I had the good fortune of meeting a senior HR professional the other day who has moved from a global IT major to a Family run 50000+ crore Indian MNC. I will leave the other stuff out and focus on the most striking aspect.
It seems there were a few employees who were neither working nor letting others work. Truly in the IT fashion, the HR head suggested "sack them". The Chairman (one from the family) flatly refused - instead SHOUTED for an hour at the guys who werent working and sent them back to work! Later in the day, he had lunch with them!
Look at the stark contrast. We seem to be forgetting the inclusivity found in Indian values and culture - instead trying to ape the "performance driven" culture pontified by the west.
This is much like a story I read when I was in school. A gentleman once consulted his neighbour on the rolls of wall paper needed for his home (both their houses were of the same dimensions and architecture). The neighbour most gladly prescribed 16 rolls of wallpaper since he had bought 16 rolls while papering his house.
Once the gentleman completed papering his house, he found to his dismay that 4 rolls were left unused. He rushed to his neighbour's house to 'investigate' this issue. The neighbour's eyes brightened up when he learnt of the 4 unused rolls and said "Oh! This is uncanny! Even I have 4 unused rolls fromt eh 16 rolls that I bought"!!
All I am trying to say is that in our eagerness to bring in business, we seem ready to forget our own wisdom and reasoning. And then we conduct concalls to discus worklife balance issues...
Happy Independance day!!
-Sid
Tuesday, August 14, 2007
Wednesday, August 08, 2007
Recording behaviours in a LGD
Have BIs along columns and record behaviours in rows. Tick each relevant Matrixed cell.
Easier during final evaluation!!
Easier during final evaluation!!
Wednesday, August 01, 2007
Have you visioned today?
Sorry if I make it sound frivolous like "have you brushed today?" Couple of thoughts in this article..
First things first. Do any bit of measurement in the behavioural domain, and you will want to look at validity and reliability - prominent among them being Construct validity - have you defined what you want to measure and are you measuring that very same thing. Simple naa!
Now apply this to a real life situation. Have you defined what you want to do and are you doing what is needed to reach your goals?
Now you must have linked it all up with Visioning I guess. This is the very line of thinking. Think of HR. I learn from my colleagues in the industry that they have, BU HR, SBU HR, LOB HR, CORPORATE HR (and probably a Inter galactic HR as well in the near future that is) in most companies.
But, have the HR departments crafted a vision for themselves? Have they gone back to the business and asked "what do you want from HR" and then used the same for crafting a vision for themselves? Unfortunately, the answer is often NO.
Possible fallouts are feelings of Role erosion, role ambiguity and an overall feeling of learned helplessness from the lowest rung of HR folks. Next "milestone" - massive HR attrition!
Think about it, let me know!
-Sid
First things first. Do any bit of measurement in the behavioural domain, and you will want to look at validity and reliability - prominent among them being Construct validity - have you defined what you want to measure and are you measuring that very same thing. Simple naa!
Now apply this to a real life situation. Have you defined what you want to do and are you doing what is needed to reach your goals?
Now you must have linked it all up with Visioning I guess. This is the very line of thinking. Think of HR. I learn from my colleagues in the industry that they have, BU HR, SBU HR, LOB HR, CORPORATE HR (and probably a Inter galactic HR as well in the near future that is) in most companies.
But, have the HR departments crafted a vision for themselves? Have they gone back to the business and asked "what do you want from HR" and then used the same for crafting a vision for themselves? Unfortunately, the answer is often NO.
Possible fallouts are feelings of Role erosion, role ambiguity and an overall feeling of learned helplessness from the lowest rung of HR folks. Next "milestone" - massive HR attrition!
Think about it, let me know!
-Sid
Monday, July 30, 2007
Touching up scratches
Was thinking about the numerous scratches that vehicles in Bangalore have everyday.. I myself went in for a non-metallic white for my car thanks to this aspect.
How about we have "tattoo"-like metallic paint that can be peeled away and stuck on the scratches? Buy into the idea?
How about we have "tattoo"-like metallic paint that can be peeled away and stuck on the scratches? Buy into the idea?
Saturday, June 23, 2007
Agnostic designations
Considering the fact that promotions are often based on "perform the next role and u will move" maxim, competency mapping for designations from an "adopt an existing model" approach is all set to run into rough weather.
Career planning in terms of a designation framework might lead to three dimensional complexities in terms of domain, designation and roles being performed.
Much like in algebraic equations, what is required is to reduce the number of dimensions. So which one of them would you reduce? Designations! Make designations agnostic to roles and you will find people wanting to MAKE roles rather than TAKE roles. You will also have lesser number of people wanting designation-promotions as well as a reduction in social promotions. People would start running after meatier roles - 'coz what will matter will be the "kind of work" I do, rather than, "what I am called".
How will you handle those with a higher designation centered work value? Ensure that the role-agnostic designations are flashy! Simple na? (Remember Uncle Appu Kuttan on Radio city? :-) )
Cheers!
Siddhu
Career planning in terms of a designation framework might lead to three dimensional complexities in terms of domain, designation and roles being performed.
