63 percent of respondents indicated high career intentionality by preferring Full-Time jobs, while only 23 percent of women said they would want to come back to Flexible roles.

workplace stress

89% of UK employees suffer from workplace stress The greatest cause of

LAYOFFS

A failed merger bid with Tata steel, hard competition in a market closely dictated by global economic trends, cheaper pricing by

foreign rivals, and environmental regulations hit Thyssenkrupp’s operations and business badly.

When Martina Merz took over as CEO a few months back she had a lot on her plate, as the company struggled. Recently, her focus has been to find efficiencies, cut debt, get rid of struggling units, and find new partners. Merz announced organizational restructuring and operational revamp.

Then came the news to list or sell its elevator division and the possibility to sell majority stakes in its struggling car parts and plant engineering divisions.

While announcing these developments, Merz had then said, “It is true that this will not be possible without significant job cuts.

This is about strengthening businesses and improving performance. This is not a sellout.”

Daimler has joined the list of latest automakers who have announced a round of layoffs in an effort to cut costs and drive resources towards the production of electric vehicles.

Daimler will be laying off about 10,000 employees by 2022 in order to become future-ready for the industry’s “biggest transformation in history.”

The automaker that also happens to own the coveted brand, MercedesBenz, is planning to reduce about three percent of its workforce including the reduction of management positions by 10 percent. The company plans to save about 1.4 billion euros ($1.54 Bn) by 2022.

r e a d s

Thyssenkrupp’s financial struggle & CEO Martina Merz’s attempt to save it

contractors and freelancers surveyed. Just under half of the employees in SMEs (47 percent) stated that low pay, the inability to build savings and no chance of progression were stressors.

Daimler to lay off 10,000 to move to EVs

q u i c k

stress in the UK workplace was found to be long working hours, with 41 percent of respondents to a study stating that they have been affected, according to the Stress in the Workplace study conducted by the Dolan Contractor Group, that gathered responses from employees of 140 companies across the UK. The next most common stressor is a deadline or client pressure with 32 percent, followed by low pay and the inability to build financial savings with 29 percent.

Six percent of permanent employee respondents stated that they would not seek help if they were suffering from excessive stress, opting to ‘hope it gets better’. This figure rose to 17 percent of

AUTOMOTIVE SECTOR

Other companies such as Audi, Volkswagen’s luxury car arm, announced that it plans to cut about 9,500 jobs as it moves towards concentrating on electric vehicles. These jobs will be cut by 2025. The shift towards electric vehicles has led to a global slump in auto sales.

BENEFITS & REWARDS

PwC Malaysia extends paternity leave to 30 days PwC Malaysia announced a paternity leave of 30 days to encourage fathers to play a more active role in parenting, and share responsibilities in taking care of their newborn. This enhancement forms a part of PWC’s flex+ program which includes lifestyle and medical benefits as well, which constitute the firm’s priority to continue its focus on employee well-being, flexibility at work, and employee needs.

Introduction of flexBenefits provides employees the option to claim for various expenses within the scope of lifestyle which includes leisure travel, fitness, workplace ergonomics tools, childcare center fees, purchase of baby gear such as car seats, and personal development courses; while medical Plus covers specialist outpatient treatment, physiotherapy, and maternity-related expenses (including fertility treatments).

JANUARY 2020 |

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newsmaker of the month

Sundar Pichai: A leader to spell out Alphabet’s future

Pichai's popularity may have slipped in the last few years as Googlers lost trust in their company’s practices, but if anyone can regain employees’ faith and put the letters of the Alphabet back together, it would be him Pichai, who joined Google as an engineer in 2004 and worked his way up through the ranks, may have a better chance of dealing with these crises than Page, his predecessor in the Alphabet hot seat. His leadership style and ability to relate to others may make all the difference: he is famously loved by employees.

They describe him as a deeply empathetic leader who genuinely cares about his team members and who values substance enough to not be swayed by office politics or opportunistic behavior; anecdotal accounts shape the picture of a man whose greatest skills lie in bringing out the best in others, enabling collaboration and compromise, and bridging the gaps between teams and individuals.

His popularity may have slipped in the last few years as Googlers lost trust in their company’s practices, but if anyone can regain employees’ faith and put the letters of the Alphabet back together, it would be him.

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Image Source: The New York Times

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ast December, one of the world’s most reputable CEOs was given what CNBC called the worst job in Silicon Valley. Sundar Pichai, who was appointed CEO of tech behemoth Google in 2015, was elevated to CEO of Google’s parent company Alphabet as well, a move that puts him in charge of not just Google, but the entire collection of experimental moonshots and passion projects spun off from Google’s innovation-mad culture.

His elevation may spell out relief for the business. Alphabet is saddled with loss-making projects that have been tricky to shut down because they are the brain-children of Google co-founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin; while Google itself, once famous for the motto “Do no evil”, faces profound internal and external challenges: internally by disaffected employees protesting against executive misbehavior and mishandling of employee concerns, and externally by a slew of antitrust accusations and regulatory investigations.

Costa Coffee names Jill McDonald as new CEO The international coffee and cafe giant, Costa Coffee’s CEO Dominic Paul will step down from his current role by Nov. 30. Jill McDonald will succeed Paul and assume her new responsibilities as of Dec. 2. At Costa, Paul has seen the company through a turning point in the organizational life –sale of Costa Coffee to The Coca-Cola Company in Jan. 2019. He has also been instrumental in helping Whitbread separate from the coffeehouse giant.

Skillsoft appoints new CMO Skillsoft, a global player in corporate learning announced that Michelle Boockoff-Bajdek has joined the company as Chief Marketing Officer. In this role, she will join Skillsoft’s executive leadership team to drive go-to-market initiatives. Boockoff-Bajdek will oversee the global marketing organization, leading both the Skillsoft and SumTotal marketing teams and the company’s customers toward a vision of unlimited learning potential.

Vishal Sikka joins Oracle’s board of directors Former Infosys CEO Vishal Sikka, has been nominated to the board of directors of Oracle. Sikka has also recently launched his AI startup Vianai Systems and happens to be a leading expert in the field of AI and Machine Learning. In his new role as a member of the board, Sikka will be guiding Oracle develop its business value in a fast-changing technological environment.

Axis Bank CFO steps down Jairam Sridharan, Group Executive and Chief Financial Officer and Key Managerial Personnel of Axis Bank, has stepped down from his post.

In a filing on Bombay Stock Exchange, the bank stated that Sridharan would like to pursue other career opportunities and as such has resigned from his services. Sridharan will, however, continue to serve as the Group Executive and Chief Financial Officer of the bank under his notice period of three months.

Audi appoints Arno Antlitz as its new CFO Audi AG, the German luxury carmaker, has announced that Arno Antlitz will take over as new Chief Financial Officer from March 1, 2020, replacing current CFO Alexander Seitz, who will move to Volkswagen Cars. The company has also appointed Dirk Grobe-Loheide & Sabine Maaben in the board of management of the brand who will join in 2020.

Condé Nast appoints new Chief People Officer Condé Nast has appointed Stan Duncan as the new Chief People Officer, In his new role, he will oversee the company’s global people organizations and lead all human resources functions, including talent acquisition, talent development, diversity and inclusion, executive compensation and total rewards, employment practices, HR technology, workforce planning and strategic business partnering.

WeWork ropes in former Publicis CEO as new CMO The appointment of former Publicis CEO Maurice Levy, as the interim Chief Marketing and Communications Officer of WeWork, has come after the co-working giant announced that it was laying off 2,400 employees. WeWork’s previous CEO, Adam Neumann, who stepped down from his role in late September, saw the brand struggle to crack the code of profitability.

Pavitra Singh succeeds Suchitra Rajendra as PepsiCo’s CHRO PepsiCo has elevated Pavitra Singh, Head of Talent Acquisition, Asia Middle East and North Africa as its new CHRO to fill the shoes of Suchitra Rajendra, who left the company in August to join COLT Tech as Country Head, India and HR Head, Global Operations (Europe and Asia). In 13 years, Singh rose to the position of Head Talent Acquisition for India Region in August 2015 and finally becoming the CHRO this year.

Paytm appoints new CHRO Rohit Thakur, who recently moved out from his role of as Head of Human Resources at Accenture India has joined Paytm as its new CHRO. Rohit transitioned out of Accenture India earlier this month and has moved into his new role at the fintech player. As the Group CHRO, Rohit will spearhead all the HR aspects as Paytm pursues its growth and expansion agenda.

Hilton appoints new VP, HR Hilton has appointed Sabu Raghavan as Vice President, Human Resources, India. With over two decades of experience in human resources in the education and hospitality industry, Sabu joined Hilton in 2011 and was most recently based in Singapore where he oversaw human resources for Southeast Asia and India.

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Uber’s Chief Product Officer steps down Chief Product Officer of Uber, Manik Gupta stepped down from his role after four years. Being the Chief Product Officer at Uber, Gupta led the global core product team. He was responsible for product management, data science, data analyst, design and program management functions. Prior to taking on this role, Manik ran Uber's marketplace and maps product teams, where he was responsible for creating mapping solutions and marketplace technologies.

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Subhash Chandra steps down as Chairman, Zee Entertainment Enterprises In light of the changes in shareholding, the Chairman and the Founder of Zee Entertainment Enterprises, Subhash Chandra stepped down from his role. In a stock exchange filing, the company said, “The board accepted his resignation and noted that this is in line with the requirements of Regulation 17 (lB) of SEBI Listing Regulations, which inter alia mandates that the Chairperson of the Board shall not be related to the Managing Director or the Chief Executive Officer of the company...”

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THIRTEE N Qu e s t i o n s

Rapid-Fire

interview

Harkirat Singh Managing Director, Woodland

By Abid Hasan

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Who is the one leader you look up to?

One thing that you consider as your strength and one thing that you would like to improve on?

Bill Gates. He has always inspired me to focus on the product before anything else. The product makes the brand, and nothing else matters.

I like to always think with a calm mind, be it for day to day activities or even in case of crisis. That I feel is my strength and works to my advantage. As they say ‘Calm is a super power’. I would like to improve my handwriting (laughs).

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What is the one leadership lesson you learned on the go as a people leader?

Which was the last book you read on leadership?

Unstoppable Teams: The Four Essential Actions of High-Performance Leadership by Alden Mills.

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How digitally ready are you as a leader on a scale of one to ten?

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Digitalization is the new face of the industry & I mark myself nine.

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What should leaders do: create more leaders or create more followers and why?

Leaders should create more leaders. That would result in more self-standing and motivating resources.

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One thing that makes you passionate about your work.

To continue taking Woodland to newer and higher heights.

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What matters to you most, effort or outcome?

I believe in effort, as efforts are never a waste of time. It either results in outcome or teaches you to improve with each attempt.

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Invest in teamwork with dedication and believe in your team.

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I believe in effort, as efforts are never a waste of time

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What sort of leader would your team say that you are?

You will have to ask them to be honest but I’d like to believe that I am a motivating and supporting leader.

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Three key learnings that you have picked up from your team.

1. Never stop trying new things 2. Passion to pursue things that make you happy (not necessarily official work) 3. Effective teamwork

What is the one thing leaders should do to make a difference?

Accept mistakes and work towards fixing them too.

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What’s the one most important factor you consider when hiring someone?

While hiring, we look for someone who is passionate about the field they are applying for. Interest makes one love their work and hence benefits the company to get the best results alongside the candidate’s growth.

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One step that you are taking to develop a leadership culture in your organization.

Giving the freedom to all to learn from their individual mistakes while working together as a team.

Ashish Shah

Reducing employee stress to improve performance Simple suggestions for fortifying organizational culture to combat erosion and employee burnout

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The 2019 Cigna 360 Well-Being Index assesses how people around the world feel about their health and well-being by measuring physical, financial, workplace, social, and family wellness. “Overall, the global well-being index remained largely steady at 62.0 points, closer to 2017 levels, with a marginal improvement from 2018’s decline,” reads the summary report. “Stress continues to affect respondents, adversely affecting how people feel about the workplace and directly contributing to the decline in physical health.” According to the report, India is one of several countries that showed an improvement in overall wellness with the highest rise of 4.4 points, while the U.S. rating (as well as that of other countries) decreased year-over-year.

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Stress: Eroding engagement of employees worldwide

Unfortunately, recently, The Economic Times reported that “Work stresses out 84 percent Indian professionals.” No one wants to lose hard-won gains on the engagement front due to stress: • Promoting a sense of autonomy and accomplishment: Drive author and leadership thinker Daniel Pink believes that “Control leads to compliance; autonomy leads to engagement.”

Employees who are empowered in their roles tend to take greater ownership of both their work product and results.

Clarifying goals and unleashing your people to achieve them demonstrates that you trust in their ability to solve problems. (You did hire them for that reason, after all!) Then, recognize when employees deliver great work and reward them accordingly. Bonuses are great, but something as small as a thank you note or congratulatory email can do wonders to boost morale.

• Encouraging healthy lifestyle habits: Research shows that healthy people are more mindful and productive and viceversa. Employees can’t fully focus on their work if suffering from psychological or physical illness, so it’s imperative that organizations provide support for mind and body wellness, and that employees prioritize both and take advantage of the support offered. For

example, employers without full cafeteria service can subsidize healthy meals delivered to the office or provide free snacks and fruits. One-on-one meetings can be conducted during a walk outside; employees can schedule time in a wellness room to meditate, pray, or just take a breather; and managers can help reinforce work-life balance by encouraging people to take time off to spend with friends and family, limit offhours communication to critical issues, and offer flexibility regarding where and when people do their work.

• Having fun together: Whether coming together in service for a volunteer event, celebrating a holiday or festival, or engaging in a little good-natured competition, having fun is an important way to lower stress and sustain a healthy work culture. On- or off-site, getting employees away from their desks gives them a chance to interact in new ways. They return with shared memories and a deeper understanding of the people they work with, which helps to forge a stronger community.

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appier, healthier, and more engaged employees make for more effective, efficient, and successful organizations.

But achieving high levels of engagement can be challenging, as a multitude of factors affect an employee’s relationship with their organization: a person’s role and potential for growth; relationships with colleagues, managers, and leaders; obstacles real and perceived; the total rewards package; having a sense of purpose and faith in the company’s direction; and many others.

One of the most frequently talked about elements of the engagement mix is employee well-being. How someone feels — physically, emotionally, financially, spiritually — has a real impact on their ability to innovate, collaborate, and connect with others and the company’s mission. The good news is that most forward-thinking organizations understand that engagement is an important organizational metric and are investing in activities and initiatives that promote employee well-being which yield both short- and long-term benefits for all.

Engagement: A work in progress While no one can completely eliminate stress from the workplace, doing what we can to lessen it is a worthwhile pursuit for anyone who cares about employee engagement and, more importantly, the people who make up our organizations. Because business is what it is, results matter, and we’re often at the mercy of stakeholder demands, deadlines, and other stressors — in addition to what’s going on in our personal lives. So as practitioners whose focus is on people and building resilient organizations, let’s endeavor to listen to, understand, support, and nurture our employees.

About the author

Ashish Shah leads the day-to-day operations of Apttus India, and supports strategic initiatives, as a member of the senior team.

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The Periodic Labor Force Survey report

by National Statistical Office, released in May 2019, shows that India’s unemployment rate was 6.1 percent in 201718, the highest in 45 years

Status: Unemployed A look at some recent reports that point toward rising unemployment in the country

By Manav Seth

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or the past few months, several worrying numbers and reports about the rising rate of unemployment in India have been doing the rounds. While such headlines are being politicized regularly, it becomes critical to contextualize these reports and understand conflicting evidence as well. Let us attempt to decipher the extent of joblessness in the nation by taking a closer look at some recent reports and studies.

Rising unemployment: By the numbers In the past few months, the results of several government-sanctioned and inde18

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pendent studies suggest that the unemployment level in the country is alarmingly high. After the results of general elections were announced, the Periodic Labor Force Survey (PLFS) report by National Statistical Office (NSO) was made public, and it showed that India’s unemployment rate was 6.1 percent in 2017-18; the highest in 45 years. A new methodology was attributed as one of the reasons behind the results, and the Chief Statistician of India, Pravin Srivastava, said that it would be unfair to compare the new numbers with that of the past1.

More recently, an academic paper written by Santosh Mehrotra and Jajati K Parida and published by the Centre

of Sustainable Employment at the Azim Premji University concluded that the total employment in India declined between 2011-12 and 2017-18 by nearly nine million, a first in India’s history2. Dr. Himanshu, a professor of economics at Jawaharlal Nehru University, also concluded that the absolute number of jobs declined by 15.5 million over this period3. Similarly, the rating agency CARE Ratings also reported that the pace of employment growth in India slowed from 3.9 percent in 2017-18 to 2.8 percent in 2018-194. Another report released by the Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy (CMIE) said that India’s unemployment rate in October 2019 rose to 8.5 percent, the highest since August 2016, although it subsequently fell to 7.48 percent in November 20195.

It is important to note that these results are contradictory to the findings of Laveesh Bhandari and Amaresh Dubey, who undertook a study commissioned by the Economic Advisory Council to the Prime Minister, which claimed that the total employment grew from 433 million in 2011-12 to 457 million in 2017-186. These disparities have been attributed to the different estimates used for the total population of the country and differences in methodologies. However, even this study concluded that the total employment in the country grew by 0.8 percent, which is less than half the rate at which the overall population grew (1.7 percent). Furthermore, the study showed that most of this increase happened in the urban areas, and despite the high growth in the rate of employment in the organized sector, India Inc increasingly prefers to hire noncontractual workers.

The many faces of unemployment in India Women's participation in the workforce: The OECD Economic Survey of

India found that India is one of the worst nations for women workers as the difference between the employment rates of women and men among OECD nations is at 52 percentage points, the highest7. The report states that unemployment among young and educated women in urban areas is also high and that underemployment and poor job quality remain fundamental challenges.

Unemployment in youth: The data from PLFS shows that unemployment among people aged 15-29 years was the highest during the January-March 2019 quarter, at 22.5 percent. Another analysis shows that the number of individuals in the 18-30 age bracket employed in the MGNREGA increased from 5.8 million in 2017-18 to 7.1 million in 2018-198. The rise is alarming because this number had steadily been declining from more than 10 million in 2013-14. Experts have opined that the growing unemployment in youth has resulted in them withdrawing from the workforce, and many people in their

20s have stopped looking for work, which means that a part of the most potent section of the workforce is choosing to sit out due to lack of employment opportunities9. The recent disruptions in the telecom and auto industries have also resulted in several thousand young individuals losing their jobs.

Rural India and unorganized sector: The Minister of State and Labor Employment Santosh Kumar Gangwar stated in the Rajya Sabha that unemployment in rural areas increased from 2.9 percent in 2013-14 to 5.3 percent in 2017-18; in urban areas, it rose from 4.9 percent to 7.7 percent during the same period10. Similarly, a 25 percent jump has been witnessed in the number of people being given work over the past five years under MGNREGA; the Rural Development Minister Narendra Singh Tomar said that the total number of individuals who worked under the scheme across the country went up from 62.2 million to 77.7 million in 2018-1911. A rise in the number of people opting for work

The government’s reaction and strategy

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With the government admitting to a slowdown12 and the RBI revising the GDP growth forecast to five percent13, questions are being raised about the unemployment rate in the country and the quality of jobs available. However, no new policy or program has been launched in recent times to focus specifically on curbing unemployment. When quizzed on the steps taken by the government to arrest unemployment rates, the Minister of State and Labor Employment Santosh Kumar Gangwar replied in the Rajya Sabha that the private sector is being given stimulus to grow and generate more jobs, in addition to fast-tracking investment in existing schemes. He said that expenditure on programs like the Prime Minister’s Employment Generation Program, MGNREGS, Deen Dayal Upadhyaya Grameen Kaushalya Yojana, and the Deen Dayal Antyodaya Yojana-National Urban Livelihoods Mission had been increased.

However, reports have shown that most of the existing programs expected to create jobs have not fared well. For instance, only 20 percent of the beneficiaries who took a loan under the Mudra scheme started new businesses14, and nearly three percent of these loans have been classified as NPAs15. Similarly, of the 6.4 million individuals trained under the Pradhan Mantri Kaushal Vikas Yojana (to impart skills), only 1.4 million got jobs16.

While one can question the reliability and accuracy of all the reports mentioned above, the fact that they all suggest the same overarching trend points towards the compounding challenge of unemployment in the country. However, amid all the gloom, silver linings have started appearing. A recent TeamLease report says that India can expect a seven percent growth in job creation over the next six months and that jobs in healthcare, IT, and e-commerce will witness the maximum growth17. Similarly, experts feel that the steps taken to boost growth in the past few months can result in higher capital availability with organizations and encourage them to hire18. Nonetheless, the government needs to act fast and implement measures that not only help the economy pick up the pace but also generate employment. To fix the systemic issues that plague the Indian workforce and job market, the government needs to do a lot more than is currently being done.

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The OECD Economic Survey of India found that India is one of the worst nations for women workers

in the employment scheme is deemed to be a signal of rural distress and lack of employment opportunities.

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Can a four-day work week amp up worker efficiency?

A concept which has seen a rise in recent times, can having four working days instead of five be helpful for both employers and its employees?

By Dhruv Mukerjee

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n what might seem like a revolutionary idea, a four workday per week model has slowly begun expanding across many developed economies.

Although slow in its adoption, more and more companies today are experimenting with the idea and have noted a rise in their overall productivity vis-à-vis the traditional five days a week working pattern.

One of the most prominent results of the four-day work came from Japan. An experiment that began last summer, Microsoft gave its employees five consecutive four workday weeks. This meant employees got three day weekends for the entire period. This move was strengthened by limiting the time for meeting to under 30 mins and facilitating more remote communications that aimed to cut out the clutter.

The use of digital platforms to communicate was also promoted. The result of this was that Microsoft’s sales per employee soared 40 percent from the previous year.

The company also saved money on electricity bills and paper-copying costs. In its trial in August 2019, 2,300 employees who were given a paid Friday off each week reported a 40 percent increase in the productivity of employees in the month (measured against August 2018). Given its limited scope and period, the experiment isn’t essentially the gold standard for comparing the benefits of traditional work structures vis-à-vis one that allows employees to work for four weeks, but it points to an important area of change –and a question. With technology raising employee productivity significantly over the years, is the norm of five workdays in a week the most efficient way of making companies productive?

A multitude of factors Many experts across businesses doubt the impact a four workday week can have on increasing the productivity for their 20

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Microsoft gave its employees five consecutive four workday weeks. This meant employees got three day weekends for the entire period. This move was strengthened by limiting the time for meeting to over 30 mins and the use of digital platforms to communicate was also promoted employees. For many, it’ll end up being the case where employers end up paying more—impacting bottom-line performance— at the cost of employees taking an extra day off. Although parts of such a concern are perhaps true, what is indisputable is that the nature of most jobs today is substantially different than it was decades back. Employees are not only more productive, they are also more efficient at remaining productive.

Not just has the business application of tech made jobs more efficient, they have also changed how employees connect and talk to each other for work-related purposes. Platforms like Slack have leveraged digital technologies to make workflow more efficient and reduce the number

of backlogs that gets created in executing often complex business processes.

Gaps may occur due to the lack of clear communication and coordination but digital technology is making the process more efficient.

Across sectors, intelligent automation and AI are slowly reducing the amount of transactional and time-consuming portions of employees' work, thus freeing them up to be more productive. Work too can be structured and allocated better between employees and to reduce redundancies. These conditions suit the four workday model whereby cutting down on the clutter and assessing performance better, companies can provide an extra day off. Although such models remain in

Can a shorter work week raise productivity? Certain experts and academicians certainly think so. But also do much more.

Adam Grant2, a psychologist from the Wharton School in Pennsylvania, in the WEF meet at Davos highlighted this relationship by adding that there currently are “some good experiments showing that if you reduce work hours, people can focus their attention more effectively, they end up producing just as much, often with higher quality and creativity, and they are also more loyal to the organizations that are willing to give them the flexibility to care about their lives outside of work."

We’ve looked at how both a tech-driven business environment and evolving candidate preferences make for some companies, at least within certain tech facing sectors, more suitable to have a four workday per week structure as it’ll improve employee productivity. The reasons for this are varied and obvious at a closer look. Long hours often cause fatigue, both physical and mental, which often end up making employees drag out their work. Thus work that can effectively be wrapped up in over lesser time, take more to be finished. Higher fatigue also leads to errors slipping into the quality of work, which might end up costing more to companies.

Social signaling many say can end up playing an important role as for employees, ‘appearing to look busy’ becomes an impor-

tant consideration. Since not all work can be closely monitored, employees are incentivized, mostly subconsciously, to spread their work across the five days, even if it can effectively be wrapped up much earlier.

Leaving office sooner and not spending a long night in the office can be taken as a detriment rather than objectively looking at the employee's performance. All these factors end up sacrificing productivity for more workdays.

But to limit the conversation just to productivity versus days worked debate would remove other advantages that both employees and companies could potentially gain and limits the scope of the argument. As candidates begin prioritizing well-being, companies that offer a four workday week stand to attract better talent and retain them for longer. It can also help build a better understanding between the employer and candidate as both trust each other to maintain productivity levels despite one less day of work. For companies too, the overall cost it's able to cut down by working one day less, are quite significant.

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Productivity not the only consideration

As candidates begin prioritizing wellbeing, companies that offer a four workday week stand to attract better talent and retain them for longer. It can also help build a better understanding between the employer and candidate as both trusts each other to maintain productivity levels despite one less day of work

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an experimental stage, with these changes slowly spreading over to other more traditional work environments like manufacturing and retail, the concept of a four workday might soon find wider acceptability.

But it isn’t just the nature of jobs that is creating a mandate for a four workday week. The workforce demographics today is split across age groups that have a different perception of what work means and as a result, have varied motivational levels when it comes to working five days a week. But a four workday model helps them balance their well-being, a priority for many.

Reports show that a four workday model can help with that. In a study done by the Henley Business School1, over half (51 percent) of the respondents reported that the four-day working week enabled them to save costs. Of those, 62 percent added that their staff took fewer days off, 63 percent said they produced better quality work, and 64 percent were more productive. What is also more interesting is that the report added that over 67 percent of Gen Z in Britain said it would drive them to pick a place to work.

Final thoughts Although trends within the business world are often short-lived, some stay to redefine the way we work significantly. It's difficult to imagine a workplace without computers or the Internet today. But while the adoption of some is fast, some take time and deliberation to become the norm of the industry. When it comes to India, most find the nature of work too dispersed and the close competition between firms too large to give up on one day of work. But today with the ability to remove redundancies, use technology and collaborative platforms to make the workflow smoother, and the option to provide employees better worklife balance, while also being able to cut costs in certain cases, a four workday week might soon become a more accepted part of reality.

Notes 1.

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‘Four Better or Four Worse?’-Henley School of Business WEF report

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50 and going strong: The journey from ‘mid-life career crisis’ to ‘mid-life career opportunity’ The employees in their 50s are not necessarily sitting back and preparing for a relaxed life after retirement.

Many wish to explore new careers, some wish to work longer and for some working for more years is more of a necessity, given the increased life expectancy. So what does this mean for business and HR?

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early a third of 50 to 65-yearolds are unemployed, according to a research. About a million of them had to leave jobs because of redundancy, caring responsibilities or ill-health. While the trend is most common in western countries with aging population like the US and UK, in Asian countries including Japan, Singapore and India many in their 50s experience what we can refer to as a mid-life crisis. Some are tired of working for many years and now seek a break, some wish to continue work but explore something different, and then there are others for whom employment is more of a need than a luxury.

The way people look at retirement has completely changed over the years. From dreaming about living in a farmhouse, gardening and watching TV, and other stereotypical ways of living the life after retirement to now switching careers in 50s and looking for new employment avenues for another undefined years of life.

Even for business and HR leaders, how they prepare the employees for retirement and look at succession planning has to change now. There is a need to revisit HR policies, from hiring to learning and development and make them flexible enough to cater to the varied needs of how employees in their 50s need to plan their career ahead.

Learning is the ultimate solution to stay relevant in the fast changing world of work

Redesigning recruitment: For employees switching careers in 50s Most of the employees in 50s are from the generation famously referred to as ‘Baby Boomer’. If we look from a stereotypical lens, baby boomers were mostly pushed into the employment market driven more by the need to work than their passion or most of them discovered their passion much later in life or their interests changed as they moved ahead in their professional journey. Now while these seem to be stereotypical perceptions restricted to only the baby boomers, such scenarios could hold true for employees from any generation. Hence, hiring based

on age becomes completely out of the question.

“For organizations, rather than focusing on just age, it is important to evaluate the complete value proposition that a candidate brings to the job role in question - experience, skills, aptitude and perhaps the most important, how the candidate fits in with the company culture, should all be weighed upon.” said Gauri Padmanabhan, Partner at Heidrick & Struggles.

