Monday 27 July 2015

Training As a Strategy

Training, till recently, was a peripheral activity. But it is increasingly taking centre stage as a strategic lever that organisations have. No sensible businessman would expect machines to not undergo maintenance and up gradation for years, and still expect performance and productivity to continue at the same level.
However, many of us don’t offer the same courtesy to our employees. Training and development for employees is akin to maintenance and upgradation. Unfortunately, training budgets are often the first on the chopping block when organisations experience uncertain times.
“What’s worse than training your workers and losing them? Not training them and keeping them.” This quote by Zig Ziglar really hits the nail on the head regarding why many companies shy away from training. However, the costs of not training far outweigh the risk of not training. Not only do good employees leave if not given opportunities for personal growth, it also reduces your competitive edge due to stagnant productivity.
Most companies undervalue the impact training and development can have on productivity and business growth. This is especially relevant for the Indian economy, where 60% of GDP is from the service industry. Which means, human capital is our biggest asset, and the key to growth.
Studies by leading international bodies such as Association for Talent Development (formerly, American Society for Training & Development) and American Marketing Association (AMA) have proved the linkage. Companies that invest more in employee training and train more employees have higher profits, better sales, and higher shareholder return. An AMA study showed that companies that had high investments in training had a return which was 45% higher than the market average on the S&P 500.
The effect of training on profits is backed by solid evidence. However, there is more than meets the eye to what causes such an effect. The way I see it, training has two benefits – the apparent and the inherent.
The apparent benefit is that employees are better skilled. The competency gap is reduced. They are better equipped to do their jobs and require less management.
The inherent benefit, is far harder to measure, but the effect is just as profound. As the many psychological experiments have revealed, training makes employees feel valued. This leads to a host of business benefits such as improved morale, new energy in the workplace and it also helps to earn loyalty.
What is most crucial for businesses to understand, is that this is what employees want. A recent survey by PWC demonstrated that training and development is the most valued benefit for millennials, with cash benefits taking the third place.
The dream of India becoming a super power can become a reality only with proper utilization of its resources. With the service sector in India having such a large impact, the proper utilization of human resources is critical. Therefore, training may seem expensive, but it would be doubly risky to try doing without it. When talent is the key differentiator in a crowded market place, training inevitably becomes a key driver of growth. And with more and more training companies willing to showcase the ROI training has, hopefully more businesses can decode the impact training has on business.

- Published in The Hindu

Friday 17 July 2015

My Humble Two Cents for the Millennial CEO

I would have used the word ‘advice’ if this post weren’t addressed to millennial CEOs! But that’s thing you see, this league of talent extraordinaire wouldn’t pay heed to patronizing know-it-alls. And rightly so! 

As someone who built a business around and about the millennial mind-set, tapping in to the kind of raw, immense potential they bring to the table, I’ve been a keen observer of the startup space in India. It’s heartening to see the scene explode with ideas and talent showcasing newer, unexplored ways to counter problems. This new breed of entrepreneurs is bold, innovative and unabashedly honest about their dislike to “set in stone rules”. These are people who've dared to dream and taken big risks early in life. They have also been scoffed at and made their fair share of mistakes. Undeterred, they have made it to the other side.

I have always believed in a saying, “Be so good they can’t ignore you” and today I see the younger lot passionately believing in the same. And every year they get younger and better- 19 is the new 23!
At the same time, I see these young men and women struggle to cope with the stress and pressures of funding, competition, marketing, the list is endless. I was all of 29 when I first became CEO so I can vouch for one thing- it isn’t easy and it sure as hell is not a job. It doesn’t come with an off button. But that’s what is great about it!

Here are certain characteristics that I adopted along the way- that have made a huge difference in the way I have dealt with the constant pressures and asks of the job.

Listen to Others and Embrace Differences
I know you are passionate about your ideas and in all probability they are pretty great ideas. But keep an open mind; listen to other people’s thoughts and inputs.  Even if they are different from yours. Especially if they are different! It’s important to overcome the tendency to conform and embrace differences.

Continue to Learn and Create things.
Always have a clear focus in mind and lay the foundation on how to go about achieving your goals. What’s the skill set required? Can you learn the basics of coding over the weekend just to be able guide your tech team better on an upcoming project even when you are an English major? 

Build Your EQ
As you grow, you are expected to have solutions to the more complex challenges of the world. And these are usually to do with human resource, building a team that resonates the same spirit as your organization. Yes, IQ is important but empathy and emotional intelligence are needed to unleash that wit and IQ.

Believe in those who believe in you
It’s not always easy to believe in yourself, but if you are as lucky as I have been- there will be people who follow you and trust your judgement. Honor them. In doing so, you embrace the idea of letting go of self as the end of the story and actually prepare the road for others to succeed.


Digital Detox – the need of the hour!  

We are all there constantly checking emails, on social- sharing, interacting and engaging on different platforms for different purposes. And although I am firm believer that any leadership should be present on social, especially Twitter and LinkedIn- I abstain from any digital interactions before 8am- It’s your time to have a dialogue with yourself, the world isn’t going anywhere.

Monday 13 July 2015

Welcoming Aboard a New Hire

Welcome aboard!
An effective onboarding program makes new hires feel valued and involved and is a good bet for long term retention…..

