Tuesday, July 01, 2014

Crossword 10 - ER & IR

Across
2. A factory where labor is employed under unhealthy working condition for long hours
6. An organization of wage-earners engaged in a single craft
8. The closing of the place of employment
9. French term emphasizing development of private business without government control
10. Funds deposited in this account will grow typically without any tax implications until retirement

Down
1. a state of relationship in which parties in industry offer the least instead of offering the best
3. the system involved remunerating the workers in any way but not in money
4. a person who continues to work when the person they work with are on strike
5. Money mainly in the form of coins and currency notes , that can be legally used to pay for things in a particular country
7. technique of resolving disputes through a neutral third party


Boss is Boss

Srikantan Moorthy




Senior Vice President,
Group Head - Human Resource,
INFOSYS.

Mr. SrikantanMoorthy, also known as Tan has been the Head of Human Resources at Infosys Ltd. since April 1, 2013 and serves as its Senior Vice President.
With over 28 years of global experience in the professional services industry, he now leads and drives all the human capital development programs across Infosys.
He joined Infosys Ltd. on December 7, 2000. Prior to taking up this role in April 2013, Tan was the Group Head of Education & Research (E&R) at Infosys, where his primary responsibility was talent development through competency building. Before taking up business enablement roles, Tan was heading service delivery for the telecommunication business at Infosys. Tan has worked in several facets of the business encompassing both strategy and operations during his career in the professional services industry.
Tan is an active representative of Infosys in several professional bodies, including the Professional Development Committee of ACM (Association for Computing Machinery), NASSCOM Education Council and IFEES (International Federation of Engineering Education Societies). As a member of IFEES, Tan has played a key role in the launch of the IFEES award for Engineering Education.
In July 2010, Tan was inducted as a founding director of the International Professional Practice Partnership (IP3) Global Industry Council (IP3-GIC). Tan is also part of several domestic and global task forces dealing with education.
Tan is engaged in youth- and education-related voluntary activities and is an advisory member of a non-profit called Youth for Seva, which focuses on harnessing the power of youth for voluntary activities.

Career bio:
·       Mr. Moorthy served as Head of Education and Research of Infosys BPO Limited until April 1, 2013.
  •      He served as Delivery Head of Infosys' Communication Service Providers and Vice President of Communication Service Providers for Delivery.
  •        Served as General Manager of the Southeast Region of Inventa Technologies Inc. since November 1999.
  •        He served as General Manager of Inventa Corporation. He served as Inventa Technologies Inc.'s Director of Operations from May 1996 to November 1999, as a Practice Director from January 1996 to April 1996, as a Consulting Practice Manager from August 1994 to January 1996, and as Technical Staff Manager from August 1993 to August 1994.
  •        Mr. Moorthy joined Inventa Technologies Inc. as a Principal Software Engineer in January 1993. He holds a Bachelor of Engineering degree from Bangalore University, India.

Performance Management: How does it Work?

Every company either large or small follows the trend of performance review in order to keep track of their employees' performance in the workplace. Improvement in performance management system has always brought profit, increased accountability and commitment to the employees. 
Another important factor of a great performance management is to build superior relationships with your workers. Try to be honest with your employees because this makes them feel free and comfortable to talk with you. They will also start discussing workplace problems with you and respect your decisions.


Andrea Watkins on articlebiz.com highlighted the need to congratulate employees for their hard work and achievement as this will increase their morale and motivate them to achieve more success.  Performance management reviews will help your employees to understand what the organization wants from them and the areas in which they need to improve. This can also encourage your employees to take up training or qualification courses to enhance their skills.

It has been found that due to lack of communication there has been a lot of misunderstandings in the workplace but a successful performance management will help remove them.

Once you are done with the performance review, it's time to evaluate the results. Check if any of the employees are lacking behind. Arrange extra training sessions for those that need one and if someone is outperforming see how you can use their skills in future to profit the business and to help them excel further. You should also check if there is any room for further improvement.

The review should not only highlight the employees’ previous performance, but it should also include future goals as well. You would need to explain the employees on how they will fit into it and help the organization in contributing towards its aim. After all a successful performance review will help your employees get motivated towards work and stay happy in the company in the long run.

Top 8 ways managers drive good employees out the door



Even though unemployment remains high, employers are reporting there’s a talent shortage in this country. What that means is this: Your most talented employees know other jobs are waiting for them. Are your managers doing enough to keep them? 

The old adage — people quit their boss, not their job — is true, according to Eric Jackson, who holds a Ph.D. in management and is the founder of Ironfire Capital LLC, which runs a tech-focused hedge fund.
Translation: While pay and benefits are obviously important, so is liking the person you work for.
Jackson recently pointed out on Forbes.com the most common reasons employees quit their jobs — and guess what … all of them can be blamed on managers.