Anjali Raghuvanshi, Chief People Officer, Randstad India echoed the same thought. “The focus while hiring is no

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learning is imperative. “The conversation needs to move away from the age factor to the learning factor,” reiterated Padmanabhan. She believes that age is just a number, what matters is one’s energy, passion and learning agility; the ability to learn new skills, technologies and adapt to new environment.

Back in October 2018, the IT major Cognizant had laid off around 200 of its senior employees at the director level on grounds of them not being tech savvy.

It was not about age but more about the inability to adapt to the changing needs of business.

the same company but explore other role or create a different role altogether for themselves. Given these scenarios, would the companies’ policies be flexible enough to cater to these needs of the employee?

Not only from employees’ perspective, but even from the organization’s perspective, it might need these experienced professionals who bring in so much knowledge and hold immense potential to help the company achieve its vision. How would the availability of an experienced in house pool in such case impact an organization’s manpower requirements? Job roles would have to be redesigned and the various elements considered while calculating the manpower requirements have to be expanded to address the changing employment needs and priorities of employees in their 50s.

“Employers don’t lay off employees because they are old but because they are complacent,”said Raghuvanshi. Complacency doesn’t come with age and neither does the drive to learn. The world’s smartest and busiest people including the older ones like Bill Gates and Warren Buffett find one hour a day for deliberate learning.

Leaders like Bill Gates and Warren Buffett lead by example and show how age is only a number and drive to create an impact is all that matters. Leaders like these have got so far by consistent efforts.

They have updated their skills and adopted to the rapidly changing environment to ensure that they not only move ahead with time but in some cases lead the way.

In 2017, Brian Duperreault, then 70 years old, was named CEO by American International Group. Given how hard it is for anyone over the age of 50 to get a new job due to persistent discrimination based on age in the workplace, these business leaders instill some hope in the current workforce in their 50s and highlight the

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longer on age but more on capability,” she said.

In fact, Padmanabhan highlighted that in a few countries discrimination based on age is also against the law. While the economies and the government are still to catch up on introducing such progressive laws, organizations who seek to lead the way through future of work should definitely welcome such policies.

Further, redesigning recruitment strategies is also critical from the point of view of employees who wish to continue to work even after the expected retirement age, ‘60s’. Some might wish to continue in

Continuous learning: The ultimate solution Whether we take the case of an employee switching career in 50s or someone exploring a different or same role in the company, 24

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opportunity for employers. The career planning for employees approaching their 50s should, hence, begin way in advance.

HR leaders can help identify the high potentials and the employees who are willing to work for longer time. The roles they are interested in should be identified and accordingly the required skills should be mapped to frame an effective and relevant learning strategy for them.

Learning is the ultimate solution to stay relevant in the fast changing world of work.

Beyond changing the talent strategies, organizations would have to disrupt the culture also a bit and create an inclusive workplace for employees of all ages.

Interventions to educate people to not discriminate might be needed It’s all in the mind: Creating an inclusive culture Beyond changing the talent strategies, organizations would have to disrupt the culture also a bit and create an inclusive workplace for employees of all ages.

Interventions to educate people to not discriminate might be needed. Further, multiple generations should be educated about the benefits of working with each other.

Raghuvanshi has in fact observed that at Randstad India, the generational diversity at work benefits the entire organization and impacts the work dynamics positively.

The bottom line is: break the age old silos and welcome the possibility of a 55 year old intern working for a 20 year old CEO. The scenario showcased in the Hollywood movie ‘The Intern’ is not so fictional anymore. So accept the reality and convert ‘mid life career crisis’ into ‘mid life career opportunity’.

Venkatesh Ganapathy

The recruiter’s dilemma in the digital era In the digital era, outbound hiring is proving to be disruptive and a threat to traditional forms of recruiting. However, there is ample scope for both inbound hiring and outbound hiring to co-exist

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and following certain email etiquette. Here data is culled from social networking sites and communities and attempt is made to match the data with the requirement.

he recruitment process has undergone a transformation with the emergence of online startups in this space. While the methods used by traditional players led to some sort of stagnation, the online players have used technology to improve the process. But this has not been without its challenges.

Inbound hiring involves an organization placing an advertisement for a particular post and candidates responding to the advertisement. This can be a time consuming process. Outbound hiring is all about sourcing a suitable candidate for a particular post. In the digital era, outbound hiring is proving to be disruptive and a threat to traditional forms of recruiting. Here’s how both inbound hiring and outbound hiring can co-exist.

Scouting the right fit – a challenging proposition

Earlier the online space was dominated by a few portals that used ingenuous methods to shore up their revenue by providing value added services to candidates and employers. These portals also badgered those who had uploaded their resumes to opt for premium services.

New age experts opine that outbound hiring has a clear edge over inbound hiring when jobs are getting automated and demand for specialist jobs outstrips the supply. Technology-enabled recruiting firms claim that they can use data algorithms for understanding human behavior.

For instance, what motivates a prospective job candidate to change his job? In the absence of substantiating data that algorithms have chosen the right talent, claims will continue to remain claims.

Inbound hiring necessitates browsing through many profiles before a suitable match is found. Outbound hiring relies on focusing on most promising targets and a greater level of personal engagement with the prospective candidate. This also means that outbound hiring places greater

control in the hands of the recruiter. While outbound hiring firms claim that resumes can no longer be relied upon as data may be fudged, the fact remains that a resume continues to be a window to know more about a candidate’s experience. There is also no assurance that positive recommendations about candidates on social media platforms depict the reality.

Outbound hiring has proved useful in hiring tech talent like data scientists, UI/ UX designers, software solution architects along with recruiting people in functional domains of sales, marketing and operations.

Inbound hiring suffers from the malaise of sending stock emails to prospective candidates putting them off. Outbound hiring is all about sending a targeted, personalized email to the prospective hire

New Age Recruitment

Which is better: Outbound or inbound hiring?

Whatever be the method chosen, finding the right candidate (with the right DNA) for a company can be as taxing as it can be rewarding. The exit of an employee from an organization and death of a person can never be forecast – other things remaining the same.

I recollect an instance when a highflying purchasing professional working in a reputed pharmaceutical firm was actively seeking a change in his job. The candidate went to the extent of expressing his desire to join a particular pharmaceutical company. After the offer letter was given, the candidate backed out at the last minute citing personal reasons. His wife did not want him to be on probation for six months.

Complexity in recruitment has often become intractable. A recruiter may work for a whole month and yet a single candidate may not be placed.

Inbound hiring or outbound hiring, recruiters have to get complete information from clients about the job opening.

For instance, is the vacancy due to business expansion? Is it because of retirement of an employee or resignation of an employee? It is also vital to learn why the organization has not identified inhouse talent.

Close interaction with decision makers on recruitment by recruiters will result in locating right candidates - at every stage, the decision should involve the client and only with his consent, a candidate can be recommended.

About the author

Venkatesh Ganapathy works as Associate Professor (Marketing) in Presidency Business School, Bangalore.

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If we think like a machine, we will soon be replaced by a machine: UOB Group’s Head of HR

In an exclusive interaction with People Matters, Dean Tong, Managing Director, Head of Group Human Resources, UOB Group talks about the people transformation agenda in the banking industry, how banks are tackling the fear of job losses to automation, how critical it is for organizations to future-proof their employees, and why the human touch in jobs will remain indispensable even in the future

By Yasmin Taj I N TERVIEW

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ean Tong, Managing Director, Head of Group Human Resources, UOB Group is driving the people transformation agenda at UOB. He has done a lot of work in the space of talent and leadership across Asia, Europe and Americas. Having worked across multiple industries including financial services, industry goods, consumer goods and telecommunication, Dean is known for bringing lateral thinking and out-of-the-box solutions to project teams. Dean has been credited for playing instrumental roles in the creation of an award winning low cost bank in Malaysia, and a number of multi-finance businesses in Indonesia.

In this exclusive interaction, Dean talks about the people transformation agenda in the banking industry as it faces immense disruption, how banks are tackling the fear of job losses to automation, how critical it is for organizations to futureproof their employees, and why the human touch in jobs will never be replaced.

The key is adaptability because the challenge that many organizations, including UOB, have is that while we know that disruption is happening, what we are not certain of is in what shape and when exactly will it happen 26

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You have an extensive experience of working with various industries. Can you tell us more about your illustrious journey so far?

UOB is just my second job actually. In my first job itself, I had the opportunity to work in many different industries and different countries. I was with the Boston Consulting Group for over 20 years. I had joined straight out of school, and I stayed for more than 20 years though I believed I would be at the job for only two years. This was pure fate. I was doing a lot of work in different industries on different topics which is when I realized that it all came down to people and organizations. For the most part of my life, I had worked in strategy. It was through that realization that I started to spend time on the people and organization side but overlaying it with the perspectives that I had seen from the different areas I had worked on. Before I joined UOB, I took a break for a month and volunteered at a hospital for a month because I wanted to make a difference in the lives of people. When this opportunity came my way at UOB, I took it up immediately because it would also enable me to make a difference in people’s lives.

At UOB, you are responsible for the organization’s people transformation agenda, making UOB the destination for the industry’s top talent.

How are you planning on achieving this goal and how far do you think you have reached?

I joined UOB because I believe in the Bank’s long-term commitment to future-proofing UOB and its employees. As an organization, we are aware that we are going through disruption and we want to make sure that the organization has the ability to stay relevant throughout this period.

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At the same time for the employees as well, it is important that we help them stay relevant. One of the things we wanted to ensure was that we don’t leave anyone behind in this journey. In this transformation program, I looked at building a ‘people platform’, which basically is built on how we plan, recruit, manage performances, develop our people, retain them, etc. The people platform is only as strong as its weakest link. What this means is that, for example, even though as an employer, I have a very attractive pay structure, if I do not fix the way I actually manage performance, how I reward employees and develop them, very soon I will lose the employee or have a less productive one. In addressing this people platform, I needed to look at it from an end to end perspective. Hence, I actually developed a transformation plan at UOB at a very early stage of my career here. After one and a half years, I’m glad to share that we have put in place a more robust performance management platform, an inclusive talent management program that we call the Escalator, and the Better U program for up-skilling our workforce. A lot still needs to be done because this is a journey that will take some years, but I believe we have built up the initial momentum that will allow us to push this forward.

Some 60,000 jobs have been estimated to be shed in banks around the world this year as banks face intense competition among themselves and with fintech startups in a low interest rate environment. How can professionals in this industry stay relevant in such a scenario?

Most banks, including UOB, are continuing to grow in this part of the world. However, there is no denying that the industry is being disrupted.

With the recent announcement of the government to offer digital banking licenses, some of the technologies that we are now adopting in the banking space will sooner or later affect the jobs in this industry. The key here is adaptability because the challenge that many organizations, including UOB, have is that while we know that disruption is happening, what we are not certain of is in what shape and when exactly will it happen.

So, there are some jobs that you can prepare the organization for, but for most other jobs, it is difficult to ascertain how and when will the jobs transform. This is one of the biggest challenges that companies are facing in terms of how we start the journey.

Would there be jobs lost to automation?

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Yes, for sure, but I think rather than ‘job loss’, a better way to look at it would be by calling it ‘job morphing’. From the statistics that we have seen in the past in different industrial revolutions, the number of jobs in every disruption have actually not gone down, but increased in a different form.

Newer jobs have evolved and replaced the traditional ones. Not only are there newer jobs, but the salaries for these jobs are also higher. Therefore, employees who are able to keep pace and morph together with the way the industry is morphing, will can actually benefit from this trend.

UOB recently launched a learning program to prepare its 26,000 staff for a digital future amid rapid change in the financial services sector.

Could you tell us more about this initiative?

From the statistics that we have seen in the past in different industrial revolutions, the number of jobs in every disruption have actually not gone down, but increased in a different form. Hence, jobs haven’t actually been lost, but have been morphed into a new form 28

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Jobs are now being redefined and morphed in the industry. So, we actually needed to bring our people along in our transformation journey. The nature of the change is uncertain, and from an employee’s perspective, there are several challenges that come up when it comes to re-skilling.

These can be from a time perspective or from a priority perspective. This does not only mean prioritizing their professional commitments, but also their obligations towards their family. This is why many times, employees de-prioritize their need for re-skilling. The third challenge is around technology adoption. This is not as easy as it seems at times.

Keeping in mind the obstacles that may come our way, we have created a program called ‘Better U’ that tackles this head-on. It is a 12-week foundation course with modules targeted at honing these competencies – encouraging a growth mindset, developing complex problem-solving skills, as well as acquiring skills in the fields of digital innovation, human-centered design and data. It

starts with a one-day in-classroom training. After the first module, our people complete the other four modules, which revolve around complex problem solving, data storytelling, humancentered design and digital awareness. The program was structured specifically to encourage mindset shifts and skillsets development. The first module focuses on broadening the mindset of our people. Once that is achieved, we introduce digital awareness to them. After this, we develop their complex problem solving skills. And then comes human-centered design, where we learn to think from a consumer perspective. If we think like a machine, we will soon be replaced by a machine.

This is actually to build on the fact that we humans actually think very differently, especially from the experience perspective. The last module of this program is on storytelling. It trains people to use their thoughts and ideas in such a way that they can bring these ideas to life for their audience. These five modules focus more on the softer skills side because we believe that this will build the foundation for them to build technical skills.

What makes you so passionate about people transformation?

The workplace of the future will be very different, but how exactly, no one can tell for sure. In a few areas, like the frontline, we already know how technology is reshaping the we work. Reliance on manual labor is reducing and we are using technology to help us better serve customers. In the space of operations, technologies like RPA and robotics will actually replace some of the more mundane things we do at work, especially in the banking industry. In the areas where decision making can be replaced by algorithms, we will see that happening more as well. In banking, a lot of jobs like trading, asset management and stockbroking are already seeing a very evident trend of being taken over by machines and algorithms, and that will continue in the future. The entire dynamic of the industry is changing as well, since the margins have been driven down so low. We have no choice but to move on to a more automated mechanism. More importantly, there will be skills required that are unknown today. The key would be how we make the organization as well as the employees more adaptable. Organizations can be adaptable if they are agile enough to reshape and restructure themselves according to what situations demand. The last and in fact the most

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What will the workplace of the future look like? What will be the key talent challenges, especially in the banking industry?

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I have worked with many organizations through their different transformations. From my experience, I have seen that change only happens when you touch upon both the people and the organization and by extension when it improves the lives of the customers that they touch. I was actually looking for a platform to make a larger change. Hence, for me, people transformation is where my two passions converge.

The fact that technology can do a lot of things that are mundane in nature, what will be left for humans to do in the future are the things which humans do best.

Hence, the future will still revolve around ‘being human’ important will be about making the world more human. That is the irony about the future. The fact that technology can do a lot of things that are mundane in nature, what will be left for humans to do are the things which humans do best. Hence, the future will majorly revolve around ‘being human’.

According to you, what would be some key trends impacting the world of work in 2020?

Within the banking industry, technology trends will continue to shape our workforce.

Most of us are watching new regulations and the opening up of the banking environment to new entrants very closely. Another area is the economic situation, where most analysts will tell you that there is a bit of a headwind given all the macro trends that we are observing. If that is the case, the question then would be, how do we sustain some of the things that we are actually doing now like the whole re-skilling effort and the push on digitization.

In 2020, at UOB, we will continue to work on the three areas of what we call #Better, which will be Better Workforce, Better Workplace and Better Work Life.

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Andy Lancaster

L&D Trends for 2020: Moving learning in the flow of work In 2020, we must encourage the development of a wider ecosystem that underpins a successful learning organization

Learning & Development

A trend that will continue to gain momentum this year is the delivery of development ‘in the flow’ of work. In 2020, employees must be empowered to learn as they work and work as they learn

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s we head into 2020, no matter what business or sector you work in, there are two words that will be at the forefront of senior leadership thinking; performance and productivity. The question of how to improve is no longer an option if your organization wants to survive.

For that a fresh approach to organizational learning must be a key part of the solution; not an old paradigm where staff attends an occasional face-to-face course but one in which learning that takes place at the heart of a business, on a daily basis.

In 2020, learning must get closer to the organization, in several profound ways.

Firstly, there must be a primary focus on key organizational needs. While there may be a broader learning offer, the core L&D effort in highperforming organizations must be supporting the achievement of key KPIs, and that requires greater clarity for the learning team about business drivers. There is a groundswell in learning circles about the importance of moving from traditional learning needs analyses (LNA’s), which are often slow and based on inadequate insight, to perfor30

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mance consulting conversations. Learning professionals must be at the heart of the business undertaking forensic diagnostics about the real needs to be supported.

In 2020, we must encourage the development of a wider ecosystem that underpins a successful learning organization. The responsibility for learning is not solely with the L&D or HR team; they must be the advocates and facilitators of a wider development engine.

For that, senior leaders must be encouraged to be champions of the learning process. It’s no longer adequate to simply have a senior sponsor for learning programs; we need leaders who engage and promote learning as a core part of their role and are known learners themselves.

Managers are also vital; to define the needs, facilitate the time and space for learning implementation and monitor outcomes and improvement. In 2020, learning should be an agenda item at every team and 1-2-1 meeting.

But learners, of course, are the most important people in the process. As we head into 2020, we must involve them more intimately in learning design. As key stakeholders, their views on what learning support is needed, how it should best be provided and when it should be accessible are core to effective learning and development. In the past few years we have seen the rise of learner-

generated content which is so effective in supporting performance; is it any wonder that engagement increases when learners have a part to play in learning design and delivery? This trend must increase.

Another emerging trend to be pursued in 2020 is the need for learning solutions to be rapidly created and deployed.

No longer do we have the luxury of the L&D team taking weeks or months to develop a solution; performance support must be highly responsive. L&D teams must develop more agile, iterative design processes where improvement is ongoing.

Many of us will need to set perfectionist tendencies aside for learning solutions that are “good enough” to create learning impact whilst not being perfect!

approach fails to provide a convenient, learnercentered interface. Across the globe, the smartphone is transforming personal lives and the rise of artificial intelligence enables increasingly personalized solutions and content. Both should be a focus for L&D. However, the use of the mobile phone is often seen as a distraction in the workplace; which undermines its value. As digital and social technologies have the potential to revolutionize workplace learning those responsible for IT solutions need a greater “can do” approach to supporting learning through devices and systems that are in common use outside work.

So, as we head into 2020, we must address the disconnect that exists in many organizations between frontline business activity and learning.

A trend that will continue to gain momentum in the coming year is the delivery of development ‘in the flow’ of work. In 2020, employees must be empowered to learn as they work and work as they learn. It’s becoming a well-coined phrase but learning that is genuinely close to the organization is about “resources, not courses”. That means the development of performance support aids, videos, podcasts and blogs will have an increasingly vital part to play in a continual performance improvement process.

In 2020, conversations are key in the move to embed learning in the workplace. Communities of practice are not a new concept, but we must be encouraging vibrant learning communities where time and technology support meaningful interactions and the sharing of ideas and practice. It’s time to invest in establishing a vibrant coaching culture where managers and peers can offer mutual support.

So, as we head into the year, what of learning technologies?

Often the focus has been on having the right organizational platform but so often a platform

Learning & Development

L&D teams must develop more agile, iterative design processes where improvement is ongoing. Many of us will need to set perfectionist tendencies aside for learning solutions that are “good enough” to create learning impact whilst not being perfect!

Learning will increasingly move into the flow of work and for that, we must develop learning ecosystems where all staff play their part in engaging and supporting learning.

L&D teams will need to move to consultative conversations to diagnose the key needs that must be met to drive performance. Learning solutions will need to be deployed through agile methods to provide rapid support. And, for learning in the flow of work we must lever workplace-based learning methods such as learner-generated content, communities of practice, coaching cultures, agilely produced resources, and smart devices.

What will be a key L&D mantra and goal for me during 2020?

Let’s get learning into the flow of work, placing it at the heart of the organization!

About the author

Andy Lancaster is the Head of Learning at the Chartered Institute for Personnel and Development (CIPD) where he is responsible for the vision and creation of innovative learning to support the people profession worldwide.

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As organizations operate more distributed business models, leaders will need to lead from the edge, adopt the right technologies, drive a new vision of organizational culture and shape innovative people strategies for the future of work

Leading from the edges:

Ravin Jesuthasan In an exclusive interaction with People Matters, Ravin Jesuthasan, Author and Managing Director, Willis Towers Watson, shared his perspective on how to redefine leadership, build holistic skills for HR, and manage change successfully in Industry 4.0

By Ester Martinez and Vallari Gupte

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uriosity and the drive to learn are going to be the most critical skills as the HR profession is on the cusp of entering a demanding Fourth Industrial Revolution. As the traditional role of a Chief Human Resource Officer undergoes a transformation and turns into a Chief People Officer, with the convergence of technology, machines and humans, workplaces will soon hire for Chief People and Machine Officer and Chief of Work, shared Ravin Jesuthasan, Author and Managing Director, Willis Towers Watson, in an exclusive interaction with People Matters.

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Here are some insights from Ravin Jesuthasan about the new-age skills that will enable CHROs to become future-ready and how leadership and culture can be redefined in order to “lead from the edges” and empower organizations to brave the winds of change in a dynamically evolving world of work.

Let’s first set the context for the Fourth Industrial Revolution. There is a lot happening demographically, societally, economically, and technologically in the landscape of people and work.

How are these factors affecting the way organizations currently look at talent or need to look at talent?

What’s really fascinating is that a number of years ago, we asked this question when Klaus Schwab wrote his book on the Fourth Industrial Revolution. We questioned ourselves whether this is a fundamental change in work or is it just technology continuing to do what it always does - making things more efficient, raising the speed quotient, etc. But what we’re seeing is actually something fundamentally different.

Artificial Intelligence has been with us since the late fifties but we never had the enabling infrastructure that we have today. The convergence of multiple technologies such as cloud-based computing, transformations in mobile, the emergence of 5G, rapid proliferation of low-cost sensors to generate data, and the increasing speed and falling cost of graphic processing units, is empowering technologists, business leaders, and people managers to realize the true potential of AI and other technologies.

The other key variable is the democratization of work which is the ability to distribute work anywhere in the world and tap into talent

at anytime without the frictional cost of hiring a person into a job. The convergence of these factors is presenting organizations with significant challenges in terms of thinking about how to get work done, in the best possible way. At the same time, these factors are also creating options like we’ve never seen before. Today, as business leaders, we have at least eight options for getting work done from employees to independent contractors to gig workers to outsourcing and alliances to tapping into volunteers for crowd-sourcing innovation or promoting brands on social media to the more intriguing options of robotics and AI. However, these choices also pose some real opportunities for HR to rethink its role. Increasingly this profession needs to shift from being a steward of employment to being a steward of work.

What do you see as the biggest obstacle for organizations, especially for those that are trying to transition into the digital world?

Can you share some insights about how organizations are shifting away from the legacy mindset to embrace agile? What are some of the approaches for CEOs and CHROs?

Most legacy cultures are predicated on an avoidance of risk and failure. Risks are unavoidable.

However, the key to getting out of the legacy mindset and embracing agile is to understand that there is even more risk involved in not doing anything new and different! The status-quo is not here to stay. Change or Die used to be the mantra. Now, the mantra is Change Faster or Die Faster. It is imperative that organizations adopt a mindset of continuous experimentation. In the words of Nelson Mandela; “I never lose, I either win or learn”.

Basically, the journey of transformation is formally structured in its approach and agile in its content. Now, perhaps you could shed some light on the context of agile and what are the implications of that context when you look at the traditional role that the CHRO used to play in an organization, and is still playing to a large extent, especially in Asia? What are the major shifts that the CHRO role is going to undertake?

The CHRO role is going to change pretty dramatically. We recently worked and completed a major research project with the World Economic Forum in collaboration with Unilever and Saudi Aramco called HR4.0¹. In the study we articulated six imperatives for the HR function: Developing new leadership capabilities for the 4th Industrial Revolution: As organizations operate more distributed business models, leaders will need to lead from the edge, adopt the right technologies, drive a new vision of organizational culture, and shape innovative people strategies for the future of work.

Managing the integration of technology in the workplace: The way work gets done is changing. A growing area of responsibility for HR is to partner with CEOs and C-suite leaders to achieve

HR plays a pivotal role in promoting a sense of purpose and belonging in the workforce, and equality and prosperity for the communities and regions in which they operate

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The biggest obstacle is legacy - legacy of culture, mindset, leadership routines, behaviors, toolset, etc. That is the biggest challenge. There are many things that we’re seeing that organizations are doing well in order to transform themselves. At the heart of this transformation is that an increasing number of these large enterprises are embracing agile and a growth mindset to counteract this legacy. They are starting to transform their core DNA.

tional waterfall approach where there is a lot of analysis, powerpoint presentations, and ultimately one person makes the decision of signing off on a particular project.

There seems to be a lot of ambiguity in this journey of transformation, especially in terms of becoming agile. Is it a structured approach or do you try and experiment and draw notes?

The thing about a concept like agility is, because it has become so widespread, it ends up taking on different flavors--there is no value judgement there. It may appear random but in fact, it is highly structured and strategically driven towards a specific outcome.

If you look at the origins of agile, from a software development perspective, it's all about quick series of sprints, rapid iterations, co-creation, etc.

It gets you better results much faster. However, it does require people to engage continuously and be all-in at all times. This is opposed to a tradiJANUARY 2020 |

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the optimal combination of human workforce and automation to ensure a positive impact on the future of work.

Enhancing the employee experience: The increasing complexity of the workforce and the use of technology is calling for a change in the way work is experienced. HR plays a vital role in defining, measuring, and enabling the meaningful employee experience in the 4IR. Building an agile and personalized learning culture: HR plays a leading role in fostering a culture of lifelong learning in the context of declining demand for certain skills, the emergence of new ones and the requirement for talent to continuously learn, unlearn, and relearn.

Establishing Metrics for Valuing Human Capital: The mutually beneficial relationship between the workforce, organizations and society

You talked about the transition of the CHRO role from Chief People Officer to Chief People and Machines Officer. It really requires an in-depth understanding of a field that was never required previously, for example, technology and business. In your experience, what are some of the things that you’ve seen successful CHROs do in order to make this transition?

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It is time to blow up the HR function’s traditional model of Centers of Excellence and move towards implementing the principles of how we work in an agile environment make it essential for HR to create a compelling case for establishing viable and scalable measures of human capital as a key performance driver and continuously demonstrate the impact of its work on business performance.

Embedding Diversity and Inclusion: Changing social, economic and political forces bring an opportunity for organizations to profoundly advance inclusion and diversity. HR plays a pivotal role in promoting a sense of purpose and belonging in the workforce, and equality and prosperity for the communities and regions in which they operate.

Now, let’s think about the shift towards becoming the steward of work from having been the steward of employment, and the implication of these six pillars. How ready are the current leaders to make this shift? What kind of transformational skills will be required to deliver this promise?

Business acumen is one of the top skills.

Knowing what you’re solving for and recognizing that what we are solving for now, is dramati-

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cally different from the problem statements of the past. Having the intellectual curiosity to want to go beyond the work that you do is important.

Have the curiosity to look around corners and see what’s coming next. One of the emerging roles that I am intrigued by, is this idea of having a dedicated person to oversee new and emerging digital technologies within HR. The speed of change is so great that you need someone dedicated to just see what’s coming next. You need someone to sense the market.

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The old tried-and-true rotations still work.

Having HR rotate through different parts of the business has had some success. Moreover, taking a much more collaborative approach with the rest of the C-suite is critical today. It is not just about HR departments working independently by themselves anymore. We're seeing HR and business operations collaborate a lot more today. It is intriguing to see that many CHROs are stepping up and helping their organizations lead with the work as they implement automation and technology.

The organizations who lead with technology invariably almost always fail because there is often a lot of breakage. A typical outcome is one where companies look to substitute talent in jobs versus seeing the nuances of where the technology might substitute some tasks, augment others or create new human work. And, this is where the CHRO is actually leading the work. They are the ones asking the questions such as, ‘let’s understand what the cultural implications are, what are the capability, cost, and risk implications and then let’s figure out the optimal role of technology.’ More

If we take it forward to the structure of an HR team that will be able to do justice to the aforementioned imperatives, what are some of the traditional roles that will probably go away? And what are some of the new roles that you think will come in? What would be a good way to transform the traditional verticalized structure in a way to break the silos and prepare for the future of work?

It is time to blow up the HR function’s traditional model of Centers of Excellence and move towards implementing the principles of how we work in an agile environment. Organizing the work of the function around the work and employee experience will be increasingly critical.

Having diverse perspectives and creating processes based on the model of a series of sprints would make the entire function more agile. For example, while designing an incentives plan for the year, the project will not just be undertaken by the Compensation and Benefits function but also by a business leader who understands the target outcome, someone from Comp & Ben who understands the market pay practices, a talent professional who understands the role of the incentive plan within the broader employee experience, a technologist who understands how the plan will be administered, etc.