Much like in algebraic equations, what is required is to reduce the number of dimensions. So which one of them would you reduce? Designations! Make designations agnostic to roles and you will find people wanting to MAKE roles rather than TAKE roles. You will also have lesser number of people wanting designation-promotions as well as a reduction in social promotions. People would start running after meatier roles - 'coz what will matter will be the "kind of work" I do, rather than, "what I am called".
How will you handle those with a higher designation centered work value? Ensure that the role-agnostic designations are flashy! Simple na? (Remember Uncle Appu Kuttan on Radio city? :-) )
Cheers!
Siddhu
Sunday, May 13, 2007
Getting to the roots
"I am a researcher" said a researcher... "am a better one at that" said a cook.
Both were correct. May be the socially recognised vectors may differ for both, but, think about it! The cook tends to find out what the family wants before proceeding to soot the kitchen...
Often, we seem to forget to to the requirements gathering in our ever ready enthusiasm to deliver results. How often do we go to the stakeholders and ask them "what do you want from HR this month/ quarter"... probably the first two times, they would jump on us and give us a list of unactioned transactions... the third time onwards, they would have to start thinking... A great opportunity for us!
Think about it, let me know..
Sid
Both were correct. May be the socially recognised vectors may differ for both, but, think about it! The cook tends to find out what the family wants before proceeding to soot the kitchen...
Often, we seem to forget to to the requirements gathering in our ever ready enthusiasm to deliver results. How often do we go to the stakeholders and ask them "what do you want from HR this month/ quarter"... probably the first two times, they would jump on us and give us a list of unactioned transactions... the third time onwards, they would have to start thinking... A great opportunity for us!
Think about it, let me know..
Sid
Motivation??
Yeah.. am back
Was conducting a workshop for senior managers on managing performance, when I was explaining the Vroom's expectancy model... awesome piece of thought actually.. clearly helps put down motivation in an equation!!
What caught my attention was that it spoke about E, V and I in a positive context... Never spoke about the situation like "if u dont do ur work, u will lose ur job", or, "if you want to retain ur job, do this bit of work"...
Think about it! Let me know...
Sid
Was conducting a workshop for senior managers on managing performance, when I was explaining the Vroom's expectancy model... awesome piece of thought actually.. clearly helps put down motivation in an equation!!
What caught my attention was that it spoke about E, V and I in a positive context... Never spoke about the situation like "if u dont do ur work, u will lose ur job", or, "if you want to retain ur job, do this bit of work"...
Think about it! Let me know...
Sid
Saturday, March 17, 2007
Extended childhood
A few months ago, a 40+ years old guy in a company was a little jumpy 'coz his revised salary hadn't been updated in the payroll and his monthly requirement was 50K to payoff his EMIs! After the regular ego massage, he cooled down and said that he did not depend on his salary! His father paid all his bills.........
Considering a generation that has spent 30+ years in PSUs, the next generation(growing at a healthy rate) seems to be quite comfortably into an extended childhood! This very segment seems to contribute generously to the mall culture.
One other interesting possible offshoot is in the area of multiple careers in a lifetime. The driver seems to be a certain self propelling mode in the west, while it is one of comfort zone and economic extended childhood in India.
Could lead to issues for retention. Hikes may not be simple hikes. They would transalate into a "how much does my company want me" factor. If there is enough work on changing this mindset, apart from the hygiene factor salary increase, a paradigm shift in the way of running the business is in the offing.....
- Siddharth
PS: Thanks to a new found Gem of a friend for powerful insights (and a nice place for ice cream)
Considering a generation that has spent 30+ years in PSUs, the next generation(growing at a healthy rate) seems to be quite comfortably into an extended childhood! This very segment seems to contribute generously to the mall culture.
One other interesting possible offshoot is in the area of multiple careers in a lifetime. The driver seems to be a certain self propelling mode in the west, while it is one of comfort zone and economic extended childhood in India.
Could lead to issues for retention. Hikes may not be simple hikes. They would transalate into a "how much does my company want me" factor. If there is enough work on changing this mindset, apart from the hygiene factor salary increase, a paradigm shift in the way of running the business is in the offing.....
- Siddharth
PS: Thanks to a new found Gem of a friend for powerful insights (and a nice place for ice cream)
Sunday, February 18, 2007
The lungi dance!
A good friend of mine and I were discussing cats and their interesting personality traits when I remembered a few incidents that happened or used to happen with regular frequency...
A momma cat had once decided to place a kitten of hers in my house. Yeah, unilaterally decided to increase the headcount at my place (forgive the HR terminology). This was when I was in second standard. A few impassioned pleas from me ensured that the kitten got it's appointment letter and confirmation immediately. So began the story.
The cat wasn't allowed into the house those days and was given it's own quarters in a wooden box mounted atop a cement stand in the garden, but, nevertheless enjoyed the warmer precincts found under the then newly purchased Premier Padmini at home.
An uncle of mine had come down on deputation for shortwhile and being the proactive kind offered to lock the gate every night. It would be useful to point out that this gentleman wasn't too pet friendly, he used to maintain a stoic indifference at best that he thought hid the underlying apathy (more antipathy than apathy). Every night would see a certain (what I thought was hillarious) performance with a few variations thrown in for variety.
