Author: Arindam Goswami | HRKatha

Having starting its journey just five years ago in India, Xiaomi has already made a significant inroad into the market plus, along with its partners, has generated employment for over 50,000 employees across the business segments with around 30,000 employed in its manufacturing segment alone. Xiaomi India currently employs one thousand employees in its Bangalore HQ and across its five regional offices. Apart from being a preferred brand in the electronics segment, it is also trying to become a preferred place to work for its employees. Muralikrishnan B, COO, Xiaomi India, says about the Company’s people strategy, “Our people strategy…

Despite flexible working, employees remain ‘always-on’ for fear of falling behind on their increasing workloads With work–life balance being heralded as one of the most important things for organisations to focus on, flexible work options were born. This included employees managing their own work hours, and working from home when necessary. Since then, in many, but not all industries, there has emerged a highly mobile workforce that has made the most of the flexibility offered to them, by working from anywhere. Then again, it may not really be the boon that we all think it to be. For flexible work…

Technology has the power to surprise us in many ways and if we review the progress of the last ten years, we will find ample proof of this. Data and artificial intelligence (AI) have been instrumental in changing the way we perceive work and how we take care of ourselves. Today, that progress is trying to change the way we deal with mental stress and health too. Chatbots for mental health are the latest innovations. These are bots designed to help provide the first step, for people undergoing mental stress and anxiety, to find a safe place to share their…

It is a known fact that there exists a gap between the academia and the industry in terms of knowledge sharing and application of that knowledge. ITC Infotech is trying to bridge that gap with their new initiative, Prarambh. An interactive platform, Prarambh allows students across campuses to log in and interact with the industry experts, by asking real time industry-relevant questions. The platform itself is a socially interactive one where students can post videos on learning content, create webinars with students from other campuses and get the answers to their queries, which are provide by the subject experts in…

HR leaders tell us what skills can be considered as the right indicators of a great manager. In today’s changing business scenario, companies treat their line managers and functional heads as entrepreneurs, who are responsible for delivering results and possess the freedom to make their own decisions. For this, they clearly need the support of their team members, and to garner that support, they need to have a fair idea of what their team needs and how to best run it to achieve good results. In short, they need good people skills. Every manager needs a thorough understanding of HR…

For Cummins, the motto is to be more innovative by being more diverse. As a broad strategy, it wishes to be representative of India’s diversity in its employee workforce and create a safe and inclusive workplace. Working with new ideas, driving innovation and developing a collective leadership is how it plans to develop a competitive advantage within the organisation. The focus on D&I begins on day one when the new employees come in. Young professionals and lateral hires alike go through a one-week induction process, which is part of the diversity and inclusion journey. Termed as GOB or global onboarding,…

Communication is a key skill needed for HR professionals to facilitate a good environment for employees. Exit interviews provide a great platform for the management to find out what went right and what went wrong. However, the very fact that an employee is exiting implies that the game is already lost. So why wait until employees decide to leave? This is where stay interviews play a significant role. A stay interview is a structured conversation between an employee and the manager. It is designed to find out what will make the employees want to continue with the organisation, and what…

It is every manager’s dream to have a self-sufficient and self-innovating team which produces good results and functions like a well-oiled machine. However, even dream teams can go wrong and this particular organisational behaviour explains how. When Paul F. Levy published the ‘Nut Island Effect: When good teams go wrong’ in 2001, the people he had spoken to responded with a shock of recognition. It was something every manager had seen in action but had no name for, that is, until he gave it one. Nut Island Effect is a phenomenon in which a team of highly motivated and skilled…

Another one of the many things doing popular rounds in the industry is the idea of full pay transparency. It means that everyone inside and outside the organisation will have access to every employee’s salary structure. Even now, it is a revolutionary step which is being looked at with quite some skepticism. At the outset, let us differentiate full pay transparency from partial pay transparency. To have partial transparency means to disclose the range of pay accorded to employees of a particular grade. An example of partial pay transparency would be when employers divulge pay ranges for different positions offered…

