Author: Liji Narayan | HRKatha

With India being the third largest start-up ecosystem in the world, and jobseekers getting drawn to start-ups like moths to a bulb, it is time to find out what makes these new workplaces so attractive to young employees. Start-ups in the country are known for their flexibility, open culture, liberal policies and practices. Not surprisingly, they attract the new generation that values freedom and abhors rigidity. But what exactly makes these start-ups such great places to work in other than the fact that their founders are young? Offer a range of advanced and millennial-friendly HR solutions to your young and…

We have all heard of people going green with envy, red with anger and white in shock. In fact, most emotions are colour coded. However, these are not mere expressions to be taken lightly. Colours do actually impact people’s moods! So if you have too many employees feeling blue at work, it is time to resort to some colour therapy at the workplace. The workstations of the employees can have yellow as the dominating colour or a mix of orange and yellow. Yellow makes people feel energetic and is associated with happiness. It is the colour of optimism and hope.…

Have you come across job seekers applying for positions in organisations specifically because they offer good food? There is no dearth of swanky offices in our country today, but there are only a rare few that are known to pamper their workforce through their gastronomic offerings. Offices of Google, TCS, Flipkart and Facebook in India are counted among these. In fact, people joke about putting on weight on joining Google. In today’s busy urban lives, it is a struggle for people to beat the traffic and reach office on time. Most professionals barely manage to gobble a sandwich or gulp…

Are you an employer who is suddenly finding his employee exhibiting sluggishness? Is your employee becoming very irregular? Is one of your staff members looking lost at work? Has she/he been unable to meet deadlines for some time? May be it is not just a bad day that your employee is struggling with. Chances are that she/he is clinically depressed. A couple of years back, a young trainee at Infosys had committed suicide as he considered himself incapable of matching up to the high standards of work expected of him and feared that he may not clear the performance assessment…

It is not difficult to identify the engaged workers. They look visibly happy at the workplace, are willing to put in extra effort and are passionate about their work. However, the employees who are not engaged, are not that easy to identify. Their lack of motivation and passion is not very visible externally. They simply go about doing the work assigned to them mechanically. They care little for performance, excellence, quality and team spirit. If a major part of the workforce comprises such people, the organisation can bid farewell to success and productivity! Time for managers to rise to the…

Holidays are always welcomed by employees as a break to rest, relax and rejuvenate. But it is not easy to snap out of the holiday stupor. After all, the mind and body have disconnected from work, office, meetings, targets, e-mails and the works. To rev the brain and heart and make them focus on work may be easier said than done. Bring back the zeal of your employees and take engagement to new heights after a vacation with Vantage Circle’s Employee Engagement Solutions. Nurture a culture of mutual appreciation, offer exiting employee perks and encourage a healthy lifestyle of your most…

The HR personnel in any organisation work hard to put the right talent in place. They also help arrange for the new entrants to be inducted, trained and settled in. Yet, with the number of job hoppers going up, it is common to find workers quitting an organisation in less than two years. Although the work of sorting resumes, shortlisting the eligible candidates and scheduling interviews has all been taken over by AI, reducing the burden on HR, the quitting of an employee is always bad news. After all, time and effort do go into interviews, induction programmes, training sessions,…

After spending almost fourteen glorious years with the Tata Group, Gajendra Chandel, CHRO, Tata Motors has put in his papers. According to an internal mail circulated amongst the staff, Chandel, who has been with Tata Motors as member corporate executive committee and chief human resources officer since April, 2014, is now planning to pursue his own entrepreneurial venture. He has confirmed to HR Katha that he now wishes to help nurture start-ups. “We all have two lives. The second one starts when we realise we only have one. Venturing on my own now, I am looking forward to work with…

Change, innovation, technology, progress, advancement, and cultural shift are just some of the terms that are thrown around in the corporate world today. With changes taking place every day and every minute, organisations can never be prepared enough for the future, when it comes to the systems they use. How can they ensure that their systems will be able to survive in the future? What should organisations do to ensure that their systems are ready to take on the challenges that lie ahead? Will it be enough to combine applications, data and infrastructure? No. It is important to also put…

Gone are the days when organisations boasted of having friendly policies in place to help working mothers straddle their personal and professional commitments. The corporate world today realises that the male employees, especially the fathers also need help to play good husbands and fathers. The annual survey that results in the Working Mother 100 Best Companies list decided to focus on working fathers this year. In doing so, it came to light that certain progressive organisations have recognised and accepted the fact that fathers also nurture the desire to be actively involved in the upbringing of their children, and that…

Digital transformation is not easy to achieve. Besides technological hurdles, there are many barriers that obstruct its path, the biggest one pertaining to organisational culture. It is much simpler to upgrade an existing technology or even introduce the latest technology. However, creating an environment and culture that is conducive to digital transformation is a different ball game altogether. According to a study by Singapore Management University in partnership with Tata Communications, DBS and KPMG, 87 per cent of the respondents admitted that culture created bigger hurdles in digital transformation than technology. “A closer look at organisations that have undergone or…

Organisations in India are taking the health and wellness of their workforce very seriously. As per a recent study by Willis Towers Watson, the global advisory, broking and solutions company, organisations have now realised that their employees’ health and physical and mental well-being is as important as their financial well-being. 66 per cent of organisations have already taken, or are seriously considering mental health strategy for their staff in the next three years. Presently, only eight per cent of employers offer programmes to support chronic behavioural health problems, but 59 per cent are planning to offer them sometime soon. 63…