It is said that any new recruit irrespective of the level, decides to stay or move on within the first seven days. I have personally experienced this several times in my professional life.
 The first few days are very like the seasoning period when either the new joinee gets accustomed to the new environment, tries to adapt the organization’s culture and smoothly fits into the groove, or on the contrary might just out rightly reject it. The reasons could be many, which would go beyond the pay and perks.
This makes it imperative for any organization to have an impactful onboarding program in place, although, I am an advocate of not having something which is too methodical, instead the focus on creativity and touching the employee’s heart, while giving him the relevant information.

For instance, if someone comes to our home, do we always go as per the plan – 7’o clock tea, 9’o clock breakfast, 12.30 lunch and so on. No we don’t. Instead, we let our guest or the new member to feel at ease and ask for his opinion. Our intention is to make the person feel comfortable and as a good host we would try to accommodate as per our guest’s preference.  Similarly I believe that there can’t be a fixed routine to the onboarding program. Having said that it’s equally important to have a plan in place so that there is no chaos at the end moment, but we should all use your creative judgment in deciding what best suits our new colleague – the new member of the family.
He has to feel invited in the new set-up.

It’s not that only an entry level executive would feel lost in her new job, but even senior employees could feel the same way if her onboarding is not done the right way.
For instance, if a senior executive joins from a competitor’s place. It is likely that he would have several apprehensions in joining your organization irrespective of the hike; he or she may have been offered. So now how do you welcome this new person. Should you start with how the competitor has had all wrong practices in place and your company has got it all right. Or should you make him feel so important on the first day that you show him how you were just waiting for him to come and change the fortune of your company.
I have seen many of my industry colleagues behaving in a similar fashion during such instances. Either they portray a very humble behavior or turn out to be too regimented, and cold.
In my opinion, the new person should be given some time to settle down in the new place and meanwhile you can also take time to evaluate him better.
So here is what I propose to have an effective onboarding program which should be beneficial in retaining employees and achieving business goals.

1.    Soak in the company culture:
Every company has two aspects of the culture. One is the set of rules framed by the company which every employee is expected to follow and on the other hand, there are some unwritten rules. It’s important for the new employee to understand both, and at times it may take a year to get things in place.
I know of a large IT company, where the company especially deputes a co-worker, who takes the new employee through the established guidelines and also the unwritten rules. It’s like you have moved into a new city or a country and how a friend would take you through the brighter and darker sides of the city.  What a great idea of inviting people to your organization and also make them feel comfortable. In such a scenario, it will be much easier for the new employee to adapt the new culture. 
I strongly recommend fostering social relationships with co-workers in making employees feel comfortable from the initial day at work.  Winning organisations consider these relationships as enriching as they make new hires feel invested in their work and the company. As part of the onboarding, companies may organize a team lunch or an evening outing on the first day, which will allow the new hire to mingle with her team, acclimatise with the company culture, work ethics and build positive working relationships. PepsiCo is one such company that I can recall that has developed an online portal called “
“Pre start”. Here new hires can find useful information on company values, culture, organizational structure, etc. In addition, it has also assimilated social media to make them feel like a coherent group.

2.     Try gamifying the process
These days it’s new trend that’s gaining momentum across industries and sector. It's not always about the bottomline, it about engaging the new hires and keeping their enthusiasm atop from day one.  That is why a lot of companies are trying gamified tools for the onboarding process.  These includes, learning challenges, games competitions and contests for the new hires. The passing and sharing of knowledge between the company and the new recruit becomes much easier with this. It eventually changes the boring onboarding process to a fun filled activity and the experience tends to linger on. Like everyone remembers the first day at college, people also keep the memory of first day at work afresh for long. This whole engaging exercise has a positive end goal.At DBS bank, for instance, to engage the new hire’s interest level as well as create curiosity around the induction program, the organization has built Stereoscopic 3D effects on select screens along with engaging videos, personalized welcome messages from department heads help in personalizing the onboarding program as well as boost performance and retention

3.    Treat it like a never-ending process
One common folly that most organizations tend to commit is that they assume that an onboarding process ends on the new hire’s first week on the job. Rather, successful onboarding programs can even span over several months to reap its benefits. The duration of onboarding programs vary in terms of organization. While for some, it may last for a week, for some, it may stretch to four months. In any organisation, the culture is built over years. So how can one expect that a new employee would come and embrace the culture in a few weeks. Every person has his own personal traits and would need a personalised approach to this. 
Assigning a manager/mentor to track employee’s initial months on the job helps to understand their comfort level on the job as well as how things are done at their workplace is also an effective way.  At different stages, the assigned manager/mentorcan ask the new hire about his experiences with the hiring process, if the induction met his expectations, any challenges or issues he may be facing. This will help the organization in understanding the level of engagementor connect the new hire has developedwith the organization. Every onboarding program has to be continually fine-tuned at different stages to keep enhancing its impact and benefits and most importantly, a successful onboarding process is never really over. L’Oreal is one such organization that supports an extended onboarding program. It has a two-year, six-part integration program called “L’Oreal Fit” which builds lasting relationships as well as develops employees for bigger challenges.
While I believe that there are no set onboarding designs or approaches that will work radically for any organization. However, from a business standpoint, it makes no sense to invest on hiring a talent, pay an exorbitant remuneration, lose productivity and then finally lose the employee because the relationship fails to take off on the right foot right at the beginning. To avoid such pitfalls, invest on your people who will help you reap the rewards of a stellar onboarding prgram.