So it stands to reason you may want to double check that your managers aren’t driving talent away with these detrimental practices:
1. Piling on work
When companies were shrinking their workforces during the Great Recession, the people they opted to hang on to where obviously the most talented. But that often resulted in the work of the recently laid off getting dumped on those who were considered “lucky enough to keep their job.”
The problems: A lot of the reassigned work was beneath employees’ talent level, and companies forgot to readjust the workloads when they began rehiring again. Worse yet, some companies never got out of the mindset that it was OK to pile extra work on the backs of the best employees.
Managers need to constantly revisit the work responsibilities of employees — especially those with the most talent — to make sure they’re doing work commensurate with their standing in the company.
2. Micro-managing
Not all employees need to be — nor want to be — managed the same way. Poor performers tend to want constant attention and direction — but not top performers.
Chances are your best employees don’t want someone constantly looking over their shoulder. They want to be trusted to get their work done without constant check-ins and direction.
As Jackson points out, another common problem is that individuals who’ve recently been promoted to management tend to want to make sure those who’ve taken over their old jobs are doing things the exact same way they would’ve — after all, that’s what got them promoted.
But this will drive good employees crazy. Give them a chance to make the job their own.
3. Being invisible
Managers can also be too hands-off — either by not being in the office or by keeping their door closed to those they’re supposed to be managing.
Employees need to know their managers are present and accessible.
4. Not recognizing others’ feelings about personnel moves
Nobody likes feeling overlooked for a promotion, but it happens all the time. Managers hire people they like over the most qualified candidates.
While you don’t want to rob managers of their power to select who they want to fill open positions, you also want to make sure they’re not just promoting their “friends.” Make sure there’s a process managers have to follow, or criteria employees have to meet, before people are promoted.
It’s also a good idea to let employees in on what those processes or criteria are.
5. Not defining career paths
Talented employees want to know where they’re headed — or, at the very least, where they can go within the company and what it’ll take to get there.
Make sure your managers are having these conversations with their direct reports on a regular basis.
6. Running terrible meetings
There are a million things managers can do to create terrible meetings — from letting arguments break out, to letting the conversation stray, to letting them run for hours.
Managers should take the pulse of employees when it comes to the meetings they hold. Do employees dread coming to meetings? Are some employees constantly asking to be excused? Do some appear inattentive?
Find out what it is employees don’t like, and fix it.
7. Being ‘above the team’
Some managers are only interested in protecting their own interests, position or power. These are not leaders.
You want managers who’ll go to bat for their direct reports, and treat them like teammates — not underlings.
It’s impossible for employees to grow if they have a manager who’s constantly beating them down.
8. Failing to put the firm’s future into focus
Almost as much as they want to know where they’re headed, employees want to know where the company’s headed.

This is especially true for talented workers, who tend to be more interested in their long-term prospects than others. If they sense there’s no big picture, or the picture keeps changing, they’ll look to jump ship.

5 secrets to weeding out bad candidates using social media

Sure, you’re looking for the right mix of skills and experience in a candidate, but you’re also looking for the “right fit.” In other words, you want someone who’ll blend seamlessly into your company culture. Problem is, a resume and interview can’t always answer the “fit” question. 



Social media can get you a lot closer. It can provide employers with an all-important window into a candidate’s true identity.
Here are some things HR pros look for to find the right “fits” for their companies:
Signs of confrontation
Is the person constantly picking fights or complaining on Facebook or Twitter? We’re not talking about the occasional criticism (everyone has a bad day). You’re looking for a pattern of discontent with the people and world around the candidate.
If the person’s constantly putting others down and arguing, it could be a sign of a malcontent.
The biggest red flag: Picking fights over little things, like what local restaurant has the best burgers. If the person’s unwilling to let others express their opinions without putting everyone one down who disagrees with his or her viewpoint, it’s probably safe to assume the person isn’t a team player.
Employer, manager put downs
By now, you probably already know the basic signs of risky candidates, like excessive amounts of photos or comments of themselves drinking or partying.
But you’ll also want to keep an eye on whether or not they’re saying negative things about their current or past employers.
Someone who’s unafraid to badmouth their boss or company online can really hurt your image. And with the National Labor Relations Board heavily scrutinizing restrictive social media policies, it’s hard to enforce rules that would be effective at limiting these kinds of derogatory comments.
That means the best approach is to weed out candidates likely to make those kinds of comments from the get-go.
Grammar and spelling mistakes
Again, a few slips of the tongue/keyboard are OK. But you want to be wary of candidates who appear to have a total disregard for the English language.
Reason: The way they communicate on social media is probably a good indication of how they’ll communicate, at least digitally, in your office.
Immature language
Yes, the Internet has a vernacular all its own. But again, the words candidates use online will crossover into the workplace.
Some terms HR managers have flagged as deal breakers, include:
§  “totes” instead of “totally”
§  “amazeballs” instead of “amazing” or “excellent”
§  “meh,” which stands for “bland”
§  “weaksauce” instead of “terrible”
§  “yolo,” which stands for “you only live once”
§  “tweeps” instead of “Twitter followers,” and
§  “methinks” instead of “I think.”
Work experience
As you’re fully aware, candidates will often try to artificially inflate their experience or qualifications on their resumes. Well, LinkedIn can be a good way to double-check that what candidates have put on their resumes is correct.
Sure, their LinkedIn profiles can be made up of lies as well, but you want to at least make sure candidates’ resumes and online profiles sync up. If they don’t, confront candidates on the issue.
In addition, check a candidate’s endorsements on LinkedIn. While it’s not necessarily hard to get someone to endorse you on the site, you at least want to see that they have been endorsed in the critical areas of expertise you’re looking for.

