A Mcdonald’s franchise in Florida has struck upon a unique way to draw candidates for interviews. Although sales in the fast food space have gone up, outlets are finding it difficult to hire enough staff. Not many show up for job interviews. Therefore, the Florida outlet has chosen to pay $50 to applicants who appear for the interview. The owner of the restaurant, who runs about 60 McDonald’s outlets in the Tampa area, apparently told his managers to do whatever it takes to entice applicants to come for interviews, because they need to keep their drive-thrus functioning. Surprisingly, even this…
Author: HRK News Bureau
2020: What to learn – what to erase Digital adoption and acceleration have turned out to be the clear winners and differentiators. Every single enterprise, small or large, picked up the thread of digital without worrying about the beginning or the end of the thread as it was important to realise and act rather than worry and wait. From an HR lens, digital skilling has gained auto traction across ranks and hierarchies. The one thing that I would like to erase from my mind is the ‘fear of the unknown’. The pandemic left people with high vulnerability and there were…
An employee working for ConAgra Foods, at a plant in Walworth County, Wisconsin, has held the Company responsible for his wife’s death. The employee, Rigoberto Ruiz, alleges that his employer had not enforced COVID protocols properly. He alleges that no policies were in place to ensure that employees maintained strict social distancing or wore masks at all times inside the plant. According to him, he contracted coronavirus at work and ended up infecting his wife, who later succumbed to the disease. Ruiz claims that supervisors at the plant never pulled up staff who were seen without masks nor did they…
A notice has been issued to Bank of Mahrashtra by the Bombay high court seeking a response to a petition challenging the Bank’s guidelines regarding use of social media by its staff. With the aim of regulating the use of social media by its existing and retired staff, the public-sector bank had issued guidelines to its existing and retired employees, customers, stakeholders and the general public. The guidelines require everyone to seek the Bank’s permission before posting comments or even writing blogs where the Bank or its offerings / services are mentioned. The guidelines apply to Facebook, Wikipedia, Twitter, Instagram…
Following the loss of two of their colleagues to corona, the Secretariat employees of Andhra Pradesh, have requested the state government to allow them to work from home. The president of the AP Secretariat Employees has also tested positive and is in quarantine. The rising number of positive cases has become a cause for concern for the secretariat staff. Of the 3,000-strong Secretariat staff, about 100 seem to have tested positive and many more are awaiting their test results. The employees feel that if not 100 per cent remote working for everyone, at least the staff members who are above…
Sashidhar Jagdishan, CEO, HDFC Bank, began the new financial year by thanking all his colleagues for going beyond the call of duty. In a letter addressed to the employees – HRKatha has got a copy of the letter – Jagdishan wrote that the last financial year was all about the collective strength of the Bank and ensuring proper functioning. He wrote that employee safety was a great concern for the Bank and that it had been working with the concerned authorities to devise ways to improve vaccination for the frontline staff of the Bank. He took the opportunity to urge…
Wat-a-Burger, the Indian burger chain has ambitious plans to expand its current 300-strong team and double it within the next six months. It aims to take its headcount to 600+ in the first two quarters of the new fiscal. The brand, which is focused on expansion in Maharashtra and Karnataka, is majorly looking at talent for its technology and management teams. The brand has recently appointed Rahul Kumar as operations head. Kumar will be responsible for streamlining functions, increasing output, merging tech with day-to-day operations, and so on. Backed by nine years of rich experience in the field of operations,…
2020: What to learn – what to erase The year has presented discontinuities that have impacted everyone without exceptions. However, this has also resulted in creating opportunities to overcome and recalibrate ways of working. At the workplace, resilience and appreciation demonstrated by organisations, their leadership and workforces have been the key defining elements in handling the disruption presented by the pandemic. Enterprises have been tested on what they stand for— their visions, values and organisational culture. Policies and processes have been validated and course correction initiated. The spotlight now shines directly on leadership behaviour at all levels. The skill to…
With organisations across the globe investing more in technological upgradation and speeding up digital transformation, there has been a rise in demand for information technology (IT) services and IT professionals. Not only have the big IT companies been offering attractive incentives, bonuses and increments to their employees, they are set to hire about one lakh freshers from campuses this year. TCS, Infosys, Wipro and HCL Technology together will take on one lakh fresh graduates and IT professionals. It is not just this hiring spree that makes the outlook bright for the IT sector, but the fact that these IT companies…