If you think about these as a series of continuous projects involving multiple stakeholders for limited durations, then there is a transition from a fixed, high-cost structure to one that is far more variable with agile teams that are continuously reconfiguring themselves and swarming to challenges and opportunities as they emerge.

The biggest trick in leadership is to be present when you’re not present. We see this in practice with great leaders like Indra Nooyi at PepsiCo and Satya Nadella at Microsoft

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and more organizations are recognizing the need to lead with the work and progressive CHROs are actually pushing the envelope here.

If you had to summarize your advice to HR and business leaders, what would you tell them in terms of things to stop, start, and continue doing going forward in the future of work in 2020?

It is time to practice leadership from the edges. Trust your people, ensure that you’re clear with your messaging, and back it up by changing the things that shape culture: performance management, development, all things HR. Also, focus on the moments that matter.

The biggest trick in leadership is to be present when you’re not present. We see this in practice with great leaders like Indra Nooyi at PepsiCo and Satya Nadella at Microsoft. Their behavior shapes decision making at all levels. That is at the heart of leadership from the edges.

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http://www3.weforum.org/docs/WEF_NES_Whitepaper_HR4.0.pdf

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Pavan Soni

5 counter-intuitive people practices from the world’s leading innovators Whether it’s giving time for employees to work on their own or encouraging internal competition, companies that are at the forefront of innovation are doing things differently. Here are a few practices you can adopt

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ne of the long-standing debates in the world of management theory and practice is whether success can be engineered and predicted, or it can only be explained, post-hoc. The hind-sight wisdom is 20/20, we know that, but can prognosis be at least as close, if not perfect? There are some companies that seem to deliver like clockwork, regardless of the external changes, competitive uncertainties, and internal turbulence. Much like successful people, successful companies do a few unusual things consistently well, and as Aristotle noted “(then) excellence becomes a habit”.

Here we are discussing such counterintuitive practices of leading innovative companies which look against the grain, but are highly effective, with a hope that success can indeed be engineered, painstakingly though. These are mostly peoplemanagement habits that make them amicable across a wider gamut of organizational contexts, pan industries, geographies, and tenure.

Sub-optimal talent utilization One of the standout insights from one of the first widely-read management books, “In Search of Excellence”, was that Japanese companies are not slaves of productivity when it comes to product development or innovation. In companies such as Toyota, Honda, Sony, Toshiba, and even at the South Korean majors, such as Hyundai and Samsung, there seems to be a sub-optimal resource utilization, by design, beyond production. Unfortunately, that rare gem of an insight got lost as the book came to stand as a protocol for McKinsey’s 7-S Framework.

Employee utilization or productivity roughly translates into how much is achieved for how little.

This unitary focus on output by input reduces humans to machines, taking out even an outside chance of discovery, or serendipity. Most ordinary organizations measure employee productivity on an almost daily basis, as much as they would measure a machine uptime, or throughput. It was fine for as long as the work was mechanical or repetitive, but in the knowledge economy, where output is delinked from input in surprising ways, productivity can’t be the right measure. In fact, measuring productivity is counterproductive. Because

Innovative companies know that output can come from anywhere, and in causally ambiguous ways where it’s difficult to pin down the series of actions that led to a great outcome 38

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managers have paid much attention to this issue and with a lack of a general sense of imagination, they have stuck for far too long to the tried and tested time-sheets, and other rudimentary means of measuring performance (read busyness).

The innovative companies know that output can come from anywhere, and in causally ambiguous ways where it’s difficult to pin down the series of actions that led to a great outcome. So, they allow for sub-optimal utilization of employees. By design, there is a free time left with employees to take up hobby projects, go beyond the immediate deliverables, engage outside their milieu of work and get back with richer insights. The famed 15 percent time-off at 3M, or the 20 percent at Google, are classic cases of a sub-optimal utilization of employees, by design. On the upside of the 20 percent time practice at Google, Eric Schmidt shares “The most valuable result of 20 percent time isn’t the products and features that get created, it’s the things that people learn when they try something new.” We are increasingly slipping into the world of non-countable, the nebulous; and the management practices should match the calling.

companies and generations of employees finding a home there. Talent can be scouted for the best opportunity from across the marketplace, ideas flow freely, and an inventor has no one boss to please. Someone’s failed solution can be a panacea to other’s problems and such a discovery happens only if the organization is not micromanaging who does what, all the time. The deliberate loosening of the work mapping, rather ruthless division of labor, and micro-monitoring saves scores of employees from the tyranny of Taylorism. Of course, this calls for an ability to manage chaos, without losing sight of the big picture, or going nowhere in particular.

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The corollary of sub-optimal talent utilization is the not-so-perfect division of labor, where, at times, multiple teams may be working on the same objective, almost competing with each other. Samsung, one of the world’s most innovative companies, and constantly ranked high-up on the R&D spending and patents, is a big proponent of internal competition. For the same product component, multiple teams across the continents of North American, Europe and Asia would be working and the parent organization would, like a Venture Capitalist, back the one with the highest promise. To a proponent of Greater Taylorism, this might look like an antithesis of Management 101; but when it comes to innovation, it works wonders.

It shrinks time to market, avoids complacency, and results in some surprising upsides not factored at the planning stage. That’s what Bill Gates meant when he prophesied: “as we look ahead into the next century, leaders will be those who empower others”.

The high level of redundancy and almost competition-like spirit amid teams help bring the rigor of a capitalistic marketplace to the organization. Now, the senior management is ‘hunting’ talent, ideas and capital inside (and outside) the firm’s boundaries, and this keeps everyone excited.

When AG Lafley, the former chief of consumer goods major P&G, declared that as much as 50 percent of new product ideas must come from outside the company, the R&D scientists and engineers were feeling the heat, for now they were not the favorites. The competition was truly and wisely open.

A marketplace model of an organization has multiple benefits, much like what Tata Group has enjoyed over the years with its 100+ group

The more innovative companies couple the top-down goals with those generated by individuals, including their personal goals

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Internal competition and duplication

Loose coupling between top-down and bottomup goals Goals stem from the mission which addresses a well identified vision; however, most employees remain disconnected to the mission, let alone the goals that they are supposed to work on. If the goals are thrusted from above, which is the case with most organizations, the employees in the trenches have a rather binary choice- follow or you’re out! Such a mechanism pays no heed to the unique knowledge or the ability this employee, deep down the corporate totem-pole has, which is largely missed by the seniors.

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The more innovative companies couple the top-down goals with those generated by individuals, including their personal goals. The proponent of OKRs (Objectives and Key Results), John Doerr, notes – “innovation tends to dwell less at the center of an organization than at its edges”. It’s imperative then that the folks at the margins are empowered to reflect and set their own goals which best suit their approach to solving a problem, or an opportunity that (so far) only they can see. An overt push for alignment of an individual’s goals to the organizational may be a hard-fought battle with little upside. It not only frustrates people who think differently, but also amplifies leadership blind spots.

A good goal setting should have no more than 70 percent goals cascading from the top and the rest emerging from the trenches, where the employee spends most of her time. These goals offer the much-needed variation to the organization, in terms of seeding new ways of thinking, better work ethics, and who knows, may result into a new type of an organization. A case in point is Marc Benioff, one of the youngest Vice Presidents at Oracle who couldn’t pursue Oracle’s Larry Ellison to adopt Cloud and eventually led to the formation of Oracle’s biggest rival Salesforce.com. If only dear Larry would have paid attention to Marc’s nudge. If only.

Teams are notorious for setting up groupthink and a regression towards mean, which discount an individual’s idiosyncrasies and, hence, the teams are good for ‘doing stuff’, but not ‘thinking stuff’

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Ditto for Bill Gates who recently admitted that his biggest mistake ‘ever’ was on losing out on the opportunity of Android, a company Google gobbled up in 2007 to turn it into a multi-billion-dollar mobile phenomenon. Don’t you think someone down the layers would have thought about the possibility of an opensource operating system for mobiles? Most likely, yes. But, alas, it didn’t match with Microsoft’s goals and priorities, or even ethos of not giving away things for free. That’s the importance of listening to the trenches.

Not everyone must work in teams Now, this is a tricky one. Haven’t we heard of the importance of teamwork?

Yes. But does every problem call for a team effort?

Are teams always superior to an individual, or just a pair? Perhaps not. The World Economic Forum identifies the top ten workplace skills for future, with the top three being complex problem solving, critical thinking, and creativity, followed by people management and coordination with others1.

Surprisingly, emotional intelligence comes sixth in number. A team is not exactly the best setting when it comes to complex problem solving, or creativity, least of all, critical thinking. Teams are notorious for setting up groupthink and a regression towards mean, which discount an individual’s idiosyncrasies and, hence, the teams are good for ‘doing stuff ’, but not ‘thinking stuff ’.

On the question of creativity and complex problem solving, research suggests that solitude is a powerful driver of original thinking, for it allows for synthesis of ideas and enabling new connections of the hitherto unconnected2. The zen like habits of Steve Jobs were instrumental in him delivering some of the most ground-breaking innovations in the modern times, on relatively matured industries, such as music, retail, and entertainment. One of the most prolific psychologists, Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, propounded that the most creative people are introverts. However, our workplaces discount the introverts heavily - they don’t open up easily, they don’t seem to get along with all, and are difficult with team, and hence are side-lined. They are the precise harbingers of innovative thinking.

Susan Cain, the author of ‘Quiet: The Power of Introverts’ observes, - “I don’t believe anything really revolutionary has been invented by a committee. If you’re that rare engineer who’s an inventor and also an artist, I’m going to give you some advice that might be hard to take. That advice is: Work alone.” And this statement comes from some sold investigation on the power of introverts.

The innovative companies pay attention to their workplace design, offering enough time for meditative work, desirable isolation and alone time, away from the oozing energies of the typical modern workplace. A case in point is IBM Fellows, a position created in 1963 by Thomas Watson Jr., for promoting the most exceptional of the scientific and engineering talent from across the company. Guess

Mark Twain appropriately observed, “to succeed in life, you need two things: ignorance and confidence”. The same applies to innovative organizations. They make mistakes (we all do), but they don’t regret for too long, or that such mistakes don’t dent their risk appetite.

There’s only learning, not guilt, or sorrow.

Jeff Bezos, one of the most prolific entrepreneurs of the modern times, says, “As the company grows, the size of the mistakes has to grow as well, and if it doesn't, you're not going to be inventing at a scale that can actually move the needle”. And Jack Ma, Bezos’ counterpart in Asia, wraps it well by stating, “instead of learning from other people’s success, learn from their mistakes. Most of the people who fail share common reasons (to fail) whereas success can be attributed to various different kinds of reasons.” Failure is indeed a great teacher.

While failure is common, learning from failure and an ability to forego and forgive is uncommon.

Innovative companies learn to move on in the face of almost life-threatening failures. This selective amnesia allows the leaders and employees to avoid the dysfunctional impact of mistakes and failures for another day. Such a culture calls for building ‘psychological safety’, where employees aren’t afraid of presenting their point of view or making mistakes or being vulnerable by choice. Promoting this very element of psychological safety, David Packard awarded Chuck House HP’s only Medal

of Defiance, for “extraordinary contempt and defiance beyond the normal call of engineering duty”. Events like these set the culture in motion of taking risk, acknowledging failure, and going on to win the day.

Employees need to learn to move on, both from failures and mistakes. In his best-seller ‘Hit Refresh’, Microsoft CEO, Satya Nadella, talks about what he said at the Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing conference on the issue of equality of women pay. Satya Nadella said that women should trust "karma" instead of asking for pay raises, a statement that he apologized for in an open letter and promised to take affirmative actions to bring about equity in pay3. He lives on as one of the most respected leaders in the world, notwithstanding a public goof up. That’s okay.

Imagine the signal it sends to the trenches that it’s okay to make mistakes; own up and move on.

So, you see, the innovative companies do different things and also do things differently. As they say, many of these are simple but not easy. Choice is yours, always.

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Weak short-term memory

Innovative companies learn to move on in the face of almost life-threatening failures. This selective amnesia allows the leaders and employees to avoid the dysfunctional impact of mistakes and failures for another day

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what? They chose their own projects, their own teams (if any), and work on their own accord. Not all good has to come from teams, and not all thrive in team settings. Leadership must allow people to contribute in whichever ways they can, as long as they are all aligned to the True North.

About the author

Pavan Soni is the Founder and Innovation Evangelist, Inflexion Point Consulting.

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Have an agile mindset, not just an agile workspace: Tarun Rai

In a candid conversation, Tarun Rai, Chairman & Group CEO, Wunderman Thompson South Asia talks about what it takes to become an agile agile workspace that is a conducive space to provide seamless combination of focused, collaborative and creative work and why creating an agile physical environment, without first creating an agile mindset and way of working, is like putting the cart before the horse

By Yasmin Taj

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arun Rai, Chairman & Group CEO, Wunderman Thompson South Asia is a Media and Communication professional with three decades of experience across both industries. In 2015, Tarun returned to J. Walter Thompson (now Wunderman Thompson) as Chief Execu-

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tive Officer, South Asia after a seven-year stint at Worldwide Media, a BBC WorldwideTimes of India Group JV. In his prolific quarter century in advertising, Tarun has helped build some of India's most iconic brands, including those of Hindustan Unilever, Diageo, PepsiCo, Kellogg’s, Hero, Nestlé, ITC, GSK and Godrej.

In today's fragmented communication landscape, Rai believes collaboration with platform/domain specialists to deliver the brand message is key and also attracting multi-disciplinary talent and delivering integrated, end-to-end business solutions is the new mantra.

In a candid conversation with People Matters, Rai shares his learning from his three-decade long professional journey, how ‘doing what you love’ should be your priority, what it takes to engage and retain creative talent and how crucial it is to have an agile mindset to create an agile workplace.

You have spent a large chunk of your professional life in the advertising industry. Tell us about your journey and your learnings from it.

There’s a discussion about ‘loving what you do’ vs ‘doing what you love’. Though there’s a fine line, I believe in the former. And if you love what you are doing, everything fixes itself. If you are enjoying your work, then you will excel

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or you could choose to believe that he was an excellent, trustworthy person till he proved to be a scoundrel. I have always followed the former. I have always believed in the people I have worked with. And there may have only a few, very few, instances where my trust was misplaced.

If you trust your team members, then empower them: It is always difficult to let go. Always difficult to let a junior in your team take important decisions. But if you don’t give them the opportunity, how would you know if they can take those decisions? And if you don’t delegate, how will you grow yourself ?

Be a leader, not a manager: People want to be led not managed. No one wants to be managed. A leader inspires, motivates, and lays down the vision.

Individuals are important, but it is great teams that win: I am a firm believer in teamwork and the importance of building good teams. I have been a sportsman all my life and learnt a lot from sports. And if there’s one thing sports teaches you, it is the power of teamwork.

A captain is only as good as his team: In my senior roles in advertising and in media, one of the most important things I have done is to form my Leadership Team. A team with who I meet regularly and share everything with. And I tell them that if, as a team, we decide on something, then it should be done as it has everyone’s buy-in. And yes, again an excellent lesson from sports.

Never forget to have fun: We spend so many of our waking hours at the office.

It would be such a shame to not enjoy them. I have always focussed on this. On

creating a community at the office and a physical environment that fosters enjoyment is very important.

What is the biggest talent challenge in an advertising agency? Is it very difficult to engage and retain creative talent?

In the last decade or so, there has been a dramatic change in the client expectations from an advertising agency due to the way in which the markets and consumers are moving. Clients are looking at ROIs more closely; they are looking for more and more data driven solutions for their marketing challenges while our industry has traditionally worked in the area of behavioral change and emotions. This has led to a dramatic shift in expectations from the talent that works in agencies. People need to be more agile about upgrading their skills than ever before. We need to learn to marry creativity with technology. The options available for talent are multi-fold due to the explosion in the number of startups in the country. Attracting talent with diverse skill sets becomes a challenge. Add to this, the significant employee population of millennials who have a strong sense of purpose.

Certain soft skills like being comfortable with ambiguity, growth mindset, collaboration skills, empathy and agility in addition to width of experience will assume greater importance. Engaging and retaining creative talent is achieved only through great work. This is possible only through an empowering work atmosphere where people can work fearlessly and are encouraged to have a POV.

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This is a sweep of three decades and needs a book to answer. However, I will pick on some uniting themes from these decades. It’s true that two of my three decades have been in advertising. However, the other decade has been pretty exciting too. My first job was in Asian Paints, straight out of business school. And from 2008 to 2015, I was in media, as the CEO of a BBC Worldwide and Times of India joint venture called Worldwide Media.

In all these years, the most important aspect has been the fact that I did what I loved. There’s a discussion about ‘loving what you do’ vs ‘doing what you love’.

Though there’s a fine line, I believe in the former. And if you love what you are doing, everything fixes itself. If you are enjoying your work, then you will excel. From Asian Paints to JWT and Worldwide Media that’s been my story. And when I stopped loving what I was doing, I got the breaks to shift industries and try something I’d love.

Advertising itself is a ‘passion’ business.

And the reason I spent two decades in this industry is because I was in love with what I was doing. There have been so many experiences on the way that have shaped me as a professional. And then there are my beliefs that have held me in good stead over these years in the various jobs and roles in my career.

• Trust people: Trust your team: I learnt this from my father who used to say that you could decide that a person was a scoundrel till he proved to be otherwise

Wunderman Thompson has just moved into a new agile workspace. But you have always maintained that an agile workspace does not ensure an agile

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culture. In fact, according you, an agile mindset comes first, and then you can create agile workspaces. Please tell us more about why you feel an agile mindset is so critical to a workplace today.

Creating an agile physical environment, without first creating an agile mindset and way of working, is like putting the cart before the horse. Assuming that an agile work environment will automatically lead to an agile mindset is naïve. In fact, it can be really counterproductive. However, if the organization has been fostering an agile way of working where collaboration is encouraged and celebrated, then an agile physical environment will contribute immensely. People will value the new space that allows greater interaction. A space that breaks physical silos and encourages more collaboration. In today’s world, not to have an agile mindset is suboptimal.

Change is moving at a furious pace. Solutions cannot be delivered by individuals.

Not even, necessarily, by an agency’s internal teams. Collaboration today requires working with partners who may not even be part of your agency. There is a dire need for a change in mindset. An acceptance of fluid collaboration. And if your organization has that mindset, then the agile physical environment is a boon. In our case, I believe, I have been able to foster that agile mindset. And we have created an open, transparent, happy and energetic physical environment that helps people collaborate more and solve problems together.

How can organizations create an agile workspace that is a conducive space to provide seamless combination of focused, collaborative and creative work, which leads to better productivity?

An agile workplace has to communicate a certain sense of openness – visually as well as in the company’s way of working. Agile workspaces can create a lot of energy which in turn has a direct impact on productivity. Since most of the agile offices try to reduce the carbon footprint through shared resources, it appeals to the heightened sense of purpose of millennials. It helps break down the traditional power distance that has existed in Indian organizations. This also leads to an empathetic workforce which finds it easier to collaborate. The world is now all about being authentic and fostering authentic connections to deliver the best possible solutions to clients and consumers. An agile workspace with an open atmosphere helps employees bring their authentic self to work. Innovative solutions emerge when silos break down and there is a democratic access to information. At the heart of all of this is a smart design concept which bears

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in mind that every agile workplace must have collaboration zones, meeting rooms, telephone booths and social spaces, and enough rooms and areas for focussed and concentrated work whenever required.

What does culture mean in today’s world of work when the world is moving towards the gig economy and a distributed workforce?

Culture is the glue that binds an organization together. Values, beliefs, purpose, policies, processes and systems roll together to create an organization’s culture.

Having a strong organizational culture becomes even more important as we move towards the gig economy where teams are formed and disbanded as per the needs of specific projects. These gig workers need something that is unique and cannot be replicated by competition and which makes them want to work with the organization again and again. An organizational purpose which is authentic, inspirational

Engaging and retaining creative talent is achieved only through great work. This is possible only through an empowering work atmosphere where people can work fearlessly and are encouraged to have a POV

and aspirational will become a critical success factor. The other success factors will be the values that an organization upholds and the standards by which these are measured for compliance. Culture starts at the top, with the CEO, with the leadership team of the organization, and then flows down across the entire workforce. Culture is also not theory, it is practice. It has to be practiced daily, it has to be visible through action rather than statements on a poster.

It needs to be authentic.

According to a previous article, 22% of new hires at Wunderman Thompson are boomerangs. What is it that brings them back? What are the pros of having boomerang employees?

I love boomerangs. I have never asked for anyone of our employees’ ‘loyalty’.

I have always told my people that they should be only loyal to their careers. In fact, I believe it is the other way around; the employee should expect loyalty from the company. The company should keep providing the employee with career growth opportunities. And when it can’t, the company shouldn’t hold the employee back.

A boomerang employee has left to check out the world outside and is coming back because he or she believes that we are, once again, ready to offer opportunities to them, to grow and build their careers. It is a reaffirmation of their faith in the organization. An empowering atmosphere has been one of the most important reasons for our boomerang hires. We believe in hiring the best people and allow them to do what they were hired for. Then, of course, the work that they get to do for some of the best brands in the country is another major draw. The access to some of the global intelligence tools has been another reason.

And finally, our agency has pretty much been the University of Advertising which has taught the nuts and bolts of advertising to some of the most illustrious names in the industry.

You have also talked about hiring nonadvertising talent and employing a blind recruitment process to fight unconscious biases. Where do you think, you have reached with that?

People love status quo. There’s comfort in it. When it comes to hiring, we like to hire ‘people like us’. We want clones or ourselves. We want the ‘mini-me’ in our hire.

However, with so much change around us, we will not be able to maximize the opportunities with only current skillsets. While we are investing in retraining our current staff, we do need the impetus of people that bring in brand new skills and thinking.

And yes, we have also experimented with

‘anonymous hiring’ to remove unconscious bias that can creep in. We suffer from so many biases that if we can successfully remove even some of them, we would be able to improve our recruitment dramatically.

On both the above, we have met with some success, but a lot still must be done.

You were named as One of India’s Most Trusted CEOs by WCRC Leaders Asia. What according to you does it take to build that ‘trust’ in your people and in your organization?

I have talked about this at length at the beginning of this interview. A leader has to take a leap of faith when it comes to people. A leader has to provide opportunities for people to grow. To learn, sometimes by failing. I have always believed in giving my people the freedom to fail. One of my favourite mantras is - ‘Fail fast, learn fast’.

And if the leader trusts his people, it has an effect on the entire organization. Trust becomes part of the organization’s culture.

And it creates an empowering atmosphere.

As Malcolm Forbes famously said, ‘Diversity is the art of thinking independently together’ and as MK Gandhi said, ‘No culture can live, if it attempts to be exclusive’. Diversity & Inclusion are the two sides of the same coin. The future success of any organization relies on the ability to manage a diverse body of talent that can bring innovative ideas, perspectives and views to their work. The most exciting part of diversity is the variety of abilities, skills, experiences and cultural backgrounds that various stake holders bring to the table. This is a very critical aspect in our business where we are catering to consumers who represent a cross section of demographics across multiple categories. If we hold too narrow a view of what constitutes diversity, we will miss opportunities to engage, connect and serve our consumers effectively. Diversity not only involves how people perceive themselves, but how they perceive others! Diversity is much more and beyond men-women ratios. It is very easy to get caught in this dimension of diversity and completely ignoring the other dimensions of diversity and sometimes even completely ignoring the inclusion angle. Inclusion is ensuring that our people are able to bring their authentic self to work without any fear. It is ensuring that they feel that they belong, feel emotionally and intellectually engaged and connected with their organization,

their co-workers and with the work they do. Simply put, Diversity is being invited to the party and Inclusion is being asked to dance! Though there has been a lot of momentum on the diversity front, a lot needs to be done on the inclusion front. Most of the diversity related challenges are a result of our unconscious biases. Diversity challenges are indelibly linked to inclusion challenges at the workplace. An inclusive workplace become a reality only when there is senior management’s commitment for the same. The next is to hold the bull by the horn. Identify the diversity challenges that are unique to the organization/industry. Address these challenges through robust D&I training programs geared towards behavioral change and follow it up with streamlining of company policies to reflect the change. Finally, hold people accountable for non-compliance.

As we draw the curtains on 2019, what are the top talent trends you have

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What is your take on Diversity & Inclusion? Do you think Diversity is only half of the D&I picture and that often times we forget about putting the right amount of effort in creating an inclusive workplace?

Assuming that an agile work environment will automatically lead to an agile mindset is naïve. In fact, it can be really counterproductive. However, if the organization has been fostering an agile way of working where collaboration is encouraged and celebrated, then an agile physical environment will contribute immensely observed in the year gone by? Can you share 3 of those?

In various ways, 2019 has been a watershed year on the talent front. There has been an increased focus, worldwide, in creating a harassment-free workplace.

Digital transformation has become a reality across all sectors leading to increased emphasis on skill upgradation. Ability to navigate through ambiguity has become a critical soft skill. ‘Hire for attitude; train for skills’ is even more relevant today.

What according to you will be the three key trends to watch out for in the talent space in 2020?

Gig workers will assume importance due to the requirement of diversity of thought at the workplace; agility and flexibility to embrace technology and data will become critical; and cross company collaboration and breakdown of silos leading to territory-free workplaces will gain impetus.

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How tailored rewards will help compensation and benefits managers drive business outcomes in 2020

By Mastufa Ahmed

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Dr. Fermin Diez, Deputy CEO and Group Director, NCSS

Total rewards have become a key ingredient of employer value proposition, talent attraction and retention

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One of the biggest difficulties compensation and benefits professionals face is the changing expectations of employees

Janani Ravishankar,

More organization in APAC and SEA are integrating benefits in the pay structure to increase the perceived value of the total package

Compensation & HR Analytics Head, Cleartrip

In the year 2020, we will see greater democratization and customization of rewards – one employee at a time Low Choy Huat, Partner, People Advisory Services, Ernst & Young

Kartikey Singh, Associate Client Partner, Advisory, Korn Ferry

Each organization must ensure that the cost of its workforce fits within an economically viable model for the business Clinton Wingrove, Director of www.ClintonHR.com

Rewards undermine our natural interest in learning. We work towards getting better test scores than learning something.

Abhijit Bhaduri, Digital Transformation Coach

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A winning rewards strategy that fits all cases does not exist Many companies still base their compensation decisions on market practice, says Fermin Diez, HR Thought Leader, Board Director, Professional Speaker, and University Faculty, in an interaction with People Matters

By Mastufa Ahmed

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r. Fermin Diez is the Deputy CEO and Group Director, Human Capital and Organization Development Group of NCSS. Having rich experience in Human Resources, he held consulting, corporate and academic roles in organizations worldwide. He sits on the Board and chairs the Assessment Committee of the Institute for Human Resource Professionals and also on the HR Committee of National University Health Services Group (NUHSG). He co-authored three books on Strategic Human Resources, Remuneration and HR Analytics and serves as adjunct faculty at Singapore Management University and Nanyang Technological University.

From payroll generation, compensation & benefits to now total rewards, what are your views on the evolution of this vertical?

Compensation is on the verge of big changes. Of the HR Verticals, it has heretofore received little attention from HRTech and HRAnalytics tools, beyond ease of administration, 24/7 performance appraisals and online salary surveys. But this is due to change soon. For one, there are enough analytics out there to start looking into the question "do incentives work?"

"And if so, which ones deliver more bang for the buck? STI? Higher pay mix? Team vs. Individual Incentives? Performance Shares vs. Stock Options?" These are questions for which everyone has an answer but on which analytics can provide an evidence-based answer.

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An area ripe for disruption is salary surveys: The day is not far where the likes of LinkedIn can supply data, both to individuals and organizations, on salaries worldwide. The Blockchain can also be used in this respect to ensure the data is accurate.

One more aspect that is currently doable is Flex-Pay, much in the way we now have Flex-Benefits. For instance, some employees may prefer a lower pay mix (with lower upside) than others. This is "Pay for Retention", or "Pay for Development", rather than "Pay for Performance", and some companies may prefer to go this route for at least some employees.

One last aspect that already is causing some companies to rethink their compensation schemes is the preponderance of part-time employees and "gig" employees.

How to create pay programs that maintain the notion of pay equity?

Exciting times!

What has been the most significant change in employee benefits over the last five years especially in APAC or SEA market?

Wellness programs. They have been around for a while and have proven to be effective, and yet many companies are yet to implement them. More things are likely on the horizon, including the possibility of "Benefits for performance" (e.g, additional leave for high performers, or lower co-payments, for instance). But not soon.

Benefits continue to look at cost-control as the primary objective.

Perks, however, will continue to improve, in order to increase the employee experience and also improve attraction and retention, as well as net promoter scores.

