New Year Resolutions of a Manager - National HRD Network

| HRD News Letter | January 2007, Vol.22, Issue:10 2|

| HRD News Letter | January 2007, Vol.22, Issue:10 3|

HRD
NEWSLETTER
Vol - 22 January 2007 Issue - 10
Editor
C. Balaji,
506, Sai Siri Sampada, 7-1-29/23 & 24,
Leela Nagar, Ameerpet, Hyderabad - 500 016.
Email - balaji.chetlur@symphonysv.com
Publisher, Printer, Owner and place of
Publication with address
K. Satyanarayana
Executive Director
On behalf of National HRD Network
506, Sai Siri Sampada, 7-1-29/23 & 24,
Leela Nagar, Ameerpet, Hyderabad - 500 016.
Mobile: 94406 65375
Tel: +91 (40) 2374-2429, Fax: +91 (40) 2375-3191,
Res.: +91 (40) 2711-2212
e-mail: nhrdhyd@eth.net
ksnhrd@gmail.com
Design Advisor
A.Thothathri Raman
Consulting Editor, Business India, New Delhi
For Advertising in HRD News Letter
Please Contact:
Ms. Kalyani, General Manager,
ZCS Consulting Limited,301,
Suraj Mansion, Ameerpet, Hyderabad - 500 016
Mobile : 9346673068
Phone: 040 - 66628977 / 66628978
email: kalyani@zcscon.com
Board Members
DWARAKANATH P, National President
SANTRUPT MISRA Dr., Immediate Past President
ANAND NAYAK, Regional President (East)
GOPAL KRISHNA M., Regional President(South)
SATISH PRADHAN, Regional President (West)
RAO G P, Regional President (North)
VARADARAJAN S. (Raja), National Secretary
ASHOK REDDY B, National Treasurer
SATYANARAYANA K, Executive Director
MAHALINGAM S, Co-opted Member
CASMIRA RAJ FR, Co-Opted Member
PANDU NAIK G. Dr., Elected Member
RAVIKANTH REDDY J, Elected Member
SANJEEV BICKCHANDANI, Elected Member
NAGARAJ D R, Nominated Member
VERMA K.K. Dr., Ex-officio member
Printed at:
Kala Jyothi Process P Ltd.
1-1-60/5, RTC ‘X’ Road Musheerabad,
Hyderabad - 500 020.
This journal is on our Website:
www.nationalhrd.org & www.nhrdn.org
Features
5 ......... President’s Message
5 ......... Editorial
31 ....... Book Review - Break Free
33 ....... Chapter News
34 ....... Cartoon Corner
Column
6 ..... Ring out the Old, Ring in the New:
New Year Resolutions of a Manager
- Madan Srinivasan
Lead Feature
8 ..... Changing Role of HR Manager
in the Corporate World
........... - Dr. A.Chandramohan,
K.Vasanthi Kumari, S.G.Ashwani
Case Study
30 ... 'Saamp Bhi Marjaye, Lathi Bhi Na
Toote' - R. Dharmarao
Articles
7..... India's Higher Education & Economy
............................. - Col. V R K Prasad
10 ... HR Strategy: Focus and Integration
................... - Eshwar Kumar Mittapalli
12 ... Talent Management
- B. Mathews and B. Saritha
13 ... Talent Retention: Key Strategies
- Tapomoy Deb
14 .............. Competency Mapping
- Catch Word In Corporates
.................... - Dr. A.Vinayagamoorthy,
S. Suja and L Shankari
16 ................ Spiritual Intelligence
- Naachimuthu, K.P, & Rekha, K.N
Contents
17 ... Facets for Successful Management
- G.V.S. Gurunadh & D. Srinivas
18 ... ICTs And Family Life
- Dr T.H.Chowdary
20 ... Appraisals Appraised
- S. Balachandran
21 ... Mood management:Success
under our skin
- Poonam Dhanavati
22 ... An overview of Empathy In
international Human Resources
Scenario
- Sambit Kumar Mishra
23 ... Behavioural Finance-the Buzz
Word Of Bulls And Bears
- L. Shankari
24 ........... Tune Your Track Towards
The Path Of Success
............................................ - Deepa S
25 ... Retention Strategies At
Corporate Level For Bpo's
- Shireesha Devraj, Vishwanath
26 ... Five occasions when you must
communicate face to face
- Sunder Ramachandran
27 ... Outstanding Leaders: The Need
of the Hour - L.K.Jena
28 ... Stress Among Call Centre
Executives: An Empirical Study
- Dr. Zafrul Allam
29 ... Exit Interview: Objective &
Modus-operandi
- Debabrata Dash
32 ... CRM - Six Steps From Customer
Service
- P. Sugunakar Reddy and T. Vijaya
CENTRAL INDIA MANAGEMENT CONCLAVE"
24 & 25th February 2007
Nagpur Chapter is organizing two days long conclave on 24th & 25th February
07. Papers are invited from all NHRDN members, non-members,
academicians and students, on all functional areas of management. The sailent
feature of this conclave is on day one, the activity will be in-house with the
presentation of papers and on day two it will be outdoor activity by the side of
a natural Dam site, 40 kms away from Nagpur, in which the various activities
planned also include various management games which may give practical
insight on various management techniques. Further details can be obtained
from Prof Shyam Shukla Corporate Relations Manager, Central Institute of
Business Management Research & Development Nagpur
M-9372335153 nhrdngp@rediffmail.com
| HRD News Letter | January 2007, Vol.22, Issue:10 4|

From
National President’s Desk
Non-monetary rewards
Bob Nelson a famous motivational speaker
and author, once said "You get what you
reward."
I couldn't agree more with him. There is
nothing more satisfying than a simple word
of praise from your manager. While many
types of rewards and recognition have direct
costs associated with them, there are others
which may be less tangible, but still very
effective. These "non-monetary" rewards
include formal and informal
acknowledgement, assignment of more
enjoyable job duties, opportunities for
training, and an increased role in decisionmaking.
This article focuses on non-
Editorial
What do we deal with day in and day out, in
our organisations and in our communities,
by and large? With notably exceptional
situations, the list includes: problems,
tiredness, burn-out, anger, depression,
frustration, emotional and physical violence,
competition, adversity, greed…How about
the new year beginning on a positive note?
Behavioral sciences have dealt extensively
with matters as above; maybe rightly so. But,
there is the other side to human life, as in
the list of six core virtues stated in the
Character Strengths and Virtues handbook:
1. Wisdom and Knowledge: creativity,
curiosity, open-mindedness, love of
learning, perspective
2. Courage: bravery, persistence, integrity,
vitality
3. Humanity: love, kindness, social
intelligence
4. Justice: citizenship, fairness, leadership
5. Temperance: forgiveness and mercy,
humility and modesty, prudence, selfregulation
6. Transcendence: appreciation of beauty
and excellence, gratitude, hope, humor,
spirituality
(at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
Positive_Psychology. On December 23,
2006)
monetary rewards, and as we will see, these
types of rewards can be very meaningful to
employees and so, very motivating for
performance improvement.
To achieve desired goals, reward systems
should be closely aligned to organizational
strategies.
Non-monetary recognition can be very
motivating, helping to build feelings of
confidence and satisfaction. It can also lead
to increased employee retention
To be really effective, the managers should
get to know different employees' likes and
dislikes. Research indicates that the type
of recognition employees appreciate most
is to be recognized by people they work
directly for. The number one choice for
recognition is sincere praise given in a timely
manner with specific examples.
A branch of psychology called Positive
Psychology has been making rapid strides
and inroads into studying the conditions and
processes that contribute to the flourishing
or optimal functioning of people, groups and
institutions (Gable and Haidt, 2005; abstract;
p.103). A growing number of psychologists
are continuously developing theories and
practices that involved human happiness
positivity to the predominantly negativity
engaging the attention of scholars and
practitioners.
In their seminal paper that introduced the
special issue of American Psychologist
devoted to Positive Psychology, Selgman
and Csikszentmihalyi (2000; p. 10) wrote: If
psychologists wish to improve the human
condition, it is not enough to help those who
suffer. The majority of "normal" people also
need examples and advice to reach a richer
and more fulfilling existence. This is why
early investigators…were interested in
exploring spiritual ecstasy, play, creativity,
and peak experiences.
Scolars like William James, Carl Jung, Carl
Rogers, Abraham Maslow, Martin Seligman,
Albert Bandura, Mihali Csikszentmihalyi,
Shelly Gable, Jonathan Haidt, and so on
have been at Positive Psychology for several
years. Gable and Haidt (2005) called for a
movement on Positive Psychology to
develop because the advances in
psychology have come "at the cost of
understanding what is right with people." (p.
105). They note that "…despite the
Being chosen to work on a task team to
accomplish a company initiative is
motivating because it helps employees gain
new skills and experiences, demonstrates
trust in their abilities, and adds variety to an
individual's work. Individual Development
Plans help identify strong candidates for
developmental opportunities.
Hence, I would advise all to make creative
use of personalized non-monetary rewards
reinforces positive behaviors and improves
employee retention and performance. These
types of recognition can be inexpensive to
give, but priceless to receive
I wish all the readers and Fellow
professionals a Happy and Prosperous
2007.
P. Dwarakanath
philosophical,
historical, and
theoretical
underpinnings
that led to the
c u r r e n t
imbalance in
psychology
[ t o w a r d
negativity], we
believe that there
is little empirical
justification for our predominantly negative
view of human nature and the human
condition. (p. 107).
Developments such as appreciative inquiry,
whole system involvement, holism etc. are
directly or indirectly related to what Positive
Psychology has been calling for.
Through this editorial, I strongly urge
students, researchers, teachers, scholars,
practitioners and my fellow HR professionals
to join this movement! Being positive does
no harm; in fact it empowers, it elevates, it
engulfs.
References:
Gable, S.L. & Haidt, J. (2005). What (and
Why) Is Positive Psychology? Review of
General Psychology, 9(2), 103-110.
Seligman, M.E.P & Csikszentmihalyi, M.
(2000). Positive Psychology: An Introduction,
American Psychologist, 55(1), 5-14.
C. Balaji
| HRD News Letter | January 2007, Vol.22, Issue:10 5|