Air India may hire more cabin crew to raise standards

Air India's top executives are set to renew discussions on hiring additional cabin crew as a way of "improving service standards" after the national carrier recently joined global airline group Star Alliance 

The airline's customer-service division has raised the issue but no number has yet been proposed to the human resources department.

The proposal would go against the grain of Air India's efforts to cut its massive wage bill. The airline hasn't made any such recruitment in the past few years, though a proposal had been made last year too to hire cabin crew.

Air India has 3,400 cabin crew of its own and another 800 on contract. Before getting into Star Alliance, the airline had an internal target to cut the number to 2,100. The Director General of Civil Aviation (DGCA), India's aviation regulator, has stipulated a minimum number of cabin crew for each aircraft type, but airlines usually deploy more. "For instance, for a 787 Dreamliner, the minimum number is seven, which can be increased to nine. But now there may be a proposal for 11". 


Air India on June 23 became the 27th member of the alliance, which includes Lufthansa and Singapore Airlines. Air India has in the past six months terminated 45 cabin crew on ground of absenteeism and will be serving final notices to 59 more over the next month and half. Air India — once synonymous with its royal mascot, the Maharajah — has in the past seven years made heavy losses after a hasty merger with erstwhile domestic carrier Indian Airlines.

The airline has been hit by high by high fuel costs and tough competition but is also plagued by overstaffing. Being state-run, it also has to operate on some unprofitable routes. It has been working hard to reduce costs. Last January, it implemented a 25% salary cut across employees, although it also promoted 6,000 of them. It eliminated several perks, including one that allowed employees to get cash against sick leaves that they didn't avail of.

Air India's salary bill has reduced by Rs 400 crore in two years to Rs 3,100 crore in the fiscal year ended on March 31, 2014. Its revenue per employee increased to Rs 99 lakh from Rs 59 lakh in 2011-12, while expenditure reduced to Rs 13 lakh per staff fromRs 17 lakh. Its losses last year reduced by a quarter to about Rs 4,000 crore. Air India currently has 23,034 employees, down from more than 33,000 at the time of the merger.

The carrier in January hived off its ground handing and engineering operations into two separate units. Barring employees in those, its headcount is just above 13,000, the executive said. It also employs 3,500 on contract and 2,200 casual labourers 


Usage of HR as Sales Force by SAP members

The HR technology giant is sending its HR staff to sell products to clients. Janet Wood, VP of global HR explains why.
Systems provider SAP is using members of its HR team to sell its products by sending them to speak to clients about their experiences. SAP executive VP of global HR Janet Wood told HR magazine it makes sense to use colleagues seen as “trusted experts” to speak to potential customers. 

“People from HR are really enjoying the challenge,” she said. “Getting out there as consultants with the sales team is something they relish.”
The growth of cloud-based technology has increased the amount of customer interaction, making HR team members more valuable to commercial success. 
“You think about customer interactions and you think about customers buying the product as a success,” Wood said. “In the cloud it’s a little bit different. You need to be in constant contact with the customer.” 
Another way that HR can influence sales, more indirectly is to embed the idea of simplicity and clarity into the company, she added. This can be done through influencing leadership and ensuring every member of staff lives these behaviours, which leads to improved relationships with both internal and external customers, Wood explained.
“There are global initiatives in this, but my message is around what individuals can do,” she said. “Every one of us can simplify within our sphere of influence. It’s how you schedule a meeting, who you invite, do you understand your goals? Don’t wait for someone to come and simplify the environment for you.”
Wood comes from a sales background, having worked previously in direct sales for IBM and in indirect sales for SAP before moving to HR. She says that one of the biggest surprises on joining HR was the scope of the work.
“From recruitment onwards, through the career lifecycle, it’s a lot broader than people realise,” she said. “HR is also heavily involved in leading success for the company. It’s a lot more work and pressure than people think. 
She added that the tight deadlines HR functions are constantly working to would surprise many people. “HR are always the ones rolling it out, getting everything in place and making sure the business is properly enabled for the next challenge,” she said