Monday, September 28, 2009

Faithless is he that says farewell when the road darkens. - J. R. R. Tolkien, 1892-1973

The weak can never forgive. Forgiveness is the attribute of the strong. - Mahatma Gandhi, 1869-1948

Make all you can, save all you can, give all you can. - John Wesley, 1703-1791

Thursday, September 10, 2009

Positive Human Relations - A Key to Success

Getting along with people is important in all walks of life – but developing and maintaining good personal human relations in politics and in business is a must – for a successful career. Andrew Sherwood wrote a book titled Breakpoints where he offers the following keys to good human relations. Of course, we all know these, through experience, but it always helps to have a memory jogger in a proper structured manner. Speak to people. There is nothing as well received as a cheerful word of greeting. It is not just the words – Good morning or Good evening. It is also the tone, the look in the eyes, the expression on the face. Smile at people. Be generous with your smile. After all, it takes 72 muscles to frown only 14 to smile. Why do more exercise when you can get by with less? But again, the smile must come through your eyes – not just your lips. It has to be a ‘genuine’ smile. Call people by name. The sweetest music to anyone’s ears is the sound of his or her own name. And the less the person is a public figure and the less frequently you have met and yet you remember the name, the sweeter it sounds. Be friendly and helpful. Do unto others as you would have them do unto you. It can be even simple things like promising to give a telephone number next day, of an old friend that someone wants to contact. One does not have to do big favours. In fact, these are not generally expected. Be cordial. Speak and act as if everything you do is a genuine pleasure, not an intrusion and certainly not a burden. Be sincerely interested in people. You can like everybody, if you try. The trouble is we make up our minds about people in advance, based on their looks, their dress, or what someone might have whispered into our ears. Be generous with praisecautious with criticism. And what you say, always goes round and back to the person. You can make friends or enemies this way. Be thoughtful of the opinion of others. There are three sides to a controversy – yours, the other persons and the right one. It is always best to state your position and back off – rather than persisting in holding the fort. Be considerate for the feelings of others. It will be appreciated. If you cannot find anything to say – they say nothing. Winston Churchill’s advice holds true – You must know when to stand up and speak out – and also know, when to sit down and shut up! It’s nothing new – but bears constant reminding, if we are going to add a large dose of human skills to our technical skills.

ITS TIME TO WORK LONGER


HR managers are now encouraging their older employees to delay their retirements. Why? Because they feel that instead of investing time and energy in recruiting and training fresh talent, at all times, they are seeking to use the wealth of experience and knowledge of their older employees to benefit their companies. We find out more about this trend....
Yasmin Taj
Changing times and the need to have a good life has led to intense competition and stress. People do not lay back and relax, as everyone is a part of the rat race. Some want to make more money, some want job security and some simply strive for a better future. We work harder than generations gone by and we have greater expectations from life than our parents did. Therefore, to keep up with the challenging and ever changing times, many working professionals are opting to delay their retirements. So, how has India Inc. reacted to this? Is it a boon or a bane? According to Sunil Singh, AGM HR, Tulip Telecom Ltd, professionals delaying their retirement has certainly proved a boon for organisations. “We think valuable technical knowledge cannot be replenished simply by hiring new talent. It is therefore safe to say that an employee delaying his/her retirement can be a good thing for an organisation,” Singh says. Sudeshna Datta, EVP & Co-Founder, AbsolutData Research & Analytics agrees, “Delayed retirements are a huge plus for organisations that value the knowledge, specialised skills and guidance that the vastly experienced older employees can bring to the table. This helps retain talent for a longer time period. It also gives organisations more time to plan in advance for the changes that come along with the retirement of employees, especially in strategic positions. However, the flip side of this is that it could lead to stagnation or a dearth of new ideas.” For Mamta Wasan, VP HR training, Fidelity National Information Services, an employee delaying his/her retirement, can be both, a boon or a bane. “This works both ways. It is an advantage in the sense that the knowledge and experience of the employee remains with the company. They also bring a level of maturity to the table. On the other hand, an older employee may not have the energy of a young one, may not be in touch with the latest trends, management practices and technology. They also add to the health care costs of the company. Finally, until they retire, there is no scope for recruiting new talent as there are no vacancies.” Although this practice is slowly gaining popularity in the workplace, there are a number of advantages and disadvantages that must be considered. “Today's workforce tends to be more geographically mobile. Therefore retaining such young workforce is far more difficult than retaining old employees. Older employees are easier to manage as a workforce. If an employee is healthy, a delayed retirement can help secure his or her financial independence,” Singh states. On the other hand, he says, “As they get older, employees tend to lose the energy, speed and agility that is required to be competitive and efficient in today's market. Retirement at the age of 58-60 is an ideal option. It also opens doors for fresh blood and promotion opportunities for middle management cadre. Delayed retirement is the biggest obstacle in in training. Both are a huge asset creating career tracks for indi- to the organisation and their deviduals.” layed retirements have proved Though a lot of organisations valuable.” believe that delayed retirements An employee from Fidelity can be a boon to them, many are puts in his two cents, “It is imyet to put it into practice. “We at portant to stay fit and to keep Tulip have not faced the problem one’s self in sync with the of brain drain, therefore, we do younger generation. One must not encourage delayed retire- embrace technology and stay up ments. Tulip has quite a young to date. We can use our hard workforce, the average age of earned wisdom and contacts and our staff as a whole is under can pass on what we know to the thirty. In teams like project man- next generation. We must ask agement and infrastructure de- ourselves what value we add to velopment, the average employee the organisation. If we have is only 27 years old. In sales, the clear targets in mind, and can average age is 29 and is slightly achieve them, then we are an ashigher. In strategic initiatives set rather than a burden.” and the leadership team, the av- As far as delayed retirements erage age is about 45 years,” ex- are concerned, the jury is still plains Singh. out for India Inc has not accept-But a few other organisations ed this new reality and is still have started accepting delayed waking up to this new day. retirements, although this is Those who follow the trends and more an exception than a rule. read the tea leaves though pre-“Yes, we sometimes encourage dict that in the future, delayed delayed retirements in our or- retirements are going to be all ganisation, specifically in areas the rage. Until that new dawn that require extensive and specif- comes, we must simply wait and ic knowledge.” Wasan adds “I watch. can recall two such cases – one in the area of banking and another yasmin.taj@timesgroup.com