It's that time again when we greet each
other 'Happy New Year'! It starts from the
last week of December and is said & heard
for at least the first couple of weeks in
January. The more exuberant & enthusiastic
of us may continue with the greeting way
beyond, if only for the merry smiles & oodles
of warmth it brings. It is quite remarkable to
think of how on a single day, every place
and everyone across the globe join in the
rejoicing of a momentous occasion that
interestingly has no astronomical or other
significance and a purely arbitrary day
bestowed upon us by the Romans. Thus,
another year in the Gregorian calendar
becomes history, making way for yet another
- a fresh beginning all over again.
While the season brings many traditions that
have been handed to us from generation to
generation, one that probably has impacted
each one of us, some year or the other, is
the making of New Year Resolutions. Indeed,
as the curtains fall on one period of 365 days
of our lives in this planet, the time seems
ripe to get into a mood of introspection - to
reflect upon the year gone by, consider
what's worked/not worked in our personal/
professional lives, hits & misses, joys &
sorrows and chalk out a broad plan for not
only the coming year, but also the near
future.
According to the online Wikipedia, a New
Year's Resolution is a commitment that an
individual makes to a project or a habit, often
a lifestyle change that is generally
interpreted as advantageous. The name
comes from the fact that these commitments
normally go into effect on Jan 1 and remain
until the set goal has been achieved.
Many New Year Resolutions involve
maintaining peak vitality, fitness or
appearance. For example, one person's goal
might be to reduce or eliminate intake of
alcohol or smoking. A student may make
one of staying attentive in class or complete
her assignments. It can also be eating
moderately or going on a fitness regime.
Then, there are those that involve society
as a whole, e.g. making donations to the
poor, become more environmentally
responsible.
Ring out the Old, Ring in the New:
New Year Resolutions of a Manager
Column
Alas, for most of us, the intentions to carry
them out definitely exist, but they go
unachieved and are often 'broken' fairly
shortly after they are set, depending on how
much of a challenge and 'stretch' you have
set for yourself.
In business parlance, a New Year Resolution
can be considered as an example of the
rolling forecast or a method of planning. By
this method, you establish plans for yourself
at regular short or medium term time
intervals, while having a rough long term
plan. Most organizations conduct their
business planning processes and finalize
& cascade the final annual strategies &
plans to employees in Q4 of the year. These
provide key inputs into individual objective
setting. Years of practice has enabled the
organizations to perfect this into a fine art,
so we do not need to delve too much into
this.
What we probably do not do a good job of is
to set a personal commitment on behavior/
habit change that would improve our
effectiveness as managers & leaders. Yes,
we do have developmental tools & processes
like the 360 degree feedback, career
management resources that guide & support
us in taking such commitments. But like New
Year Resolutions, it becomes an uphill task
to stay focused on them throughout the year,
especially as one has to juggle several
conflicting priorities and stay in a perpetual
state of stress & anxiety, caused by many
factors like speed-to-market, tight budgets/
resources, war for talent.
Ask yourself, when was the last time you
were 100% stress free and felt as free as
a bird?
But, surely as managers who are beginning
the year 2007, there are some things we
can do to increase our productivity while
lowering stress and reflect a year down with
satisfaction about the progress we've made
on them and how we are already beginning
to feel the benefits coming in. Here are five
potential New Year Resolutions for
Managers. The good news is you don't have
to do all of them. Choose the ones that fit
for you. And let me know how it goes.
Madan Srinivasan
No.1: Define Daily Goals
Many managers leave at the end of the day
feeling like they've been running in place --
the to-do list is as long as it was at the start
of the day -- maybe even longer. One of the
reasons managers feel stressed is that there
is no end to the work they can do -- and it's
never all done.
Counteract the endless to-do list by creating
daily goals. Spend 20 minutes each Friday
afternoon reviewing your activities and
deliverables for the next week. Create a plan
for the week and identify what you want to
accomplish each day. Leave yourself some
slack, because you know something will
come up.
Cross off the items as you get them done. If
you finish before the end of the day, you
can declare success or choose to start a
task slated for the next day. Either way, you'll
leave with a feeling of accomplishment.
No. 2: Build a Personal Measurement
Program
Many people think they know where they
spend their time during the workday; most
of them are surprised at what the data
shows. Make a daily log with half-hour
increments. Track your activities for two
weeks. Discover for yourself where you
spend your maximum time. Do not be
surprised if you are spending 50-60% of
your time in Category C items like locating
data, files and papers, catering to ad-hoc
requests, responding to irrelevant emails,
etc.
If you do care about spending time on highvalue
activities, organize yourself in such a
way that you can make it a reality.
Continuously monitoring yourself will give
you some hard data on where the hours go.
You can also capture how you experience
your day by asking yourself:
Madan Srinivasan, President, Organization Capabilty Pepsi Co India Holding Pvt Ltd., Guraon. He can be reached at:
Madan.Srinivasan@intl.pepsico.com
l
l
On a scale of 0-9, how would you rate
your satisfaction at the end of each day?
On a scale of 0-4, rate how much value
you receive for the time you spend in
each meeting.
| HRD News Letter | January 2007, Vol.22, Issue:10 6|

There are no good or bad results from this
tracking -- this information can help you see
patterns and make decisions about
allocating a scarce resource -- you.
No. 3: Invest in You
You are the most effective management tool
you have. Your investment in yourself will
pay off for your employer and the people
you work with. There are several learning &
development resources that can help
broaden your options for responding to
management challenges.
Choose one area that you want to explore
or where you want to catch up on the latest
thinking in the industry. Remember, you
don't have to learn something new for a
workshop to be worthwhile. It can also mean
developing networks which you can leverage
as a sounding board, information source,
etc.
No. 4: Create Time for Reflection
Several of us are 'dynamos' at the workplace
- goal-oriented and always in motion, giving
us little reflection time at work. If we were to
think every day for a few minutes how our
actions & decisions had played out, how the
day was going and what might we do
differently, we can enrich ourselves and
improve our productivity. Taking time to
reflect isn't selfish and or a waste of time;
it's where we integrate our experiences,
extract lessons and develop new
hypotheses for action.
No. 5: Revitalize Your Support Network
Managers often feel stuck in the middle: The
team is saying, "We can't do it all," and the
boss is saying, "Do more with less." Other
managers may have different priorities, and
it may feel like they are pulling in yet another
direction. Even though managers spend all
day with people, managers can feel isolated.
This becomes easier by developing a
support network.
A visual way of doing this is to sketch a
diagram of your support network. Place
yourself in the center of the page. Place the
people and organizations that you can call
on for support at the appropriate relative
distance from you. When you've finished
your diagram, examine your support
network. Do you have people who will help
you work through problems when you're
stuck, help you generate ideas or listen
when you need to talk? Do you have people
at work and outside of work who you can
talk to about professional issues? Look for
support that generates positive action as
well as identifying the problems. Some
managers find problem-solving support
outside the company in professional
associations or online communities.
At the beginning of every airplane trip, the
flight attendants remind each one of us to
don our own oxygen mask before assisting
others. These suggested New Year's
resolutions are like that. When you invest in
your own effectiveness, you'll be better able
to support the people who are counting on
you at work.
Ring out the Old, Ring in the New!
Happy New Year!
India's Higher
Education & Economy
u H
Col. V R K Prasad
As India is marching towards becoming literacy rate is hovering at 59.5% - a poor meteoric rise in telecom, IT, BPO and
a major global economic force (third match to any developing nation. The pharma industries there is a yawning gap
largest in a couple of decades from now
(Goldmann Sachs) with an impressive
growth rate of 8% and the business houses
are spreading their tentacles, but the
graduating youth is relatively unemployable
due to lack of required skills. The less said
the better about the higher education which
witnessed a lowered growth rate in 2000 -
between demand and supply - yes, of quality
manpower which comes only from quality
higher educational institutions. Higher
education which generates knowledge
sustenance of the growth apparently seems 05 compared to the last few decades, both encourages analytical thinking,
difficult though not impossible due to its
inadequate human capital management. A
World Bank report says India "is the best of
the world - it is the worst of the world - and
the gaps are growing" India's top technology
colleges set global standards. Yet "many if
not most children finish government primary
schools incapable of simple arithmetic. Yes,
the education state of the country is a cause
for concern. Only one third who enter school
complete secondary education rightly so
because, any unannounced visitor shall see
less than half the teachers in government
schools, at any given time. A billion plus (1.5)
nation finds only 11% of its relevant age
group (17 - 23 years) population entering
in enrolments and number of institutions.
With close to 18000 colleges and 348
universities India almost figures at the top
in terms of higher educational institutions.
Despite spending Rs.10 lakhs / PA per
student in IIT / IIMs less than 5% end up
doing what they are best trained to do with
many of them heading westward(140000
every year). India ranks very poorly in terms
of turning out Ph Ds -16500/annum
compared to 45000 in US and the irony is,
large part of them are of Asian origin
particularly of India and China. A rough
estimate puts the teaching stream at a low
of 4% from a 37.67 million graduates and
post graduates of the country. As the
encompasses imparting of relevant and
diverse skills needed by the business
enterprise, has become a critical need of the
hour. At present only .37% of our GDP is
going towards higher education which is three
times lower than what it is in developed
countries and public expenditure per student
at $ 406 is among the lowest in the world
compared to China ($2728), Indonesia ($
666), Brazil ($3986) and even Malaysia ($
625). While private players like, ICFAI, MAHE,
AMITY,SYMBIOSIS, etc are playing a stellar
role in contributing their mite to the cause of
higher education a lot still needs to be done
in this regard, only then we can confidently
say that the route to becoming a major global
colleges / universities quite naturally the country's economy is looking up with economy is well laid and clear.
u H
Colonel VRK Prasad is Dean, Icfai School of HRD and he can be reached at vrkprasad@rediffmail.com
| HRD News Letter | January 2007, Vol.22, Issue:10 7|