He would descend down the steps into the garden, bedecked in a lungi, gingerly holding a Navtal lock and a key. He would very discretely (or so he thought) look around for the fur-red fiend and start off towards the gate. His fiend had in it's mind decided that the lungi was it's plaything. So began the performance (with me peering out of the window and giggling as silently as possible).
It would begin with a soft 'mew' from the cat who would be seated strategically under the car. This would trigger a reflex 'look all around' response from unc. Sensing a passing of danger, he would gleefully rush towards the gate and lock it, returning slowly between the car and the compund wall.
The meow would be repeated at this point and would be followed by a meow meow alongwith a sincere "I am a friend not a fiend" look on the face while trying to play with the lungi. The poor chap (unc) used to be terrified and reply with a shoo shoo. The script would go like this:
Wraaoooum
Ay hrmmggmm (done with a closed mouth)
Meow?
Shoo shoo
Mew mew (tempo picked up)
Go, go away
The cat used to make strategic intrusions near the 'lungi territory' which left the poor guy totally go bonkers with terror writ all over his face.
By the time unc reached the door, the cat had had its exercise for the day and the grr grr s were louder from unc than all the tom cats in the neighbourhood algebraically summed.
Post script:
Uncle's family landed up in Bangalore the next year and aunt adopted a cat who had unrestricted entry to all areas of his house. Poor guy!
Continuing ta(i)les:
The following incident happened with the same cat, and included my cousin as a stakeholder.
The guy (a few months older than me) was 'instructed' by his mom - "no touching the cat with hands". Displaying a rare legal competency at that age of 8, he probably read the instruction carefully and decided to touch the cat anyways, but with a newspaper covering his hands.
Off he went with the day's newspaper, at top speed, trying to befriend the cat making all kinds of "I have some food for you" noises. Information overload and dissonance was writ large on the cat's physiognomy since the poor thing only saw a nut rushing towards it with a huuuuuge newspaper in both hands and yet making friendly noises!
The chase continued for a few minutes all over the garden, under the coffee shrub, across the hibiscus plant (where the editorial came to rest) until the guy spotted a rather large spider. That was enough for his to land up on his mom's lap, a whimpering poor kid!!
The cat was quite relieved as well.
The newspaper was then retrived from the garden and the editorial columns had a generous coating of the 'friendly neighborhood' bandicoot's intestinal ourpourings.
~ Siddhu
A momma cat had once decided to place a kitten of hers in my house. Yeah, unilaterally decided to increase the headcount at my place (forgive the HR terminology). This was when I was in second standard. A few impassioned pleas from me ensured that the kitten got it's appointment letter and confirmation immediately. So began the story.
The cat wasn't allowed into the house those days and was given it's own quarters in a wooden box mounted atop a cement stand in the garden, but, nevertheless enjoyed the warmer precincts found under the then newly purchased Premier Padmini at home.
An uncle of mine had come down on deputation for shortwhile and being the proactive kind offered to lock the gate every night. It would be useful to point out that this gentleman wasn't too pet friendly, he used to maintain a stoic indifference at best that he thought hid the underlying apathy (more antipathy than apathy). Every night would see a certain (what I thought was hillarious) performance with a few variations thrown in for variety.
He would descend down the steps into the garden, bedecked in a lungi, gingerly holding a Navtal lock and a key. He would very discretely (or so he thought) look around for the fur-red fiend and start off towards the gate. His fiend had in it's mind decided that the lungi was it's plaything. So began the performance (with me peering out of the window and giggling as silently as possible).
It would begin with a soft 'mew' from the cat who would be seated strategically under the car. This would trigger a reflex 'look all around' response from unc. Sensing a passing of danger, he would gleefully rush towards the gate and lock it, returning slowly between the car and the compund wall.
The meow would be repeated at this point and would be followed by a meow meow alongwith a sincere "I am a friend not a fiend" look on the face while trying to play with the lungi. The poor chap (unc) used to be terrified and reply with a shoo shoo. The script would go like this:
Wraaoooum
Ay hrmmggmm (done with a closed mouth)
Meow?
Shoo shoo
Mew mew (tempo picked up)
Go, go away
The cat used to make strategic intrusions near the 'lungi territory' which left the poor guy totally go bonkers with terror writ all over his face.
By the time unc reached the door, the cat had had its exercise for the day and the grr grr s were louder from unc than all the tom cats in the neighbourhood algebraically summed.
Post script:
Uncle's family landed up in Bangalore the next year and aunt adopted a cat who had unrestricted entry to all areas of his house. Poor guy!
Continuing ta(i)les:
The following incident happened with the same cat, and included my cousin as a stakeholder.
The guy (a few months older than me) was 'instructed' by his mom - "no touching the cat with hands". Displaying a rare legal competency at that age of 8, he probably read the instruction carefully and decided to touch the cat anyways, but with a newspaper covering his hands.
Off he went with the day's newspaper, at top speed, trying to befriend the cat making all kinds of "I have some food for you" noises. Information overload and dissonance was writ large on the cat's physiognomy since the poor thing only saw a nut rushing towards it with a huuuuuge newspaper in both hands and yet making friendly noises!