Google has committed to changing the way it handles sexual misconduct cases, following its workforce staging a walk-out from its offices across the globe recently. The workers protested following a report that the Company had terminated 48 employees, including senior officials, who were accused of sexual misconduct. The employees had expressed their disapproval of the manner in which such cases were treated at Google. With an aim to calm the discontented employees, Sundar Pichai, CEO, Google, revealed the alterations the Company plans to make in its policies so that sexual harassment cases and complaints are handled better in future. Pichai…

NIRA — the digital credit provider and HR’s answer to offering financial assistance to employees in need without going through the awkwardness of getting into their personal and private issues — just closed an important round of seed funding worth a million dollars. The fintech start-up that ties up with corporates to provide small credit to employees with limited access to traditional avenues of finance, today announced it had received $1 million in seed funding from angel investors in the UK and India. The funds will be used to accelerate the establishment of the core team and acquisition of relevant…

Though it is a matter of pride that this century has seen women excelling as leaders and not just mothers, wives, care givers and professionals, we are not surprised to see more men than women in leadership positions. While there may be many all-women organisations and a sizeable population of women across hierarchies in various companies, the top positions on the corporate ladder are still dominated by men. Why is that so? Women do not lack the qualities that are necessary in leaders. In fact, they seem to be blessed with all the traits that are essential in leadership positions.…

It is common knowledge that successful businesses stand on the qualities and strengths of their workforce. When it comes to small businesses, the role and reliability of the employees takes on greater significance, especially when it comes to keeping customers satisfied and fulfilling their expectations and demands. The challenges faced by small business owners are more because they have to juggle various roles. Even the smallest of mistakes, especially in the HR department, can shake the foundation of the business. Owners of small businesses often have the required funds to invest and possess knowledge of the concerned field or product(s).…

It is true that an organisation’s growth is directly proportional to its employees’ health. If your employees are ill, they will take sick leave frequently. Their irregularity will affect productivity. The recuperating employees usually tend to take long to get back to normal and slow down their team members too. The low energy levels of unhealthy employees reduce the pace of work and adversely affect the overall positivity of the work environment. These are reasons enough to sit up and take note of your workforce’s health needs. Most organisations have gyms and play areas within the office. Offices of today…

Going by the revelations of the State of Working India 2018 report, the country’s women are a long way from enjoying what they truly deserve. The Report by the Centre for Sustainable Environment (CSE), Azim Premji University, reveals many interesting facts about the state of work and workers in the country. It is a mixed bag — of positives and negatives alike. Let us take a look at what it has to say, especially about women workers in the country. The brighter aspects first — Between 2010 and 2015, wages, factoring in inflation, grew at two per cent per year…

How difficult is it to look for a needle in a haystack? Well, recruiters and HR professionals will endorse the aptness of this idiom when it comes to looking for the right talent. With the innumerable resumes that are available to choose from, shortlisting the best and then zeroing in on the ones you wish to hire, and that too within a limited time, can be a huge challenge. This is where knowledge of Boolean search comes in handy. Now that digital recruiting tools are here to stay, Boolean search should definitely be of interest to HR departments—if they are…

Most of the corporate workforce sees automation as this big monster that gobbles up humans, or rather, their jobs. There is no doubt that the automation wave is getting stronger day by day. With the media sharing scary statistics day in and day out, it is no longer hard to believe headlines announcing loss of millions of jobs to machines and artificial intelligence. But it is time to look at the bright side. Millions of jobs will also be created. Not everything can be done by machines. Therefore, for those who wish to protect their careers, the best strategy is…

When you visit hill stations, you will often hear the constant singing of cicadas, which can get rather annoying for those who are not native to the region. However, you will find that the locals go about their business without even noticing that incessant noise. This is because they are habituated to it. They hear it continuously on a daily basis and have learnt to tune it out. Thus, habituation may be described as the phenomenon wherein an individual exhibits the tendency to ignore a certain stimulus to which he has been exposed frequently. Instances of habituation are many. You…

In a unique move to contribute towards the environment, the Indore Municipal Corporation (IMC) has instructed its employees to set up compost units at their houses to dispose of wet waste. According to the Municipal Commissioner, Asheesh Singh, this dictate is part of the 3Rs initiative—reduce, reuse, recycle—wherein it is important to dispose waste at source. This is IMC’s way to promote home composting in the city. By making home composting compulsory for its own staff, IMC is attempting to show the way and hence, encourage people to set up their own compost units at home. All the officers and…

Here is yet another reason why organisations should focus on hiring more women and also encouraging them to take on leadership roles – women are more likely to remain with an organisation than men! Also, at the C-suite level, the rate of attrition of women is only four per cent, whereas it is eight per cent for men! However, men are more likely to be promoted to mid-management levels as compared to women, and the hiring of women has fallen by 2.5 per cent in the last one year. These facts came up in a study done by the AVTAR…

Imagine a joint family that consists of three or four generations living under one roof. Ever wondered what keeps things harmonious and what keeps them together? While a lot of adjustment and understanding goes into making a joint family work, it is also all about how each of the members accepts and respects the generational differences. Each generation has different motivators, for instance, in a typical Indian multigenerational family, while the grandparents may spend their leisure time taking strolls in a park or joining social clubs, the youngsters may be happier going clubbing or taking adventure trips with friends. Similarly,…