INTRODUCTION
HR manager can play a role in
environmental scanning i.e. identifying and
analyzing external opportunities and threats
that may be crucial to the company's
success. Similarly HR manager is an
important key person to develop competitive
intelligence that may be useful in the
strategic planning process. He participates
in the strategy formulation process by
supplying information regarding the
company's internal strengths and
weaknesses. The strengths and
weaknesses of a company's human
resources can have a determining effect on
the viability of the firm's strategic options.
HR managers are strategic partners in
business operations. They play important
roles to meet the challenges of an
organisation. Strategic and competent HR
manager need change in their mindset from
seeing themselves relationship managers
particularly to utilize full human resources.
Strategic HR managers need a change in
their mindset from seeing themselves as
relationship managers to resource
managers knowing how to utilize the full
potential of their human resources.
The new breed of HR managers needs to
understand and know how to measure the
monetary impact of their actions, so as to
be able to demonstrate the value added
contributions of their functions. HR
professionals become strategic partners
when they participate in the process of
defining business strategy, when they ask
Lead Feature
Box 1.1 Traditional Roles of HR Manager
1. Counselor Role
2. Mediator Role
3. Trouble shooter Role
4. Spokesman Role
5. Changing agent Role
6. Communicator Role
7. Teaching Role
8. Role of Professional Attitude
9. Role OF Fair treatment
questions that move strategy to action and
when they design HR practices that align
with the business strategy. By fulfilling this
role, HR professionals increase the capacity
of a business to execute its strategies. Thus
this article focuses on roles of the HR
manager to meet organizational challenges.
Now a days HR manager is expected to
involve himself in business planning and
strategies to understand the business
requirements and the HR strategies to the
emerging business realities. HR manager
has to understand the Change Management
Programmes to bring in cultural
transformation. He has to promote the
achieve ownership of HR practices by
business heads to improve credibility of the
policies and programmes for the
organizational success. In view of changing
trends and practices, it is clear that HR
manager has to reorient himself before
attempting to address the organizational
challenges. A broad review of global Human
Resource Development shows that HR
managers have been continuously
participating in planning process. Therefore,
Human Resources managers have to play
the strategic and systematic roles at different
level in the changing corporate world. Human
resource manager has to perform different
roles based on the changing trends,
practices, of Human Resource Management.
The roles will be different from organization
to organization both in nature and structure
of the organization. However, the important
traditional roles and changing roles can be
presented in the following box 1.1 and 1.2.
Box 1.2 Changing Roles of HR Manager
1. Role makers rather than role takers.
2. Integrate the policy.
3. Practice changing business strategies.
4. Versatile people in HRD.
5. Learning individuals.
6. Ready to handle responsibilities.
7. Have highly applied behavioural
science.
8. Global competitors.
9. Global net-workers.
10. Innovative leaders.
Changing Role of
HR Manager in the
Corporate World
Dr. A.Chandramohan, K.Vasanthi Kumari, S.G.Ashwani
In today's changing competitive corporate
world, maintaining a competitive advantage
by becoming a low cost leader or a
differentiator puts a heavy premium on having
a highly committed or competent workforce.
Competitive advantage lies not just in
differentiating a product or service or in
becoming the low cost leader but in also
being able to tap the company's special skills
or core competencies and rapidly respond
to customer's needs and competitor's moves.
In other words competitive advantage lies in
management's ability to consolidate
corporate-wide technologies and production
skills into competencies that empower
individual businesses to adapt quickly to
changing opportunities.
In a growing number of organizations human
resources are now viewed as a source of
competitive advantage. There is greater
recognition that distinctive competencies
are obtained through highly developed
employee skills, distinctive organizational
cultures, management processes and
systems. This is in contrast to the traditional
emphasis on transferable resources such
as equipment. Increasingly it is being
recognized that competitive advantage can
be obtained with a high quality workforce
that enables organizations to compete on
the basis of market responsiveness, product
and service quality, differentiated products
and technological innovation.
In a nutshell, a strategic perspective of HRM
that requires simultaneous consideration of
both external and internal requirement leads
to superior performance of the firm. This
performance advantage is achieved by:
Dr. A Chandra Mohan is Professor, SRM School of Management, SRM University, Chennai. E-mail: dracmohan_mannava@yahoo.com,
Ms. K Vasanthi Kumari is Lecturer, SRM School of Management, SRM University, Chennai. Email: rashmivasanth@yahoo.com,
Ms. S G Ashwani is II MBA student, SRM School of Management, SRM University, Chennai. Email: govind.ashwani@gmail.com
l
l
l
Marshalling resources that support the
business strategy and implementation.
Utilizing the full potential of the human
resources to the firm's advantage.
Capital to complement and augment the
human resources based advantage.
Traditionally viewed as a powerful marketing
tool to manage customer perception,
'branding' is being increasingly used by HR
departments as a tool to recruit new people
| HRD News Letter | January 2007, Vol.22, Issue:10 8|

and establish its position in the organization.
This is a reflection of the changing role of
HR-from a recruiting entity to a business
partner, internal consultant, operational as
well as an administrative expert. In addition,
there is also a continuous effort to establish
strong partnerships with both internal and
external customers.
ACCENTURE INITIATIVE
Accenture has tied up with XLRI,
Jamshedpur, to cater to its internal HR
needs. It has launched an HR training
academy where recent graduates seeking
careers in HR can access specialised skills
that the IT and ITES sectors would require.
In fact, the first batch of 34 professionals is
undergoing training at the organisation. At
the end of the 24-month programme, the
participants will receive the `Accenture and
XLRI Certification in Human Capital
Management.' During the programme, the
candidates will go through both face-to-face
and virtual lessons. Though the faculty
mainly comprises professors from XLRI, top
management executives of Accenture, from
India, and other locations, will also coach
the candidates on various aspects of HR.
THE NEED FOR HR BRANDING
A brand is a product, service or concept that
is publicly distinguished from other products,
services or concepts, so that it can be easily
communicated and helps in establishing a
unique identity. It is a promise to the
customers that a specific level of value,
quality and service will be received. The
most important point to be noted is that
'building a brand' is a corporate strategic
issue and not a short-term tactical activity.
The past few years have seen dramatic
changes in its perception or outlook by
corporate leaders. From just being looked
as a support function, HR today is viewed
as a key player in driving corporate success
and customer satisfaction. "In today's
knowledge driven economy, HR plays a
strategic role in bringing in the right kind of
people into the organization.
ACHIEVING BRAND SUCCESS
THROUGH EMPLOYEES
A brand is an external manifestation of
several internal processes of a company.
There are few companies like Tata
Consultancy Services (TCS), Infosys, IBM,
Cadence, HP, Sun Microsystems, Wipro,
Daksh, Satyam, Tata telecom, I-Flex
solutions, Texas Instruments, Polaris
Software and Birlasoft, who have
successfully established their HR brands
both in India and abroad. According to
Sinha, among the Indian companies Wipro
and Infosys would be the leaders in
branding. In case of MNCs, it is Microsoft,
IBM, Intel, Oracle, HP and Accenture, which
are the leaders.
Experts state that to reach out to all levels
of employees, the HR team has to perform
the role of a facilitator instead of enforcer.
Effective communication (listening and
promoting) and educating the employees
about their capabilities and potential
contributions can help strengthen the HR
brand.
According to Kartikeyan, the HR manager
needs to take three steps to embed the HR
brand. First is the strong internal anchoring
of HR. "HR members must have a pride in
their profession and must not be limited to
activities like staffing, training, and
compensation. The HR policies and
programmes have to be framed in such a
manner that they reinforce and promote the
'brand behavior' and people think
themselves as a 'brand'. This needs to be
followed by each employee of the
organization.
The HR has to use PR as a major skill to
make its brand visibility. Besides,
communicating it in board meetings,
organization's newsletter and intranets, the
HR team also has to devise different
employee-friendly schemes. According to
Zarir Batliwala, head of human resources
for HP India, to gauge the real experience
of the employees and make an impact of
being there, the intranet acts as a great tool.
HUMAN RESOUCE MANAGERS AT
INFOSYS
The CEO of Infosys says that their machines
are human beings. Computers and software
are tools in their hands, their finance and
their employees and their employees are
their human resource. In essence, all the
resource of his company is human
resources.
In addition he says that all employees
manage their human resources and d
others' human resources. Thus, all the
managers are human resources managers
as managing their team members is their
responsibility.
HUMAN RESOUCE MANAGERS IN
SATYAM
Human resources Manager, Satyam
computers, proudly says, he performs more
critical functions of:
l
l
l
Resource Match
Resources Allocation
Employees Development
ATTENTION ARTICLE CONTRIBUTORS
All article contributors are once again requested to limit
their articles to 1,000 word count.
Please send only soft copies of articles and photographs
with the full address and contact numbers through
e-mail to: nhrdhyd@eth.net and
l Employee Retention
Though all the software managers manage
their team members, the HR managers
perform more critical specialist function of
HRM.
CONCLUSION
Though still at a nascent step, market
analysts point out that this trend is expected
to catch up very fast in times to come. This
will see a lot of activity in the HR arena,
with companies coming up with innovative
branding exercises. For this, the HR
manager needs to have a good
understanding of the business and it future
course, so that he can work out his policies
and branding exercise accordingly.
Talking about future success stories Martin
Appel, vice president for human resources
at IBM India Limited says, "Organizations
which invest in hiring the best and
developing their skills, can provide a high
performance culture that will be the
frontrunner. HR plays an important role in
partnering, supporting and sometimes
leading the business in these areas." It won't
be easy, but ongoing communication, and
actually meeting the organization's real and
expressed needs, will help HR earn
respect."
u H
ksnhrd@gmail.com
| HRD News Letter | January 2007, Vol.22, Issue:10 9|