The chase continued for a few minutes all over the garden, under the coffee shrub, across the hibiscus plant (where the editorial came to rest) until the guy spotted a rather large spider. That was enough for his to land up on his mom's lap, a whimpering poor kid!!
The cat was quite relieved as well.
The newspaper was then retrived from the garden and the editorial columns had a generous coating of the 'friendly neighborhood' bandicoot's intestinal ourpourings.
~ Siddhu
Tuesday, February 13, 2007
What is it?
What is it...
with HR professionals and Cats?
The wicked VP - HR in Dilbert is a cat.
I am a HR guy, I love cats.
This is much like the conversation I had the other day with a researcher. Helped me get my frame in place.
My thought was a corollary of an article in TOI. The article spoke about employees with a 'bad' attitude. Out of my experience, I knew that more often than not, this titled is splotched on employees who seem to have a low tolerance to show of authority. Sounds familiar? You bet!!
Read up on Hofstede's 5 dimensions and one finds that he defines power-distance bottom up not top down. That is, the tolerance that a person / society has towards others exhibiting power-distance. I have put it very loosely described. Read up more on what he has written when you have time.
Coming back, I proposed a hypothesis on my thought - employees branded as having 'bad attitude' more often than not seem to have a low power distance. The researcher's perspective on this disproved it in a minute. How? Think about it and leave a comment. Will tell you if you are on track.
Siddhu
with HR professionals and Cats?
The wicked VP - HR in Dilbert is a cat.
I am a HR guy, I love cats.
This is much like the conversation I had the other day with a researcher. Helped me get my frame in place.
My thought was a corollary of an article in TOI. The article spoke about employees with a 'bad' attitude. Out of my experience, I knew that more often than not, this titled is splotched on employees who seem to have a low tolerance to show of authority. Sounds familiar? You bet!!
Read up on Hofstede's 5 dimensions and one finds that he defines power-distance bottom up not top down. That is, the tolerance that a person / society has towards others exhibiting power-distance. I have put it very loosely described. Read up more on what he has written when you have time.
Coming back, I proposed a hypothesis on my thought - employees branded as having 'bad attitude' more often than not seem to have a low power distance. The researcher's perspective on this disproved it in a minute. How? Think about it and leave a comment. Will tell you if you are on track.
Siddhu
Thursday, December 14, 2006
Thursday, October 05, 2006
Resonance frequency??
Of late, whenever I get stuck in a traffic jam right on top of a fly-over, yes, right on top of a flyover, from where the only means of escape is a ejection seat with a parachute, I have felt like I am sitting on one of the forks of a tuning fork.
At the beginning, I thought that it was the wind at that altitude (yeah, as if we are talking of 15000 ft above mean sea level). No, there was no wind. I thought, it was due to fast moving traffic in the opposite direction. No. It happened even when there was no traffic. That was when I thought about the concept of resonance. With most vehicles idling (not to be mistaken with making idlies) and the rpm being close to 1000rpm, could it be possible that the flyover's natural frequency is close to it? Which means, when enough numbr of vehicles start idling on the flyover, the flyover would start moving rather violently!
Hope someone somewhere who is supposed to read this post reads it and checks the natural frequency of the flyover over Diary circle....
~Sid
At the beginning, I thought that it was the wind at that altitude (yeah, as if we are talking of 15000 ft above mean sea level). No, there was no wind. I thought, it was due to fast moving traffic in the opposite direction. No. It happened even when there was no traffic. That was when I thought about the concept of resonance. With most vehicles idling (not to be mistaken with making idlies) and the rpm being close to 1000rpm, could it be possible that the flyover's natural frequency is close to it? Which means, when enough numbr of vehicles start idling on the flyover, the flyover would start moving rather violently!
Hope someone somewhere who is supposed to read this post reads it and checks the natural frequency of the flyover over Diary circle....
~Sid
Monday, October 02, 2006
Perspective...
A senior VP operations was recently sharing his experiences with a few of us juniors when he in no uncertain terms told us that HR was all about understanding the business - which means understanding the macro picture of how money comes in and wealth is created. He, for one, used his HR folks as a sounding board before taking business decisions, for getting a different perspective on things. Being a core operations guy, his insights were amazing... "HR guys are clerks if they do not know the business as deeply as the business head knows"
Doesn't this somewhere sound a lot like the Raja Rishis of yore? Well read, mentored guys with powerful insights into day to day operations, right hand guys for the business head!
Think about it... will write in detail about mentoring for HR guys sometime...
Naga Sid
Doesn't this somewhere sound a lot like the Raja Rishis of yore? Well read, mentored guys with powerful insights into day to day operations, right hand guys for the business head!
Think about it... will write in detail about mentoring for HR guys sometime...
Naga Sid
Sunday, October 01, 2006
Are we short of HR professionals?
Are we short of ‘good’ HR Professionals?
I met a senior HR professional recently who confided that it took atleast six months if not more to close any open HR position. He said, “There is a shortage of good HR professionals”. I was shocked. More than shocked. With the brands in our country spewing out a multitude of bright eyed youngsters who seem to get placed in their pre-final semesters, how could this be true?