How does a winning Total Reward strategy look like?

Perhaps one of the biggest difficulties C&B professionals face is the changing expectations of employees, given the nonchanging expectations of shareholders.

How to balance these two certainly qualifies as the "horns of a dilemma"! However, the answer lies in applying analytics to employee preferences that, at the same time, either produce higher performance, or reduce overall cost at the same perceived value.

This is a good question that deserves collective thought. My hypothesis is that we have been very dogmatic about the notions surrounding pay-for-performance as the only model. Shareholders expect Return on the Compensation Investment, Finance prefers costs to be variable and thus likes the idea of higher variable pay, Management pursues profitability as a KPI, and HR often aids and abets these arguments by managing the cost side of the equation more than the revenue side when it comes to looking at ways to enhance productivity. Also, many companies still base their compensation decisions on market practice ("if my competitor does it, we should too!").

And the theoretical constructs around agency theory and expectancy theory (that is to say extrinsic motivation) have yet to change to a different mode of thinking (e.g. Prospect theory) in the general HR community. Old loves die hard! It will take time for a few insightful companies to start using their data to analyze compensation packages and outcomes, for the new models to debunk old paradigms, and for

the rest of the world to notice and start changing. A case in point: Everyone knows companies like AB InBev and Netflix pay top of market, and everyone knows they are incredibly successful in their business results. Yet few companies are willing yet to emulate these two. This will change in due course.

What are the top challenges that businesses face when it comes to framing the total rewards strategy and its implementation?

Perhaps the biggest challenge stems from aligning the diverse views that are always present in any compensation strategy discussion. The first is the shareholder view: They are less concerned with the amount paid then with the return received.

In other words, they are less concerned with internal equity and external competitiveness, and more with the performance part of the pay-for-performance model.

The second view is that of the market: There is a "price" for each type of employee and for the skills they bring. This is the external competitiveness model.

Then there is the HR Function view: The function needs to balance attraction with retention and with motivation.

Thus, market competitiveness serves to attract but immediately attention turns to internal competitiveness to retain and

somewhere in the middle lies variable pay as a motivator, as long as it doesn't affect the other two; a difficult balancing act. The fourth view is that of the company: Overall KPIs are usually measured in a rather UN-balanced scorecard where revenue growth and profitability dominate. If the pay package aims to increase productivity by driving revenue and profitability, all is well and good. But if HR cannot prove (not just imply, but prove!) the link between higher pay and higher productivity, the company view will default to control of this cost as a means to seek productivity gains. Finally, is the view of the employees; to an employee, reaction to pay is often emotional, akin to thinking "the amount in my pay check is the exact amount my company loves me!", which quickly derives into "the love somebody else more!", or "that company loves their employees more than my company loves me!".

This emotional reaction to pay makes it hard for C&B professionals to then discuss "facts" and "data" (e.g. how often has the argument: "we pay at the 50th percentile and build our salary grades around the market data from our consulting vendors; you are paid within the salary band", really worked when trying to convince an employee that they are competitively paid?). Balancing these differing views has, for years, been the most difficult part of the C&B job.

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Large organizations now realize that a personalized, agile, holistic rewards system is essential to attracting, motivating, and developing talent. So why are so many companies falling short, even as they realize their rewards programs are outdated?

A winning rewards strategy that fits all cases does not exist. Which strategy a company can deploy will depend on a number of factors, including business strategy, the type of people the company wishes to attract, company culture, and the state of the labor market, among others

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Let me illustrate these two possibilities: On the one hand, assume employees prefer a lower-risk pay mix (say 90/10) over a higher-risk pay mix (say 75-25). If the company, through analytics, can demonstrate that this new pay package actually reduces turnover (and the cost associated with it), with no material loss of performance, then it can build a business case to make this change. The second example would be to use conjoint analysis to explore which combination of benefits has highest perceived value at a given cost point. Or conversely, which combination of benefits can provide the same current perceived value at the lowest cost.

A winning rewards strategy that fits all cases does not exist: Which strategy a company can deploy will depend on a number of factors, including business strategy, the type of people the company wishes to attract, company culture, stage of business growth, strength of competitors, the company's employee value proposition, and the state of the labor market, among others.

A well-designed strategy can positively affect results, whereas a poorly-designed strategy can actually cause the company to lose value, as we have seen in recently publicized cases where incentive systems led to improper behaviors.

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Employees to drive the next-gen rewards strategies We are seeing a growing shift in the market when it comes to benefits design and implementations, says Kartikey Singh, Associate Client Partner, Advisory, Korn Ferry, in an interaction with People Matters

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By Mastufa Ahmed

The transaction value of rewards in terms of running payroll and conducting benchmarking is being taken up by new analytics and technology platforms.

Compensation and benefits as it was known earlier had become total rewards, which is a concept that means being equally tangible and cash-based, as well as intangible and experience-based.

This new paradigm not only forces the reward function to focus on cost and optimization, which are very business-centric, but also on employee welfare and experience, which are employee-centric. For far too long, the compensation concept is driven by the needs of the organizations, but the new age reward would have an equal component of employees’ needs and would therefore cater to ideas beyond pay, focusing on employee expertise, progression, purpose, mobility, flexibility and more.

What has been the most significant change in employee benefits over the last five years especially in APAC or SEA market?

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s a member of Korn Ferry’s Singapore Reward and Benefits Solution leadership team, Singh specializes in the area of Reward Strategy, Sales Compensation, and Executive Pay and Governance. He advises organizations across EMEA and SEA to ensure they align reward pay-outs to business outcomes.

Singh has a successful track record of leading global teams to support large MNC clients, developing total reward frameworks and strategies, ensuring alignment with human capital strategy, market competitiveness, and regulatory compliance.

Prior to joining Korn Ferry, Singh worked with PwC where his client work was focused in the areas of organizational restructuring, Reward Strategy and performance management system Singh earned his MBA with specialization in Strategy and Human Resource from XLRI, Jamshedpur in India. He also holds a Bachelor of Engineering (B.E.) degree with specialization in Electronics & Communication Engineering.

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How do you see the evolution of compensation and benefits to total rewards? What’s new?

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The benefits proportion as a percentage of the total package is only around 10 percent in Singapore. This is significantly lower than that of other developed countries in the West and even the USA, where the value of benefits can go up to 30-35 percent respectively.

However, we are seeing a growing shift in the market when it comes to benefits design and implementations. More organizations in APAC and SEA are integrating benefits in the pay structure to increase the perceived value of the total package. This is aligned with shift in benefits toward those that are most appreciated by the employees; for example, we have seen organizations in

Asia starting to test flexible benefits, where they allocate a certain fixed sum of dollar value by grade and give the options to employees to select the packages that make more sense for their individual situations.

They typical classify benefits in categories around financial, health and well-being, lifestyle and work-related benefits and let employee select relevant ones from each of the categories. This is not only helping them to optimize cost but also making benefits effective from a perceived value context.

How should total reward professionals and businesses frame Total Reward strategies given the changing expectations of employees?

There are five fundamentals tenets to designing a superior rewards strategy are as follows: • Break the link with organizational hierarchy – move away from the current hierarchical structure focus on vertical progression ‘through the ranks’; • Focus on skills rather than role accountabilities – roles will be constantly changing and require individuals to develop the right skills to drive business success; • Measure performance based on achievement – recognize the need for bravery in great performance and understand the critical behaviors that will underpin achievement; • Stop locking people in with reward systems – remove the link between length of service and highest-paid, breaking the golden cage; • Encourage mobility – recognize the value of horizontal and lateral movement as a critical part of career and personal development but break the culture of financial entitlement.

Once reward professionals use the above building blocks to develop reward strategies and policies, it would not only help align rewards to stakeholder interests, but also create a unique employee experience.

When designing rewards strategy, it is crucial that they use differentiated positioning by employee segments/job families, as well as skill sets to focus on the key skills/functions that are core and critical to the business and are less competitive

For far too long, the compensation concept is driven by the needs of the organization, but the new age reward would have an equal component of employees’ needs and would therefore cater to ideas beyond pay, focusing on employee expertise, progression, purpose, mobility, flexibility and more

for other functions. Reward of the future would become more person driven rather than job driven, and it is important that organizations and professionals start to move beyond the grade and structure-based approach to a more flexible and personbased approach.

How is technology such as analytics transforming pay and benefit practices?

Technology and analytics are playing an important role in making HR become more tactical from a decision-making perspective. From live dashboards to interactive bots, from succession heat maps to manpower optimization ratio, information is readily available and can not only help management take quick and businesscentric decisions, but also improve the entire work experience for employee.

pay level for employee groups based on individual preferences.

Large organizations now realize that a personalized, agile, holistic rewards system is essential to attracting, motivating, and developing talent. So why are so many companies falling short, even as they realize their rewards programs are outdated?

Organizations are changing but the pace of change in slow. Moving away from a hierarchical grade-based pay approach to a dynamic market-linked personal pay is not easy. The internal buy-in within organizations is very difficult.

However new age organizations in technology and fintech are able to absorb these changes much quicker and faster than traditional manufacturing and indus-

• Managing cost and maximizing value: The curve of optimization is typically based on cost and perceived value to employee, many organizations miss this concept and tend to focus mainly on spent. If it’s not valued by the employee, then the return on this spent is sub-optimal.

• Offering a distinctive Employee Experience: Many organizations consider market benchmarks as gospel trust and try to align their reward quantum and practice based on them.

Seldom do they realize that what is best practice might not be the best fit for their specific situation.

• Delivering Transparency and Equity: The most common challenge around the implementation side to ensure a sense of fairness and trans-

trial organizations. In addition, moving to a personalized and agile reward system might increase inflation in pay in many cases, as without proper governance and control these systems can also be misused.

Whilst we see organizations moving to these reward systems at their own pace, the reputation of organizations would be impacted if they remain dormant.

What are the top challenges that businesses face when it comes to framing the total rewards strategy and its implementation?

Challenges faced by organizations are quite similar when it comes to framing and implementing reward strategies. The most common ones are: • Aligning reward pay-out with stakeholders’ interests: There is a growing disconnect between pay outcomes and business outcomes and organizations typically find it difficult to bridge this gap.

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We are seeing HR as a growth consultant who can increase revenues by building better cross-functional teams, introducing product and service innovation faster and achieving their KPI revenue from these innovations. HR can also act as a productivity driver, decreasing overall cost of operations by increasing productivity via simplified processes and automation. The future evolution will focus on understanding and tapping emerging digital technologies that can enable efficient and effective delivery of HR strategies and programs.

Pay and Benefits is also evolving at a fast pace from being a cost item to be an investment item. Platforms are more interactive, dynamic and can provide businesses with key information on cost efficiency, market movements, sensitivity ratios, etc. that shape the workforce and effectiveness conversations. We would assume that there is going to be an increased role for AI and Bots in the future to support HR in analyzing market data and jobs and advising on

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More organization in APAC and SEA are integrating benefits in the pay structure to increase the perceived value of the total package. This is aligned with the shift in benefits towards those that are most appreciated by the employees parency. Many times, internal equity issues create massive dis-engagement amongst employees even when the market competitiveness is quite high.

As we enter the year 2020, what trend or development do you think will significantly impact the reward profession?

Balancing rewards between the needs of employee and needs of business will be crucial.

Millennials would make organizations take notice of their unique requirements, especially the intangible rewards, and would force them to adapt to a more flexible approach to remain competitive and an employer of choice. Rewards would need to focus on improving employee and organizations productivity by assessing risks, anticipating changes. Being able to react faster to market challenges around talent and employee needs would become a critical determinant of success.

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Total rewards should ultimately drive overall business success

It’s time we should rethink our total rewards strategy, says Low Choy Huat, Partner, People Advisory Services, Ernst & Young Advisory Services Sdn. Bhd., in an interaction with People Matters

By Mastufa Ahmed

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hoy Huat Low is a Partner and the Malaysia People Advisory Services Leader in Ernst & Young Advisory Services Sdn Bhd. He has more than 24 years of experience helping clients to improve organizational, workforce and people performance.

Choy Huat has worked with various companies in diverse industries, including energy, natural resources, aviation, automotive, financial services and public services, across Malaysia, Thailand, Singapore, and Indonesia.

He also has significant experience in major HR transformation projects, including the setting-up, design, development, and delivery of HR shared service centers for a national oil and gas company, a major Malaysian conglomerate, a global chemicals company, and a global mining company.

Here are the excerpts of the interview.

What has been the most significant change in employee benefits during the last five years especially in APAC or SEA market? How do they differ from other markets?

As companies consider the various strategies and operating models for the digital economy, the fundamental principle that rewards should be based on and driven by performance still remains.

Interestingly, in the digital age, there is an even greater focus on the company’s and individual’s performance as a measurement of success. More often than not, this renewed focus on performance would require companies a total rethink of their total rewards strategy to attract, retain and engage employees.

Therefore, my experience in the SEA market is that many leading companies have started to shift the narrative on their total rewards philosophy. While remunera-

tion is still important, often, it’s a more human-centric approach that is also reflective of employee needs in the digital workplace, whereby companies provide greater care for their employees such as the needs of millennials who have started young families. Elements like flexible work arrangements, well-being, flexible benefits, mindfulness, etc. are more commonly pitched as a form of rewards beyond the typical base salary and bonuses.

Can you share an instance of a successful total rewards implementation by any organization?

The framing of total rewards should focus on two key areas: Firstly, it should ultimately drive overall business success, and hence factor in how everyone in the team contributes to a bigger financial outcome and the company's purpose.

Secondly, it should then drive different behaviors depending on the nature of roles that could require more agility, such as for project management roles or be delivery focused such as operational, functional jobs.

Recently, I worked on a project to help a client who has moved very rapidly into the digital economy by setting up different digital companies with a holding group structure but their total rewards strategy has not changed from their traditional business.

They need to hire new talent that they’ve

In the year 2020, we will see greater democratization and customization of rewards – tailoring specific rewards for employees, one employee at a time 52

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not hired before such as data scientists while growing top-line financial metrics.

Managing such diverse business needs is very challenging given that they have businesses across nine different jurisdictions.

Ultimately, the solution involved balancing short-term and long-term rewards, focusing on key financial metrics and different rewards mechanisms to drive different behaviors.

How do you see the rise of technology especially analytics and how are they transforming pay and benefit practices?

There are different areas where technology is impacting HR – be it through data and analytics, cloud, robotic process automation (RPA), blockchain, artificial intelligence (AI) or even different delivery models. For example, in HR Operations, RPA is used in processes such as payroll to work more effectively and efficiently, given the capability of bots to work 24/7 while ensuring compliance is met and

short have archaic rewards philosophies that need to be updated. They have to understand that money is no longer the most important factor when it comes to enabling an exceptional employee experience or in attracting and retaining top talent.

Essentially there are three challenges.

Firstly, HR departments and practitioners are not agile enough to switch or move their total rewards strategies. More often than not, they were involved in designing the outdated scheme, which is why there is resistance. HR departments and practitioners also do not know what to do or fail to seek help fast enough. Secondly, there is a lack of support from the board and top management as they may resist the change and adopt a more forward-looking total rewards approach. Thirdly, articulating the business impact beyond the financials is not easy and therefore the case for change needs to be looked at from the lens of the employees, not the employers.

What are the top challenges that businesses face when it comes to framing the total rewards strategy and its implementation?

My view is that companies that fall

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accurate payroll is processed to deliver an enhanced employee experience. At a more strategic level, the payroll information is often analyzed to provide insights to assist HR Directors to make better performance, talent and reward decisions aligned to business strategies.

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Rewards philosophies will need to be linked to the greater purpose of the company, which will require in-depth reflection and integration between policy and purpose, to really make it impactful

As we enter the year 2020, what trend or development do you think will significantly impact the reward profession?

In the year 2020, we will see greater democratization and customization of rewards – tailoring specific rewards for employees, one employee at a time.

Another key trend is that rewards philosophies will need to be linked to the greater purpose of the company, which will require in-depth reflection and integration between policy and purpose, to really make it impactful.

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What if there were no rewards at work?

Rewards undermine our natural interest in learning. We work towards getting better test scores than learning something

By Abhijit Bhaduri

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n the workplace, there is a special team of people who manage “total rewards” that does everything with the belief that periodic rewards make the employee feel appreciated and a little more engaged.

Could it be that our system of rewards is just what is making them disengaged?

Could it be that rewarding high performance is precisely what is making people not collaborate with colleagues? Could it be that offering rewards for innovation is stopping the employees from taking on complex problems? What does the science say?

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What are you incentivizing?

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Everything around us is about rewards and incentives. We post pictures on social media and then go back and check the number of likes it generated. Instagram offers preset filters that let us choose how each picture can be made to look amazing. We choose a filter that will make the moment look truly distinct and make everyone else feel jealous about the good life you have.

That means we need to frequently post moments from our life that are only “incredible” or “amazing” or “awesome”.

Anything short of that is ordinary and ignored. The entire vacation is spent wondering if we missed capturing the perfect sunset rather than experiencing

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Rewards make us choose targets we are sure to achieve or exceed. We choose fewer challenging goals so that we can achieve them the beauty of the setting sun. I have seen couples go through the marriage rituals a few more times until the photographer gives the nod of approval. Even your harshest critics will liberally shower “likes” on the wedding photos you share. The highest paid wedding photographers guarantee a certain number of likes on Instagram and hence that justifies the premium.

You put up photos on Facebook and each one gets say 50 “likes”. The next one you post gets 3 likes. Think of what that does to you? It demotivates you and makes you less spontaneous. You wonder if the last one was the beginning of a new trend. The number of likes rules your life. Instagram has started hiding the likes that you can see on others' photos (you can see the likes your own photos get). "We will make decisions that hurt the business if they help people's well-being and health", says the CEO of Instagram. Rewards work well in the short run but do not work well in the long term.

When having a large number of team members is celebrated, it encourages everyone to become a people manager.

The result is a large percentage of people managers are not fit to lead teams. But they are there because being a terrific individual expert is sneered at by the organization. Organizations reward individual stars and then wonder why collaboration is low among colleagues.

Stop incentivizing learning Reskilling the entire workforce is going to become part of every organization’s agenda. If we want to get employees to explore new challenges, then STOP incentivizing learning. Setting learning goals generates compliance. A terrific learning experience run by the L&D team may be more valuable than sending people to an Ivy League college. Junior managers are sent for internally run programs while the senior leaders are sent to external programs. When we are determined to do

asked to speak about failures. After all the performance appraisal systems only reward people who achieve or exceed goals. This in itself is the basic trigger to “sandbag” our targets for the year.

The sales team will first figure out how to get their incentives and plan their sales strategy accordingly.

• Avoids complex problem solving.

Studies show that when children are rewarded for solving puzzles, they choose the simplest ones because that is the fastest way to maximize rewards.

It robs them of the joy of solving a problem they had to grapple with. We make heroes out of people who overcome adversity. But we rarely create an adverse scenario voluntarily by choosing a difficult problem to work on.

Organizations do not tackle problems that require a multi-year effort because reward cycles are often annual.

• Technical debt: Organizations reward and celebrate tangible achievements.

Many long-term decisions that impact the health of the company are dropped because it is hard to show quick results.

Publicly listed companies are notorious for being myopic and looking only at the next quarter when they have to go to the

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something, we will do it without waiting for rewards. If you want to build a learning organization, stop rewarding and incentivizing learning. Here are some reasons that researcher Alfie Kohn discovered in experiments: • Rewards kill curiosity. Rewards undermine our natural interest in learning. We work towards getting better test scores than learning something. When the apps offer us badges and stars for learning, we find ways to game the system. The end result is a student who knows how to crack the entrance test of a prestigious institute but is not employable when he/ she graduates from it. The L&D budget is the first casualty when the times are tough. All slogans about building a learning organization fail because people know that solving a problem faster is better than trying to figure out why the problem arose in the first place.

• Rewards make us choose targets we are sure to achieve or exceed. We choose fewer challenging goals so that we can achieve them. People learn very quickly that for all the talk about failing being OK, the real heroes are the ones who win. Only successful people are

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Studies show that when children are rewarded for solving puzzles, they choose the simplest ones because that is the fastest way to maximize rewards. It robs them of the joy of solving a problem they had to grapple with street to show improvement in share prices or other metrics. The result is that long term solutions and fundamental changes are left for the successor to do. In technical functions, not addressing fundamental tasks is called technical debt that often kills the product or service.

How about rethinking rewards in 2020 when we have perfect vision? Making work reasonably challenging is reward enough. Don’t ruin it by adding external rewards. Then sit back and watch the magic.

About the author

Abhijit Bhaduri is a coach, author and one of the most followed writers in the area of Talent Management. Follow him @AbhijitBhaduri JANUARY 2020 |

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Why you need to revamp your total rewards programs

Each individual employee’s experience of the Total Rewards Strategy determines whether it works for us or not. And, we need to understand that HR’s views of this are often out of sync with those of the employees at large

By Clinton Wingrove

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s 2020 approaches, much will be written about Total Rewards Strategies, and we will all be encouraged to think about: • External forces and comparisons – what are competitors for talent paying and how do we wish to compare?

• Local legislation – what are our compliance issues related to e.g., gender, disability, working hours, seniority, etc?

• Global equity – if we are a multinational organization, how should our Total Rewards packages compare across national boundaries?

• What our organization should pay for e.g., what do we pay for in recurring reward (e.g., skills, experience, knowledge, job responsibilities, …) and what do we pay for episodically (e.g., results/ output, exceptional input, ad hoc performance, …)?

• The structure of rewards – how do we structure total rewards e.g., pay grades (shallow or deep, wide job families or narrow job types) or spot salaries?

• What we include in Total Rewards e.g., base pay, variable pay, vacation allow-

ance, maternity and parental leave, compassionate leave, various assurances and insurances, training and development, recognition and awards, scholarships, sabbatical and other forms of educational leave, travel, car allowances, working environment (including flexible hours and working location), opportunities for community service and charitable contributions, board and other representative positions, ….!

• How pay (and, indeed all benefits), are determined e.g., external standards, annual progression, union negotiated settlements, formulaic (e.g., based on assessments or performance data), manager discretion, executive decision for different groups, HR decision, employee driven (e.g., linked to demonstrated criteria such as certifications, achievements, …); • When pay etc changes are made e.g., employment anniversary, annually for all, event driven, on demand, in response to results, …; • Who makes individual reward decisions e.g., a system, manager, direct manager

+ indirect manager, manager + HR, HR alone, …; • How, when and by whom decisions are communicated. More about this shortly!

All those are important. But three facts are often neglected in the face of all those detailed discussions. First, each organization must ensure that the cost of its workforce fits within an economically viable model for the business. Second, we must understand what Total Rewards can and cannot achieve. And, third, how each employee experiences Total Rewards is critically important.

Economically viable business model In a prior article, I referred to the 6531 HR philosophy, the “6” of which relates to the six critical contributions that HR must make to any organization. The first of those six is “Update the organization's strategy, not merely support it.”

We can choose to have a Total Rewards Strategy that merely responds to the organization’s overall strategy. Or, we can use it to inform other aspects of the organization’s strategy. For example, if the organization wishes to pay at Upper Quartile in order to attract and retain top talent in its sector, then it needs to ensure the funds to support that. This may have implications for R&D (to develop disruptive premium priced solutions); for Sales (to focus on

Every element in our Total Rewards package will have a potentially different perceived value for each employee. And, herein lies the challenge 56

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premium client acquisition and retention to reduce % cost of sales); for Finance (to maximize incoming investment and cash flow, and minimize bad debt), for Operations (to achieve higher levels of productivity), etc.

As HR professionals, it is important to understand that we may need to persuade more than the CEO and the CFO to approve our recommended Total Rewards Strategy.

It may be the Head of R&D, Head of Sales & Marketing or even the COO who needs to enable the strategy and we must ensure their commitment to actions, not merely their agreement.

What can a total reward strategy achieve?

Each organization must ensure that the cost of its workforce fits within an economically viable model for the business Each employee’s experience of Total Rewards is critically important

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Each individual employee’s experience of the Total Rewards Strategy determines whether it works for us or not. And, we need to understand that HR’s views of this are often out of synch with those of the employees at large!

Every element in our Total Rewards package will have a potentially different perceived value for each employee. And, herein lies the challenge. All too often, we design our strategies for the average employee; we benchmark against the mean or median salaries; we match the average of our competitors’ profit share schemes; we provide insurances against the average of others in our sector; etc.

But, we probably do not have a single average employee in our workforce – they are all unique; and they all chose to work for us, not for our competitors. How they experience each and every single element in our Total Rewards Strategy impacts their perception of the organization and the contributions that they therefore make – the return they give us on our investment in them. And, what is the single largest factor in their experience? Their immediate manager! They are the ones who can identify and address those different needs and wants.

“The significant differentiator of sustainably successful organizations is the quality of their leadership and management.” Approximately 66 percent of those who leave organizations cite an interaction with their manager as a key trigger

for them doing so, and that their manager failed to give them needed feedback or to hold others to account. Indeed, some 50 percent of current managers report having received insufficient training pre and post-appointment … and not even enjoying managing others.

So, our Total Rewards Strategy must include ensuring that we have quality people-management. Managers need to: • Understand fully the Total Rewards strategy; • Communicate the strategy regularly and frequently to their staff - so that the staff understand and appreciate the full range of benefits that they experience working in our organizations; • Be empowered to make as many of the Total Reward decisions for their staff as possible; • Apply the strategy transparently and fairly, and be charged to justify themselves each decision they make, not pass the buck to others.

Without the above, all our efforts will be thwarted. Let’s make sure that 2020 sees pragmatic Total Rewards Strategies implemented by high caliber managers, working to deliver sustainably successful organizations.

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Pay (the purely financial elements of the Total Rewards package) and other tangible benefits are key components of Talent Attraction but are rapidly superseded as motivators or retainers by each employee’s working experience once they have joined.

Frederick Herzberg’s Two Factor theory of motivation, developed in 1959, still applies i.e., that there are satisfying factors, such as financial reward (which if not supplied sufficiently, lead to dissatisfaction and decreased productivity etc.) and motivating factors (typically non-financial) which, so long as the satisfying factors are present, motivate individuals.

Financial incentives, therefore, rarely have the motivational impact that is expected. In fact, they frequently have damaging effects. They are most effective with a very small percentage of individuals who genuinely are motivated by potential earnings and with those who are experiencing immediate financial difficulties.

Both these groups pose significant peoplemanagement challenges. Non-financial rewards tend to have a longer-term positive impact on both development and performance for all.

We should seek to ensure that our Total Reward Strategy is: • Sustainable given the likely vagaries of the organization’s foreseeable performance and funding; • Sufficiently generous and comprehensive to attract the talent that we need at various levels; • Demonstrably fair, so that employees feel they receive appropriate reward and recognition for their performance … and that others do not receive rewards that are substantially different for similar performance; • Sufficiently transparent so that employees do not feel cheated or envious. Note, with the level of social media engagement, the concept of secrecy over individual pay is no longer sustainable.

About the author

Clinton Wingrove is Director of www.WantToBeGreatManager.com and www.ClintonHR.com He may be contacted via: clinton.wingrove@WantToBeGreat.com.

Or LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/clintonwingrove JANUARY 2020 |

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A winning rewards strategy augments business success In an exclusive interaction with People Matters, Janani Ravishankar, who leads Global Compensation & HR Analytics at Cleartrip, shares how a personalized, agile, holistic rewards system is essential to attracting, motivating, and developing talent

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By Mastufa Ahmed

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anani Ravishankar has been associated with Cleartrip for over three years where she is helping steer Cleartrip's multi-market play by leading the Global Compensation & HR Analytics space for the travel technology brand. She has over 14+ years in the Human Resources function spanning several facets of HR like Talent Acquisition, Business Partnering, Organizational Development, Compensation, Benefits and Analytics.

An alumna of BITS Pilani, Janani has also worked with Mphasis, Infosys and Polaris in her previous avatars. A dedicated gardener, Janani is deeply interested in Carnatic music, painting and enjoys singing whenever her schedule allows her.

Here are the excerpts of the interview.

From payroll generation, compensation & benefits to now total rewards, what are your views on the evolution of this function?

Work has been an integral part of human lives since times immemorial and human effort has been compensated through monetary/non-monetary levers ranging from barter, cash and benefits. At the workplace, with every change in the constitution of workforce (for eg: Baby Boomers to Gen X, Gen Y, etc.), there has 58

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been a development in the HR processes as well. What started as a function that was involved only in processing specific cash payments at specific periods, Compensation & Benefits (C&B) became a much larger function that solved for objectivity, clarity and care. It provided visibility around payments and introduced elements of care (health/life insurance). Today, C&B has reinvented itself to become an element in the broader Total Rewards portfolio of an organization. Gone are the days when C&B was perceived as a significantly numerical function with little / no emotional aspects. In its current evolving avatar, C&B is a complementing part in the jigsaw puzzle of Total Rewards and is critical to provide better employee/candidate experience. While payroll had no connection with employee value proposition, total rewards have become a key ingredient of employer value proposition, talent attraction and retention.