Education v\s Emplyability


Education vs. employability
Employability of available talent is a major concern across industries. Experts believe that this is mainly due to a disconnect between education and industry requirements. Experts are now calling for an effective revamp of the education and training systems to enhance employability
According to the Effective Education for Employment (EEE) study by Edexcel there is a remarkable mismatch between what is being taught in schools, colleges and universities and the knowledge, skills and behaviour businesses and organisations are looking for in new recruits. Ross Hall, Director of International Edexcel and co-author of the report, says “The most striking finding of the study was the consistency with which we heard calls for large scale reform, wherever we went. Many of the businesses we spoke to felt that education failed to effectively prepare individuals for the workplace. Even students felt that their education lacked relevance to the jobs they were hoping to apply for in the future.”
While the demand for large scale reforms in the education sector to match the expectation of industries is gaining prominence, how to equip people with the relevant skills they need is a serious concern for many. Dr Manas Fuloria, co founder & Executive Vice President, corporate development and strategy, Nagarro Software Pvt Ltd suggests that at school or college level, the focus of teaching should be more top down rather than bottom up. It should start with what does the person needs to know to do a good job rather than just going through the details of all the traditional subjects.
Train to gainBringing in drastic changes to the education system seems to take a long time, so many firms have implemented several training programmes to improve the quality of the available talent. Today there are various training programmes both within and outside firms, conducted independently by organisations or in partnership with various universities.
But experts say that training programmes must be designed in such a way as to motivate and improve the skills of a person. “A training programme must do three things - it must inspire and motivate and sell the importance of the skills, it should package the training in a memorable way, and it should have the person actually use the training in a simulated job environment,” opines Fuloria.
“The training programmes should be more work centric and they should be developed according to the needs of the work and the workplace. It is becoming increasingly apparent that it is behaviour which marks out the adaptability of a person in a workplace. So equal emphasis on specific skills as well as behaviours is desirable,” adds Claire Stuart, international marketing manager at Edexcel.
Equip yourselfAnd the success of a training programme lies in how much of it an employee could use effectively in his or her work life. Even though training programmes could help employees improve their skills and prepare themselves, experts say that personal effort is also crucial in enhancing employability. “A lot of the responsibility for ensuring employability falls on the shoulder of the student/jobseeker himself/herself. Today one can find so much information on search engines like Google about everything. So if a person want to learn how to run a project well or want to learn how to write good software, he/she can find volumes of information about it is largely free. What is needed is the motivation and focus to use it to develop skills,” says Fuloria.
According to the EEE study, employers in India have some specific requirements that they look for in job seekers which include traits like ability to work in a team, high aspirations, sense of responsibility, creativity etc. All these skills can be developed by training and practice. So even as discussions about a change in the curriculum and education systems to enhance employability, students or prospective employees must put in their own effort to master knowledge and skills, which they could obtain even without the help of anyone on the outside. This will surely help increase their value in a tough job market.

Friday, September 4, 2009