H R
C E N T R E
O F
E X C E L L E N C E
HR MESH F E B R U A R Y
2 0 1 1
Editorial January edition.
recent trends and developments HR mesh has always tried to in HR field. bring in the latest trends in the Know more about the new waves HR field to its readers. of HR value creation through reWith the same spirit, we intro- cruitment outsourcing.
Greetings from HR Forum! Welcome to the February issue. Thank you all for the overwhelming response we received for our
duce you to shift that is happening from product branding to employer branding, in this issue. This issue of the HR Mesh also gives an insight into the effectiveness of Employee of the Month programmes. We are sure our readers will benefit from these articles about the
And lastly, we love hearing from you. So feel free to write to us about your views, opinions and suggestions at: hrforum@scmhrd.edu. As we always say, until the next edition, Happy Reading!!
Shift Product Brand to Employer Brand BRAND- this word rings a bell in everyone’s mind!!! Irrespective of the various strata the society is divided into, whether a vagrant, or an affluent, whether a kid, or a veteran, everyone knows what the billboards say and what their favourite celebrity endorses. Such is the power of brand, which heaves a bystander and converts him into a customer. Brand is associated with product, service, idea, nations and personalities. It is ubiquitous and rules the minds and hearts of millions. We are in a world where almost one fourth of all advertisements use celebrity endorsements giving a clear ratification of the fact that consumer’s perception is strongly monitored by the accountability of the endorser. The product sells when the credibility of it is reinforced periodically. Similarly,
credibility of an organization has to be endorsed by the employer to attract the best employees. Firms from diverse sector like Siemens, Honeywell, Yahoo, Accenture, and Starbucks have well defined and managed employer brand. Incorporating employer brand is a step these firms have taken to secure and retain the potential employees which will facilitate them to disseminate their brand popularity. With the advancement in different fields like biotechnology, nanotechnology, and changes in demographics and economics of the world with advancement of fast growing economies there comes a future where shortage of skilled labour is inevitable. As obvious, the deterioration in the quality
of employees will result in decreased productivity. The companies are taking notice of this upcoming threat and employer brand provides the long term solution to it. This concept entails unremitting marketing where the employee becomes the brand ambassador of the workplace. Time and again all big players in the market have attributed employees as the most crucial asset for the success of an organization. All business strategies revolve around the workforce a company has developed for itself. Everything takes a backstage if the human resource is not in its place. A skilled employee is the first and foremost demand for any organization if it wants to flourish and maintain its brand value. This makes it imperative for any firm to create a brand value not just
P AGE
2
for the consumers of the product but also for the consumers of the job. An organization must portray itself as amicable place to work and be a magnet for best talents. Gone are those days when organizational size, reputation were the factors for a talent to move into a company. What determines the permanence of an employee in an organization is the relationship he develops. Companies like Cadbury use a single slogan for all the employees from the top management to those at the end of the pyramid. Tying all the human resources in a single string of trust and dependability presents a favourable firm’s employment image and attracts niche employees along with the retention of the previous cream workforce. The perfect example was the recent achievement by Tata Steel which bagged the Asia’s Best Employer Brand Awards, 2010. The steel giant believes “people are its key assets and value creation for the company depends principally on their professional and personal wellbeing”. It defines the organization as a multicultural family and focuses on each employee as a congealed asset that contributes to the growth of this family. Marketing fabricates the product brand in the mass, whereas, Em-
ployer branding serves as a bridge between the marketing and HR functionalities. It develops value proposition just like a product intends to develop. It presents the picture of the organization’s value, culture and impressions of current employment system. Blended with meticulous external marketing and followed by internal marketing where brand promise is established in the organizational culture, a sense of commitment of is inculcated within the employees. The popularity of employer brand discerns it from other players in the market which in turn helps it to acquire distinct employees. Proficient human capital adds value to a firm and an adroit investment in this human resource brings competitive advantage to the firm where the employees are driven by company’s goal. The impact of employer brand is intense enough to percolate brand loyalty which results into employee productivity. Replicating the habit of loyal customers to support their brand under less favourable conditions, employees stay with the firm even if other attractive offers are on the floor. Another
positive upshot of employer branding is that it promotes self monitoring by employees and triggers career development. In a nutshell, employer branding is stimuli and consequence of marketing. Employer branding strives to resolve the mystery of keeping an employee motivated to work for the organization and compliment its brand value. Branding a consumer product creates awareness about the product, brings it on forefront, and adds to expand the market share. But today this is just not enough, the companies need to look beyond the set boundaries of good product quality and invest in the human capital that is the root of whole business process. Employers need to market themselves and influence the best flair. Employer branding can heighten the attraction of job- fit employees, escalate the retention motto of current dextrous employees and transforms the self employee brand into THE BRAND of the company, as the saying goes, “successful individuals create successful team” (Article by Sakshi Dadhich, Student SCMHRD)
Recruitment Outsourcing - New waves of HR value creation HR outsourcing is a process in which a company uses the services of a third party to take care of its HR functions. A company may outsource a few or all of its HR related activities to a single or combination of service provides located in offshore destinations like India, China, Philippines, etc.