It is a business-aligned sub-function within HR that strategizes various reward interventions to ensure business success.

What has been the most significant change in employee benefits during the last five years?

There is a shift in the mindset among employers in terms of not just extending benefits to employees but to rather identify benefits that appeal to their different demographic segments. Further, there is increased focus on the education of benefits to ensure it is a win-win for employers (offering benefits that are needed) and employees (receiving needed benefits at either no / subsidized cost). The APAC market is increasingly focused on extending flexibility, top-up and choice, and physical/ emotional well-being.

In order to cater to today’s multigenerational workforce, reward strategies need to constantly evolve

How should total reward professionals and businesses frame Total Reward strategies given the changing expectations of employees? How does a winning rewards strategy look like?

In order to cater to today’s multigenerational workforce, reward strategies need to constantly evolve. There is no ‘one-sizefits-all’ approach, especially in matters relating to employees’ career aspirations/ life interests, etc. Any cash / non-cash reward comes with either a direct or indirect cost. Rewards professionals need to look beyond the current and immediate and consider sustainability and scalability of the approach. In my opinion, a winning rewards strategy is one which is objective and augments business success without compromising on the organization’s values. It encompasses several elements like pay, bonuses, benefits, growth opportunities and work environment. Every aspect of the strategy needs to reflect the same theme and belief for it to succeed.

How do we see the different areas of HR transforming due to technology and analytics? How is technology transforming pay and benefit practices?

Technology is revolutionizing the way employers and employees approach work.

Companies today acknowledge that their talent pool comprises people belonging to different cultures, age groups and social status working under one roof. Hence it becomes all the more important to bring all the positive energies together and march towards achieving organizational objectives. Given that this is easier said than done, companies today are relying on technology to enable an ecosystem that is open, collaborative and connected. According to industry reports, currently, the global technology penetration is about 57% which is expected to steadily increase over the next few years. While technology is disrupting every segment, it has also dramatically changed the HR landscape in recent years.

Technology coupled with people analytics offers extensive insights about various programs/processes thereby enabling organizations to gauge the return on investment through systematic identification and measurement of metrics. Companies are using technology to enhance HR service, boost productivity, and help deliver more rewarding and personalized experiences for job candidates and employees. AI (eg: Chatbots) has permeated several facets of HR like Recruitment, Engagement, Pay & Benefits. For instance, organizations are supporting managers to take pay-related decisions for a candidate/employee faster by empowering them with data and analytics.

We need to look at compensation as a conscious, objective strategic tool for an organization and not as a short-term lever to aid short term plans. Analytics helps in predicting and correlating possible benefits from a particular pay/bonus intervention. Companies are supporting employee benefit selection through techenabled offerings with simplified decision support and choice enablement. Technology is leveraged today to understand individual employee needs/preferences so as to extend customized benefits packages. As companies are moving from employee wellness to wellbeing, having an online portal for benefits administration is hygiene. We really need to focus on using technology to understand our talent deeply by operating within the tenets of data security and confidentiality.

The need of the hour is to have a rewards strategy which is broad and has a flavor of flexibility and agility very different from the Provident Fund or Gratuity Acts, but not have the flexibility due to statutory regulations.

Can you share an instance of a successful total rewards implementation by your organization?

At Cleartrip, we have a program called CT Achievers. Every Cleartripper aspires to be a part of this club that touches multiple facets like recognition, development, compensation and benefits. CT Achievers club is a select group formed with complete meritocracy for only a few across the organization. This approximately includes the top 10 percentile of the Cleartrip workforce. The crème de la crème of Cleartrip that show consistently unprecedented levels of performance, commitment to Cleartrip and play a pivotal role in taking Cleartrip to new heights make it to the Club. Every selection for Cleartrip Achievers club is based on a comprehensive process comprising an objective review by managers and leaders, and is based on the quality of work and its business impact. Each CT Achiever is recognised in the public forums like town halls, email communications, team meetings and is awarded a special bonus to celebrate their inclusion into the club. A plaque is presented to each CT Achiever to express that their role has been important in taking Cleartrip places! Being part of CT Achievers also means, they are nurtured

In this ever-changing dynamic business environment, organizations are required to strategize and execute within a short span of time. This would mean that any initiative has C-Suite buy-in, right investment, stakeholder alignment and a robust communication plan. Many organizations face difficulties rolling out the plan due to perception differences amongst the diverse talent groups. Line Manager empowerment and enablement may not be strong in order to deliver the program effectively to employees. In many cases, communication link breaks down at crucial points resulting in partial success / failure of the program. For any program to succeed, time-tested key elements like transparent communication, positive work environment and development-oriented culture are essential.

The need of the hour is to have a rewards strategy which is broad and has a flavor of flexibility and agility.

STOR Y

Organizations today, irrespective of their size and scale, have to keep one aspect at the core: Understanding their talent. This is the key ingredient to ensure the success of an initiative. Today’s workforce consists of a significant proportion of millennials who are looking for a fastpaced, dynamic, open work environment which is aligned to their career interests and that helps them move closer to their purpose. Having said that, workforce also includes talent from Baby Boomers / Gen X / Gen Y and so on. Organizations, on the one hand, want to give personalized, agile rewards to their talent. On the other hand, their execution may be focussed on one group only. A balanced strategy is one which takes into account the needs of different employee groups and offers flexibility while retaining the soul of the program. As they say, ‘the devil is in the details’. Organizations may be good at strategizing, but fail on execution. This is where organizations need to invest more time and energy. Execution not only refers to how well a program is rolled out but also refers to the ability of organizations to take calculated risks and embrace change.

Also, reward programs are designed based on multiple factors like - needs of the employees, appetite of the organization, opportunities or enablers available in the industry to meet these needs, etc.

Often there are boundaries within which an organization can design their rewards.

For example, an organization may want to create a retirement benefit which is

What are the top challenges that businesses face when it comes to framing the total rewards strategy and its implementation?

C OVER

Large organizations now realize that a personalized, agile, holistic rewards system is essential to attracting, motivating, and developing talent. So why are so many companies falling short, even as they realize their rewards programs are outdated?

to take up higher roles and also perform at the highest standards. Their development goals are defined and help them progress towards what they want to pursue both short-term and long-term. Apart from this, they are also a part of the exclusive teams who come together to solve some important modules across the organization.

Last year, Cleartrip acquired Saudi Arabia based leading online travel organization Flyin.com. We are looking to extend this program to include members of our extended tribe as well.

As we enter the year 2020, what trend or development do you think will significantly impact the rewards profession?

Personalized rewards are going to be increasingly talked about. In the Benefits space, there have been few customizations over the last few years, especially in insurance-related matters. However, there is scope for more in the overall benefit offerings depending on individual needs. When it comes to pay-related matters, there is still some distance to travel to reach a personalized package. How can a package be truly customized to suit employee needs is the way forward (barring the statutorily required components). With customization scaling new heights, talent attraction and retention are taking a whole different dimension. It waits to be seen if a day comes when we have a prospective candidate put up the expected salary on the resume / social media for organizations to auction for!

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Steve Black

Why 2020 is the year to go global with your talent strategy

W o r k p l a c e P o l i cy

Why recruiting and maintaining a diverse workforce is critical for business success

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t’s no surprise that organizations that offer a diverse global culture are some of the best places to work, and these companies have less trouble attracting top talent to fill their vacancies. They know the highest-performing organizations today are successful because they’re people-centric, agile and diverse, and they approach talent acquisition, recruitment, and retention from a global perspective.

This is in stark contrast to even just a decade ago when talent management often centered around specific geography—companies recruited from within a commuting radius of their physical locations. Global mobility was reserved only for the most senior executives at many organizations.

Now that moving from place to place has become easier, and technology makes remote work accessible from anywhere, borders are no longer a consideration for many HR teams and employees.

In fact, the pendulum has swung soundly in the opposite direction: recruiting and maintaining a diverse workforce is critical for business success.

Plenty of studies show the benefit of diversity on business performance, and it’s also become a critical ingredient in leadership—for example, 72 percent of CFOs have worked internationally – according to a study by Forbes. That’s why talent

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Now that moving from place to place has become easier, and technology makes remote work accessible from anywhere, borders are no longer a consideration for many HR teams and employees mobility has become a critical enabler of global diversity. The ability to easily move people wherever they need—or want—to work can be a strong differentiator for both recruiting and developing talent.

Even for organizations that aren’t necessarily looking to develop a global footprint, a strong mobility program that fosters diversity is a must-have business strategy. And, it will become increasingly vital as the business landscape becomes more global.

If you’re not focused on this yet, you could quickly get left behind. Here are five reasons why 2020 is the year to go global for any organization.

• Mobility is expected. Employees are increasingly looking for mobility opportunities. In fact, 70 percent of employees say transferring to another location within their company would advance their careers, according to our study.

Perhaps even more telling, 22 percent have left a company because they were denied a mobility opportunity. In today’s tough recruiting and retention market, not offering mobility opportunities could mean that your best and brightest employees will find them somewhere else.

• Mobility is more valuable than money.

Many employees are eager to take advantage of a mobility opportunity purely for the experience and career-building benefits, even without an increase in salary or job title. They value mobility itself as a reward or recognition.

• Mobility preserves and propagates institutional knowledge. Offering mobility opportunities not only helps to preserve institutional

communication a challenge. Allowing those staff members to become immersed in one another’s culture can help smooth some of those edges and make collaboration much more effective.

This can substantially benefit customer relationships as well. Topia has a large customer base in France, and we’ve noted that interpersonal communication is much different in the French culture than in the US or UK. Once the differences are understood, partnerships can improve dramatically. It’s also possible that certain locales are better suited for specific types of talent development. For example, Topia has a strong engineering presence in Tallinn, Estonia, and we’ve grown our headcount there by nearly double this year alone. While it started out with mostly Tallinn locals, it quickly became clear that the market was becoming increasingly competitive and we had an opportunity to find great talent abroad while living our own values. So, we began moving employees there to immerse them in that environment. Now, only 40 percent of our employees in Tallinn are

W o r k p l a c e P o l i cy

Companies that top the charts of best places to work are putting global culture and talent mobility first, including mobility across both roles and geographies knowledge by retaining top talent, but it also helps to leverage that knowledge throughout the organization. Sending experienced, innovative and ambitious employees on assignment to another location gives them a chance to share their experience and insight with coworkers in that office, thus spreading that unique accumulation of knowledge.

• Mobility expands your talent pool. If you’re only recruiting within your local market, you’re extremely limited in the talent and skills you can attain and in the cost of that talent.

For example, if you’re only recruiting in San Francisco, you’re up against steep competition for the same talent pool. By expanding your recruiting on a global scale you can tap into a much larger pool of skilled candidates.

• Mobility enables cultural diversity. Encouraging team members to live and work in a different location creates a much deeper understanding of their co-worker’s cultural perspectives and can help with customer interaction as well. For example, if your US team routinely interacts with your team in India, there may be some cultural differences that may make

native to that area; the rest are from India, Turkey, Brazil and other regions with a total of 12 different nationalities represented on the team.

Companies that top the charts of best places to work are putting global culture and talent mobility first, including mobility across both roles and geographies. In order to keep pace in the coming decade, organizations must assess their current diversity and make a concerted effort to develop a plan to cultivate a global culture. Start by making sure that current global staff feels empowered to speak up, share their perspectives and are heard by their teammates. Begin an exchange program to send staff to work in offices around the world to give them a new perspective on the co-workers they interact with every day. Expand your recruiting efforts to draw talent from different parts of the world to gain a more global perspective.

All of these strategies will not only benefit your innovation, product development, customer relationships, and overall business performance, but it will give you the edge you need to remain competitive as the market goes global around you.

About the author

Steve Black is the Chief Strategy Officer at Topia - an award-winning global mobility management platform JANUARY 2020 |

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High-performance culture starts with high employee self-awareness In an exclusive conversation with People Matters, Dudi Arisandi, Chief People Officer at Indonesian OTA player Tiket.com, shares his views on what goes into building highperformance organizations

By Shweta Modgil

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i n t e r v i e w

high-performance organization is an organization that is able to perform exceedingly better than those of its peer group over a period of time by focusing in a disciplined way on that which really matters to the organization. But who exactly determines what matters to the organiza-

tion? What are these factors that go into building high-performance organizations? As today’s organizations are facing the need for change at a faster pace than ever before due to advancements in technology, multi-generational workforces and global economic implications, what is the kind of culture that acts as an enabler of a high-performance organization?

In an exclusive conversation with People Matters, Dudi Arisandi, Chief People Officer at Indonesian OTA player Tiket.com, shares his views on what goes into building high-performance organizations.

Here are the excerpts of the interview.

What does building a high-performance organization truly mean?

An organization that can achieve their goals/ objective (financial & non-financial) through strong routine/discipline ways constitutes a highperformance organization.

What would you say are the three most important factors in creating a high-performance organization?

I would list the following three factors that play a critical role in creating a high-performance organization1. Leadership Commitment (from all level) 2. Company Culture 3. Employee Engagement

What is the role of leadership in building a high-performance organization?

The objective of building a high-performance culture is to help the organization to achieve high levels of performance, and results, consistently over time 62

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Leadership has several roles to play when it comes to building a high-performance organization.

It starts with Role Modelling. The leader must buy-in and be committed to performance-based initiatives and continue with aligning between values and the organization goals.

The other important role is providing time to give routine feedback to their team. Last but not least, leaders need to be change agents/ambassadors for all initiatives related to building a highperformance culture.

What kind of organizational culture is most suited for a high-performance organization? How can HR leaders build that culture in the organization?

What are some of the steps being taken at Tiket to build a high-performance organization?

Tiket’s transformation just started in the last three years, when it was acquired by one of Indonesia’s biggest conglomerates. Most of the initiative related to turning around the business and we did it. Our business grew more than double compared to the previous year.

From an HR perspective, we just started to revamp all the HR processes early this year (2019).

We started by revisiting all the HR infrastructure, including but not limited to HR Digitalization, performance review, reward & compensation, the talent acquisition process, employee engagement initiatives and learning initiatives. Along the year, we build a high trust from our stakeholders and introduced many initiatives to improve upon all HR processes.

Starting in October 2019, we also revisited our existing values and will change our culture in sync with the new values. The most important reason why we changed is that we aspire to build a more high performing culture through our current values.

What are some of the learning and development initiatives being taken by Tiket to upskill its employees?

We believe that to build a high-performance culture, start with high employee self-awareness.

We started the year by building a self-awareness

What HR Leaders can do is to build an HR strategy that is aligned with the objective of a High-Performance Culture-right from the hiring Process to firing

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The objective of building a high-performance culture is to help the organization to achieve high levels of performance, and results, consistently over time. So, there are some important values that must be embedded in the organization such as a continuous learning culture (Learning Organization), a safe environment, openness to change and engaged employees.

What HR Leaders can do is to build an HR strategy that is aligned with the objective of a HighPerformance Culture-right from the hiring Process to firing.

HR leaders can also take more initiatives to make people more engaged and buy-in the plan.

program and each Tiket employee needs to join with the program. In the program, employees get assessment results about themselves and their teams. With this approach, employees get to know each other and support each other to achieve organizational goals. We continued the program with a Leadership program which will be more robust in 2020. We declared that 2020 is our “BUILD” moment. We just finished our Tiket Academy blueprint, which will go live in January 2020.

How is Tiket helping its employees to prepare for the future of work?

Tiket is enabling its employees to ready themselves for the future of work through the following three steps1. Revisit existing values and build a stronger culture to ensure people are ready for the future of work 2. Enable the Tiket academy for spearheading long-life learning initiatives 3. Provide flexible working arrangement and work-life harmony initiatives JANUARY 2020 |

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Dying for a better pay cheque?

Even as organizations encourage management practices that literally sicken and kill employees, they also suffer because toxic management practices do not improve profitability

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Jeffrey Pfeffer & M Muneer

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few years ago, in a highly shocking incident, the then MD of Tata Motors, Karl Slym jumped off his top-floor hotel suite in Bangkok. Two years ago, the COO of Encyclopedia Britannica decided to follow suit, by plunging down the ventilation shaft of his apartment building. Prior to that, a young CEO of SAP India, and a friend, Ranjan Das, succumbed to a massive heart attack, reportedly due to deprived sleep patterns. The list is never-ending: Anand Bajaj of Bajaj Electricals, VG Sidhartha of Café Coffee Day, Saumil Shah of BankAm Merrill Lynch India, and so on.

These are not isolated cases. Two recent studies have found that depression, anxiety, and stress prevail among 46 percent of employees in the private sector in India. Demanding work schedules, high pressure on KPIs linked to higher perqui-

sites, and the always-on mobile phone syndrome are the top three culprits. In addition, sleep apnea, relationship issues, poor eating habits, lack of exercise, lifestyle issues such as EMI troubles and peer pressures to maintain luxurious lifestyles complete the list.

The harmful side effects of what we call “management toxicity” are affecting more and more Indians just as we see it among Americans.

Of the eight hundred thousand suicides across the world annually, about 100 thousand are literate Indians – potentially employed or employable.

India is the world capital for diabetics and cardio ailments are affecting more and more Indians in the 30s.

It implies you don’t have to work in a coalmine or chemical plant to get health hazards. In fact, blue-collar occupational hazards have been largely eliminated after the introduction of stringent HSE processes in most companies. Reprising a lesson from the Quality Movement that “what-gets-measured-gets-affected”, companies pay attention to workplace fatalities and incidents, such as falls or chemical spills, where bodily harm can be readily ascertained and benchmarked globally.

Unfortunately for the white collars, the invisible stress at work is intangible, and as with most intangibles at enterprises, these don’t get measured. This inevitable part of contemporary workplaces just keeps getting worse for almost all jobs, resulting in an ever-higher physical and psychological toll. The American Psychological Association’s 2015 report noted that the top two sources of stress were money and work. Another poll reported that nearly half of employees surveyed missed time at work from work-related stress and 60 percent said that stress had made them sick.

Yet, a surprising number of recent studies have shown that performance is not positively related to work hours. The greater the work hours, the lower the productivity per hour worked. Just working more doesn't accomplish much. An HBR article argued that even though managers seem to "want employees to put in long days" and "respond to

A surprising number of recent studies have shown that performance is not positively related to work hours.

The greater the work hours, the lower the productivity per hour worked. Just working more doesn't accomplish much 64

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their emails at all hours," such policies backfire for people and companies.

There is a lot of evidence that long work hours are hazardous: • A review of 27 empirical studies found that long work hours "are associated with adverse health" including "cardiovascular disease, diabetes, and disability".

• Working overtime was associated with a 61 percent higher injury rate.

• A meta-analysis of 21 studies reported "significant positive mean correlations between overall health symptoms (physiological/psychological) and hours of work.

If the aggregate statistics are disturbing, the individual stories are horrifying. We are sure we all have enough experiences to share ranging from health issues, depression, family problems, missed opportunities, job changes and so on.

injury risks. They must choose their employers, at least partly, based on stress-related dimensions of work that profoundly influence their physical and mental health.

2. Second, employers will need to determine and measure the costs of their toxic management practices in terms of both direct medical costs and indirect costs via lost productivity and increased employee turnover. That understanding will be a necessary first step toward change.

3. Third, governments will need to acknowledge and take measures on the externalities created when enterprises retrench people who were physically and psychologically damaged at work. The famed IT industry is a classic example here. The public costs of privately created workplace stress have already prompted policy attention and action in the UK and Scandinavian countries. With “Modicare” getting

The saddest part is that even as organizations encourage management practices that literally sicken and kill employees, they also suffer because toxic management practices do not improve profitability. Unhealthy workplaces diminish employee engagement, increase turnover, and reduce job performance, even as they drive up health insurance and health¬care costs – truly a “lose¬lose” situation.

Ironically, most companies have developed elaborate measures to track their progress on environmental sustainability while little thought is given to “employee sustainability”. Although environmental sustainability obviously is essential, so is creating workplaces where people can thrive and enjoy physical and mental health. We should care about people, not just endangered species or photogenic polar bears, as we think about the impact of corporate activity on our environments. And as companies obsess over their carbon footprint, they would do well to consider their footprints on human beings – a carbon-based life form - who work for them.

In our opinion, if anything has to change, a combination of the following things will need to occur: 1. First, employees must comprehend what constitutes health risks in their work environments.

That includes the omnipresent psychosocial risks that are more damaging than physical

launched, it is in the economic interests of the government to reduce unnecessary – and preventable – healthcare costs.

4. Fourth, societies will need social movements that advocate “human sustainability” and better work environments as important as environmental sustainability. Dumping pollutants into the air, water and ground have been rampant here even today but of late people have woken up to fight for a better environment and made companies pay for the damages.

Because of the public movement, governments all over the world passed laws and developed norms restricting pollution. (Delhi is a live example of too-less-too-late in terms of public movement).

5. Fifth, employees will need to learn how to say “No” when it is right to say so instead of continuing with the servile mentality. It is also important to bring focus to “jobs to be done” very objectively and adhere to time management principles.

We seem to be creating truly lose-lose work environments, in which people are making themselves sick for no other reason than to demonstrate their "commitment" and that they will literally risk their lives and health for their employers. If we are serious about building healthier societies, time to act is here and now. It just is not worth dying for a better pay cheque!

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Employees will need to learn how to say “No” when it is right to say so instead of continuing with the servile mentality. It is also important to bring focus to “jobs to be done” very objectively and adhere to time management principles

About the authors

Jeff Pfeffer is a chairprofessor of organizational behavior at Stanford University; and M Muneer is co-founder and chief evangelist at the non-profit Medici Institute Foundation.

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Ronni Zehavi

Office dating policies in the age of #MeToo Mcdonald’s zero-tolerance policy against fraternizing may be a cautionary effort as a result of the #MeToo movement, which has created tension between male and female coworkers over the last year

W o r k p l a c e P o l i cy

Hiding a workplace relationship only makes an office romance more scandalous, and they’re happening regardless of zero-tolerance policies

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o some, meeting your potential match in the workplace seems like a viable dating option. But following Steve Easterbrook’s departure as CEO of Mcdonald’s, the modern workforce is wondering why office romances are now a fireable offense.

Mcdonald’s zero-tolerance policy against fraternizing may be a cautionary effort as a result of the #MeToo movement, which has created tension between male and female coworkers over the last year.

The #MeToo movement is more than necessary and raises awareness about sexual harassment at work. Instead of enforcing strict policies to deter workplace relationships, though, can those companies try to make the work world a safer place for women by building out office dating policies that are flexible without putting their businesses at risk?

#MeToo has changed the workforce Workplace policies, in general, have evolved since #MeToo garnered global attention. Its effect on workplace relationships is another story, with recent research showing the movement has caused 66

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men to feel unsure about how they interact with female coworkers. They’ve become hyperaware of their actions when attempting to engage with female colleagues, considering potential consequences of their demeanors and body language ahead of time.

The #MeToo movement has put increased pressure on managers and employers to make sure they’re setting a good example, abiding by the rules, and fostering a work environment that’s safe and comfortable for all employees without exception. A prime example of a #MeToo measure is the love contract, the latest trend in offices where dating is allowed, but monitored closely.

These contracts detail the stipulations of engaging in a romance and covers legalities pertinent to the objectives of the #MeToo movement. Love contracts include copy on the Equal Opportunity Employment Act, biased favoritism, performance and productivity standards, as well as mutual consent.

Paper-written policies and written agreements help HR and employers safeguard the behavior within and intentions behind workplace relationships, allowing employees the chance to understand the space and boundaries required between genders in a professional setting; whether they’re courting each other or respecting someone’s rejection wishes.

Companies can build stronger dating policies An SHRM workplace romance survey found that only 42 percent of companies have developed a formal, written, workplace dating policy. A solid, company-wide dating policy enforced by HR can do

Transparency is key in the modern workplace Hiding a workplace relationship only makes an office romance more scandalous, and they’re happening regardless of zero-tolerance policies.

As of 2017, 57% of employees responding said they engaged in a romantic relationship at work. The good news is that 55 percent of HR professionals questioned in similar surveys said that marriage was the most likely outcome of the office romances they experienced or mediated.

Transparency in a modern work setting is critical when addressing a phenomenon directly impacted by the #MeToo movement. Why? Because

What #MeToo means for the modern workplace is that a carefully curated policy is necessary to ensure respectful, appropriate, and fair treatment for women at work

W o r k p l a c e P o l i cy

wonders for workplace relationships; it’s crucial to build out a policy that suits the values and morals of your business’ vision. After all, dating policies don’t have to be zero-tolerance, but they do need to protect the integrity and comfort level of all employees.

Ironclad dating policies dictate the appropriate boundaries between personal and professional relationships, and the fine print should address an employee’s obligation to report active office relationships if gone noticed. When a new couple goes public, though, what happens next? Dating policies should outline the prohibition of physical contact or PDA between employees during work hours, and host a dedicated section on anti-harassment policy and harassment-reporting mechanisms.

A strong policy typically underlines the employer’s decision to either discourage or forbid fraternization between managers and their team members, as well. In these trickier circumstances, it’s the employer's right to modify reporting and org chart structures. The goal of any office dating policy is to ensure the professional satisfaction and growth of each employee, by providing a plan workplace romance plan of action that aligns with #MeToo values.

companies must be transparent about the rules and open with their teams and should demand the same transparency from employees engaged in relationships as to avoid legal and ethical complications.

What #MeToo means for the modern workplace is that a carefully curated policy is necessary to ensure respectful, appropriate, and fair treatment for women at work. The way employers and management address employees has certainly changed under the influence of the movement, informing male colleagues on how to be aware of their actions when engaging with a female coworker. Implementing these policy best practices is in the interest of everyone, creating a forwardthinking and respectful work culture, with both budding relationships or none at all.

Instating an office dating policy that protects the wellbeing and professional development of employees doesn’t limit the possibility of people finding love. Instead, it just helps protect the company and the comfort level of those involved.

About the author

Ronni Zehavi is the CEO of Hibob, a people management platform JANUARY 2020 |

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How telcos can take a leap in 2020: Interview with Farid Basir, CHRO, Telekom Malaysia With 5G and other next-gen technologies coming into the picture, how can telecommunications companies capitalize on the ongoing disruptions to attract and retain its employees

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By Anushree Sharma

i n t e r v i e w

elecommunications technology is developing at such a fast rate that telcos are constantly reviewing their business models and assessing their required skills. Skilled workers are essential to drive innovation and change, however, the war for talent is fierce and the labour shortage is only going to increase.

In an interaction with People Matters, Farid Basir, CHRO, Telekom Malaysia, shares that there is a need for employers to instil continuous learning and development into their culture. Employers that embrace this culture can train and retain workers who are open to the skill changes required to stay competitive in the sector.

Here are some excerpts from the interview:

What are some of the driving forces impacting the telecommunication sector in Southeast Asia? How is it different from other regions of the world?

Technology has been a major force of change in telecommunication industry. To name a few, 5G, NFV/SDN, Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning have been a game-changer in the growth as well as disruption in the industry. The changing customers' demands driven by the advancements of technologies and the maturing connectivity market, are pushing telcos in ASEAN to explore new revenue streams by going beyond their core area (connectivity) into ICT solutions.

Another driving force is government regulations & policies. For instance, Myanmar is seen to be the next Asian telecommunication company, as the government decided to invest further on infrastructure as well as operations regulations.

Foreign investments in Myanmar has also seen foreign countries invested in their telco. This trend is not much different from the other regions but ASEAN is several steps behind the mature markets in terms of technology adoption due to several 68

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Technology has been a major force of change in the telecommunication industry. To name a few, 5G, Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning have been a game-changer in the growth as well as disruption in the industry

factors such as economy, high entry barrier, legacy mindset of businesses, lack of innovations, and limited initiatives by the government.

So, amidst these disruptions, how can we push the performance and health of telco organizations?

The skills that are highly needed to stay competitive in the market besides updating and upgrading the technology would be improving the service which will get gain competitive advantage

As we look into the future, telco’s leaders must be sure they have the right skills and talent to deal with rapidly changing markets and new competitors. What are these skills which are required by the telecom industry to stay competitive in the market?

I think that the skills that are highly needed to stay competitive in the market besides updating and upgrading the technology would be improving the service. By improving the service, a telco will have the competitive advantage. To strategize and execute well in getting a bigger market share will also be a skill of a leader that is highly important.

Understanding where to sell and whom to retain and ensuring churn is mitigated.

their capabilities and drive brand leadership.

The collaboration should include not only the technology partners, but also cross-industry and go-to-market partners.