Let us look at different facets of this problem. There seems to be a distinct disconnect between possessing competencies and being effective! Does this demonstrate an inherent dichotomy? A competency can be understood as “with everything else being equal, the person with a competency performs better than one who doesn’t posses the competency”. On closer examination, one realizes that there isn’t a dichotomy. A position competency should be situational. Often in hurry to ‘implement’ a competency model, companies tend to ‘borrow’ competencies and behavioural indicators. This is something like wanting your kid to behave like your neighbour – despite your neighbour’s house being very different from yours! Ditto is the situation with business schools. True that there are generic competencies, but then, generic competencies are effective only when crossed and embedded in second level or higher competencies which are environment specific.
Many management schools seem to be churning out finished products giving attention to the generic competencies, not paying attention to what the customer (industry) wants! There has been one effort where the customer need centricity has seen to pay off rich dividends and that is in a reputed institute in Gurgaon which most audaciously picked the brains of the top HR professionals of the country, framed their curriculum and stood by it. If success were to be measured by placements, the first batch was lapped up in four hours flat, and, twice over!
It has been my own experience while conducting interviews that specific skills are sometimes missing among HR position aspirants. These include working knowledge of tools such as Excel as well as gaping holes in knowledge of rudimentary concepts. On the other hand there is no lack in the ability of aspirants to conceptualise and strategise! Jenelik as early as 1976 has described this phenomenon where students of management are made to get used to virtual power and decision making abilities in business schools. Thus, there is an urgent need to relook at whether enough attention is being given to those competencies that are required or it remains to be a behavioural indicator of bounded willpower on the part of the management schools!
With the industry clearly defining competencies required by HR professionals in frameworks such as COMPMOD of CII-NHRDN, it is now the turn of management schools and students of HR to come together and draw up an action plan to ensure the development of competencies that are required by the industry. Afterall it is the era of being responsive to customer needs which determines if one is at the table or on the table. Period.
S.Naga Siddharth
I met a senior HR professional recently who confided that it took atleast six months if not more to close any open HR position. He said, “There is a shortage of good HR professionals”. I was shocked. More than shocked. With the brands in our country spewing out a multitude of bright eyed youngsters who seem to get placed in their pre-final semesters, how could this be true?
Let us look at different facets of this problem. There seems to be a distinct disconnect between possessing competencies and being effective! Does this demonstrate an inherent dichotomy? A competency can be understood as “with everything else being equal, the person with a competency performs better than one who doesn’t posses the competency”. On closer examination, one realizes that there isn’t a dichotomy. A position competency should be situational. Often in hurry to ‘implement’ a competency model, companies tend to ‘borrow’ competencies and behavioural indicators. This is something like wanting your kid to behave like your neighbour – despite your neighbour’s house being very different from yours! Ditto is the situation with business schools. True that there are generic competencies, but then, generic competencies are effective only when crossed and embedded in second level or higher competencies which are environment specific.
Many management schools seem to be churning out finished products giving attention to the generic competencies, not paying attention to what the customer (industry) wants! There has been one effort where the customer need centricity has seen to pay off rich dividends and that is in a reputed institute in Gurgaon which most audaciously picked the brains of the top HR professionals of the country, framed their curriculum and stood by it. If success were to be measured by placements, the first batch was lapped up in four hours flat, and, twice over!
It has been my own experience while conducting interviews that specific skills are sometimes missing among HR position aspirants. These include working knowledge of tools such as Excel as well as gaping holes in knowledge of rudimentary concepts. On the other hand there is no lack in the ability of aspirants to conceptualise and strategise! Jenelik as early as 1976 has described this phenomenon where students of management are made to get used to virtual power and decision making abilities in business schools. Thus, there is an urgent need to relook at whether enough attention is being given to those competencies that are required or it remains to be a behavioural indicator of bounded willpower on the part of the management schools!
With the industry clearly defining competencies required by HR professionals in frameworks such as COMPMOD of CII-NHRDN, it is now the turn of management schools and students of HR to come together and draw up an action plan to ensure the development of competencies that are required by the industry. Afterall it is the era of being responsive to customer needs which determines if one is at the table or on the table. Period.
S.Naga Siddharth
Thursday, September 28, 2006
Changing the colour of the skies - making transformation a habit
Capt. Gopinath is Managing Director of Air Deccan, a unit of Deccan Aviation Private Limited, India’s largest private heli-charter company. A graduate of the National Defence Academy, he has served in the army. Gopinath also has to his credit, the Rolex award for ecological site farming and is also the recipient of the Wipro PRSI Award.
What is transformation?
Rapid change perceived as desirable only after it has happened.
Act I Scene I: Transformation of land
Just out of the army, Capt.Gopinath returned to his village in Karnataka to find that his family's land had been acquired due to the construction of a dam over a nearby river. The land allotted to his family as compensation was arid and was widely perceived as uncultivatable. With no other options in sight, he packed rations, a rifle, his army tent, his pet dog and travelled with one farm labourer to the allotted land.
He toiled day and night and planted coconut saplings as also other plants. Plants were selected and positioned after carefully analysing the soil and the geography. After months of toiling, (during which he used to be ridiculed by others for toiling on dry land) the land started showing it's innate potential. The carefully planned planting of fast growing trees helped bind the soil. The now homogenous soil began retaining water. The 'uncultivatable' land seemed to have woken up from deep slumber! To this day, his farm is known for not using pesticides and the like. It 'lives and grows naturally' and needless to say, keeps Gopi's accountant very busy.