Online courses have erupted all over the internet because of the huge demand for new skill-sets. Some of these courses are short, over 11 or 24 hours long, and come with the promise to equip the learner with all the tools and techniques necessary to woo the interviewer. However, are they as effective as short they are or are they just farce? Today every individual is in a rush to acquire as many qualifications as one can to print out a shiny CV laden with certifications. Due the over-the-counter nature of these courses employers may be skeptical about the value…

Organisations are heavily reliant on agencies for employee verification. It is usually the HR consultancy firm who arranges for the verification to be done. In many cases, certain details are overlooked and fraudulent information is passed, right under the nose of the agency running the process. When the prospective employer finds out during the interview that the information provided by the candidate is inaccurate then he or she is automatically rejected. In addition, the HR firm who supplies the candidate in the first place takes the heat and might have to disassociate with the organisation. Apparently, a few players in…

When it comes to disclosing salary information on job advertisements, it is cause of contestation. Many companies would disagree on whether or not it is a good idea to provide salary details while posting a job. Even employers who favour transparency might argue that it is premature. However, including salary details can be a benefit for both employers and employees. Most companies seldom include wage information on their job postings. Reputed companies especially, do not find the need to disclose salaries as candidates apply either way.“Compensation offered on basis of experience’ is the common disclaimer. A quick search on Indeed…

A search for ‘blockchain’ on Google will throw up many results, and the majority will be associated with Bitcoin and cryptocurrency. However, the concept is primed to disrupt a lot more than currency. It has the potential to change the way organisations function. In fact, it is a boon for HR and the way it handles business. The HR fraternity has been on the forefront of embracing technology, and now there is a new technology in town with multiple applications that will make it easier for HR to carry out business functions in a more secure and simple way. All…

ISRO may not have been successful in the safe landing of Vikram lander on the moon. However, the efforts of the team were widely appreciated. The Company earned a lot of respect among the people in our country. Probably, this could be the reason why this government organisation has emerged as one of the favourite destinations for Indian techies wanting to build their careers. In fact, ISRO is the only state-owned company to have found a place in the list, which is dominated by multinational companies. Every year, Indeed, a global job site, releases a list of companies where Indian…

On 14 December, 2019, Indian private lender, Axis Bank hosted the second edition of its exclusive mega job fair, JobX, in Delhi. The fair was organised at the New Police Line Grounds, Model Town. The event was flagged off by Amulya Patnaik, Delhi Police Commissioner, and Suchana Patnaik, president, Police Families Welfare Society (PFWS). Axis Bank’s JobX is an exclusive mega job fair aimed at providing employment opportunities to the retired personnel and children of Delhi Police. The event at Model Town was the second edition in Delhi. The first was organised in December last year, at Kingsway Camp. This…

Despite the bleak headline, the overall trend is not that bad, according to a six-year survey. This year, the percentage of students ready to take up jobs stood at 46 per cent, which is only a marginal dip from last year’s 47 per cent. In 2014, the employability score stood at 33 per cent, which says that the change has been positive, overall. In an online survey, over 150 organisations across nine industries were questioned on their hiring intent for 2020, including what kind of candidates they are looking at, where they plan to source them from, and how. About…

Digital learning is the talk of the town. With byte sized and on-the-go learning, people are able to learn almost anything, and that too on their own. Employees prefer to learn online and pick up new skills as and when they need it. However, new marketable skills are not the only things people need to know, and it is not possible to teach everything through a digital format either. Discussions on learning and development encompass a wide range of topics, which also include behavioural change. When it comes to changing behaviours or habits, learning requires a human touch. People behave…