2. Agile: The telco leaders should consider going beyond their comfort zone and consider new technologies. They should also be agile and ready for changes. For example to equip the sales team who have been selling connectivity, with new skillsets to sell other solutions such as cloud and IoT. 3. The business acumen competency allows telco’s leaders to apply knowledge of an organization’s business model and competitive situation. It can be combined with other competencies, such as critical evaluation, consultation and communication to deliver the strategic activities.

4. To stay competitive, the organization should focus to hire talents that have technical competencies like network strategist, network security, data mining, technology and solution evaluation for both in fixed line and wireless technology focus area.

Other steps that we can also consider: 1. Open for partnerships: Going beyond connectivity requires new skillsets. ICT solutions are often vertical-centric. It is important for telcos to be open for partnerships in order to expand

With the telecom industry going through massive consolidations, what are the top trends you see in Malaysia and other parts of Southeast Asia? What kind of opportunities these mergers and acquisitions can bring to the industry?

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We are now living in a highly disruptive age where industry boundaries are collapsing which then triggers multiple sources of competition.

Generally there are three rules that can push the performance and health of telcos. They are: Better before cheaper: Don’t compete on price; compete on value. Connectivity has become a commodity. The maturing market and price erosion lead to margin pressure in telcos.

Telcos need to explore new opportunities beyond connectivity services while playing to its strength to differentiate in the market, such as offering network based ICT solutions (e.g., SD-WAN, IoT) instead of competing against the incumbent IT providers.

Revenue before cost: Drive profitability with higher volume and price, not lower cost. Whilst pushing for higher volume, it is also important for telcos to increase its operational efficiency by adopting new technologies such as AI, analytics and cloud to drive profitability. Most telcos position themselves as digital transformation enablers, but are often laggard with their internal transformation. According to Malaysia Communications and Multimedia Commission (MCMC), Malaysia’s mobile-cellular penetration rates in the first quarter of 2019 rose to an average 131.4 percent from 130.2 percent per 100 inhabitants in 2018 while broadband penetration rate is at 127.1 percent per 100 inhabitants compared with 121.1 percent per 100 inhabitants in 2018. Based on the market demands, the higher volume is coming from mobile-cellular penetration There are no other rules: Do whatever you have to in order to remain aligned with the first two rules.

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One of the consolidation and merger of large telecommunication company including the proposed merger of Telenor’s Asian operations with Axiata Group which will give birth to the region’s largest telco by revenue. It would operate across nine countries, serving a customer base of 300 million out of a combined one billion population. Some telcos are actively acquiring new nontelco companies/startups to expand their capabilities while others have strong venture capital arms to invest in startups to drive innovations.

Nevertheless, various opportunities from these activities including: • Merger and acquisitions can allow companies to achieve efficiency through greater scale and scope, as well as gain access to new technologies and markets however; they can also serve to reduce competition and result in market dominance

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I can see jobs in telecommunication still show positive demands as recent report on Critical Occupations List 2018/2019 by TalentCorp listed several position that highly needed by telecommunication industry: Software Tester, Information Technology Manager; Application Development Manager; Data Operations Manager; Network Manager; Application Security Engineer; Database Manager; Information Technology Infrastructure Manager; Information Technology Sales Manager; Creative Multimedia Manager; Chief Information Security Officer; Information Technology Business Development Manager; Software Development Manager.

It shows that jobs in telecom sector will continue to grow. Moving forward, the demand for telecom jobs will shift from the core telecom skills to value-based positions, such as data scientists and solution consultants. The conversations with the customers are changing from technical benefits to outcome-based.

To ensure the organization attracting the right talent, we must have a concrete and robust talent management strategy. Organization must continue to review their EVPs to ensure its addressing the multi-generational talent needs. Organization must prepare their talents or existing workforce for re-skill especially in areas for network infrastructure in relation to Fifth –Generation (5G). In addition, jobs creation related to network security and data analytics will be significant in the near future.

Strategy in attracting and retaining the talent can be done by using the following:

Merger and acquisitions can allow companies to achieve efficiency through greater scale and scope, as well as gain access to new technologies and markets however, they can also serve to reduce competition and result in market dominance

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• A huge plus point for the deal is the innovation center resulting from the merger, which will create new skilled jobs. However, some of the concern is related to redundancy which might cause loss of employment • To become bigger or grow in size and leapfrog the rivals. In contrast, it can take years or decades to double the size of a company through organic growth. Bigger means better strength and also confidence among stakeholders. Yet in that same time, different cultures can create challenge and communication barrier among employees.

• Exposure to new technologies / future skills to increase their knowledge.

• Holistic approach in rewarding talent either in term of monetary (salary, bonus, incentives, allowances) and non monetary (benefits, educational assistance) • Providing an innovative environment and promotes creativity hence; able to utilize their innovation and creativity to develop product and services • Structured career pathway and development program for fresh graduates to fast track their career growth.

How do you see the job avenues in the telecom industry? Do you predict the jobs will grow in the sector? And how can one ensure that they are attracting the right talent? What is your strategy to attracting and retaining talent?

What's your take on the future of jobs now that technologies such as AI, IoT, and big data are making inroads into business DNA and transforming jobs?

In order for business to survive, they should have the capability to predict and act accordingly to the internal and external factors that shape the business success and failure. By adopting the technology like AI, IoT and Big Data, it can accelerate the growth and performance of the business. The technologies such as AI, IoT and analytics will not replace jobs but will transform the job scopes and requirements. For example, a product manager is still needed in the future. However, instead of developing a product based on the industry trend, the technologies will enable product managers to use data and insights to develop solutions that are tailored for customers' demands. It is important for the telcos need to equip themselves with these emerging skill-sets (e.g., AI, IoT, Analytics) in order to leverage their data and differentiate in the market. There are many third party platforms available in the market, but internal capabilities are still required to further unlock the data and connect the final dots between the platforms and customers' requirements. These skills are also important to enable telcos to improve their product capabilities, customer experience, as well as internal efficiencies.

From people and HR perspective, 2019 focused on to develop skills or re-skills their people that meet industrial revolution 4.0 with several critical future skills including big data analysis, machine learning, complex problem solving, digitization, critical thinking and emotional intelligence.

As businesses continue to face challenges in meeting the revenue, skills requirements undergo rapid change and organization to think differently about how they can access the talents in varying ways and mobilizing internal resources rather than hiring unnecessary from outside. Hence, recruiting has become harder than ever.

Another trend is the use of AI, cognitive technologies, robotic process automation which making job more digital and more data-information driven. Everything should be supported by concrete data analysis before any decision being made which is good in reducing the risk.

Gig employment have been considered alternative work or options supplementary to full-time jobs so far. Today, this segment has grown and gone mainstream, while organizations are looking strategically at all types of work arrangements in their plans for growth.

Are you planning to leverage any technology to better manage your people and drive innovation? What are your plans and people's priorities for next year?

Yes, we have established Human Capital Innovation team who are responsible to leverage on technology that includes the implementation in-house application that performing functions of Artificial Intelligence (AI) as well robotic process automation hence ease daily operation and maintenance.

Our plans and people's priorities for next year started when we move into a new operating model based on the Agile way of working, to strengthen our customer focus, efficiency and tempo. In addition to instilling Agile, this realignment is also meant to reduce duplication and overlapping responsibilities. As such, most of our functions are centralized to allow easier implementation of a unified set of rules and procedures, streamlines processes, reduces resource requirements, resulting in a more consistent experience and making life easier for our customers.

It is the mission of the HR Team to partner with our business and functional units to maximize the potential of our greatest asset—our PEOPLE, in support of the Group’s values, vision and objectives.

We embrace change and the opportunity it brings. We are focused on empowering collaborations that enable the Group to anticipate, innovate and respond to market volatility and fulfil customers’ needs. To better equip ourselves to achieve this mission, we have undertaken a realignment exercise and started to move TM HC into a new operating model that is based on the Agile way of working.

Leveraging on the agile operating model to increase business focus, efficiency and effectiveness, our priorities among others will be Future Skilling, Wellness at workplace, Robust talent and career management process.

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How do you see the year 2019 from people and HR perspective? Do you see any specific trend that has implications for 2020 and beyond?

It is the mission of the HR Team to partner with our business and functional units to maximize the potential of our greatest asset—our PEOPLE, in support of the Group’s values, vision and objectives

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Dr. Mrityunjay Kumar Srivastava

Building competitive advantage through people – A leader’s role We look at the role of the business leader in enabling their employees to become the business differentiator

M LEADERSHIP

ichael Porter in his famous book “The Competitive Advantage: Creating and Sustaining Superior Performance” talked about two types of competitive advantage: one coming from a favorable cost position and the other coming from an ability to differentiate. Although he made this statement long ago, it is pertinent and true even in today’s hyper-competitive business environment.

Superior products, services, cost, and technological differentiation undoubtedly play a vital role in building a competitive advantage for the organization. However, many times, even the best of products, services and technologies find no takers due to poor articulation of the value proposition to the prospective customers. Hence, when it comes to building competitive advantage, maintaining a balance between the organizational offerings and how one positions these offerings in front of the customers is of paramount importance.

It is a known fact that the majority of the customers buy the idea before they buy the product, service or technology. Hence, people in front of the customer provide the winning edge over the competition and the fact remains that organizations being contrived systems need smart people to sell the products, services or finest of technologies.

The question here is ‘does a leader play a role in helping his or her people build competitive advantage?’ Evidence over time repeatedly suggests that they can. Some of the companies such as Southwest Airlines, Apple or Disneyland, etc., are live examples where leaders have helped their teams build sustained competitive advantage in the market. So, some of the obvious questions that cross our minds are: • What does a leader do to inspire members to articulate the value proposition in front of the customers as well as serve the customers in the best possible manner to win their hearts?

• How does a leader proactively help build solution orientation in the minds of people for the issues customers may face, so that they respect us as trusted advisors and not vendors?

• What should a leader do to make members feel valued, passionately engaged and thus profitably productive for the organization?

Studies conducted on successful leaders across the world advocate that being genuine in thoughts and actions coupled with common sense galvanize positivity in team members. Some of the other simple things leaders practice on a day-to-day basis to help people own the organization and thus build competitive advantage are: Listen with the intent for action: When people start feeling that the leader is listening for understanding to help them, meaningful and engaging conversations take place. Moreover, this cannot happen unless leaders consciously put in the effort to listen to not only what others

The moment employees start believing that the leader respects their expertise and that they are open to learn from them, they become partners in business 72

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are saying verbally but also try to understand what is unsaid, feelings unexpressed and nonverbal cues. The most important thing here is the action taken by the leader after listening to the team members. Any action taken needs to convey a strong message that ‘the team members are important to the leader’. Once team members start believing that they are important in the eyes of the leader, they share their thoughts unhesitatingly, which they would not have done otherwise. Trust enables people to willingly go the extra mile not only to make the organization successful but also in enabling the organization to stay ahead of the competition.

Focus on psychological contract: According to John Purcell, Faculty of Management, the University of Bath when employees feel that the manager has broken or breached their expectations about work and career opportunities, they feel less committed. On the contrary, when leaders help members build a psychological contract with the organization, employees behave as good

Reach out: What happens when leaders reach out to their team members and give them a feeling that they are there to help the employee succeed?

What happens when leaders genuinely believe that people are the real asset and it is their responsibility to help employees make a meaningful and lasting contribution? Experience shows that whenever leaders reach out to employees and inquire about their wellbeing and professional development, the employees’ morale and engagement go up. Similarly, when leaders restrain themselves from creating an artificial barrier of position power around, people open up and share their hearts out.

Obviously, the message spreads around that the leader is open, and values ideas, suggestions, and feedback given by team members. Mere feeling that the leader has approached them and paid attention to their ideas excites members with a sense of ownership to protect the cause of the organization and they do better in the future.

Help people innovate: Leaders are responsible to bring the members together as a team and lead them to optimal performance outcomes. However, this requires the leader to recognize the importance of embracing differences in people and be

citizens, support fellow members in organizational cohesion and deep bonding. The psychological contract enables discretionary behaviors – to do more for the organization than laid down in the written contract. Employees engage in meaningful actions and put in the best effort to add value readily. When the feeling of psychological contract is dented, because of perceived poor management, discretionary behavior is withdrawn leading to dissatisfaction, despair and a dip in productivity.

Research shows that when leaders build emotional connect with their employees and treat them as a strategic advantage, employees often outmaneuver and outperform.

Humility to learn: It requires tremendous inner strength and humility on the part of the leader to accept that he or she has learned something new from their followers or youngsters who are way below in the hierarchy. This shows that the leader is courteously respectful to superior knowledge & skill possessed by members and not the position one holds. The moment employees start believing that the leader respects their expertise and that they are open to learn from them, they become partners in business.

skillful to integrate differing points of view to get the best from them. Obviously, this will be possible only when the leader thinks more about the organization and people and less of himself/herself.

Moreover, this certainly requires a tremendous inner strength of conviction. The good news is that if done well, it promotes a culture of partnership.

This also encourages team members to embrace an entrepreneurial mindset where they feel reasonably confident to share and build on ideas fostering innovation, growth, and sustainability. Members know that the leader is always there to back them in case they fail in experimentation and that helps them flourish cognitively. In addition, the sense of freedom helps members build a competitive advantage for the organization.

Let us not forget the fact that Machine Learning, Artificial Intelligence and all other sophisticated creations that are revolutionizing the business and our life, are inventions of the human mind. If leaders look after and nurture people well, they, in turn, will take care of the organization as well. According to Bersin by Deloitte’s “Building Competitive Advantage with Talent”, published in April 2015, “Organizations with a talent strategy are 4.2 times more likely to be in the top quartile of business outcomes.”

LEADERSHIP

Once team members start believing that they are important in the eyes of leader, they share their thoughts unhesitatingly, which they would not have done otherwise

About the author

Dr. Mrityunjay Kumar Srivastava is working with Wipro Limited, Bangalore, India, as Vice President, L&D, HR JANUARY 2020 |

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Abhipsa Mishra

Change management:

The more things change, the more they stay the same In this fast-moving competitive era, change at an organizational level has become imperative, yet more than 70 percent change initiatives fail. Read on to know why this happens and how organizations can manage change and make it successful

M a n a g i n g

C h a n g e

A

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n epigram by Jean Alphonse, a French novelist, in his journal Les Guepes reads: “Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose”; which literally translates to “The more it changes, the more it is the same thing”.

These words aptly describe the business world today, which is dynamic and ever-changing. Organizational change is the process of where it is moving from its present state to a desired future state.

The change therein may be anything like process, culture, technology, etc. In this fastmoving competitive era, change at an organizational level has become imperative, yet more than 70 percent change initiatives fail.

Here are some reasons why change initiatives fail in an organization.

Lack of leadership buy-in and change awareness Most change programs fail because there is less support from the leadership team, or there is a misalignment between employees and the organization’s leaders. In IT organizations, particularly, most change initiatives require a significant change in the mindset and behavior in order to succeed.

The solution? According to experts, leadership alignment and support is paramount to achieve organizational change. They also suggest forming a team of senior executives directly reporting to the CEO who directs and brings in adoption to change as a culture within the organization. However, this behavioral shift should not be limited to leaders alone. During a change initiative, IT organizations tend to give priority to systems than employees. “Sustained change is always people driven” says Lee Colan in his article “10 Reasons Change Efforts Fail”. He writes, “Even implementing new software successfully is more about the people who will use it, install it, train it, and support it than it is about the system itself.” In most of the ERP implementations we do, technology comes last; what precedes is the assessment of user psyche

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for the need of change, change awareness and change adoption. Change projects fail when these are not done, and technology is given importance over people behavior.

Below are the key pointers that leaders need to work on before they float the idea of change: • Vision & mission • Core values • Culture • Organization structure • Performance management • Rewards & recognition • Communication • Knowledge management • Technology • Business processes

These are the areas that help leaders understand if change is required and if yes, how are they going to cascade the idea of a changing organization to the rest of the organization and build a future state successfully.

Employee resistance Employee resistance to change is one of the most important factors affecting the success of an enterprise-wide change initiative. The natural human response to change of any kind is discomfort and resistance, and sometimes even the conventional empathetic approach of connection and persuasion is not sufficient to alleviate fears, because hardwired habits take

Most change programs fail because there is less support from the leadership team, or there is a misalignment between employees and the organization’s leaders

Often, organizations dive right into the design phase without adequately planning the change they are trying to implement.

It is imperative of the leadership to chart down a plan that identifies activities that need to be conducted at the early stage to make it successful.

Planning pointers • Setting up a governance structure – This streamlines the roles and smoothens the decision making • Deciding a timeline – A schedule keeps everyone on the same page and helps develop the sense of urgency • Engagement plan for stakeholders – who needs engagement, what is bothering, how are we going to address the issue, when are we going to do that – this is a well laid-out plan that helps create buy-in amongst the employees and is tailored to address the engage-

ment issues of the impacted personas • Communication – Identifying the time, channel, and developing the content for communications at various project stages are imperative. This make the stakeholders and employees aware about the developments and maintain transparency.

• Integration initiatives – This helps in maximizing the speed and efficacy of change adoption

Improper resource planning Adoption and sustenance of a change is a long-term process. These are not results of a splendid solution design. The conceptualized solution needs to be developed, implemented, tested, refined and reinforced.

Resourcing: This is a methodical process and takes resources in a phased manner. If it is not planned at the earlier stages, meeting the resource requirement becomes difficult and getting them aligned to the very purpose of the change gets diluted. This results in failure of change.

Hence, resource planning should be done at the primary project stage. Few pointers that need to be included in the resource planning are:

• Adequate resource supply at each change stage • Staff turnover during transition • Asset allocation per resource for smooth functioning of Business as Usual (BAU)

C h a n g e

Poor change planning

Leadership development is a part of virtually all organizations but change leadership development is greatly missing. Transformational leadership is a skill that leaders need to learn and build before starting the change itself

M a n a g i n g

long to change. However, we have seen in our practice that more than frameworks and models, it is the watercooler talks and coffee sessions that are the best way to communicate the purpose of change for employees to accept and internalize it.

So, what works? PROSCI, the global leader in change management; suggests the 3-phase change management process – Preparing, managing, and reinforcing change. These phases are scientifically researched and proven to meet the desired results. What works best is communicating early and communicating often. Using social media internally and other tools like newsletters also facilitates the speed of the communication. Hosting live sessions with the C-suite wherein employees can directly ask questions and get answers from the horse’s mouth also works very well. In addition to proper communication, what works very well is involving employees in the change process and encouraging them to generate ideas on how to transform the enterprise. Some actions to build employee change readiness include: • Developing & cascading strong senior sponsorship for people focused work • Keeping front line managers & supervisors informed. A transparent change helps to involve them at the initial project stage. Training enables and empowers them to face the changes and cascade it to the bottom of the pyramid • Rewards and recognitions for desired behaviors and outcomes are essential.

A well laid-out plan that includes both tangible & intangible rewards keeps the employees motivated and competitive.

This helps in facilitating drive amongst the entire organization.

Inadequate change leadership skills Leadership development is a part of virtually all organizations but change leadership development is greatly missing. Running an organization and running change initiatives are two different things. Transformational leadership is a skill that leaders need to learn and build before starting the change itself.

Change leadership enables to: • Foresee interdependencies – cause & effect, deferred consequences • Conceptualize the big picture – the future state • Build people connect – transparent and continuous communication • Navigate complexity better – creating alternatives About the author

Abhipsa Mishra is Consultant – Change Catalyst, OCM Practice, LTI JANUARY 2020 |

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Every business will have a virtual workforce: CEO of Freelancer.com Matt Barrie, CEO, Freelancer.com shares the story behind

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the launch of the platform, how companies today feel empowered to scale their workforce real-time through crowdsourcing platforms and which regions experience greater acceptance of the gig economy, in an exclusive interaction with People Matters

By Bhavna Sarin

A

n award winning technology entrepreneur and the co-author of over 20 US patent applications, Matt Barrie is the Chief Executive Officer of Freelancer.com, the world's largest freelancing marketplace. In conversation with People Matters, Matt shared the story behind the launch of Freelancer.com, how employers can engage gig workers and how can the gig workforce ensure sustainability of the gig economy.

Here are the excerpts of the interview with Matt.

What triggered the idea of Freelancer. com? What is the story behind the launch of the organization?

Freelancer.com was founded in 2009. I had previously started a few companies and was looking for a new idea to work on and I came across this new opportunity for a whole new business.

In a nutshell, my mother wanted to get some data entry done, with thousands of entries into a spreadsheet, and I was trying to get someone to do it locally. I expected to pay about $2 an entry, so about $2,000 for a thousand entries. However, nobody wanted to do it. I went online and incidentally stumbled across GetAFreelancer.com, posted a job and came back a few hours later with 70 people wanting to do the job

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from different countries and cities. I was trying to get someone to do the job locally (and couldn't even get them to do it), and I ended up getting a team of people in Vietnam to do it instead. They did the job perfectly in just three days, and I only had to pay them $100 after the job was done.

I realized that this was a game-changing opportunity.

I researched the industry to find out what was going on, and decided to get into this space. While writing the business plan I came across some of the entrenched competitors in the space that had raised millions and had years of head start. I realized pretty quickly that it would be very hard to start from scratch, given the positioning of the competition and the difficulty and time required to establish initial liquidity in a marketplace.

I then bought an existing marketplace GetAFreelancer.com and further developed it into Freelancer.com, tuned the business model and proceeded to acquire other similar websites/domains and competitors in order to accelerate the growth of the business.

How open was the market and employers to the concept in the initial years compared to the present day?

The market and employers today are more open with the concept of freelanc-

Large organizations are now able to flexibly scale their workforce in real-time with tailor-made features that provide transparency, control, talent management and compliance, together with the ability to scale adoption across the organization

ing compared to the initial years. Employers are finally able to build or market their product, and the freelancers have found flexible work options. Freelance workers are no longer limited to locally available jobs. This turned out to be an opportunity for them to even start their own servicebased business and achieve lifestyle goals.

The Internet has made it easy for people to learn multiple skills which they can earn from on our marketplace. Many of our users have successfully completed projects that have nothing to do with their educational background.

More and more companies have teams working from different parts of the world.

It’s common to hear of small businesses that have teams of 3 - 5 remotely collaborating from different countries. For the past few years, corporate companies have started feeling empowered by freelancing and crowdsourcing projects. Large organizations are now able to flexibly scale their workforce in real-time with tailor-made features that provide transparency, control, talent management, and compliance, together with the ability to scale adoption across the organization.

How can employers improve engagement and career prospects for the gig economy?

• Start by knowing what you need: While a good freelancer may be able to fill in some gaps on a project description, your best bet in getting quality bids is to know what you’re looking for.

If you aren’t sure exactly what to ask for, do a little research before you post.

• Provide a detailed description: Your description should answer as many potential questions as possible. Think about what will be required of the provider you hire and be as clear as possible.

• Consider your budget selection carefully: Too low budget may eliminate some of the better candidates for your project. Setting the budget too high may leave the door open for some price gouging, but this is usually fairly easy to spot. No matter what, though, don’t set

• Make a good impression: As early as bidding on projects, make yourself stand out from the rest. Present yourself professionally, and tailor your proposal to what the project requires. State what you will provide, how much it will cost, and how long it will take you to deliver.

• Propose milestones: Work out milestone payments in parts, especially if the project involved require a lot of work.

• Background check: Employers consider several factors when deciding who to work with, so it is only fair for you to do the same to them. See the "about the employer" sections of projects and contests for a general idea about their accounts, payments, and reviews.

• Do not bite off more than you can chew: As tempting as it is to accept more projects in order to earn more, compromising quality just to finish the workload that you accepted can reflect on employer feedback, which can hurt your reputation on the site.

• Go the extra mile: If trying to give your best in all your projects becomes habitual, it will eventually be synonymous to your brand. Employers will keep coming back to you, and your client base will be a lot bigger without you realizing it.

a budget higher than what you’re willing to pay just to attract more experienced freelancers.

• If you have examples of what you need, upload them: Don’t borrow content from websites, articles, programming code, or other sources as your examples, unless you own the rights to the source. Doing so may constitute a copyright infringement.

• Allow enough time for bidding: If your project isn't urgent, don’t rush freelancers to bid. Remember that the top professionals are usually the busiest, so you might eliminate some of the top freelancers if you set the bidding time too short.

What are the top regions with maximum number of gig workers? And what type of employers and which geographies and industries display greater openness and acceptance to gig workers?

How will the year 2020 look like for the gig economy?

Large and small businesses are still hiring but not always in traditional ways.

Forward thinking and innovative companies –especially those looking to streamline and scale, are increasingly looking to crowdsourcing markets to build an elastic

Freelance workers are no longer limited to locally available jobs and this turns out to be an opportunity for them to even start their own servicebased business and achieve lifestyle goals

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What do gig workers need to do to ensure sustainability and growth of the gig economy in the long-term?

Regions with majority of the gig workers on Freelancer.com based on the total number of users are India, United States, China, Pakistan and Indonesia. Regions displaying greater openness and acceptance of hiring gig workers on Freelancer. com based on the total number of users include the United States, India, United Kingdom, Australia and Canada.

labor force that’s on demand, high quality, speedy, and often filling gaps in niche skills requirements.

Based on Freelancer.com’s Fast 50 Report for Q3-2019, the demand from data analytics indicates more savvy businesses are seeking these highly specialized freelancers to help determine business decisions that increase revenue, improve operations, respond to emerging market trends and gain a competitive edge, while virtual assistants are streamlining processes and creating efficiencies and saving costs.

In the future, or starting from now, every business is going to have a local, physical workforce, and they’re going to have a virtual workforce.

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SEA i n T e c h HR

HR and Work Tech

The Southeast Asia Market Opportunity 78

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In this exclusive People Matters report, we bring together some of the key insights into what makes the Southeast Asia region the ideal destination for HR Tech solution providers from across the globe and how businesses in this region are turning uncertainty into opportunity

By People Matters Editorial

T

Southeast Asia is one of the most rapidly expanding regions for growth, a hub for innovation, favorable digital environments and technological transformation, according to a study(1). SEA countries are a major global hub of manufacturing and trade, as well as one of the fastest-growing consumer markets in the world. With the thirdlargest labor force in the world, behind China and India, ASEAN has outpaced the rest of the world on growth in GDP per capita since the late 1970s.

Income growth has remained strong since 2000, with average annual real gains of more than five percent. This proximity combined with government initiatives and a diverse talent pool means the region is one of the world’s most robust and cutting-edge talent ecosystems in constant, rapid movement. Perhaps most important, almost 60

SEA

The global human resource management market is anticipated to reach USD 30.01 Bn by 2025, registering a CAGR of 11 percent from 2019-2025. The HR technology market too is changing at a faster rate than ever.

According to the People Matters State of HR Technology Report 2019-20, the extended segment

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Southeast Asia: The Business Hub in the Making

T e c h

percent of total growth since 1990 has come from productivity gains, as sectors such as manufacturing, retail, telecommunications, and transportation grow more efficient.

Capacity building has helped the national economies to adjust to the changes and advancements in technology, challenges associated with globalization, and work practices.

Southeast Asia is also one of the best places for startups, with four of the world’s most innovative unicorn companies Grab, Go-Jek, Traveloka, and Tokopedia making enormous economic strides in the region. The region’s investment ecosystem(2) has developed critical mass and is entering a new phase of growth. Since 2012, Southeast Asia has given rise to 10 unicorns with a combined market value of $34 billion. It is expected the deal value over the next five years will total $70 billion— double the level of the previous five years— and that the region will produce at least 10 new unicorns by 2024.

Though Singapore remains Southeast Asia’s investment hub with over 160 active HR tech providers(3), vibrant start-up ecosystems are emerging across the region. The number of companies in Indonesia raising the first round of funding in 2017 rose more than 300 percent from 2012.

Together, Indonesia and Vietnam generated 20 percent of the region’s private equity deal value over the past five years, and that percentage is likely to grow. In fact, a survey(4) showed nearly 90 percent of investors said the hottest Southeast Asian market outside of Singapore in 2018–19 will be Indonesia and Vietnam.

HR

he Southeast Asia region is among the fastest growing regions in the world, with many experts estimating it to become the fourth largest economic zone globally. With a diverse number of nations, industries and cultures, Southeast Asia and its accompanying trade organization (ASEAN, the Association of Southeast Asian Nations) are becoming attractive business opportunities across the globe. With the unprecedented growth this region is experiencing, the role of HR across organizations is also evolving massively.

Given this context, HR today is facing fierce challenges in helping organizations become top destinations for talent, building the workforce of the future, managing an agile organization and retaining top employees, all while providing strategic insight to key decision makers.

Today’s dynamic HR technology and services market is aligned to achieving these challenges.

