The Tata Group has been bagging headlines for all the wrong reasons of late. As per a report in The Times of India (ToI), 35 employees at Tata Steel were fired for violating the firm’s code of conduct. Three more were fired for sexual misconduct.
The 35 staff members had been indulging in “unacceptable practices’ that were ethically wrong. Complaints had been received from whistleblowers about authority being abused and conflict of interest among others. This had led to thorough investigations.
It hasn’t been long since it came to light that the hiring process at Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) was compromised. A whistleblower complaint revealed that ES Chakravarthy, the global head of the IT major’s resource management group (RMG), had been taking bribes from staffing agencies for years. The RMG handles the hiring within the organisation, and places one person per minute on average! The division has about 3,000 employees and is responsible for placing over a thousand engineers and new hires on projects on a daily basis. Following thorough investigation spread over a few weeks, the head of recruitment was sent on leave, while four senior officials of the RMG were fired. Three staffing firms were also blacklisted.
N Chandrasekaran, chairman, Tata Group, has been advocating an open culture and zero-tolerance policy for some time now. Under his leadership, the Group has been encouraging employees to fearlessly come forward and present any issues they may have with the practices or policies of the firm.
Chandrasekaran is reportedly contemplating creating a role of group chief safety officer for the Tata Group.