The special operation group (SOG) of Valsad police caught Bruck Pharma’s technical director, from Daman, along with an associate from Vapi, allegedly selling Remdesivir in the black market. About 18 vials of the injections were seized from them. The police received an alert about the associate, Varun Kundra, selling Remdesivir injection at a higher price than available in the market. The police then approached Kundra posing as a customer and bought one injection at the cost of Rs 12,000. Kundra was later caught when he came to deliver the injection. A total of 12 vials were found in his possession.…
Fractal Analytics, the New York-headquartered artificial intelligence (AI) and analytics company, is gearing to expand its team by about 1,000. Last year, it had added almost 600 to its workforce, including 250 freshers from campuses. In FY22, the Company is looking to add more software engineers and graduates from the humanities stream. The Company, founded by Srikanth Velamakanni, Pranay Agrawal, Nirmal Palaparthi, Pradeep Suryanarayan and Ramakrishna Reddy almost two decades ago, posted a revenue of Rs 1,000 crore and a growth of 16 per cent over 2019-20, at the close of financial year 2021. It now aims to post a…
American information technology firm, DXC Technology, will hire 7,000 freshers from campuses in India this year. Given the rise in demand for talent, the hiring will be 40 per cent more this year, than it was last year when it had hired about 5,000 freshers. The Company has a 40,000-strong workforce in India and employs over a lakh and a half worldwide. The Company will continue to have employees working from home till June this year. Last week, DXC Technology successfully sold its healthcare provider software business to the Dedalus Group. The Company hopes to receive about $450 million from…
Capgemini has tied up with the Indian Institute of Technology (Indian School of Mines) Dhanbad to develop innovative solutions for the aerospace, automotive and manufacturing industries. The partnership aims to foster industry-academia collaboration, particularly in the context of Capgemini Engineering and the application of low-carbon technologies for sustainability. One of the main focus areas is to develop a Model-Based Systems Engineering (MBSE) framework to overcome some of the present challenges in the automotive and aerospace industry, such as product complexity management, net-zero sustainability solutions, enhanced safety, productivity and training in workspaces. Additionally, Capgemini is providing project management, mentoring, funding and…
SK Jain, CHRO, Jindal Stainless is no more. On Friday, April 16, Jain suffered a cardiac attack at his residence. Jain, a seasoned HR professional, was associated with Jindal Stainless for over 28 years. Apart from managing several HR roles, also handled operations at the Company for six years. He joined Jindal Stainless in 1991, and he played a major role in setting up the Company’s compensation and performance management systems, and designing its training processes. Jain started his career as a personnel officer with BHEL, Punjab, where he was elevated to the role of senior personnel officer. He worked with…
More than one lakh employees of Life Insurance Corporation of India (LIC) will receive 16 per cent hike in wages, as approved by the Centre. They will also enjoy a five-day work week. That means all Saturdays will be non-working days. The wage revision will come into effect from August 1, 2017. Employees across cadres will also be eligible for an additional special allowance in the range of Rs 1,500 to Rs 13,500 per month, which shall be used to calculate dearness allowance (DA), but will not count for house rent allowance, city compensatory allowance, privilege leave encashment, gratuity, superannuation…
2020: What to learn – what to erase Clearly, 2020 dispelled big myths around physical presence. While one has to concede that many jobs (like making cars) cannot indeed be done virtually, there certainly are many more smarter ways of working. Meetings, reviews and real-time collaboration are all possible without physical presence. I found people more willing to at least explore an alternative, and change their work style last year. The lack of discipline and empathy, with unending hours at work within a home setting are a bother. There needs to be a ‘switch off’ from work. I have heard…
Data reveals that unemployment in Australia has dropped to a one-year low, and the number of people in jobs has exceeded pre-pandemic levels. This is a good sign of economic recovery. Naturally, shares closed at their highest level in almost 14 months. The unemployment rate fell from 5.8 per cent to a 12-month low of 5.6 per cent in March. Number of hours worked went up from 1,762 million hours to a record high of 1,800 million hours (up 2.2 per cent) to be up 1.2 per cent over the year. The participation rate also rose from 66.1 per cent…