Act I Scene II: Transformation of silk production
With his farm yeilding results, Capt.Gopinath started considering silk farming as a viable business. He found that using bamboo as a substrate for rearing silk worms was something that no one else had thought of and implemented. Using bamboo racks for rearing silk worms cut costs drastically and improved yields since bamboo made the racks sturdier and made them usable over multiple rearing cycles. This one innovation is lauded to this day and earned Gopi the Prestigious ROLEX award for ecological site farming.
Act II Scene I: Heli business
One of his sojourns to his farms was with a colleague from his army days in an army helicopter. He loved the experience. The then Chief Minister of Andhra Pradesh extended an open invite to entrepreneurs in one of his drives to boost the economy. The ever vigilant Captain spotted the business potential in starting a heli-charter company. Gopi and his friends rented a helicopter and flew it down into Hyderabad one foggy morning. They went straight to the CM's residence - because they did not know where else to go! Deccan Aviation won it's first client. Today, Deccan Aviation is India's largest helicopter operator next only to the defense services! With bases across the country, they have offered variants in their services such as heli-ambulance.
Act II Scene II: Flying a billion people
On one of his trips to the US, he learnt that the number of persons that flew annually there was higher than the population of of two states in india put together. The model of Ryan Air and Southwest airlines drew his attention. That was enough to launch him into what would lead to the transformation of the Indian skies - Air Deccan
The Indian aviation sector had witnessed the shakeout of the 90s and people considered aviation as a business where you could become a millionaire very easily - if you entered the business as a billionaire in the first place. The well networked lobby controlled the prices of air tickets and a one way ticket from Bangalore to Delhi costed anywhere from Rs.8000 to Rs. 20000. All this was to change.
Air Deccan's business model was different,.... quite different
Smaller aircraft such as ATRs with higher fuel efficiency were inducted. Smaller aircrafts meant lower landing and parking fees and quicker turnaround times. Quicker turnaround times meant longer times in the skies, which meant higher revenues ("an aircraft earns money only when flying not when parked in the bay" as Gopi says). Aircraft space was for sale for advertising. For the first time, you could see NDTV on the tail cone of an aircraft, Sun Microsystems near the landing gear, Chevrolet on headrests of seats and Wipro under the cockpit fuselage! Pilots had to pay for their training, airhostesses got a share of the revenue earned from sales on board and the HR team was two members strong for the first year of operations!
When asked about competition from the other airlines, Gopi categorically stated that his actual competition was from the railways! (This seems to have been proved right with the Railway Minister recently announcing a second round of fare cuts for AC class tickets)
Nothing is free on an Air Deccan flight. When asked "Surely, you can at least offer water?", he had this to say: "Look, we flew 1.5 million passengers last year. If we made provisions for free water, it would have been consumed by the flight crew, the airport staff and others as well. In the process, we would have ended up spending Rs 3 crore on water alone. It is not feasible for us. We need to educate the customers instead of asking them what is on their wish list. If you need something, you may as well pay for it. In this way, we have been able to save 20 per cent on distribution costs and turned our cost centres into revenue centres."
A strong focus on costs made it possible to introduce tickets for fares of Re.1 and Rs.500. Even today, the taxes are often higher than the ticket cost on an Air Deccan flight!
Has he succeeded at transforming the Indian skies? You bet!! From one aircraft and two routes a day, Air Deccan has grown to a fleet of 36 aircraft. It offers 270 flights a day and 55 destinations across the country at a 98% ontime performance. All this in three years flat.
The Impact
Indian skies have changed colour. New airlines such as Spicejet, Go, Indigo, Kingfisher, Paramount and Air India Express have made their appearance in what was considered a 'closed' industry. Today, the average price of a ticket from Bangalore to Delhi is around Rs.2500. Check fares have made their appearance. Airports are being modernised. Interior towns that were economically soporific are twitching their noses at the waft from freshly minted green papyrus.
Capt. Gopinath seems to have changed the altitude (and attitude?) of flying in India. Like he says "making a billion dreams fly".
What is transformation?
Rapid change perceived as desirable only after it has happened.
Act I Scene I: Transformation of land
Just out of the army, Capt.Gopinath returned to his village in Karnataka to find that his family's land had been acquired due to the construction of a dam over a nearby river. The land allotted to his family as compensation was arid and was widely perceived as uncultivatable. With no other options in sight, he packed rations, a rifle, his army tent, his pet dog and travelled with one farm labourer to the allotted land.
He toiled day and night and planted coconut saplings as also other plants. Plants were selected and positioned after carefully analysing the soil and the geography. After months of toiling, (during which he used to be ridiculed by others for toiling on dry land) the land started showing it's innate potential. The carefully planned planting of fast growing trees helped bind the soil. The now homogenous soil began retaining water. The 'uncultivatable' land seemed to have woken up from deep slumber! To this day, his farm is known for not using pesticides and the like. It 'lives and grows naturally' and needless to say, keeps Gopi's accountant very busy.