When companies look at driving HR function internally or via an outsourcing arrangement, outsourcing has always won on the basis of pure cost benefits. Against the common notion that no outsourcing arrangement can be as an effective replacement of a company’s internal
HR practice, there are several proven facts and cases that strongly recommend outsourcing as a strong means of HR innovation for driving cost advantage and value quotient all at the same time. Worldwide
companies
rou-
FEBRUA RY
2011
tinely outsource their important HR functions such as payroll processing, employee data management, recruitment process outsourcing and training to cut costs and attain performance benefits. At the same time, outsourcing all the HR functions lead to critical circumstances. However, wise outsourcing and better control are the key drivers for drawing long-term HRO benefits. With the challenge to quickly respond to constantly changing market trends and the need to acquire strategic resource skills, organizations turn to recruitment sources for the answer. The advantages of recruitment process outsourcing include lower cost of recruitment,
P AG E
faster time to hire and enhanced overall processes such as background checks, screening and testing, sourcing, application tracking and much more.
ing converts fixed costs into variable cost, which gives the ability to pump more capital into production-related activities, further focusing on operational efficiencies.
Quickly head-start new projects The key ingredient for achieving cost advantage in today’s highly competent marketplace is through quick addressal of several new successive projects. An efficient outsourcing firm can help in quickly scaling up the required talent which usually involves weeks or months to hire the right people and provide the start they need.
Hiring temporary employees for peripheral or short term projects incurs additional costs in training them and subsequently let them go with the brain-train. Going in a planned way through outsourcing helps companies focus human resources where they need them the most.
Reduced Labour Costs
Ability to focus on core business function These days employee retention is the biggest challenge for HR function. Outsourcing allows businesses to divert HR synergies towards Control Capital Investments more important areas and help firms attain Though the initial motive of recruit- competitive advantage. ment outsourcing is to cut costs of (Source: www.articlesbase.com) HR function, furthermore outsourc-
‘Employee of the Month’ programmes Are they really effective? In today’s world, organizations are encountering stiff competition from other players in the industry in retaining talented employees. Motivating employees and keeping them engaged has increasingly become a critically important task. Giving employees a good monetary compensation is not enough to keep them interested in the job. The focus has shifted to providing rewards and incentives to employees for keep up the motivation levels. How can employees be motivated? It is difficult to categorically state what motivates employees in an organization. Motivation is very intrinsic to an individual. What motivates an individual varies from person to person. Many organizations have programmes that reward employees periodically based on their performance. These programmes are aimed at encouraging employees by recognizing good work. The ‘Employee of the
Month’ programmes are commonly used by many companies. The award may include a small cash bonus, a certificate signed by the top management and/or a photo of the employee put up on the company’s Wall of Fame. On similar lines, many companies also give Quarterly awards to reward employees or even teams for delivering good performance in the quarter. Though these programmes are very popular, they may not be the best way of motivating today’s employees. As motivation is personal, interaction between an employee and his/her manager can play a significant role in motivating an employee. Positive reinforcements provided to an employee by the manager on a frequent basis can foster higher motivation levels. The reward programmes can motivate employees for a limited period after they’re initially launched. Keeping the same programme
active for a long time can make it ineffective as employees would lose interest in them. Making innovative changes to the programmes from time to time has become a challenge for HR. While rewarding individuals on performance basis, companies may face a situation where employees from a few select teams are consistently performing well and hence keep getting rewarded frequently. This could lead to a situation where employees from the other teams may feel neglected and misinterpret the management’s motive as being biased towards certain teams. To prevent the occurrence of such a situation, the management may decide to give rewards to employees of each of the departments irrespective of the performance of those departments! One way to improve these programmes is by allowing employees also to nominate colleagues for the awards. This would make the system more transparent and acceptable to temployees. During my work life, I’ve seen awards being given to employees on quarterly basis. A year after the programme was launched
3
P AGE
we saw awards being given to people who had not received any award in the previous quarters. By talking to my colleagues, I realized that some employees who were awarded were not considered deserving by the other employees. This can adversely impact employee motivation levels and can tarnish the programme’s reputation. Any award given by the organization should be valued and held in high esteem by its employ-
ees. It is therefore necessary for manag- Month’ programmes can be effectively ers to give a thought to this aspect be- used in conjunction with other techfore rewarding employees. niques of keeping up the employee moAt times, the programmes reach a satu- rale. A lot of thought has to be put into ration level where so many employees the design of these programmes and the have received awards that the award no possibility of ensuing consequences longer excites them, thereby defeating should be analyzed carefully. If implethe purpose of the rewards programme. mented properly, these programmes can Such a situation would signal a necessary play an important role in motivating and engaging the workforce. change to the existing programmes. In summary, the ‘Employee of the (Article by Aditi Naik, Student SCMHRD)
Upcoming HR Events 1) Webinar on Courage Leadership: Using Venue & Date: 12-03-2011 at King of 2011”. courage to transform the workplace George Auditorium, Dadar East, Mumbai 3) NHRDN Talent Acquisition and ReDate: 24-02-2011, 14:00 to 15:00 Eastern A leading event to discuss the imple- tention Conclave Time mentations and impact of HR technolo- Venue & Date: 18-03-2011 at India HabiThis webinar will focus on actions you can gies with exceptionally beneficial Net- tat Centre, Lodhi Road, New Delhi take to be more courageous at work, and working between the HR executives, HR Sessions on the talent edge, employee what you can do to inspire more coura- Professionals, Consultants, Academi- engagement, compensation and benefits geous behavior among those you work cians, Researchers and Scholars on a practices, HR technology and social single platform to explore various aswith or lead. pects of the theme “Smart HR Managers media at work and talent management 2) Silicon India HR Symposium best practices
On a Lighter Note... Team HR Forum SENIOR Divya Kohli Heena Bhagat Neha Pandit Rahul Kolhe Richa Malik Shweta Agrawal JUNIOR Aby Kottukappally Aditi Naik Bibin J Poovathany Divya Amarnath Isha Chandra Karanbir Singh Wunnava Madhulika
(Source: www. CartoonStock.com)
4