HR Strategy: Focus and
Integration
The term Strategy has derived from the
Greek word, "strategos", which means
the art of general. Strategy is more used in
Militaries, the military generalship and
process of setting the war objectives and
achieving them is called as strategy. Later,
Strategy has been adopted by the
Industries, Business and Management. The
top-level management of a Business
organization, will set a long-term objective
or a direction for business (which is also
called as mission and vision) to direct
themselves and their teams through this
process they have to follow certain
guidelines throughout the organization
(Which is also called as Business Policy)
and the top-level management will decide
on how the available scare resources are
utilized properly to achieve the desired
objectives (called as resources allocation).
Business Strategy includes three important
components, Long - term objective (Mission
and Vision), Business Policy and Resources
allocation, taking of these three decisions,
is called as setting the strategy or strategy
formulation. Over a period of time, the firm
will implement them and execute them
through out the organization, which is called
as strategy implementation, and the
effectiveness of strategy and its success
rate is measured, which is called as strategy
evaluation. If the desired results are
achieved the company will continue to
implement the same strategy when the
environmental changes, competition,
technology, international sphere have no
change, else it will modify them and
implement a more effective strategy to reach
the desired results.
Though the Business strategy has gained
wide acceptance across the industries, the
companies, especially the new-age
businesses and knowledge companies have
been focusing on functional level strategies
like HR strategy, Marketing Strategy and
Finance Strategy. This article enlightens the
readers to understand what a HR Strategy
is and its importance.
Can a human resources strategy helps?
Human Resources strategy is a new
emerging concept in the business world.
Though the concept of strategy has
successfully applied to various business
functions and levels, the application of
strategy to Human resources has failed
because of ever demanding change. The
environmental changes like globalization,
technological changes, legal, regulatory,
mergers and acquisitions, etc., have not
made the consistency of application of
strategy concept to human resources. As
the corporate strategy aims at two major
functions, focus on Business objectives and
integration with the business units and
functions likewise, Human resources also
adopt the focus and integration concepts for
developing an HR Strategy. To define on
what to focus and with whom to integrate
the following four principles strategy
development process has to be considered:
1. Framework
2. Statement
3. Analysis and
4. Planning
Framework:
For developing a HR Strategy the firm
should adopt a logical framework for
understanding and defining the Strategy.
The most often used framework for HR
Strategy is strategy formulation framework
which is a rationalist's perspectives. The
approach for developing HR strategy starts
with "What we do must be relevant to our
corporate objectives"? This question helps
the HR personnel know the purpose of
organization and their purpose of existence
in the system. In developing any corporate
strategy based on the strategic formulation
framework addresses three key strategic
decisions.
1. Where are we now?
2. Where do we want to be?
3. How do we get there?
In formulating an HR Strategy, the following
two Human Resources functions should be
added to the above framework.
1. What kinds of people skills will be
needed to manage and sustain the
organization in the future to meet strategic
business objectives?
2. What human resources programmes
and initiatives will be needed to deal
effectively with the external pressures and
demands affecting the organization?
Eshwar Kumar Mittapalli
As focus figures strongly in the strategic
process the need to clarify areas of strategic
human resources responsibility is broken
down into four key dimensions.
l Culture
l Organization
l People and
l Systems
Considering the above corporate strategy
framework, HR functional dimension and
strategic human resources responsibilities
we can define HR Strategy as
"A co-ordinated set of actions aimed at
integrating an organization's culture,
organization, people and systems".
Statement: HR Mission
Mission statement is a statement which
answers the questions what we are? Where
we would like to reach? How we would like
to do the business? And how we are going
to service our stakeholders. This mission
statement is an organization direction. The
question how we are going to serve our
stakeholders describe what organization is
going to give for the financial, man power
and mind-power services offered to the
company. In majority of the Mission
statements the company will add the
statements like "we provide the proper work
culture and facilities to the employees and
take proper safety measures of work". But,
is this the just objective for the entire Human
Resources or does this serve the purpose
of HR policies and objectives and future
focus?
The human resources function has to be
clear as to where the organization is trying
to go and then consider the implications for
its own activities. In this context, American
writer George Ordiorne refers to the driving
forces of the business as a means of
providing human resource direction.
Consequently, if the organization is
"technology driven", the need to recruit,
develop, compensate and retain
appropriately qualified engineers and
scientists will be the driving strategy of the
human resources function.
Alternatively, other organizations see the
method of distribution as the driving force.
These are frequently sales organizations,
Eshwar Kumar Mittapalli, is a Faculty member in ICFAI National College, Warnagal, You can reach him at eshwar.chinna@gmail.com
| HRD News Letter | January 2007, Vol.22, Issue:10 10|

and they often rely on door-to-door sales
representatives with high levels of
motivation, enthusiasm and persistence to
achieve success. The recruitment of parttime
staff or amateurs is vital, as is the need
to train them quickly. Apart from
commission-based incentive schemes little
provision is made for high staff benefits or
for security. So the human resources
function in this type of organization is again
able to take its lead from the underlying
business strategy.
The Human Resources Mission statement
should answer the simple questions like;
l "What is the people contribution of our
business?"
l "Why does our function exist?"
l "Who are our customers?"
l "What do our customers buy?" (Not to
be confused with what you are selling.)
l "What needs to happen in order for our
function to be judged effective?"
Answering the above questions specifically
considering the current and future issues
of Organization, Human Resources, Career
development and Competences help in
defining an appropriate Human Resources
Strategy.
Analysis:
Conducting a rigorous SWOT analysis
(strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and
threats) clarifies the current status of the
function, the organization and its external
operating environment. This is a process
that should be undertaken on a regular basis
in order to redefine the function's mission
statement and to provide a quantitative and
qualitative human resource input to the
strategic planning process. Like most good
techniques, the SWOT analysis is simple
to understand, apply and convert into
positive action.
Given the complexity of forces now affecting
organizations, it is particularly important to
monitor the external environment. By
appointing an individual or a group of
managers the HR should monitor the
internal and external environment and to
research the possible organizational
implications. Line managers should be coopted
into this process as it helps to
generate new issues, understanding,
ownership and commitment to any
subsequent human resource activities. The
need to assess the future demands from
the external environment and the
organization is vital. However, the process
also involves a lot of internal analysis. For
example, do you have the right skills? Has
your team got management credibility? On
what matters does the organization consult
you? Having completed this status report
the human resources function is then able
to engage in the next step of strategy
formulation.
Planning:
The need to generate some strategic human
resource options and then to make strategic
choices is how the rationalist framework
progresses. Yet it poses a structuring issue.
How do we develop, shape and order our
options and choices? This can be resolved
by focusing on our four dimensions: culture,
organization, people and systems.
Classic personnel activity has tended to
cover the areas of people and organization,
but even in these areas its actions have
often lacked integration so that we tend to
alter remuneration structures without
reference to organization structure or people
capability. The result is often a lack of coordination
and direction. Culture is an
interesting, and to some people,
controversial inclusion.
Organization culture - its measurement,
monitoring and management - provides the
potential to enhance organizational
performance. While the difficulties and
academic arguments over whether or not
culture can be changed remain, the fact is
that more and more chief executives are
receptive to the concept of corporate culture
as a possible source of competitive
advantage. Schein has argued that
corporate culture is something that needs
to be understood and managed as a key
aspect of human resources. Legge has
termed the use of culture by personnel
people to gain power a "deviant innovation".
She sees this use of culture as an attempt
by the human resources professional to
change the basis on which organizational
success and the human resources
function's contribution to it are evaluated.
This requires the human resources
professional to act as a link between
individual and corporate values.
What is also interesting in this area is the
traditional suspicion and sometimes hostility
displayed by our profession towards
diagnostic tools, such as attitude or
organization climate surveys. This is
puzzling, for such devices provide a major
opportunity for the function to make a
significant contribution to the functioning of
the organization in a quantitative form.
On the other hand, many human resources
functions have not had very much to say
about systems, outside traditional areas
such as appraisal or management
development. Few human resources
functions have an input on systems such
as those involving major information
technology investments. Typically, the
reaction from the IT professional might be:
"What would they know about it?" The fact
is we probably know a whole lot more than
any of the other functions including finance.
Surely the real cost of information
technology investment is not the hardware
but the costs of training people to use it
effectively. How many IT systems suffer from
serious under capacity because of
inadequate training? Yet somehow this kind
of debate only ever happens in a small
select group of companies. The objective of
trying to develop a human resources
strategy is to put human resource issues
such as this on the boardroom agenda. In
examining these four dimensions it is
possible to develop a series of strategic
continuums which do in fact generate a
series of options in terms of human resource
activities. This merely provides some of the
more obvious options, whereas an individual
company analysis, set against the corporate
objectives, will generate significantly more.
Clearly some key choices have to be made.
Once line management and the human
resources function have followed through
this process it is then possible to set some
broad human resources objectives. These
broad objectives then need to be broken
down into the specialist areas such as
remuneration, recruitment, appraisal and
training and development.
The recruitment choices may be whether
the organization promotes only from within
whether it goes to the external market. Does
the organization have narrow or wide career
paths? In the compensation area, does the
organization promote high or low base
salaries, few incentives or many incentives?
Does the organization afford limited or high
employment security? By following through
this particular approach, each specialist
function is required to set operational
objectives which are consistent with the
human resources mission statement and
objectives and ultimately the corporate
strategy. It should also ensure that
remuneration programmes are consistent
with career planning and development
activities and so on.
Conclusion:
One of the major responsibilities of the toplevel
management is to highlight the
corporate mission, vision, objectives,
values, principles and culture throughout the
organization. To inculcate this in the teams,
the company will orient the new employees
through training programmes and to
continue the same the companies will
circulate internal newsletters throughout the
organization. When these teams come to
the execution of their roles, responsibilities
and duties and taking the decisions (Longterm
or short-term) much more gaps will be
found between the functional level strategy
and the corporate strategy. The HR Strategy
is also not exempt from the above. The HR
strategy should focus on the Business
Objectives and HR Objectives and it should
integrate with the Culture, Organization,
People and System. u H
| HRD News Letter | January 2007, Vol.22, Issue:10 11|

Talent Management
"To put it simply and starkly, if you don't
get the people process right you will never
fulfill the potential of your business."
- Larry Bossidy.
In the competitive scenario to attain
competitive advantage in every aspect what
we need is how different we are from our
competitors and what are our core
competencies. In our knowledge based
economy value is the product of knowledge
and information. In the new day context
companies cannot generate profits without
ideas, skills and talent of knowledge workers
and companies have to bet on people but
not on technologies certainly not on capital.
To survive in the knowledge based economy
over the long run, organizations must
become focused and be capable of
managing employees as their most critical
resources hence workers now require more
education and skills than ever before, as
positions have become more knowledge
based and information intensive. And with the
business going global and of cutthroat
competition there is a need to develop and
deploy people who can articulate the passion
and vision of the organization and make
teams with the energy to perform at much
higher levels. Hence talent plays a vital role.
Definition of Talent Management
"The capacity to learn + capacity to think +
capacity to relate + capacity to act
accordingly * values of the organization is
called as talent"
"Talent management implies recognizing
person's inherent skills, traits, personality
and offering him a matching job".
While there are no Magic formulae to
manage talent, the trick is to locate it and
encourage it. Talent management is
beneficial to both the organization and the
employees.
Features of talent management
l Talent management is of identifying,
realizing and guiding untapped potential
in people.
l It means nurturing and developing those
people identified of having ability and
potential and it should form part of any
organizations recruitment and retention
strategy.
l It involves individual and organizational
development in response to a changing
and complex operating environment. It
includes the creation and maintenance
of supportive people oriented
organizational culture.
l Talent Management is a conscious
deliberate approach undertaken to
attract, develop and retain people with
the aptitude and abilities to meet current
and future organizational needs.
Every person has a unique talent that suits
a particular job profile any other position will
cause him discomfort. A wrong fit will result
in further hiring, retraining and other wasteful
activities. In order to bring harmony in such
situation the key ingredient is "putting the
right people in the right jobs."
Talent management brings together a
number of important human resources and
management initiatives. Organizations that
formally decide to manage their talent
undertake a strategic analysis of their
current HR process. Talent management
approach adopted and focused on cocoordinating
and integrating the following.
l Recruitment: ensuring right people are
attracted to the organization.
l Retention: developing and
implementing practices that reward and
supports employees.
l Employee development: ensuring
continuous formal and informal learning
and development.
An important step to be identified in the
organization is the staff or employees that
are critical to the organization. Many
organizations lost a lot of "organizations
knowledge" in the downsizing exercises a
few years ago. The impact of the loss was
not immediately apparent. However it did not
take long for many companies to realize their
mistake. What more important is to think of
whether people still seen as an
organizations most valuable assets.
Business leaders are quick to say that, but
when it comes to the real situation they are
not realizing the same consequently they
are worried about retaining them.
For those companies who have the foresight
to take more innovative and imaginative
approaches they will have the opportunity
B. Mathews and B. Saritha
to gain competitive advantage by creating
niche for human resources. For those who
don't, their future competitiveness will
remain even more uncertain.
Now let us discuss in detail some of the
important aspects which are needed for
talent management.
Attracting talent:
Attracting qualified talent is the critical first step
in the talent management cycle. The improving
economy, baby boomers, retirement and other
factors are creating keen competition for talent
these days. Hence this step has become more
critical than ever before.
Companies have to attract good talent by
establishing their brand identity. As we know
that we get good customers with a good brand.
In the same way companies must develop their
image in the society by implementing the best
practices in each and every aspect.
Selecting talent:
Once qualitative people are attracted then
it is very important to choose right candidate
for the right job. What companies have to
do is to match the job analysis with human
analysis which gives the real picture of role
fitment. This process must be adopted by
every company in order to have high
performance teams which give competitive
advantage.
"Any strategy, no matter how smart is dead
on arrival unless a company bring it to life with
people-THE RIGHT PEOPLE"---- Jack Welch.
Retaining talent:
Most companies today would acknowledge
that their human assets are their most
important asset. But since companies can't
own employees the way they own factories
or product your success or failure hinges
on the quality and duration of the relationship
you form with your people.
In present scenario people choose
companies which have congenial
atmosphere and prefer change if they don't
get desirable, as it may hinder the growth and
success of the company. Hence retention is
vital than recruitment. Rewards for high
performance employee welfare opportunity
for individual development, employing
personal and professional counseling
B.Mathews, Asst. Prof in management, St. Mary's college of Engineering and Technology, Hyd. Can be reached at: mailmathews@gmail.com
B.Saritha, IT recruiter, IT Global Services, Hyderabad. Can be reached at: saritha_bis@hotmail.com
| HRD News Letter | January 2007, Vol.22, Issue:10 12|