Act I Scene II: Transformation of silk production
With his farm yeilding results, Capt.Gopinath started considering silk farming as a viable business. He found that using bamboo as a substrate for rearing silk worms was something that no one else had thought of and implemented. Using bamboo racks for rearing silk worms cut costs drastically and improved yields since bamboo made the racks sturdier and made them usable over multiple rearing cycles. This one innovation is lauded to this day and earned Gopi the Prestigious ROLEX award for ecological site farming.
Act II Scene I: Heli business
One of his sojourns to his farms was with a colleague from his army days in an army helicopter. He loved the experience. The then Chief Minister of Andhra Pradesh extended an open invite to entrepreneurs in one of his drives to boost the economy. The ever vigilant Captain spotted the business potential in starting a heli-charter company. Gopi and his friends rented a helicopter and flew it down into Hyderabad one foggy morning. They went straight to the CM's residence - because they did not know where else to go! Deccan Aviation won it's first client. Today, Deccan Aviation is India's largest helicopter operator next only to the defense services! With bases across the country, they have offered variants in their services such as heli-ambulance.
Act II Scene II: Flying a billion people
On one of his trips to the US, he learnt that the number of persons that flew annually there was higher than the population of of two states in india put together. The model of Ryan Air and Southwest airlines drew his attention. That was enough to launch him into what would lead to the transformation of the Indian skies - Air Deccan
The Indian aviation sector had witnessed the shakeout of the 90s and people considered aviation as a business where you could become a millionaire very easily - if you entered the business as a billionaire in the first place. The well networked lobby controlled the prices of air tickets and a one way ticket from Bangalore to Delhi costed anywhere from Rs.8000 to Rs. 20000. All this was to change.
Air Deccan's business model was different,.... quite different
Smaller aircraft such as ATRs with higher fuel efficiency were inducted. Smaller aircrafts meant lower landing and parking fees and quicker turnaround times. Quicker turnaround times meant longer times in the skies, which meant higher revenues ("an aircraft earns money only when flying not when parked in the bay" as Gopi says). Aircraft space was for sale for advertising. For the first time, you could see NDTV on the tail cone of an aircraft, Sun Microsystems near the landing gear, Chevrolet on headrests of seats and Wipro under the cockpit fuselage! Pilots had to pay for their training, airhostesses got a share of the revenue earned from sales on board and the HR team was two members strong for the first year of operations!
When asked about competition from the other airlines, Gopi categorically stated that his actual competition was from the railways! (This seems to have been proved right with the Railway Minister recently announcing a second round of fare cuts for AC class tickets)
Nothing is free on an Air Deccan flight. When asked "Surely, you can at least offer water?", he had this to say: "Look, we flew 1.5 million passengers last year. If we made provisions for free water, it would have been consumed by the flight crew, the airport staff and others as well. In the process, we would have ended up spending Rs 3 crore on water alone. It is not feasible for us. We need to educate the customers instead of asking them what is on their wish list. If you need something, you may as well pay for it. In this way, we have been able to save 20 per cent on distribution costs and turned our cost centres into revenue centres."
A strong focus on costs made it possible to introduce tickets for fares of Re.1 and Rs.500. Even today, the taxes are often higher than the ticket cost on an Air Deccan flight!
Has he succeeded at transforming the Indian skies? You bet!! From one aircraft and two routes a day, Air Deccan has grown to a fleet of 36 aircraft. It offers 270 flights a day and 55 destinations across the country at a 98% ontime performance. All this in three years flat.
The Impact
Indian skies have changed colour. New airlines such as Spicejet, Go, Indigo, Kingfisher, Paramount and Air India Express have made their appearance in what was considered a 'closed' industry. Today, the average price of a ticket from Bangalore to Delhi is around Rs.2500. Check fares have made their appearance. Airports are being modernised. Interior towns that were economically soporific are twitching their noses at the waft from freshly minted green papyrus.
Capt. Gopinath seems to have changed the altitude (and attitude?) of flying in India. Like he says "making a billion dreams fly".
Thursday, September 21, 2006
Eternal optimism... shattered? Re-build it
There is a new similie in town... "He looks like a HR guy without transactional work"
Go deeper and you will discover that for a very long time, HR has been and probably for time to come as well, will be associated with mundane, day to day, essential but not important transactions. There has been movement from Personnel to Human resources to Human capital... but, are we actually redefining the role?
Look around and you will find lots of HR professionals who strongly believe that HR's core competency is transactional effectiveness. This seems to spring from the eternal spring of hope that some day ... somewhere, they will get a revelation that will tell them what to do other than transactions.
So strong is their belief that transactions is the way, the truth and life, that they stop reading the latest happenings, they are apathetic to an orientation of applying concepts to day to day work.
These are the people who are going to be hit by the awakening that companies are experiencing of late. Companies are creating units that will be totally responsible for transactions processing and asking HR to do what they are supposed to do!
This is where, the devotees of Transactions are finding themselves at a loss.... they lived on eternal optimism of the earlier mentioned revelation. Now, they find that they are not supposed to do that which they prided themselves on!
What is the way forward? Read, read and read some more. Take up a topic close to you and become an expert in it. Network like mad. To start, introduce low transaction, high impact activities. Connect concepts, try to make a difference. Often I wonder if "Service orientation" is the 6th Big personality factor.