Apna, India’s largest professional-networking platform for blue- and grey-collar workers, has entered into an agreement with the National Skill Development Corporation (NSDC) to provide the first-ever professional-networking platform dedicated to the blue and grey-collar workers. For the first time ever, these candidates will be part of communities based on their verticals and skillsets. The collaboration aims to provide access to the frontline workers to avenues of skill development, training, and community collaboration in their preferred language. This association will enable candidates currently enrolled/ certified through NSDC to build a digital professional identity, network with community, upskill and prepare themselves for…
After posting excellent Q4 results, the best in ten years, employees at Wipro can look forward to receiving skill-based bonuses for domains, such as data analytics and cybersecurity, based on performance. The IT company will be giving hikes to senior staff and also plans to begin hiring. The increments and promotion cycles will be effective starting June 2021. In December 2020, Wipro had announced hikes for junior staff. The Company added about 14,826 employees in FY20-21, of which 3,000 were freshers taken on in the last quarter. The Company’s net profit grew by 27.7 per cent year-on-year to Rs 2,972…
Lenovo India has today announced the appointment of Bhavya Misra, HR director, Pepsico, as the CHRO. Misra will be based out of Bengaluru and will be responsible for driving and heading the people agenda at Lenovo India. In her last role, Misra was the HR business partner for commercial, finance, and IT for Africa, Middle East, and South Asia, at Pepsico. She comes with a little over 13 years of experience in HR, of which she spent over 11 years at PepsiCo. After completing her MBA in HR from MDI, Misra started her career with PepsiCo as a management trainee.…
Atlassian Corporation, Australian software company, is gearing up to expand its India team by about 300 R&D engineers. Globally, it is working towards hiring over 1000 employees, over the next one year. The Company, which provides team collaboration and productivity software, and has a 700-strong workforce right now, is looking for both front-end and back-end engineers. Its R&D and customer-support centre in Bangalore— which is its fastest growing R&D site— is in the process of scaling up its operations. Atlassian, which is known for Jira, Confluence, Bitbucket and Trello, recently unveiled a host of benefits, employee-first policies, as well as…
2021 – changing organisational design Talent acquisition will become increasingly net-based. Predictive AI tools will be used to assess and support hiring decisions. Block- chain will become critical to redefine the talent-acquisition process. New skill-sets and leadership competencies will be sought out. With travelling, physical working and such other limitations losing importance, chances of a more inclusive and diverse workforce (particularly gender, location and age based) will be enhanced. Perennials will emerge as the new workforce segment, replacing the Millennials. Unlike the past, this segment will not be based on age cohorts, but on the basis of the talent capability…
Express Stores, which recently raised seed funding of Rs 8 Crores, led by venture capital firm Venture Highway – founded by Neeraj Arora ex-Whatsapp, Samir Sood, ex Google – is looking to expand its team. The Indian branded omni-channel chain of Bharat’s Kiranas, headquartered in Gurugram, is a 360-degree solution provider, expanding its team across various roles in 2021, as it expects a significant growth momentum in its online and offline business channels. It will hire in the areas of technology, business development, FMCG supply chain and operations. With the fresh hiring, its team is expected to double in strength,…
VMware, a US headquartered cloud computing and virtualisation tech firm, announced that it will enhance its existing wellbeing benefits programme, to allow its employees an opportunity to live a more healthy and balanced life. It will offer all employees an additional wellbeing allowance of Rs 29,565 as equitable reimbursement. If the employees so wish, they can use the wellbeing amount to pay for their vaccination and that of their families. The Company did alter some of its policies to ensure that teams had help and resources to cope with the challenges of the new normal. “At VMware, we believe that…
Infosys will hire more than 25,000 freshers for FY22, of which about 24,000 will be from India. The focus, of course, will be the divisions where attrition is more. The IT major had a 2,59,619-strong workforce as on March 2021, with a significant 38 per cent being women. It posted a net addition of 10,307 employees, while attrition for the quarter stood at 15.2 per cent, compared to 10.3 per cent in Q3. The company saw a net addition of 10,307 employees. In FY21, it took on about 21,000 freshers from the campuses, with a significant 19,000 being taken on…
In a bid to retain employees, Walmart Inc. will shift more of its US workforce to full-time positions. The retailer expects at least two-thirds of its hourly employees becoming full-time staff by the end of January 2022. That means, over a period of a year, there will be about 100,000 additional full-time positions as compared to 2016. Once these employees take on full-time positions, they will be able to follow fixed weekly schedules, which had been a common grouse of its workers. In 2020, amidst the pandemic, Walmart had hired almost half a million people to tackle the rising demand…