initiatives enhances QWL, QC- a seasoned
technique helps in retention of employees.
In order to retain talented people, pamper
the talent pool and aspire them with
recognition, status, and good money and also
encourage them in the quest for knowledge.
They have to provide assistance with financial
planning, entrepreneurship and
intrapreneurship development programs and
some times part time employment options. If
these things are not provided people will find
companies where all these things are
available and quit the present organization.
Steps to be taken to gain competitive
advantage through talent management
Industry academia partnership:
In order to manage the talent, initiatives
must be taken from the route base level of
people during their educational process in
the colleges. Organizations must have an
MoU with the colleges in developing the
talent according to their requirements and
there by providing training and development
programs to the students so that when they
graduate they will readily deliver the services
to the company.
Faculty development programs:
It is not an end developing the students
according to the requirements. It is equally
important to conduct various developmental
programs continuously to the faculty in the
emerging trends and issues by the eminent
persons both from academics and industry
so that it furthers research and better
education and orientation to the students.
Better HRP:
Companies have to take employees
forecasting as serious as they do business
forecasting. This enables to know the
requirement and may not fall shortage of
the talented employees.
Continuous training:
Like Motorola and Disney every company
has to allocate funds for continuous training
and development programs and ensuring
its implementation.
Finally talent management is more than just
another HR process. It requires a holistic
and integrated approach;
"Talent is a natural ability, left undeveloped
it could reman dormant and hidden for ever."
u H
Talent Retention:
Key Strategies
Today talented professionals are
increasingly mobile, have highly
transferable skills, are Internet literate, well
informed and above all, sought after.
Organizations are constantly struggling to
keep these valuable individuals as the best
way to deliver sustained competitive
advantage in the knowledge economy.
Retention of talent is fundamentally talent
continuity. In an upturn, the cost of not
having the right talent could be untold
billions in lost and missed opportunities and
in a downturn the cost could be bankruptcy.
Therefore it is crucial for every organization
to retain talented people by developing
appropriate talent retention strategy.
Following are some of the key talent
retention strategy:
1. Knowing key talents: Organizations,
especially senior leadership, must find
time to get to know their potential and
key talents by relating to them
personally.
2. Clearly defining which employees
the organization wants to keep: Many
organizations have focused on
determining which employees they
should get rid of rather than on which
ones they should keep. Many
downsizing packages unfortunately
resulted in talented people leaving the
organization as they could find other
work quickly.
3. Communicating talented employees
their retention plan: Many
organizations have deliberately not told
talented people that they were special
in many ways for fear of alienating the
average performers. In the current
scenario, it is easy to retain average
performers and increasingly difficult to
retain talents.
4. Providing recognition: It is crucial to
understand what drives key talents. The
major reasons talented people leave
organizations are lack of recognition,
lack of involvement, and poor
management. Providing recognition
helps to retain key talent and also yields
great feedback and generates ideas for
talent retention.
5. Providing opportunities for
development and involvement:
Providing development opportunities,
mentoring programmes and ensuring
knowledge transfer within the
organization efficiently and effectively
helps talented people to provide an
organization valuable input on creative
business opportunities and solutions. It
also enhances their commitment to stay
with the organization.
7. Rationalizing culture: Talented
employees appreciate performance
oriented, ethics driven, autonomy
seeking and supportive of great place
to work practices.
8. Providing intrapreneurial
opportunities: By allowing talents to
Tapomoy Deb is G M - HR with Spentex Industries, New Delhi. E-Mail: tdeb1969@rediffmail.com
Tapomoy Deb
run a business inside a larger business,
an organization can gain commitment
and ownership of results while
simultaneously developing people.
People who see opportunities for
ownership and personal development
are much likely to stay with the
organization.
9. Challenging Jobs: Top talents like
challenges and risks, otherwise
boredom will set in and they will be
looking for something more interesting
elsewhere. It is very challenging for
organizations to design work that way
but they cannot do it then talents are
not expected to stay.
10. Providing resources: Talents must be
given the tools they need to do their jobs
effectively. Of course, expenses are to
be carefully watched but expense
cutting should not cause the best
people to wish they were somewhere
else, and then they soon will be.
Organizations need to clearly identify,
develop, involve and recognize key people.
It is not limited to the favoured few but
focusing on those people whose skill sets
are crucial and rarely available and
prospective to organization. Those
organizations that are able to create a
dynamic, a new human resource model will
retain the high knowledge talent needed to
succeed in a globally competitive
environment.
u H
| HRD News Letter | January 2007, Vol.22, Issue:10 13|

Competency Mapping
- Catch Word In
Corporates
Dr. A.Vinayagamoorthy, S. Suja and L Shankari
Abstract
[A Competency HRM model is developed
by the researchers with regard to Functional
competency of thirty middle level managers
of a leading organization, manufacturing of
Power Steering Gears, and the acceptability
of the model was tested by the pilot study
conducted by them].
Introduction:
During the LPG era, the competency
movement has been gaining momentum in
the HR area. Talented people are today's
scarce strategic resource, it has become
increasingly difficult attract, motivate and
retain the best in the market place.
Competency mapping place a key role in
integrating the human resource system by
providing vital information required to link
rules and individuals.
In this context, the researchers decided to
conduct a pilot study at a leading
organization, manufacturing of Power
Steering Gears.
A Conceptual Model of Individual
Competence
Following are the steps involved in the
competency mapping
Step 1: Identification and Classification of
the Competencies
The proposed model used the following tools
for identification of competencies.
1. Job analysis interview
2. Focus groups
3. Questionnaire
4. Job description
5. Direct observation methods
6. Training programmes
From this initial list, the competencies are
classified into two, they are
Personal Competencies
Professional Competencies can be
motivational, intellectual, social and
emotional. Professional competency can be
organizational, management and functional.
Step 2: Developing the contents of the
competency profiles
A competency profile may describe an
individual, a position, a group of positions
or a whole organization.
The proposed model profiles both the
targeted and existing profiles
Step 3: Competency profiling in competency
mapping
Competency mapping identifies an
individuals strength and weakness, helps
him/her understand them better and shows
him/her where career development efforts
need to the directed.
Self-assessment
A self-assessment instrument is an efficient
means of evaluating skills in that the
respondent answers direct questions about
their competencies and assessment.
The instrument is in the form of a
questionnaire where the candidates simply
indicate their level of ability in each
competency on a four level verbal scale
namely unfamiliar, familiar, competent, expert.
Degree of Importance: in the profile of a high
level manager, the competency "developing
a vision" might be relatively more important
that "Communicating in writing" even if both
are selected for the people. This aspect is
known as identification of the degree of
importance.
This model uses the verbal scale
Virtual
Levels of Profiles
Who or what is Target
being described
Individual
A profile of the competencies an
individual should exhibit after
participating in a training and
development program. Might Be
referred to as the Training and
Development Desired
Outcomes Profile.
Essential
Desirable
These points in the scale carry the
weightage 3,2,1 respectively.
Assignment of required level: the
assignment of required level for that position
was done to present bias that might occur
when assigning desired and observed
weights together.
Assignment of observed level: The superiors
did the assigning of the observed level later
to present the influence of the required level
on the mapping
Integrate the collected date:
The self-assessment sheets and the
observed level marked by the superiors
were integrated. In case of huge difference
both the parties were asked to give
behavioural indicates to support their claims
Three key steps in using the competency
information 1. Translate the data 2. Conduct
a gap analysis 3. Interpret the profiles.
HOW TO MEASURE GAPS
If the purpose of the gap analysis's to
identify training needs, then a one-to -one
comparison of the individual's level of
mastery on specific competencies with the
desired or required level of mastery will
provide an indication of the competencies,
which will require attention. Any
competencies where a candidate's rating is
below what is required would be flagged for
follow-up. This may mean formal training,
on- the- job experience or mentoring.
Existing
In a staffing context, a
competency profile is derived for,
each individual competing for the
job. This might be referred to as
candidate Profiles or Applicant
Profiles. Upon hiring an individual,
his or her competency profile,
could be called an Employee
Profile or an Incumbent Profile
Dr. A.Vinayagamoorthy, Reader, Periyar University E-Mail: avm_2007@yahoomail.com
Ms. S. Suja, Ph.D., Scholars, Periyar University E-Mail: sujaboobalan@yahoo.co.in
L.Shankari, Faculty, Sona School Of Management. Salem.; saishanpari@yahoo.co.in
| HRD News Letter | January 2007, Vol.22, Issue:10 14|