Think about it..... let me know....
Cheers!
~Sid
Go deeper and you will discover that for a very long time, HR has been and probably for time to come as well, will be associated with mundane, day to day, essential but not important transactions. There has been movement from Personnel to Human resources to Human capital... but, are we actually redefining the role?
Look around and you will find lots of HR professionals who strongly believe that HR's core competency is transactional effectiveness. This seems to spring from the eternal spring of hope that some day ... somewhere, they will get a revelation that will tell them what to do other than transactions.
So strong is their belief that transactions is the way, the truth and life, that they stop reading the latest happenings, they are apathetic to an orientation of applying concepts to day to day work.
These are the people who are going to be hit by the awakening that companies are experiencing of late. Companies are creating units that will be totally responsible for transactions processing and asking HR to do what they are supposed to do!
This is where, the devotees of Transactions are finding themselves at a loss.... they lived on eternal optimism of the earlier mentioned revelation. Now, they find that they are not supposed to do that which they prided themselves on!
What is the way forward? Read, read and read some more. Take up a topic close to you and become an expert in it. Network like mad. To start, introduce low transaction, high impact activities. Connect concepts, try to make a difference. Often I wonder if "Service orientation" is the 6th Big personality factor.
Think about it..... let me know....
Cheers!
~Sid
Sunday, September 17, 2006
Are we forgetting them?
Are we forgetting them?
“He is an engineer and a distinction holder at that. Does he have good attitude? Big time!”
The wave of the information technology industry while undoubtedly having given lakhs of citizens of our country an entry into professionalism and a life of compliant and comfortable consumerism in it’s crest, seems to have left a couple of annual generations in its base.
It is but common experience that companies experience annual frenzies called recruitment drives in engineering colleges where they vie each other to grab freshers. These freshers are not immediately ‘billed’, but are put through a learning cycle wherein they are effectively made to unlearn more than they are needed to learn! By this, I am referring to the focused range of skills (Languages/tools) that they are made to master. Thus, we seem to be effectively recruiting them for their ability to learn rather than the competencies that they posses.
While recruiting for a HR operations assistant, it was the author’s experience that out of the ten resumes shortlisted for the post, seven of them turned out to be those of engineers who had graduated in the years 2001 and 2002. They were all good students going by their marks and all of them were either computer science engineers or Electronics engineers.
All of them were victims of the downturn that the IT industry experienced and hence the subsequent freeze that was imposed on campus recruitments. Thus, the lofty dreams of a good job that they could look forward to were no longer around.
On further investigation, the author discovered that approximately 60% of those who had passed out in the years 2001 and 2002 seemed to have either augmented themselves with a MBA or had continued with ‘not very well’ paying jobs which in turn seem to have drawn them into vicious cycle that keeps them away from a job that many of their juniors have! The object of our discussion is the latter segment.
What are your views on taking this segment of ‘freshers’ who seem to have been forgotten by us, skilling them appropriately and providing them with a ‘life’?
Do write in with your inputs!
~Sid
“He is an engineer and a distinction holder at that. Does he have good attitude? Big time!”
The wave of the information technology industry while undoubtedly having given lakhs of citizens of our country an entry into professionalism and a life of compliant and comfortable consumerism in it’s crest, seems to have left a couple of annual generations in its base.
It is but common experience that companies experience annual frenzies called recruitment drives in engineering colleges where they vie each other to grab freshers. These freshers are not immediately ‘billed’, but are put through a learning cycle wherein they are effectively made to unlearn more than they are needed to learn! By this, I am referring to the focused range of skills (Languages/tools) that they are made to master. Thus, we seem to be effectively recruiting them for their ability to learn rather than the competencies that they posses.
While recruiting for a HR operations assistant, it was the author’s experience that out of the ten resumes shortlisted for the post, seven of them turned out to be those of engineers who had graduated in the years 2001 and 2002. They were all good students going by their marks and all of them were either computer science engineers or Electronics engineers.
All of them were victims of the downturn that the IT industry experienced and hence the subsequent freeze that was imposed on campus recruitments. Thus, the lofty dreams of a good job that they could look forward to were no longer around.
On further investigation, the author discovered that approximately 60% of those who had passed out in the years 2001 and 2002 seemed to have either augmented themselves with a MBA or had continued with ‘not very well’ paying jobs which in turn seem to have drawn them into vicious cycle that keeps them away from a job that many of their juniors have! The object of our discussion is the latter segment.
What are your views on taking this segment of ‘freshers’ who seem to have been forgotten by us, skilling them appropriately and providing them with a ‘life’?
Do write in with your inputs!
~Sid
Starting off
I used to and still have a site on Geocities which I find a little painful updating and Orkut is slightly an exclusive community that not all my friends prefer or have an account. Advantage Blogger!
In the coming weeks/months, I hope to spew out my neuronal transactions. Do post your opinions and thoughts about the same. Let's try and make a difference.
Cheers!
Sid
In the coming weeks/months, I hope to spew out my neuronal transactions. Do post your opinions and thoughts about the same. Let's try and make a difference.
Cheers!
Sid
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