People Matters estimates that the extended segment of work (that includes workforce productivity, gig economy, enterprise benefits, workforce healthcare and robotics) would be approx. of 300 Bn USD. In this exclusive People Matters report, we bring together some of the key insights into what makes the Southeast Asia region the ideal destination for HR Tech solution providers from across the globe and how businesses in this region are turning uncertainty into opportunity. We also dive deep into cutting-edge research and gather expert inputs to gain incisive insight into how the HR and Work Tech market looks in Southeast Asia today, alongside a picture of what to expect in the future.

State of HR Technology in Southeast Asia

HR today is facing fierce challenges in helping organizations become top destinations for talent, building the workforce of the future, managing an agile organization and retaining top employees, all while providing strategic insight to key decision makers JANUARY 2020 |

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SEA i n

SEA countries are a major global hub of manufacturing and trade, as well as one of the fastest-growing consumer markets in the world. With the third-largest labor force in the world, behind China and India, ASEAN has outpaced the rest of the world on growth in GDP per capita since the late 1970s

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of work (that includes workforce productivity, gig economy, enterprise benefits, workforce healthcare and robotics) would be an approx. of 300 Bn USD. With an array of new-age tools and technologies at its disposal, HR leaders have moved ahead of simply automating routine administrative processes like attendance and payroll. Today, the application of intelligent technology permeates workforce management, career planning, talent acquisition, L&D, employee engagement, and business intelligence. Leaders all over the world, including the APAC region, are striving to formulate policies and processes wherein technology plays a central role.

As a matter of fact, HR leaders are no longer simply ‘digitizing’ their work, but ‘digitalizing’ their entire work process to integrate technology into the core of job roles(8). This critical shift indicates that organizations are now embracing the possibilities of intelligent technologies by

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using HR Tech to redesign recruitment, employee engagement, and training with an unequivocal focus on the employee experience.

Categorically speaking about Southeast Asia, the investment in newer HR tools and systems has been rising steadily in the region. As a matter of fact, the HR Tech adoption in nearly 70 percent of the organizations in the APAC region intends to increase their spending on HR technology(9). For the last three years, the adoption of HR Tech has been in double-digits and small organizations are the fastest-growing segment among all new HR Tech adopters.

People Matters studied the major economies of SEA - Singapore, Malaysia, the Philippines, Indonesia, Thailand, Vietnam and interviewed the global consulting firms, venture capitalists, business advisors and curated the top trends driving the HR tech industry. The following trends will help you make informed investment decisions in the HR Tech industry of SEA. The experience economy: There lies an opportunity across all aspects of HR as far as technology is concerned. Part of it is driven by aspirations of organizations like: • To become more digital and hence automating as much as possible • Improving employee productivity and efficiency • Responding to changing business and work models However, according to our report, we found that the whole HR Tech opportunity in SEA is being created because of a clear focus of organizations around employee experience.

According to Puneet Swani, Partner, Career Business Leader - International Region, Mercer, organizations are increasingly looking to attract talent and focusing on creating a consumer mind ‘internally’ which is forcing them to look at everything on employee experience and hence they are looking forward to adopt technologies in all the functions be it Talent Acquisition, Learning & Development, Performance Management, Payroll, etc. in order to offer a great employee experience.

It is predicted that by 2020, nearly half of Southeast Asia’s population will be under 30 and more than 55 percent of its working-age population will be comprised of tech-savvy millennials.

It is no news that the new-age generation put a lot of stress on workplace experience. Supporting the

USD 54 bn 8.1% CAGR

USD 180 bn 6.% CAGR

USD 7.5 bn 6.0% CAGR

USD 6 bn 57.2%

USD 49 bn 6.4% CAGR

Workforce Experience & Productivity

gig economy/ community

enterprise benefits

robotics/ AI

workforce healthcare

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recruitment and onboarding has been more historically the most prominent is because it has helped demonstrate a tangible outcome towards improving recruitment efficiencies. Given that recruitment still happens to be a significant source of HR spend, that has obviously been helpful.”

Adding to this, Vidisha Mehta, Managing Director, Talent & Rewards, Singapore, Willis Towers Watson shares, “Recruitment will observe high growth, particularly in the early stages of sourcing and screening. There are several solutions in place, and these are continuing to evolve in terms of the use of AI to make the process faster, of higher quality and to minimize bias.”

Another function that has observed an instrumental growth in the last few years is Learning & Development and experts are optimistic about the function evolving at a much faster rate in Southeast Asia. The reasons are multifold but what is really driving a lot of investments into the area of L&D is preparing “the workforce for the future”. The governments in the SEA region, especially in Singapore are constantly implementing reforms and initiatives to upskill the workforce to keep up with the dynamics of evolving business needs.

Today, learning is no longer about having a learning management system which was built many years ago with intent to track learning data.

The focus now is on providing a continuous learning experience embedded into the employee’s workflow to make learning accessible, easy and experiential.

HR T e c h

Opportunities and challenges

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The HR Tech industry is one of the most sought after industry in Southeast Asia. If one consid-

SEA

fact, Tiang Lim Foo, Partner at SeedPlus said that this demographic opportunity marks a key shift in the region as these young professionals expect consumer grade technologies that they are used to outside of work, at work.

SMEs, MSMEs and state-owned organizations will become the largest consumers: The maturity journey of the HR Tech industry is not linear as countries are evolving differently based on economy and unique market demands. Gauging market maturity on the basis of the region's economy wouldn't suffice. For example, Singapore is growing at two percent, Malaysia and Thailand at four-five percent and Indonesia at six to seven percent. Going by this data, the favorable choice of investment would be clearly Indonesia. However, the maturity of employers and HR tech adoption is probably the highest in Singapore, which is not quite the same in the other markets.

Saikat Chatterjee, Senior Director and HR Advisory Leader - Asia, Gartner shares, “One way of looking at investing in a particular region would be the segments one wants to cater to.” He shares that SMEs and state-owned/homegrown companies are the biggest opportunities for investment right now.

If we talk about Singapore, if you were to segment companies into four, you will have governmentowned organizations, large enterprises based out of Singapore, western multinationals based out of Singapore, and SMEs. Considering the first two options which are government-owned organizations and large organizations, these two categories constitute a very small percentage. Hence, paving the way for western multinationals and SMEs to be the area of opportunities for HR Tech service providers. However, a major constraint with western multinationals with APAC headquarters is that all the decisions with technology adoption and investments are carried by the global headquarter. Hence, in Singapore, SMEs become the biggest opportunity for the HR Tech companies.

However, the case is different in countries like Indonesia and the Philippines which are mostly populated by state-owned organizations. These organizations which are generally large organizations and conglomerates are a great opportunity for investments.

Continuing with the above findings, Swani shares, “Traditionally, the local multinationals/ conglomerates seem to be following best practices that some of the companies in the west implemented. That is no longer a case now. Some of these companies are leading with the HR practices and the advantage they have is that the decision making is much faster having their HQ in the same region.”

Recruitment and Learning are the two burgeoning areas of growth: Recruitment and Learning & Development were unanimously selected as two areas of highest potential for growth in the HR Tech market, as per our report.

Recruitment for some years has been continuously evolving and will continue to evolve. Dhritiman Chakrabarti shares, “The reason recruitment technology including sourcing, assessment,

Southeast Asia is also one of the best places for startups, with four of the world’s most innovative unicorn companies Grab, Go-Jek, Traveloka, and Tokopedia making enormous economic strides in the region

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Country

Total Population

Total Working Population

GDP

Singapore

5.87 million as of August 2, 2019

3.73 million in 2018

Indonesia

270.63 million in 2019

Malaysia

Ease of Doing Business Ranking

364.16 billion US dollars in 2018

Manufacturing, Financial Services, Headquarters, FinTech, Tech Startups, Innovation, Medical Technology, Aerospace Engineering, Clean Energy, Healthcare, and Content Development

2

Agility, digital skills, analytical and data-driven in nature – such as data scientists, product managers, UX designers, and other digital roles

Talent retention, digital adoption, shrinking and aging workforce, upskilling

136.18 million in February 2019

1042.17 billion US dollars in 2018

Petroleum and Natural Gas, Textiles, Apparel, Footwear, Mining, Cement, Chemical Fertilizers, Machinery, Electronics, Hardware, Software, Telecommunications, Plywood, Rubber, Food, Tourism, Fintech Startups, Ecommerce

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Digital talent, Back End Developers, Data Scientists, Android Developers, Full Stack Engineers, Front End Developers

Managing millennials, employee engagement, skills gap, upskilling and retention of talent

32.48 million as July 28, 2019

15.3 million in 2018

354.35 billion US dollars in 2018

Banking and Finance, Digital Technology, Media, Automotive, Manufacturing, Electrical and Electronics Industry, Construction and Real Estate

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Digital skills in big data, software and user testing, mobile development, Cloud computing and software engineering management

War for talent, managing millennials, employee engagement, upskilling and creating a continuous learning mindset

Thailand

69.63 million in 2019

38.55 million as of 2018

504.99 billion US dollars in 2018

Automobiles and Automotive Parts, Financial Services, Electric Appliances and Components, Tourism, Cement, Auto Manufacturing

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Digital skills, learning agility, soft skills Sales, Engineering, IT, Accounting, Administrative

Attracting, engaging and retaining current and new talents, skills shortage, technology adoption, an aging workforce, managing millennials

Philippines

108.23 million as of August 2, 2019

72 million in 2019

330.91 billion US dollars in 2018

Travel and Tourism, Agriculture, Real Estate, Outsourcing, Retailing, Construction, Healthcare

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Digital competency, along with management and communication skills

Localization of talent, inclusion, going digital, hiring and retaining good talent and employee engagement

Vietnam

96.46 million in 2019

54.58 Million in 2018

255.00 USD Billion

Food Processing, Garments, Textiles, Shoes, Machinebuilding, Mining, Coal, Steel, Cement, Chemical Fertilizer, Glass, Tires, Oil, Mobile Phones

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Tech, engineering, arts, design, entertainment, sports, and media workers.

Skills in people management, emotional intelligence, problem solving and judgment and decision making

Retaining talent, low attrition rates, low-skilled workforce, creating an attractive employer brand, driving best behaviors from employees to ensure optimum productivity

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SEA

Main Industries

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Top Skills

Top HR Challenges

ers Singapore alone, there are about 200 HR tech companies and most of them don’t even operate outside Singapore. Accelerating the efforts, the Singapore government is putting a lot of effort in preparing the future workforce, which is further giving mileage to HR Tech startups to grow. Additionally, the ease of doing business in Singapore has made it tremendously easy to set up or operate business in the country. Adding to the advantages, the overall emphasis on offering a great employee experience throughout the employee life-cycle is a favorable condition for investing in the SEA HR Tech industry.

But it is equally important to note that how HR Tech startups plan their next wave of growth/ evolution has some important strategic choices to be made. Here are some steps which you should think about while investing in SEA HR Tech industry:

i n SEA

Across the globe, the world of work is changing at an unprecedented rate due to new technologies, increased digitization and automation. Every aspect of career lifecycle - from recruitment to retention to retirement plan will be impacted by these shifts in how organizations do business.

While it suggests a huge opportunity for HR tech providers and investors within the SEA region, the key to success lies with the tech companies which will offer a product that offers a great employee experience.

In the near future, organizations in the SEA region will have a much younger workforce as compared to their European and North American peers. This presents a unique opportunity for lead-

ers in the region to implement a strategic digital culture of work as younger employees, who have been born in the digital age, will adopt new-age tools seamlessly.

The investment and innovation in the industry have also been a result of favorable domestic policies. The governments of APAC nations like India, Singapore, and China have extensively campaigned for the use of digital technologies in everyday life and businesses by creating policies that favor the digital ecosystem.

Additionally, providing mobile-enabled HR tech solutions is no longer a choice but a necessity. A growing body of evidence shows that a majority of organizations already offer mobilefirst HR services to their employees and facilitate talent acquisition, payroll and leave management, and other critical workplace communication using the mobile.

All of these developments also mean that the role of HR will also evolve and new tech-enabled roles will emerge in the industry. HR leaders and professionals will have to learn new topics, like data security and analytics, and will be expected to create a new framework of working that combines the best of technology and unique human skills.

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The way ahead

While it suggests a huge opportunity for HR tech providers and investors within the SEA region, the key to success lies with the tech companies which will offer a product that offers a great employee experience HR

• Single-use case: HR Tech startups have been largely successful in building ‘Single Use Case’ applications for one or more geographies within SEA. Single use case examples could include recruitment automation using virtual assistants, employee pulse surveying, assessments/psychometric tools, etc. This has helped startups to gain early traction in the marketplace, win clients, grow revenues, etc.

• Explore horizontal adjacencies across employee lifecycle: Another strategy for startups could be exploring horizontal adjacencies sideways across the employee lifecycle which will improve their stickiness with current clients as well as provide a more holistic offering which will not be prone to disruption by another advent of technology in the year ahead.

• Think about the problem: While organizations in SEA are investing a lot in HR Tech adoption, it has been noted that most of the time investors and HR Tech companies invest in this industry just because the market is hot!

Achieving ROI from adopting technology still persists to be a struggle. If you plan to invest in HR Tech, you need to think about why are companies even investing in HR technology?

Get to the core of the problem that HR is tackling right now.

Reference: 1.

2.

3.

4.

Vinayak HV, Fraser Thompson, and Oliver Tonby (2014) Understanding ASEAN: Seven things you need to know, Mckinsey Data Viewed: 01-11-2019 Suvir Varma and Alex Boulton (2018) Investing in Southeast Asia: What’s Behind the Boom, Bain & Company Data Viewed: 01-11-2019 Singapore HRTech Market Map, 2019 Data Viewed: 01-10-2019 Suvir Varma and Alex Boulton, 2019, Bain & Company The Next Private Equity Hot Spots in Southeast Asia Data Viewed: 04-09-2019

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Vikram Shroff

PoSH Act in the #MeToo era Since the uprise of #MeToo as a movement, several new situations have arisen, some of which were not envisaged at the time of enforcing the PoSH Act

WOME N AT WORKPLA C E

fully equipped in coping with some of the situations, as discussed below.

1. The PoSH Act came into effect in December 2013. Some of the postings of #MeToo related to workplace incidents occurring prior to that period, would not get protected under the PoSH Act. 2. The PoSH Act requires the complaint to be raised to the employer’s internal complaints committee (“IC”) within three months from the date of the incident. The IC may, upon its discretion grant an additional three months of extension in certain limited situations.

However, complaints that are time-barred cannot be protected by the PoSH Act.

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ecently, the Delhi High Court passed an order directing a social networking site (SNS) to take down the #MeToo posts against an Indian artist. After the anonymous post, raising allegations of sexual harassment, the artist filed a defamation suit. The Court restrained the SNS from posting any further posts against the artist and directed the SNS to reveal the identity of the person who posted it. The Court added that such allegations of sexual harassment cannot be posted in public without any legal backing and to that extent, it should be taken down.

Since the uprise of #MeToo as a movement, several new situations have arisen, some of which were not envisaged at the time of enforcing the Sexual Harassment of Women at Workplace (Prevention, Prohibition & Redressal) Act in 2013 (“PoSH Act”).1 Our criminal laws were also amended the same year to introduce “sexual harassment” as an offense and provide punishment, including fine and imprisonment, for committing the offense of sexual harassment.2 However, the existing laws still appear to be not

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Complaints that are time-barred cannot be protected by the PoSH Act 3. As per the PoSH Act and rules thereunder, an external member on the IC may be a person familiar with the issues relating to sexual harassment. However, the participation of a lawyer as an external member of the IC was successfully challenged before the Rajasthan HC, leading to confusion on who can be an appropriate external member.3 4. The PoSH Act limits the IC’s appointment to three years - there is lack of clarity in case of a situation in which the tenure of the IC members has expired during an ongoing investigation of a matter.

5. Recently, the Delhi High Court held that the inquiry proceedings should be fair, impartial and in conformity with the principles of natural justice.4 In the case where the allegation of bias was established against one of the members of the IC, the Court was of the view that a new IC needs to be constituted and the proceedings should start afresh.5 6. As cited above in the case of the artist’s allegations, there have arisen certain situations

Considering the frequency of incidents being reported and complaints being filed, a Group of Ministers (GoM), headed by the Home Minister, along with three other senior members, was set up in October 2018 by the government. The GoM is meant to be the central authority to examine the legal and institutional framework in dealing with matters of sexual harassment of women at workplace. This initiative needs to be revived by the government.

The PoSH Act does not provide for handling anonymous complaints, which could come up on social media

WOME N AT WORKPLA C E

in which derogatory content has been posted on SNS in the form of a statement, pictorial representation or otherwise having sexual undertone to it. If the woman feels that she has been aggrieved by such behavior, she may file a complaint with the IC. However, it may pose practical challenges for the IC to handle those cases where the identity of the respondent may not be known.

7. The PoSH Act does not provide for handling anonymous complaints, which could come up on #MeToo or on social media. Employers and their ICs may face legal and practical challenges in handling and investigating anonymous complaints.

8. In case any sexual harassment complaint has been proved, the criteria for determining monetary penalty under the PoSH Act remains vague and unclear. In the absence of clarity, the IC would find it difficult to arrive at a precise monetary amount to be paid by the respondent to the complainant.

9. Individuals who wish to appeal against the decision of the IC may face challenges in doing so given the lack of information relating to the Local Complaints Committee or District Officer in several of the Indian states. If and when, the matter eventually goes to the Court, given the huge pendency of matters, it is likely to take a considerable time for the matter to be adjudicated upon, defeating the purpose.

In the wake of series of sexual harassment incidents after the rise of the #MeToo movement in the film and media industry, the Producers Guild of India instituted a committee to lead anti-sexual harassment efforts among filmmakers and actors.

In addition to this, the Editor’s Guild of India lauded and extended its support to the women journalists who brought up their incidents in public.

Other industry associations can take a leaf out of this exercise and assist their member companies. Based on the surveys and studies conducted recently,6 employers have started to review their HR policies and practices in dealing with sexual harassment prevention and complaints. Some companies have also increased the frequency and intensity of their trainings conducted for employees and IC members.

To conclude, it remains a difficult task to combat the challenges of dealing with sexual harassment allegations at the workplace and complying with the PoSH Act with quick and efficient resolution. A collective effort of all stakeholders to work towards achieving the common goal of building a safe workplace with a top-down approach continues to remain the need of the hour.

About the author

Vikram Shroff is the leader of the HR law (Employment and labor) team at Nishith Desai Associates JANUARY 2020 |

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Paul James

A model to predict and improve industrial relations climate The term Industrial Relations Climate is used to describe the nature and quality of relationships between labor and management in an organization

H HR

S t r a t e g y

aving been in the industry for the last 30 years or more and having managed major industrial unrests or advised major corporates in resolving such disputes which includes strikes, lockouts, closures, wage settlements, etc, I wanted to propose a Conceptual Model for assessing the Industrial Relations Climate in an Indian setting, which while being simple is also solution-oriented.

The reason to have a proactive assessment is that it will help resolve an issue before it snowballs into a major turmoil.

In the Western literature, Industrial Relations (IR) Climate is defined as the degree to which relations between management and employees are seen by participants as mutually trusting, respectful and co-operative (Hammer, Currall, and Stern 1991).

Dastmalchian, Blyton, and Adamson (1991) see workplace IR climate as an outcome of the organizational context and structure, human resource policies and wider industrial relations context, with climate mediating the relationship between these and industrial relations outcomes.

I attempted a search in the Indian Literature for available models but there were none.

However, I noted an interesting study which said that an individual's perception of the psychological climate in the organization has a significant positive impact on his willingness to engage in tasks well beyond his contractual tasks which in Organizational Behaviour parlance is referred to as Organizational Citizenship Behavior (OCB).

I propose a Conceptual Model for assessing the Industrial Relations Climate in an Indian setting which is solution-oriented. The proactive assessment can help resolve an issue before it snowballs into a major turmoil 86

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Therefore, I felt a practical tool will be helpful, especially to the multinationals that set up factories on our shores, to proactively understand their IR climate.

Therefore for our analysis, I have developed a simple two way matrix based on two factors: 1. The vulnerability of the organization 2. Collaboration

Measures IR Climate based on 2 metrics Vulnerability

Collaboration

I had felt that vulnerability determines the IR climate. About thirty years ago, I was working as a Personnel Officer at a factory manufacturing a type of Resins. I found a pattern; disputes will take place only during the half year end or year end, when we will be trying hard to make up for the customer demand. There will be a pin drop silence during December-January months when there will be a maintenance shut down. The Union will take up a sensitive issue only when we were in a vulnerable position to arm-twist and pressurize us. This was a great learning to me at that time.

But that was during the pre-liberalization era and also it was a chemical process industry so

a. I have classified the type of vulnerability based on the following: i. Process industry where the shelf life is short-food, milk, etc ii. Public utility services-Original Equipment supplier to auto majors iii. Industries wherein their product can wait to be marketed. iv. Hospitals v. Public transport

I have assigned scores from “1” for Companies which can be grouped as Least Vulnerable to Highly Vulnerable for which I have assigned the score of “5”.

2. Collaboration a) I have identified the following criteria to identify the type of Collaboration which is as follows: i. Collaboration score Productivity rate Number of grievances unresolved over a period of 6 months Supporting Factors I give credit to Collaboration based on the scores they get for the following: i. Employee Satisfaction Survey Scores ii. Grievance Redressal Systems iii. Recognized Union- Authorised Representatives of workmen iv. Signed Long Term Wage Settlement

S t r a t e g y

1. The vulnerability of the organization

An individual's perception of the psychological climate in the organization has a significant positive impact on his willingness to engage in tasks well beyond his contractual tasks which is referred to as Organizational Citizenship Behavior

HR

I have assigned scores for these criteria to measure the overall score for Collaboration.

Now based on the two –way matrix I map the Industrial Relations Climate which will highlight 4 types of Climate which is self-explanatory:

High vulnerability Low collaboration (5.1)

Vulnerability

any work stoppage can damage the product. So our vulnerability was high during peak market period and added to that was the process vulnerability which means the entire batch could get spoilt if they go on strike and in those days a batch would cost around five hundred thousand rupees which was quite a lot of money at that point of time. Often we were forced to agree on an issue during those times as customer supplies will get hit.

Later, during the post-liberalization era, I worked in an auto component major being the sole supplier of a product to all the major auto industries. Here again, I had to handle a major strike. I realized that work stoppage could bring to a grinding halt the entire auto majors in the country. This was our weak point so the Union were forcing our hand to relent to their demands.

I had to declare a partial lockout of the striking workmen after I convinced my MD to my idea and got the work done with temporary workforce.

They finally relented when they realized that we had steered through our vulnerability. They came forward for an amicable solution.

But, thereafter, I realized that we cannot change our vulnerability but can change the way we deal with the union.

So I started a proactive grievance resolution method which I called ‘Healing’ to bridge the trust deficit which was present. It took time as the Union initially had doubts about our sincerity. Later, we moved on from the past. I devised another approach taking a leaf from the political sphere; agreeing to disagree on certain issues and not allowing those to strain the relationship. This paved the way for building a favorable industrial relation climate, greatly improving our collaboration while our vulnerability stayed stuck at the same place. But we had no apprehensions that time and the Union also increased productivity.

Apart from this having handled major industrial turmoil, I realized “collaboration“ was the key. I found that in a major manufacturer wherein ten years ago when they started their plant there was a strike that lasted for three months. I was engaged by that Company to find a resolution.

It took several days but we were able to find a solution. Thereafter, we started a “Collaborative Process” with the same union and there had been peace. Of course, we do have our differences but we are serious in our Collaborative Process, so we find solutions however, difficult the issue is.

Therefore, I developed this model:

High vulnerability High collaboration (5.5)

Moderate vulnerability Moderate collaboration

Low vulnerability Low collaboration (1.1)

Low vulnerability High collaboration (1.5)

Collaboration

Now I recommend to the Company that it is with them to move the Collaboration Score from low to high.

I have helped corporates using this matrix to predict the IR Climate and take steps to improve.

About the author

Paul James is the Managing Partner & Principal Consultant at P S C S - A HR Consulting Firm JANUARY 2020 |

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Visty Banaji

Music and management What can organizations learn from orchestras

The road less travelled

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eaders have often been compared to chess grandmasters. This is a particularly inadequate analogy and reflects the same mindset that makes some leaders treat their people as pawns. Unlike real people, even the most powerful piece on a chessboard, the queen, never questions or subverts an order, much less behave any differently depending on how gently or roughly she is handled.

It would be far more illuminating and useful to compare organizational leaders to conductors of classical music orchestras. They are far better models of getting diverse but highly talented people to work in teams while giving each of them ample scope to display their individual capabilities. Like conductors perform works composed by others, most corporate CEOs also interpret, finesse and execute the vision or breakthrough innovation of a founding entrepreneur or inventor. Of course, just as some composers conduct their own creations (for a while, at least), there are inventors who shepherd their inventions

to commercial success. Entrepreneurs, by definition, found and run businesses for varying lengths of time. However, not only is the proportion of creators-cumexecutors (at least on the large scale) small in both music and business, there is no invariant correlation between the excellence achieved in creation and execution.

This column, however, deals only indirectly with the leadership conductors provide to orchestras. Our focus is on the players themselves and what we can learn from the kind of attitudes, relationships and spirit that makes for great orchestral ensembles.

DOSTI ho to Aisi Gustav Mahler’s 8th Symphony is often called the “Symphony of a Thousand” because it requires a large number of instrumental players and vocalists (though it is normally performed with far fewer than a thousand). No conductor could manage such a huge number of musicians unless the players themselves had the training, skill and temperament to work in unison,

with one small team taking support from the rest and being prominent at one time while another takes pride in place later and so on.

Musical abilities are not our concern in this column but corporates can certainly learn from the complex piece of coordination which brings an initial creator’s vision to fruition with minimal resort to command and control. I would like to summarize the delicately balanced and somewhat contradictory characteristics needed to achieve such a miracle as Disciplined Orchestra-Style Teamwork & Innovation or DOSTI. Let’s parse these descriptors a bit.

An orchestra is not free to play whatever enters each player’s head. There is a score that the player has to follow and interpret as demanded by the conductor (perhaps after discussion). The order that is the outcome of such discipline is, of course, at the heart of the beauty of classical music and of much else. As Pearl S Buck wrote: "Order is the shape upon which beauty depends." The discipline of the orchestra is very different from the reg-

Disciplined Orchestra-Style Teamwork & Innovation or DOSTI requires light-touch leaders who foster selfdiscipline, creative ideation and voluntary teamwork among employees, the way great conductors do 88

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our DOSTI resistance. As explained in an earlier column7, Evolutionary Psychology provides us with some interesting leads into the origins of our different attitudes to teamwork, leadership and, consequently, the way we play music as well as organize ourselves for other large-scale projects.

On the face of it, DOSTI should flourish in geographies like India which fall in "ecological regions characterized by higher prevalence of infectious diseases, [where] human cultures are characterized by greater collectivism."8 However, as defined in these studies, "collectivists make sharp distinctions between coalitional in-groups and out-groups, … [and] collectivism is characterized by a strong value placed on tradition and conformity".8 Since modern

Sociologists have related this hierarchical orientation to the hierarchical structure of the caste system as well as the emotional distance maintained by the father from his children."10 Both these predispositions tend to push Indians to the extreme ends of three continuums, preventing us from attaining the synthesis that lies in the middle and is essential for orchestral and organizational excellence.

Let’s take, to start with, the way most of us in India like to be led. The 'sultanism'11 that we frequently prefer takes us to one end of the scale: not all of us would pass Lyndon Johnson’s Macy window loyalty test12 but many would come pretty close to doing so! According to a recent Pew report: "Support for autocratic rule is higher in

The road less travelled

imented discipline imposed on a marching squad (or a traditional mass-production line). Players in an orchestra constantly need to modulate their performances based on what other players are doing and respond in a far more nuanced fashion to the conductor’s cues than a squadsman does to the orders barked at him.

An even more delicate balance has to be struck by an orchestral player between group and individual performance. There is no question that an orchestra’s worth stands or falls as a whole, regardless of how well an individual plays. "In direct opposition to what it means to be a good soloist, orchestra members desire with all their hearts to create 'one sound' with their fellow musicians… Of course, there are times where you may play an independent line of music or two, or [be] given the honor of showcasing as a soloist. For the most part, however, orchestra members strive to blend their instrument's sound … the effect being that multiple instruments are played together as a single, unified sound."5 At the same time, there is no gainsaying the extraordinary skill and unique interpretation expected from individual players.

Obviously, this innovation has to be acceptable to the conductor and limited to their own instrumental domains. An oboe player suddenly playing the French horn’s part because s/he thought of a way of doing it better would be as ridiculous as a CFO telling a CHRO how to swat down unions (and that, of course, never happens!).

Cultural challenges Having brought our argument to this point without much controversy (except in the minds of CFOs and, anyway, what are you doing reading this journal?) let’s stir up things a bit by examining why organizations in India find it a challenge to build DOSTI-friendly cultures. Or, to put it another way, why are we orchestrally challenged? It is certainly not my contention that we Indians are unmusical. But our culture doesn’t lend itself naturally to the blend of discipline, cooperation and structured creativity that orchestras demand.