Group of
individuals.
Position
Group of
positions
Organization
Step
Consider the level
Consider the role
Consider the stage of
organizational
development
Consider other
relevant contextual
variables
Identify relevant
professional
competency
categories and
competency clusters
Select personal
competencies
Collect additional
supporting
information
Review, customize,
finalize
A new team is being formed in the
organization. This group of
individuals will conduct strategic
planning and policy review. The
profile describing the
competencies desired of the new
team members could be referred
to as the Strategic Planning
and Policy Review Team Profile.
As part of the process of
staffing a vacancy in the
organization, one can develop a
Position Profile. This describes the
ideal competencies for someone
in that position.
A new business line requires that
your organization build a senior
IT management group. By
combining generic management
competencies with specific
knowledge competencies that are
associated with IT, you develop an
IT Management Profile to recruit
or develop staff for this particular
group.
With an eye to the future, one can
develop a profile to describe the key
competencies expected to support
organizational performance five
years in the future. This might be
called a 5-Year Organizational
Outlook Profile.
There is a high performing team
in the organization, against which
we can benchmark all others.
The profile describing the,
competencies currently exhibited,
by this group of individuals might
simply be referred to as the Team
Profile.
To re-classify a position in the
organization a Position Profile
provides an accurate descriptive,
picture of the competencies
currently required in that position.
Your organization seeks to
flatten its hierarchy. One,
approach is to identify a group of,
positions or levels that share
basic competencies. By profiling,
these positions, the levels that
require the same fundamental
competencies can be combined.
To profile the key
competencies that are currently
exhibited by all individuals of the
organization a self-assessment
may be done. This is a snapshot
of the organization as a Profile of
the Organization Today.
Description
Consider the amount of responsibility, authority and
accountability required to perform the work. The hierarchical
levels in the organization will be the guiding light.
Consider the major/minor activities/ responsibilities relating to
the profile being developed.
Consider the organization's life cycle and its current stage of
development
Consider other contextual variables that are likely to influence
the identification and selection of competencies for inclusion in
the profile being developed. The relevance of particular
contextual variables is driven by the profile's intended purpose
and application.
From the Competency Listing, developed in the first step, identify
the competency categories of greatest relevance to the profile.
From within each of these categories, identify the competency
clusters of greatest relevance-this is the profile's first cut.
From within each of the competency clusters select the personal
competencies of greatest relevance to the profile.
In order to verify/substantiate the competencies selected to this
point, gather additional supporting information from sources such
as an expert panel or surveys.
Based on the information gathered at the previous step, review
and tailor the profile, adding any additional competencies and/or
information deemed to be important - this is the profile's final cut.
PERSON JOB MATCH
To find the perfect fit for the job the following
analysis method is very beneficial. For e.g.,
two candidates are competing for a position.
Candidate A exceeds requirements on two
of the four competencies and falls below on
the other two. Candidate B falls below on all
four competencies.
Process 1:
The sum of all gaps of candidate A (+or-
)=20+10+20+20=70
The sum of all gaps of candidate B (+or-
)=10+30+10+10=60
According to this process, candidate B
would be better fit for the position.
Process2:
The sum of all negative gaps of candidate
A= 20+20=40
The sum of all negative gaps of candidate
B= 10+30+10+10=60
According to this process, candidate A
would be better fit for the position.
Key Steps In Creating the Contents of
Competency Profile
The application of competency profiling at
the recruitment stage can help to reduce
cost. Firstly, if advertisement for a vacant
position contains some indication of the
required competencies, the no. of unsuitable
applications can be reduced. Also
competency profiling can help to reduce the
likelihood of costly recruitment errors and
any subsequent business errors made by
the recruit.
Conclusion:
Competency mapping is not rocket science,
but it can be as explosive in terms of
reenergizing employees and building a
dynamic organization. Competency model
are not ends in themselves. They are means
to an end a set of standards to drive human
resource processes. Competency based
HRM have the capacity to actually drive
organizational change rather simply
enabling change to take place.
u H
OUR MIND
The mind is our best friend or our
worst enemy as it depends on our
thinking. Jesus said, “The kingdom of
God is within you.” Milton said, “The
mind is its own place. It can make a
heaven of hell and a hell of heaven.”
Positive thinking brings happiness
and purposeful thinking brings power
and success.
- Prof. I V Chalapathi Rao
In Ancient Wisdom-Modern Insights
| HRD News Letter | January 2007, Vol.22, Issue:10 15|

Spiritual Intelligence
Naachimuthu, K.P, & Rekha, K.N
INTRODUCTION
'To be taught is nothing- everything is
inside waiting to be awakened'
- Paracelsus
Individuals require a wide variety of skills,
knowledge or ability to perform a task. It is
generally referred as the "Intelligence".
Although it is hard to define Intelligence, it
can be described as, the individuals' overall
ability to adapt, adjust, learn and carry out
abstract thinking, etc. As more researchers
started focusing on specific aspects of
intelligence they classified intelligence in to
various types such as Academic / cognitive
intelligence, mechanical / motor intelligence,
emotional intelligence (interpersonal
intelligence & intrapersonal intelligence),
social intelligence, etc. To complement all
the other types of intelligence, Spiritual
Intelligence (SI) is classified as another type,
which deals with truly humane aspects and
fills the gap of how to make a man, a
complete 'being'.
HUMAN BEING - A MIXTURE OF THREE
ELEMENTS
Human beings are product of three elements
viz. Thinking, Feeling and Being. Thinking has
more to do with IQ/ Cognitive Intelligence and
it helps an individual to analyze, adapt to
situations, make wise decisions and act
accordingly. Feeling is more related to
emotions/EQ. It refers to the individuals'
ability to understand the emotions of oneself
and others and handling it more effectively.
Though these two (IQ & EQ) are more
focused on external environment, SQ is more
focused on inner development and it helps
in giving individuals how to make a value
addition to it.
Being
Thinking
Human
Being
Feeling (EQ)
SPIRITUAL INTELLIGENCE
The term 'Spiritual' or 'Spirituality' refers to
the subtler element of one's inner self. It has
nothing to do with religion. A person is said
to be exercising spirituality, when he or she
is able to see one's own self in others. When
this spirituality is practiced a harmless,
happy and harmonious living community
can be developed in this earth. The term
'Spiritual Intelligence' can be described as
'the intelligence with which we address and
solve problems of meaning and value, the
intelligence with which we can place our
actions and our lives in a wider, richer,
meaning-giving context, the intelligence with
which we can assess that one course of
action or one life- path is more meaningful
than other.' (Danah Zohar & Ian Marshal)
Spiritual Intelligence is a transformative
intelligence that makes an individual whole
and gives him / her ones own integrity
(Zohar, 2000). Spiritual intelligence can be
described as a deep self-awareness in
which one becomes more and more aware
of the dimensions of self, not simply as a
body, but as a mind-body and spirit. When
we employ our spiritual intelligence, we
reach the extraordinary place in which our
mind no longer produces data of the type
wanted or needed and the need for intuition
becomes accelerated. As conscious beings,
we are aware of our thought images and
feelings as they arise in our consciousness;
yet our complex and not so complex
processing of information in the brain leads
to an inner experience. This inner experience
represents the essence of spiritual
intelligence.
QUALITIES OF SPIRITUAL MATURITY:
◆ Love, compassion and service: Love
and compassion are often associated
with the beginning of a true spiritual life.
Love dissolves confusion and fear and
elicits kindness, openness and respect.
Unless we love and trust ourselves, we
cannot love others. Compassion goes
beyond a personal form of love to a love
of all creation.
◆ Honesty and authenticity: No longer
lying to ourselves and others about what
we are doing and what the
◆
◆
◆
◆
◆
◆
◆
◆
◆
consequences are. To live as we really
are without delusion about the reality of
the past, the present, our selfhood and
behaviors.
Physical, emotional, mental and
spiritual clarity: Physical clarity has to
do with attention to the body's health
and real needs. Mental and emotional
clarity have to do with awareness,
discernment and lucidity. Spiritual clarity
has to do with wholeness, simplicity and
sensitivity.
Responsibility and discipline:
Becoming accountable for ourselves
without feeling excessively responsible
for others. Dependable and creative
completion of our responsibilities and a
disciplined approach to personal growth.
Serenity: A state of equanimity, inner
tranquility and peacefulness in the face
of challenge and change.
Personal freedom: Letting go of
attachments and living questions and
problems into answers and
opportunities without drama, escape, or
avoidance.
Tolerance and patience: The ability to
embrace self and 'the other' in spite of
perceived weakness or difference. To
even move beyond tolerance to
acceptance and celebration of
difference and diversity. Patience means
to take events and experiences as they
come without complaint or expectation.
It also means all things have a natural
time and place to be.
Faith, trust, and inner security: The
ability to live without anxiety or doubt.
An inner security free of fear and
deprivation.
Wisdom and understanding: Deep
insight, possible at any age, expressed
through everyday action.
Gratitude, humility and willingness:
Gratitude is the recognition of the little
miracles that occur everyday. Humility
is the ability to move beyond arrogance
and grandiosity toward an honest
acceptance of ourselves with all our
perceived limitations and faults.
Hope, happiness, joy, and humor:
Naachimuthu, K.P, Faculty member, Sona School of Management, Salem. E-mail : pnachimuthu2005@yahoo.co.in
Rekha, K.N, Academic Associate, Indian School of Business, Hyderabad. E-mail : rekhathegreat@gmail.com
| HRD News Letter | January 2007, Vol.22, Issue:10 16|