In a scramble to find the top candidates, organisations often end up in a rush to push talent in through the door before their competitors. It is indeed a challenge for all companies to reduce the time for hiring even while ensuring that all the proper checks are carried out. The pressure is on HR to manage the whole exercise. So what do organisations prioritise while looking for the right fit for their company? With the country witnessing growth across fields—whether it is the booming start-up sector or national and global brands taking hold of the market—it has become important…

What is better, to be a ‘jack of all trades’ or a ‘master of one’? For HR, the answer probably lies somewhere in the middle. The HR profession, just as the businesses it supports, faces a constant challenge to keep up with the latest trends and update itself. Evolving technology only poses more challenges. The different facets of HR are increasingly being handed over to specialists who have mastered one or two specific HR skills. An HR generalist, who has his hands in a lot of pies, may not deliver results or leverage big data in the same way as…

In the search for top talent, prominent recruiters have been generous in terms of offering compensation. The 2018-20 batch of IIM Indore witnessed a record high stipend being offered, which went up to four lakhs— a full 33 per cent increase as compared to last year. The average stipend offered was 1.54 lakhs, which was again a 24 per cent increase from the previous season. The average offer went up to Rs 2.86 lakhs for the top 100 candidates, while the top 200 were offered a compensation of Rs 2.51 lakh, on an average. Around 24 per cent of the…

We all have been part of groups, clubs or societies in college and school. Generally, such groups come together because the members have common interests. During school and college it provided a great opportunity to bond with other like-minded students. Organisations are now creating similar groups, clubs and societies for its employees. These small groups seem to be doing wonders in achieving the diversity and inclusion agenda. At GE capital, employees have a group called ‘book-reading club’. On the last Friday of each month, for two hours, the employees who were part of the reading club, come together to read…

While the traditional resume does an excellent job of listing out top skills, it may fall short on highlighting other skills which may be as important. A video resume in addition to the traditional one, might just do the trick. At the outset, it should be understood that video resumes cannot be a substitute for their written counterpart. They cannot be used to apply for jobs in every industry. For instance, a video resume will be useless while applying for manufacturing roles or in the medical profession. A video resume adds flair and personality to the application, while highlighting important…

Goldbricking refers to the act of making a worthless item seem valuable. Literally speaking, it is akin to plating an ordinary brick with gold and passing it off as a bullion. In the workplace, it can be related to employees pretending to work hard while hardly working. These are the workers who leave early, intentionally work slowly or take long breaks. In today’s era, when almost every work is done online, goldbricking is also known as cyber-slacking. It can be tough for the organisation and its HR to tackle such counter-productive work behaviour (CPWB). Fortunately, there are ways to manage…

Technology professionals have the luxury of being in demand in today’s world. All thanks to the fast- paced technological change happening across sectors. To keep pace with the demanding market, professionals need top-of-the line training. Three areas in particular are in high demand among enterprise professionals. Cyber security, networking, storage and backup have been found to be the top priorities for organisations along with cloud expertise, Internet of Things (IoT) experience, data and business analytics knowledge, as well as artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) expertise. Modern-day technology professionals are interested in learning and developing their enterprise skills. Byte-sized…

Saba Adil, who has joined Avanse Financial Services as chief people officer (CPO), is looking forward to her stint with the startup in its growth phase. She says, “It’s exciting to join organisations in their growth phase. The fun of building, as well as the energy and positivity are all pervasive and contagious! It’s also the opportunity to make an impact, see your initiatives fructify as the organisation moves to more mature levels! The sense of ownership and the pride of having built something is very fulfilling and therefore, will keep me excited and energised! I do look forward to…

There was a time when romance and affairs in the workplace used to be taboo. However, nowadays they have become acceptable albeit with certain boundaries. But what if they involve two people whose difference in professional positions is way too big? What should the company do then? Last Sunday, McDonald’s, the world’s biggest fast food chain announced that its CEO is stepping down. The Company took this decision after it emerged that Steve Easterbrook, CEO, was in a consensual relationship with an employee, which violated company rules. The board of the Company released a statement saying that Mr. Easterbrook had…