As Aakar Patel put it in a recent column: "Polyphonic harmony was a desired effect, celebrating an activity only humans are capable of doing and enjoying: harmonious group activity… However I confess I do not see any aspect of Indian culture that promotes, reinforces and celebrates harmony. Indeed the answers to why we Indians struggle with group activity – traffic, football, parliamentary debate, war and conquest – things requiring interaction in concert with other humans, requiring harmony, may be found right here."6 There are many explanations offered for

As important as the leaders we appoint are the other people choices we make and how we meld teams into alloys that far exceed the properties of their elemental parts organizations are invariably mixtures of in and out groups and need continual teambased innovation, our collectivist inheritance gives us an evolutionarily imprinted aversion to DOSTI. Another interesting consequence of high pathogen densities in tropical regions is the receptivity to authoritarianism by societies originating in those geographies.9 This desire for dominant leaders may also have a social origin. According to Prof R K Gupta "…

Indians are submissive, more obedient to seniors, more dependent on others as well as fearful of people in positions of power.

India than in any other nation surveyed."13 The opposite extreme we otherwise land into is relative anarchy where, in the absence of a dominating leader, we pull each other down and squabble amongst ourselves (functions, business units, departments, sections, you name it) till the next red queen emerges. Even when we dance, it takes a 110-decibel drum beat to impart a modicum of rhythm to our movements.

It is not clear whether we don’t generate enough conductor-style leaders (who guide organizations by subtle signs while permitting freedom for the performers to JANUARY 2020 |

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The road less travelled

give of their best) or whether we turn such leaders into more autocratic selves by the strongman demands we make on them. The fact remains that Level 5 leaders,14 who are particularly needed by new generation tech enterprises, are in very short supply here.

The virtuoso of Indian classical music is a self-contained marvel. S/he is composer, conductor and player rolled into one.

In this model, there is no transmission loss between one role and the others. This efficiency advantage, however, is far outweighed by the unlikelihood of one person commanding the same virtuosic heights in three or more distinct disciplines. As mentioned earlier, many (if not most) composers of Western classical music have conducted or played their own work. But it wouldn’t have mattered if they hadn’t.

A moving story from the life of Beethoven makes this point: "Three years before Ludwig van Beethoven shook his great fist at the thunder & lightning raging outside

Much praise has been lavished on the Indian penchant for “Jugaad” and this is justified – up to a point. When it pervades the entire working culture of an organization and becomes an alternative to standard operating procedures it can lead to inconsistent quality and great risks to safety his window and fell back dead on his bed, his Ninth (last) Symphony was given its first performance in Vienna. Beethoven, a homely, dumpy, shaggy-headed little figure, stood in the orchestra, eyes fixed on his score, awkwardly beating time. He was not the official conductor. The players had been instructed to pay him no attention.

He was so deaf by that time that he could hear nothing of the great, surging music called for by the pinny, almost illegible little notes he had made. He did not sense the applause which came afterward until one of the soloists, a Fraulein Caroline Unger, turned him around so that his eyes could take it in. The music passed into the background then. The demonstration took a sudden, emotional turn as the people started shouting, beating their palms together still harder in an effort to assure the fierce-looking little man of their sympathy, their appreciation."15 Beethoven went on to compose some of his most path-breaking string quartets in the remaining years of

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his life when he could neither conduct, perform or even hear them. To transpose to an organizational context, when an initial vision has to be taken forward and executed for an indefinite period of time by different generations of successors, only the specialization model followed by Western orchestral music fits. At the other end of the self-sufficient all-in-one extreme of the Indian musician is the totally routinized role into which the less gifted of us fall. Even when more creative spirits rise above this routine, they do not generally move to the specialized expertise model which is true synthesis but resort to a selfsufficient 'Jugaad' version. That is all very well for a temporary fix but, as we shall see in more detail later, it cannot be the path to long term organizational progress.

At the heart of DOSTI is, of course, the manner in which we operate as collectives.

Teamwork with diverse colleagues is very different from thinking collectively about

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our sub-group. "In an interesting conceptualization, psychoanalyst Alan Roland … demonstrates … the subtle and important differences between the familial orientation of Indians and Japanese. According to him while a Japanese seamlessly extends his familial orientation to his workgroup and the employing organization, an Indian’s in-group remains confined to his extended family and the caste community. This … has very challenging consequences for effective teamwork in organizations located in India."10 Loyalty to an in-group provided a survival advantage in pre-historic and, to an extent, even in pre-industrial societies. Modern organizations can’t afford to work on this basis.

Being hostile to (or even ignoring) 'the other' significantly diminishes the overall effectiveness of any group. When they are themselves reduced to a minority within their workgroup, Indians can become even more clannish and distant from those group goals that demand personal effort

but may not result in individualized credit.

This type of behavior gives rise to the belief many “expats” nurses that Indians are great individually but struggle in team tasks.

Nice-to-have for others are musthaves for us It would be ridiculous to conclude that, because of the cultural overhang we have described, Indian companies are unable to build high-performance teams and organizations. Those that have done so, however, have mastered some or all of the remedial measures described in this section. A few that haven’t yet done so may still be successful based on the power of their business models and favorable circumstances but they are like sailing ships tacking against strong cultural headwinds. As they master DOSTI and make it a source of strategic competitive advantage, their pace of progress and sustainable growth will be substantially quickened. Here are the building blocks of lasting DOSTI, DOSTI requires light-touch leaders who foster self-discipline, creative ideation and voluntary teamwork among employees, the way great conductors do. There are, of course, authoritarian conductors16 but, while they may sparkle in public performances, they do not build the spirit that characterizes the great orchestras of the world. This is true also for political and business leadership as evidenced by Bill Gates’ recommendation of Archie Brown’s 'The Myth of the Strong Leader'17: "Brown’s core argument is exactly what his title suggests: despite a worldwide fixation on strength as a positive quality, strong leaders – those who concentrate power and decision-making in their own hands – are not necessarily good leaders. On the contrary, Brown argues that the leaders who make the biggest difference in office, and change millions of lives for the better, are the ones who collaborate, delegate, and negotiate – the ones who recognize that no one person can or should have all the answers… Through my work in the business world and at the foundation, I’ve seen firsthand how ineffective and even dangerous it can be when leaders make decisions alone – and how much good we can do when we work together. Good leaders will challenge themselves, bring in fresh thinking and expert advice, and not only invite but seriously consider opposing viewpoints."18 Specifically in the business context and many years before Brown, Jim Collins explained the profile of such leaders perfectly: "…

Level 5 leaders embody a paradoxical mix of personal humility and professional will… [and] set up their successors for even greater success in the next generation…

We need CounterJugaadi Inventiveness to provide a sustainable and reliable stream of fresh ideas education under the aegis of teamwork."20 This simple change, of making the working group the learning group, and putting them through really tough situations (that demand contributions from each person in the team to pull through) will go a considerable way to overcoming the restrictive collectivism that prevents many Indian corporates from unleashing the power of universal cooperation in the interest of the organizational purpose.

Finally, we come to the way we gain the advantages of innovation. Much praise has been lavished on the Indian penchant for 'Jugaad'21 and this is justified – up to a point. When it pervades the entire working culture of an organization and becomes an alternative to standard operating procedures it can lead to inconsistent quality, general sloppiness and great risks to safety.22 We need Counter-Jugaadi Inventiveness to provide a sustainable and reliable stream of fresh ideas. One such disciplined approach to innovation comes through the TQM movement and Kaizen. Industry in India had made great progress in universalizing this culture and its attendant techniques till some organizations found that the 'Jugaad' of cutting costs through

contractualization was much easier than through Kaizen and continuous quality and productivity improvements. If we resurrect this movement, we shall get the double benefits of diverse teams working together for organizational goals along with innovation flowing in the directions where it is most needed.

DOSTI with virtuosos Does all this mean that organizations with a DOSTI culture have no place for individual brilliance? Far from it. Exceptional contributors operating in such environments can develop and display their genius to the full, assured that there will be a team to support and complement them rather than being constantly in conflict with equally ambitious crabs waiting to pull them down.

To take the orchestral parallel again, virtuosos who play concertos have world-wide recognition. But though these performers occupy center-stage, they are neither self-contained nor self-sufficient.

Quite apart from the form imposed by the distinctly antecedent composer, there is the rest of the orchestra (under the conductor’s tutelage) with whom the virtuoso has to team and play in real-time to display fully his or her genius. It is this combination of iridescent individual performances embedded in an amalgam of coordinated team contributions that make for truly valuable modern organizations. Indian enterprises perhaps stand to benefit the most 'From the New World'23 of diamantinestudded DOSTI.

The road less travelled

[They] display a compelling modesty, are self-effacing and understated…. Level 5 leaders look out the window to attribute success to other factors than themselves.

When things go poorly, however, they look in the mirror and blame themselves, taking full responsibility."14 The Indian predilection for 'sultans' demands the Level 5 antidote more than most Western cultures.

For leaders who are already in the system, coaching can help to an extent. There are even programs where leaders can step into a conductor’s shoes. The referenced writeup elaborates on what the leader of a business can learn from leading an orchestra.19 But these interventions can rarely affect the transformation in leadership styles that are necessary for autocratic leaders to become conductor-like and, hence, selection remains vitally important.

As important as the leaders we appoint are the other people choices we make and how we meld teams into alloys that far exceed the properties of their elemental parts. There are many reasons for diversified recruitment but one of the strongest ones is that it is the only way we get an opportunity to bring 'the other' (of a variety of origins, educations, genders, orientations and beliefs) into the each workgroup and make the teamwork together in harmony while delivering high quality and output. The reason why affirmative action only at the time of recruitment (whether it is job reservations or RTE places in schools) frequently fails miserably is that the “out group” is thrown into the deep end of the pool, sometimes with dominant group swimmers splashing water into their faces and certainly not coming to their rescue when they are struggling to stay afloat.

Our onboarding and teaming processes are mostly infructuous in this regard because they work with the joining cohort or the people nominated for the teambuilding programme rather than the teams that will work together. The reason military teams work better regardless of their initial origins is that they go through their baptisms of (training or real) fire in the same groups that will operate and fight together later.

Teddy Roosevelt adopted this method to meld the disparate volunteers to the Rough Riders into a united team. "To stimulate the 'fellow feeling' he believed essential to the success of the mission he deliberately arranged tents at the training ground … in such a manner that cowboys and wranglers slept side by side with the scions of financiers. He … brought easterners and westerners together in the daily chores of laundry and digging and filling in latrines.

Eventually, a common denominator emerged throughout the entire regiment – a leveling of money, social status, and

About the author

Visty Banaji is the Founder and CEO of Banner Global Consulting (BGC) JANUARY 2020 |

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Praveen Sinha

A wide-spectrum image of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs There are similarities between the story of Rubik’s Cube and the multidimensional Maslow’s hierarchy of needs which can be rearranged and applied in multiple situations

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he Rubik’s Cube, which was invented in 1974 by Erno Rubik, a Hungarian architect, made up of nine colored squares on each side which can be rearranged in 43 quintillion different ways. That is 43,000,000,000,000,000,000.

There are only a handful of toys that last more than a generation. But the Rubik's Cube has joined the likes of Barbie, Play-Doh, Lego and the Slinky, as one of the great survivors in the toy cupboard. What makes it remarkable is that it did not start out as a toy. The Rubik's Cube was invented as a working model to help explain three-dimensional geometry.

Interestingly, there is some similarity between the story of Rubik’s Cube and the multidimensional Maslow’s hierarchy of needs which can be rearranged and applied in multiple situations in multiple ways.

We are more familiar with “ascending” the levels of the hierarchy of needs, as explained by Abraham Maslow. However, it would be worthwhile to relook at the

We are familiar with “ascending” the levels of the hierarchy of needs, as explained by Abraham Maslow.

However, it would be worthwhile to relook at the other side of hierarchy of needs – “descending” the levels 92

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not so obvious side of hierarchy of needs – “descending” the levels and its multifaceted application.

To begin with, let me share a real life story relating to divestment of a business unit and outsourcing of business process to the third party. The other one is the phenomenon commonly seen today i.e. entrepreneurs inverting the pyramid and they start from self-actualization.

In case of divestment of a business unit in a company (SKL -name changed), it was observed that as soon as the formal announcement of divestment was made, most of the log tenured mid to senior level experienced and talented managerial staff (age group 40-55 years) started feeling threatened. They were permanently settled in Delhi/NCR and did not want to relocate to Mumbai in a new organization and new work culture. Many of them accepted lower salary in their new job, lower management hierarchy and reduction in their fringe benefits.

It gave us an impression that they descended from “Self-actualization” (they

were talented, well experienced and achievers) to “Security” stage in Maslow’s hierarchy as they started fighting for survival.

In addition, their “Self-esteem” (prestige) also got a huge dent as they went for lower management category job, lower salary and benefits.

A very similar phenomenon was observed when one company decided to outsource a business process to a third party. The employees who moved to the new entity actually felt very insecure as they had to start a fresh (fresh joining date) and adjust to a new organization…new work culture. It appeared that suddenly Security needs took over Self-actualization and they descended in Maslow’s hierarchy.

A very common scenario around us is when entrepreneurs invert the pyramid and they start with self-actualization. The following was reported in the news line in 2018: “With the launch of Traxi, a service platform to aggregate farm equipment (including tractors) demand, Escorts Ltd is hoping to transform itself into the next

Maslow wrote that only those who have met all of the four previous needs could reach “selfactualization”, the ability to reach their potential or to be self-fulfilled. If this were true, no one would ever become an entrepreneur handy in making a quick assessment (diagnostic through leadership interviews). If we look at Maslow hierarchy of needs and ask Line managers to plot their people in hierarchy blocks, it would give them a broad view and some meaningful insights on existing departmental / functional culture and work out on some priority agenda. The insights may tell them about what makes people to work for the organization, what motivates them, and what makes them “Stay” in the organization, etc. Further, when the managers found that a large number of people were at higher level in the hierarchy of needs, then it was inferred that the organization is blessed with sound people support and it can to go for achieving some audacious goals.

The Managers, who knew where his / her people are in the Maslow hierarchy of needs, helped them to conduct performance conversation better not only during the half-yearly/annual performance reviews, rather it proved very useful in their regular conversations. For example, employees at “Security needs” level,

required a different approach and style as compared to those who were on higher level of needs –Social needs’ - ‘Esteem needs’ – ‘Self-actualization’ needs.

In CXO level hiring, the fundamental criteria (in the context of Maslow theory) was the following: a) To select a candidate who believes that fulfillment of “Social needs” (belongingness) is a must to create a right environment within the organization for propelling a higher level of employee engagement and productivity. This helped the organization in preparing ground for cultural build up required for sustaining critical organizational change and business transformation. b) In addition, an assessment of drive for fulfilling ‘Esteem needs’ (need for achievement of extraordinary results/ self-confidence) was also important. c) Further, selection of candidates having a drive for “Self-actualization” was important when business was entering into ‘transformation zone’ and critical change management phase. This was particularly true in R&D (for delivering to customers new/competitive products at low cost) and Sales acceleration to penetrate new markets.

Further, during the change management (business transformation phase), the following were observed: Some people found pace of change extremely high and they were not able to run with the required speed – they were Low on Focus – Low on Energy. Even some people with High energy but with Low focus, felt quite insecure about their future. The conversation with them was to bring them back to the track was quite different as compared to other people who were aligned with the change and were performing well.

People who were high on “Esteem needs” adapted to organizational change very well and progressed with the organization towards fulfilling “Self-actualization needs”. However, there was a downside to this phenomenon – perpetuation of internal unhealthy competitions amongst employees in some departments/sections which created dents on fulfilment of their “Esteem”.

I personally find it quite interesting to explore more and more about the application of Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs in context of a real world scenario.

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Uber/Ola of the agriculture segment.

TRAXI becomes an alternate service for farmers who cannot afford to buy a tractor.”

Maslow wrote that only those who have met all of the four previous needs could reach “self-actualization”, the ability to reach their potential or to be self-fulfilled.

If this were true, no one would ever become an entrepreneur. Let us examine this phenomenon further.

We have observed that true entrepreneurs are passionate and they sacrifice Basic needs for their passions. They get so busy that they forget to eat and in the process push themselves to the breaking point, enduring high levels of stress as they confront the unknown path ahead.

We have also seen that many entrepreneurs quit their well-paying jobs to turn their dreams into reality. And contrary to Maslow’s theory, it looks like that the first act of becoming self-actualized is to throw away Safety and financial security without blinking an eyelid.

Most entrepreneurs miss their kids and family at least initially sacrificing Social needs. They find it difficult to spare more time for family and friends when pursuing their dreams of building their enterprise.

We have seen that friends and family members often think that the entrepreneurs are crazy as they give up so much for their new enterprise. They also call them idealists and dreamers, but they (entrepreneurs) overcome self-doubt and they confidently move towards their dreams and goals --Self-esteem.

It is quite evident from the above briefing that the entrepreneurs start with selfactualization; they begin with undying resolve of fulfilling their dreams, desires and goals. They see them achieving with every pitch to investors, sale to a customer or addition to their product and service offering. For them, struggle is part of the joy --Self-actualization.

Let us shift the gear and examine the application and usage of multifaceted theory of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs in a company where I worked earlier: High performing employees were found to be high on fulfillment of their Social needs (network within and outside the organization/ with good horizontal relationships) and Esteem needs (had extraordinary confidence, sense of achievement and shown hunger for doing more). They also demonstrated that they were moving right on self-actualization path-they possessed a good combination of focus and energy in achieving audacious goals and soon they became the pillars of change and business transformation. The multifaceted Maslow theory also came

About the author

Praveen Sinha is the Ex Head – HR Centre of Excellence, Corporate HR, Escorts Ltd & Cofounder, People n Planet Fora JANUARY 2020 |

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Past month's events

Knowledge + Networking

The Era of Self-Directed Learning - What’s HR’s New Role and Strategy People Matters & Degreed 29th November 2019 DoubleTree by Hilton, Gurgaon “Improving learning and development” is a top-rated challenge according to Deloitte’s 2019 Global Human Capital Trends Report. At a time when the emphasis on learning is aligned to life-long and continuous learning programs, the driver of the learning road-map is the individual.

In this era of self-directed learning, what is the role of the L&D team?

How should HR professionals curate learning? And how can they enable their learners to take charge? This roundtable focused on how learning and development are evolving as changes in technology and skills impact the new world of work. In such a scenario, the role of HR and L&D leaders become more important in how can they help talent upskill in line with future skills and competencies? How can they design their learning processes to support learning for the future. More so, when it comes to specialized professions such as finance and accounting, what will be the key competencies needed for them in the future.

Acquiring the Workforce of the Future People Matters & ABC Consultants 10th December 2019 The Leela Palace, Gurugram As the nature of work changes and business models transform, the war for acquiring the right talent will become even fiercer. To keep pace and attract the right kind of talent for their future workforce, organizations need to revamp their talent acquisition strategies completely. The hour of the need is to build a talent acquisition technology an ecosystem that is fit for purpose, intuitive, efficient and reflective to the needs of candidates and companies to never let the pipeline for the future workforce dry.

People Matters and ABC Consultants organized a roundtable discussion with leaders like Vinod Subramanian, Chief Operations Officer, FlexAbility (ABC Consultants) and Neil Jones, Head of the Asia Pacific Region, Alexander Mann Solutions, who shared some great insights on how to reflect and ideate the talent strategy for building a talent acquisition technology ecosystem. The session also focussed on the factors shaping the total talent strategy for the future and role of technology in building a Talent Acquisition Technology Ecosystem.

The why and how of motivating millennials People Matters & Sodexo 17th December 2019 Online Millennials are an extremely loyal and hardworking generation, especially if you make it clear to them that you care. Millennials tend to be well-versed in the constantly changing world of technology - they're open to change and meet problems headon. They do not fear obstacles and, instead, get excited about the opportunities that constraints may create.

Organizations can definitely learn a lot from this generation if they keep an open mind to do so. However, one of the significant challenges in managing a millennial workforce is to keep them motivated. Millennials are largely running towards jobs with purpose and quality. They always lookout for a sense of accomplishment. Suvodeep Das, VP - Sales and Marketing, Sodexo BRS India and Aravind Srinivasa Raghavan, Senior Director & Staffing Partner - Talent Supply Chain discussed the business vision of 2025 and the importance of creating a motivated workforce through this webcast by People Matters and Sodexo. The webcast also focussed on the usage of digital in accelerating the motivation scale of your millennial workforce.

People Dimension for Quality Culture People Matters & NamanHR 18th December 2019 Online New dynamics are forcing the industry’s HR functions to rethink their 'people' game plans. HR needs to play a vital role in 'quality' as it is more of a

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cultural issue rather than just technology or process. Ajay Bhatt, President - Global Human Resources, Intas Pharmaceuticals and Samir Parikh, MD & CEO, NamanHR, in this webcast by People Matters and NamanHR, talked about you the importance of examining quality sustenance from a people's perspective and how an organiza-

tion could nurture will and conviction among people to develop and sustain a quality culture. The webcast also deep-dived into how culture plays an important role in sustaining quality.

The challenges faced while building ownership towards quality at multiple levels and ways to manage them.

Upcoming events 'Say Yes': IWN Leadership Conclave

CII Feb 10, 2020 IDCO Vashi, Navi Mumbai, Navi Mumbai, Maharashtra, India Yi The Future will be a flagship national event of Yi. The Summit will address the need of the Nation to build an ecosystem for fostering innovation and leveraging it to build our youth’s future in the digitally connected world. Yi The Future will discuss the role of youth in creating the future of everythingHumans, Tech, Design, News, Informa-

tion, Art, Peace, Explorations and Education. The platform will convene creative collaborators trailblazing entrepreneurs, futurists, exponential thinkers, leaders of tomorrow, technologists from across the nation and the world, science fiction writers, illustrators, designers, and futurists to create new ideas and bring new worlds to life where these ideas will, should, or may exist.

Visit CII official website for more info

People Matters TechHR Singapore 2020 Conference and Workshop People Matters 19th February to 21st February 2020 Marina Bay Sands Convention Centre, Singapore The future is on everyone’s minds-what lies ahead and what will be its impact on people and work? How can we be future-ready by design? It is these questions People Matters TechHR Singapore 2020 will explore and hope to find the answers to. People Matters TechHR Singapore 2020, Asia’s largest HR and WorkTech conference is back in a bigger and bolder format. Themed around ‘By Design’, the conference will examine the purpose of technology, its impact on business, accelerating change in talent practices as well as the way in which we architect digital culture while keeping an eye on what technology brings to the fore. The conference will also stimulate conversations on completely rethinking how we run our business, how work gets executed and how we create seamless experiences for our customers and employees. Speakers like Jason Averbook, CEO & Co-Founder, Leapgen, Cassie Kozyrkov, Chief Decision Scientist, Google, Nora Manaf, Head, Group Human Capital, Maybank, Nadiah Tan Abdullah, CHRO, S P Setia Berhad and

more will share with us their thoughts.

Additionally, we also have People Matters TechHR Certification Workshops planned for 19th February as part of People Matters TechHR Singapore 2020.

We are privileged to launch full-day certification workshops for all registered delegates. Get an opportunity to learn from the best in the HR and Work Tech space at the Marina Bay Sands, Convention Center, Singapore at a special offer price of SGD 395. Also, we have planned an immersive learning experience for our delegates through People Matters Study Tour 2020, dated 21st February.

Renowned organizations like Netflix, OCBC, Unilever, Olam International, SUTD and many more on board already with us. Each of these organizations will share their digital success stories and best practices which make them the most desired organization to work for.

Knowledge + Networking

CII 27th Jan - 28th Jan 2020 Grand Hyatt Bolgatty Kochi, Conference Hall, Kochi, Kerala, India IWN was formed by the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) to support women in their professional and personal growth in the areas of leadership, wellbeing, gender parity, mentoring and networking.

The IWN Southern Region has 9 active chapters and around 700 members from amongst CEOs, professionals and students. Now more than ever, today’s most transformative minds are redefining pathways to power and taking bold ideas to the front lines to solve for the most pressing challenges of our time. Across industries and generations, women are at the helm navigating monumental change to re-architect industries, spark major movements and unlocking opportunities for others. Women leaders are pioneering new possibilities in their chosen fields to shatter perceptions, blaze new trails, explore frontiers and re-inventing the future to find solutions with purpose and positive impact.

With this background, the Indian Women Network is organizing a Leadership Conclave on the theme, ‘Say Yes – Women for India@75’ on 27-28 January 2020 at Grand Hyatt Kochi Bolgatty.

The ‘India@75’ denotes the year 2022, when Independent India will turn 75.

The Conclave will bring together inspiring and innovative visionaries whose ambitious actions are changing and transforming their companies, communities and the world at an unprecedented scale. Featuring keynote conversations and dynamic panel discussions, it will convene a diverse range of luminaries from the worlds of politics, business, social entrepreneurship, media and entertainment.

Yi The Future

https://singapore.techhrconference.com/ register

Visit CII official website for more info.

JANUARY 2020 |

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Blogosphere

>> Sivakumar Palaniappan

An important reminder to HR leaders and professionals to incorporate innately human qualities in the workplace in the face of increasing digital tools and technology

Should human resources stay human?

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here is no question about whether HR must embrace technology and make the best use of new-age tools and digital platforms. However, should it be done at the cost of the personal touch? Should the critical human element be lost amidst technological evolutions? Should the human resource function avoid staying human?

Organizations today collect vast amounts of employee data and details and this data is used to improve HR practices, including talent acquisition, resource management, and deployment, training, and development. However, there is no denying that there are limitations to technology as well. For example, Google launched its muchtouted managerial qualities study, Project Oxygen, a multi-year project aiming to find out what makes a good manager at Google. After much work and statistical analysis, Project Oxygen identified eight behaviors as common key elements among all their high performing managers. The conclusions were obvious and discovered over the years in the behavior studies.

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So, the fundamental question to ask is, how much tech should HR embrace? Should HR departments primarily rely on technology or should they use their instinct acquired over the years of experience? The obvious answer is that tech in HR is here with multi-billion business opportunities and will drive us henceforth. It will help us better understand, comprehend, and make decisions with the data we have. However, HR must remain human forever.

Here are some ways of making your HR department more human.

Treat your employees as “human beings�

Remember that we work with human beings all the time and not human resources. People aren't resources that can be used up for projects based on requirements and pushed out when not in need. Treating people with dignity and selfrespect is the first step of humanizing HR. Even when you rely on tech tools, keep asking yourself, "What shall I do to humanize the situation and process?"

Empathize and appreciate feelings

Invest in face-to-face time with your employees Some of the most effective texting, collaborating, and communicating tools in our workplace have enabled people to work more closely than ever before. At the same time, people are increasingly feeling isolated, disconnected and lonely as well.

Screen-to-screen communication might increase the pace in the organization, but it lacks the impact of face-to-face communication. In-person interaction naturally results in higher levels of personal trust, bonding, and credibility.

Introduce fun in the workplace Introducing workplace fun in your organization will help improve team bonding. A leading IT product development organization saw a drastic improvement in their teams’ behavior just by introducing simple smiley ball games on their floors every afternoon after the lunch break.

Create opportunities for your employees to come together in-person, meet, talk, socialize, and have fun outside of their work. Lunch meetings, coffee discussions, general meet-ups, self-interest groups are some ways to create such possibilities even in a high-pressure industry.

Reduce the tech induced stress Though technology has improved our lives significantly, the negative impact of technology

Some of the most effective texting, collaborating, and communicating tools in our workplace have enabled people to work more closely than ever before. At the same time, people are increasingly feeling isolated, disconnected and lonely as well

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The ability to be empathetic, understanding different perspectives and feelings will help build strong relationships in the workplace. It makes people feel more connected, with a better understanding of others and their beliefs. HR leaders who are better at empathy will be able to influence, inspire, and help people achieve their dreams and goals. Empathetic leaders enable us to connect with others in a real and meaningful way, which in turn creates a happy work environment.

on mental and physical health is also becoming increasingly evident. Organizations need to understand how much tech is too much tech and use it as an enabler; not a hindrance. The best way to reduce tech-induced stress is to encourage employees to unplug and disengage from work once in a while.

Human resource professionals are the strongholds of company culture and values in any organization. While they are overwhelmed with data, quant, and algorithms, they must never give up their primary role of being emotional advocates.

There is no doubt that we have to embrace technology, but we will only thrive if we keep ourselves inherently human, and keep working on qualities like being emotional, vulnerable, intuitive, imaginative, creative, etc.

About the author

Sivakumar Palaniappan is the Founder Director at Thinkfluence Global JANUARY 2020 |

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| JANUARY 2020

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