Hope and happiness are states of well
being and contentment emanating from
a deep feeling of inner wealth irrespective
of outer events or experiences. Joy and
humor spring from a warm heart and a
sense of the 'cosmic game'.
◆ Connection with the earth, nature and
everyday life: Even though we may find
great inspiration in sacred systems or
transcendent experiences, we
recognize the sacredness of daily
activities, other people, other life forms,
inanimate matter, and nature. "It's no
good being an angel if you're no earthly
use."
◆ living in the present moment: The
ability to live in the present rather
escaping to the past or the future. The
ability to constantly 'let go'.
◆ A sense of wonder, mystery, and
reverence: A direct experience of the
cosmos which is unitive, inclusive, and
expansive. A sense of being aware of
the profound interconnectedness of all
creation.
◆ A sense of purpose and place in
space and time: A sense of the unique
and necessary place and personal
contribution of each individual being in
the world. "Where does my deep
gladness meet the world's deep need?"
SPIRITUALITY AT WORK PLACE
Spirituality or being spiritual is a way of
expressing ones' true self or the humane
Introduction
An effective manager pays attention to many
facets of management, leadership and
learning within organizations. So, it's difficult
to take the topic of "management success"
We suggest seven management success
skills without which we don't believe you can
be a successful manager.
The most important issue in management
success is being a person that others want
to follow. Every action you take during your
career in an organization helps determine
whether people will one day want to follow
you.
nature, such as respect, regard, empathy
or compassion for other being. The practices
of mindfulness and character development
that are so much a part of SI can be a
tremendous asset to people in all aspects
of life. So individuals can bring this
spirituality in to workplace as a part of their
own character. How one approaches,
communicate and build positive relationship
with peers, sub-ordinates, top management
and customers is both a practical, emotional
and also spiritual way of approach.
The integration of Spirituality or Spiritual
Intelligence in work place follows seven
principles, which when inhibited into an
organization makes the employees more
effective, productive and efficient (personally
& professionally). They are:
1. Creativity: It refers to conscious efforts
to see the things differently, breaking out
of habits and out-dated beliefs to find
new ways of thinking, doing and being.
2. Communication: It refers to ones ability
to be assertive, frank and straightforward
in sharing information or ideas. Simply
to say it is the integrity and candor in
one's way of behavior or communication.
3. Respect: It refers to the true regard and
acceptance of others as oneself and it
also includes the ability to appreciate
diversity/ differences and learning to use
these differences for mutual benefit.
4. Vision: It refers to the ability to see the
unseen, imagine the unimaginable. This
l
l
l
version, when not followed by proper
mission remains only as dream. So for
growth, development or expansion one
should be willing to dream about making
impossible, possible.
5. Partnership: It refers to the ability to
accept, appreciate and implement the
views of others, if it is beneficial to a
larger extent/ larger community and at
the same time it also involves the ability
to challenge the views, when it is not
feasible. Thus partnership is a balanced,
fair and unbiased way of being and
working together.
6. Energy: It refers to the ability of an
individual to diffuse or spread positive
forces in the environment he lives/
works, so that everyone feels respected,
cared for and are motivated to
demonstrate the same.
7. Flexibility: It refers to the ability to adjust
and adapt to changes in situations,
people etc. Resistance to change or
being more rigid will make one's mind
more narrowed or stagnated and will
prevent further development/ progress.
CONCLUSION
Spiritual Quotient/Spiritual Intelligence thus
hold the hope for fulfillment and it helps in
developing or empowering oneself and
others. SQ also helps people in building a
healthy and harmonious community and
makes the world a better place to live in.
u H
Facets for Successful
Management
A successful manager, one whom
others want to follow:
Builds effective and responsive
interpersonal relationships. Reporting
staff members, colleagues and
executives respect his or her ability to
demonstrate caring, collaboration,
respect, trust and attentiveness.
Communicates effectively in person,
print and email., Listening and two-way
feedback characterize his or her
interaction with others.
Builds the team and enables other staff
to collaborate more effectively with each
other. People feel they have become
more - more effective, more creative,
G.V.S. Gurunadh & D. Srinivas
more productive - in the presence of a
team builder.
u H
G.V.S. Gurunadh is Director - HR, Capital IQ Information Systems (India) Pvt. Ltd, he can be reached at vgunturi@capitaliq.co.in
D.SRINIVAS is Faculty of Human Resources Management in Alluri Institute of Management Sciences, Affiliated to Kakatiya University,
Hunter Road, Warangal, He can be reached at vasu_kazipet@yahoo.co.in
l
l
l
l
Understands the financial aspects of the
business and sets goals and measures
and documents staff progress and
success.
Knows how to create an environment
in which people experience positive
morale and recognition and employees
are motivated to work hard for the
success of the business.
Leads by example and provides
recognition when others do the same.
Helps people grow and develop their
skills and capabilities through education
and on-the-job learning.
| HRD News Letter | January 2007, Vol.22, Issue:10 17|

ICTs And Family Life
The old order chngeth yielding place to
the new
Lest one good custom should corrupt
the whole world
- Poet Laureate of UK; Lord Tennyson
The Bhagawad Geeta says,
Kallah kalayataam aham
I am time that causes change.
Since the evolution of the cosmos and life
on the planet, earth there have been
changes in the species that inhabit this earth
and the way that human beings formed
communities, nations and states and
governments. What happens over time is
the development of technology . Inventions
make life less arduous and increasingly
more comfortable for human beings . As
intelligence and knowledge grow, there will
be less and less manual work and drudgery
and more and more work is done by
machines. In the information age the world
is knit together by the global information
infrastructure (GII) of optical fiber cables,
terrestrial and satellite microwave radio
communications systems. During the last
200 years the world trade was mostly in
goods, in things physical which are surplus
and produced inexpensively in one country
and are required in other countries across
Oceans and land masses. Nations had
concerted together international trade
organizations like the UNCTAD to facilitate
less and less painful and expensive means
of trade of goods. Now in the information
age more of brain work and less of
mechanical work is required. Machines
become more and more intelligent and even
start learning. But to make machines do the
work which our mind does and make them
learn as humans learn, fabulous of brain
work is required. This brain wok is called
services, Whether they be for design or
consultation medical prescription or
transaction; banking; insurance; education;
entrainment; design; planning; collection and
process of information and so on. Just as in
production of goods there are competitive
advantages for certain countries and global
trade assures the availability of goods
everywhere at least expense, so does trade
in services help the storage and exchange
of information and knowledge for the modern
services economy.
2. The services economy is information
and knowledge- dependent. In developed
countries services sector contributes 65 to
75% of the GDP. In Inida, it is 55%. People
can gat the best advantage out of the new
information & communications technologies
which are the foundation for the knowledge
economy only if they are educated and
skilled in the use of knowledge machines
and systems; that is, computers and the
Internet. We find that along with urbanization
which has been happening inexorably all
over the world, human beings are wanting
more and more creature comforts. Instead
of commuting in public transport people
have their own vehicles; homes are airconditioned
and are with all types of
information & entertainment equipments like
colour TV, microwave oven, refrigerator,
alarm systems and so on. And if this level
of life is to be sustained, it is not sufficient if
one person works. Both husband the wife
are having to work to get a family income
sufficient to sustain the new style of living.
Education and medicine and health services
are becoming expensive. This is another
reason why both have to work. If both of
them go for work, then they cannot have
many children. So we see that where wife
and husband are working, such families
have one or at best two children. It is not
only the difficulty and expense in upbringing
of the children that is, lading to small families
but the cost of education is another reason.
When once both wife & husband work, who
will look after the child or children? In the
rural homes we have grandmothers and
uncles and aunts who could look after the
children. But in cities where housing is very
costly, we cannot have joint families. The
old will have to be increasingly consigned
to senior citizen homes. So the infants are
left in Crèches or more affluent ones engage
Nanis at home while both go for work. As
the infant grows he/she is put in a preprimary
school . Then the more affluent start
putting them in hostels .This means that the
children are not having parental care since
Dr T.H.Chowdary
infancy. When both of them come home,
from work they are so tired that they have
hardly any time or energy to converse with
the children and instruct them in ethical and
moral life through tales and stories. What
education the children have is left to the
schools. That means the parents and family
have abdicated the responsibility to bring
up the child to build character into them to
instill aspiration into him, outsourced if at
all if they are forthcoming. These tasks are
to tutors, coaches, teachers, for a fat fee.
3. When children who grow from infancy
in the care of schools and hostels and when
they grow up they are sent to the USA, what
family affection will be there? If the young
turn to the parents and say, you never
brought us up, you never cared for us; of
course, you paid money for all our schooling.
So we owe you money and nothing else.
Therefore the educated who go to the USA
and other countries discharge their filial
responsibility by sending money to the
parents to buy a home / flat in a city and
perhaps, equip it with all conveniences
including a PC and a telephone so that over
IP telephony they could inexpensively
converse with the old in a flat in Hyderabad
and the young working in the USA or
elsewhere. Yes. There is one need of the
parents for the young working men and
women in the USA. When the child is to be
delivered , it is very costly in the USA to
have hospital care. And also one cannot
afford to engage a Nany to look after the
infant. So the mother is called to the US at
the time of delivery of the baby and for a
few months therefore to look after the baby.
Then she is sent back. Thereafter the advice
by the young to the parents is, "you are old;
you are becoming older; you can't travel and
therefore you need not have to come here;
you can live comfortably in the flat we have
financed". And then on Father's Day and
Mother's Day the working young in the US
will call to wish the Mother and the Father.
So instead of our traditional value of "Mathru
devobhava, pitru devobhava" every and all
the time, these are remembered only on
the Mothers Day & Fathers Day as in the
US.
Dr. T H Chowdary is the former Charman of VSNL and presently Advisor to TCS and Satyam Computer Services and can be reached at:
hanuman.chowdary@tcs.com;thc@satyam.com
| HRD News Letter | January 2007, Vol.22, Issue:10 18|

4. Of late, India ias placing very high value
on women's education. We have come to
realize that an educated mother only can
bring up achieving children . Yes. That is, if
a mother is educated, morality and ethics
and family affections are there. But not
otherwise. Now in order to promote girls'
education especially in the professional
courses, the State of Andhra Pradesh has
reserved one third of the seats to girls in
engineering and medial and such
professional colleges. These who become
engineers and computer professionals have
become a new class of Indians. To this class
can be added non-professionals that is,
B.Sc B.com, B.A educated girls who are
also now-a-days required in large numbers
by the BPO, Call center and KPO
businesses. Thus, we find tens of thousands
of girls being employed . They are newly
liberated, they have had no moral or ethical
instruction either in the home or in the school
or in the college. Money- independence selfwill
and equality with men are what these
cherish. They don't want to marry early.
5. Once I was addressing students in an
Engineering college in Guntur . About 40%
of the students are girls. At the end I placed
before them the great opportunities that
educated young especially, in information
technology, and bio- technology are having
in countries across the globe. At the end of
the meeting, some parents met with me
and castigated me " you people have
spoiled our state; you are asking us to send
girls to school. Now they have only one aim,
to go to America. They don't want to marry.
They say, we are too young. There is now
tension in the homes. We have invested a
lot in their education, some sold away
properties and gold; now these girls break
up all relations just to get a job in the USA
or in other cities like, Bangalore, Mumbai ,
Delhi. The family relationships are breaking
down and we elders are worried whom they
will marry and what will happen to the
marriage, whether there will be any
affections survive".
6. The change is coming about very fast
and most undesirably in the ICT (Information
& Communication Technology) sector. The
software, BPO, call center and KPO
companies like Infosys, Satyam Computers
already have between 25%- 45 % of
employees, girl graduates . They are paid
as much as boys and that too quite heavily.
In the third year itself, they are it is not
uncommon that they get Rs. 500,000 per
year and above. These girls are flush with
independence as well as money. They are
away from the homes and they live in
working women's hostels. Many have their
own transport finance companies and banks
are competing with one another to give
loans. Boys and girls who very freely
address some times very outrageously and
girls are too eager to exert their liberty and
freedom and newly -gained independence
both financially and from family. Many of
them do not want to marry for long. Their
aim is somehow to go to the USA. If there
are marriages, these girls prefer those who
are already in USA or foreign employment.
Marriage for them is not a bond between an
young boy and girl but a means of going to
the US. Some of them get on to the Internet
and cultivate acquaintances, then
friendships and almost marriage bonds
through "chatting" on the Internet. Parents
may with utmost care fix up marriage but by
the time these people land in the US , they
are eager to pick up the Internet spouse and
say good bye to the marriage that was
arranged in India. There are numerous
cases I have come across .
7. I make it a point during lunch time to sit
in the cafeteria, observe people and also
talk to the boys and girls. Some of them
become very good friends. There are cases
when they come and give me invitation for
marriage. I go very happily and even counsel
them what is meant by marriage and how
they should behave. Soon after marriage the
girl tells me, "Sir, I have divorced that guy".
I: Why had you divorced him so soon?
How could you discover the marriage has
to breakup ?
She: It is very easy . He is not
compatible. I don't want to be so ever
directed or dominated by him.
8. So to these people, marriage means
nothing. In our tradition marriage is
indissoluble. It is not for the young man and
the girl to indulge in only pleasure. It is to
raise children who would be great, healthy,
proper citizens. That is the biological function
of the marriage according to our traditional
understanding and education. But these
professionals don't have any such view.
Marriage in India is a unique phenomenon,
a unique samskara. When the Purohit
performs the marriage, just observe what
they are reciting. Bharata Varsha, all the
rivers, all the mountains, etc". That invocation
is to make the newly -weds aware of the great
heritage and then they take the oath or the
promise that Rama and Sita made when they
got married. The ceremony lasts for two to
three hours and like nowhere else in the
world. This is to instruct the newly weds with
lots of people present as witness that they
are entering into an indissoluble relationship
for the sake of the world, humanity. The
educated, young, lacking moral and ethical
education and our history, think that the
useless ceremonies are foisted upon them
by their ignorant and country parents.
9. There is another work situation which
is telling very badly upon marriage and
family life. The young are living in a flat. The
boy is a software professional. He goes to
office in the day. The wife is working in a
BPO company. She goes to the company
in the night. Now where is the marriage,
where is the family, where is the time for
them to bring up children? This type of
unnatural living has its inexorable effect of
broken marriages and health hazards.
10. Yes. We are aware of increasing
deterioration of marriage and family in the
new services economy in the country but is
there anything that could be done in order
to enable both the people to work but at
the same time, nurture and bring up children
and care for parents. This would involve
sacrifice. There are girls who are very well
educated, qualified coming up from great
enlightened and cultured families. These
girls decide that until their children come
up to the age of 8 or 9, they don't go to
work. They choose to have children only
after three years of marriage; after that they
will have one or two children. They will bring
them up staying at home; put them to school
and when they are between 8 or 10 years
go for work again. So during the period
when at home, I give education, I impart
culture and instill values. What is the use of
a life when the family members don't have
affection, don't have bondings. This is
culture. This is in consonance with Indian
tradition and at the same time is not in
conflict with the new life style that services
economy and globalisation are bringing
about. Richness by way of wealth and
possessions of all sorts and creations
comforts cannot make people happy.
Happiness is a state of mind; contentment
gives happiness comparing with those who
are less fortunate and poor instead of
comparing with the wealthy people is
wisdom. Our wisdom says that the richest
man in the world is one who has got the
fewest wants and desires. Running after to
realise the wants is what causes misery.
Therefore we can have modernity and
technology; change with family life and
humanity and humanism, if we are brought
up in the light of our ancient wisdom in this
land. The literature like in Mahabharata,
Raymayana and Bhagawata and further in
the Upanishads can make us Poorna
Purushas with modern knowledge, with
science technology, and all of these without
disruption of family.
u H
QUOTABLE QUOTES
”The times are changing, the world is transient and only they live who live for others. The rest are more dead than alive.”
“Arise, Awake and stop not till the goal is reached” - Swami Vivekananda
| HRD News Letter | January 2007, Vol.22, Issue:10 19|

Appraisals Appraised
Annual Appraisals of employees is a
regular annual ritual in practically every
organisation, world over. The Appraisal
season is one of anxieties (as to likely
outcomes) for most employees and
opportunity to innovate 'games' (to influence
the outcomes) for some. Over the last fifty
years or more, organisations have been
aware of the inadequacies of the systems
adopted. Several attempts have been made
to improve the credibility of the systems and
the fairness of the outcomes. MBOs, KPAs,
360 degree appraisals, Balanced Score
Cards and now CRMs (Capability Maturity
Models) have been developed and tried, but
have not lasted too long. The reason is
simple. None of these address the implicit
weakness in the appraisal systems. The
situation is similar to the fact that cardiac
by-pass surgeries do not address the real
problems of cardiac patients, viz., their life
styles, and therefore do not cure.
Appraisals are usually used to decide on
increments and promotions. Naturally, a
small section of employees will benefit more
than the majority of them. Some
organizations insist that not more than about
10% or 15% should be appraised as better
than the rest of them. It is inevitable that the
majority will be unhappy and attack the
system as manipulative, biased, unfair, etc.
Those who are aware of the procedures or
criteria for decision making will attempt to
manipulate data appropriately. Superiors will
be compared on grounds of leniency /
strictness, concern (or lack of it) for their
subordinates, biases towards certain
functions / qualifications / communities, etc,
generating pressures of trust and mistrust.
Middle managers have problems accepting
responsibility and providing rationale for the
decisions or passing the buck elsewhere.
Overall, the atmosphere will be vitiated.
When one or two individuals in a team are
picked out for distinguished performance,
the team spirit (e'sprit de corps) is an
immediate and unavoidable casualty.
Appraisals have been designed as aids for
the development of people. Assuming that
employees develop (acquire or sharpen
skills) at and through work, organiasations
owe it to their employees to provide
opportunities for such development.
Appraisals are designed to be the
mechanisms to identify the strengths and
the weaknesses of individuals. The
consequence of identifying a deficiency has
to be to eliminate that deficiency. When such
identification is understood as intended to
help the appraised employee become better,
the appraisal becomes non-threatening and
comparisons with others irrelevant. In
contrast, when appraisals are used to
distribute rewards, the consequence of
identifying a deficiency, is a public
announcement as to who is better than
whom as well as a permanent loss (of
remuneration or position) and therefore,
threatening, generating a response of
defensiveness and denial.
Appraisals, when used as tools in the
process of helping individuals to develop,
have to be a continuous process,
highlighting deficiencies as and when they
become manifest, so that corrective
measures do not wait. There is no reason
to delay decisions on correction till the end
of the year. Doctors, who examine patients
throughout the year do not pronounce the
diagnosis in a bunch at the end of the year.
They begin treatment as soon as the
diagnosis is made.
The process for development of people in
organisations, postulates that employees
are interested to develop in terms of skills
S. Balachandran, Management Consultant at Mumbai. E-Mail: s.balachandran@vsnl.com
ADVERTISEMENT TARIFF
S. Balachandran
and perspectives and attain increasingly
higher levels of expertise, and to be
recognized as such for higher levels of
responsibility or for consultation.
Development is learning. Learning is done
by self. Others can help in the process of
learning. They cannot teach, in the sense
they have no control in the process of
learning. The appraisal, which is an analysis
of the present state and the further progress
required to be made, is therefore most
effective when done by self. Self appraisal
fails when it is part of the reward system,
because then there is an attempt to show
that one is not less than another.
The philosophy behind appraisals as
instruments for development therefore,
demands that the appraisal be done by the
employee himself, and the senior should
help in the self appraisal, with his own inputs
from observation at work. The timing of the
appraisal is to be determined by the
employee concerned and that is when he
feels the need for help. The superior has to
adjust his priorities accordingly. That is when
the superior gets to be perceived as helpful
and supportive. The direction of the
discussions is based on the employee's
analysis of his work, the rationale for the
same, his appraisal as to how he is doing
and what he need s to do to improve, his
plan to so improve, the help that he needs
from the senior to go about this improvement
plan and so on. The discussion then
becomes satisfying to the employee and he
embarks on a journey of learning with the
full support of the senior. The employee -
superior relationship gets stronger. .
This a very brief statement of the concept
of how appraisals can be converted from
the threats that they now are, to powerful
instruments of HRD
u H
Gate Fold Two Pages Colour - Rs. 40,000/- Back Cover Page - Rs. 30,000/-
Inside Pages Double Spread Colour - Rs. 30,000/- Inside Pages Double Spread B & W - Rs. 22,000/-
Inside Cover Page Colour - Rs. 20,000/- Inside Page Colour - Rs. 15,000/-
Inside Page B & W - Rs. 10,000/-
Contact : kalyani@zcscon.com or 093466-73068
| HRD News Letter | January 2007, Vol.22, Issue:10 20|

Mood Management:
Success under our skin
The aim of writing this article is to learn
how to better manage the inner
organisation as a means for more effective
leadership of the external organization and
develop a practical self management plan
so that one can get the best out of oneself
and others too. As we are going through
rapid, delicate changing times, there is no
such day when we can say: 'Yes' today is a
fine day, nothing came up, no problems, no
circumstances, no situations, no stresses
and no conflicts. Each and every day
something or the other comes up and during
such times, if we are not aware of what is
happening within us and try to justify the
wrong then probably it would be difficult to
survive in the long run. Hence managing self
is the key to managing a larger organization.
New and different capabilities are required
to be effective in this changing environment.
These are not just the technical skills but
they are the self-managing skills like
intuition, flexibility, clear focus, tolerance and
managing ones's mood. Moods can
enhance or damage every aspect of our
work. When we are in a bad mood it is
difficult to be positive or confident, and the
smallest obstacle can throw us off. When
we are in a good mood everything flows and
we feel and act more confidently and
effectively. Moods often seem to have a life
of their own and come and go for no
apparent reason.
Mood Management is being able to handle
our feelings so they are relevant to the
current situation and that the reaction is
appropriate. According to Daniel Goleman's
Emotional Intelligence, Mood Management
can be defined as: "to handle emotions in
appropriate manners". Persons proficient in
this domain are better able to shake off
negative emotions like gloom, anxiety, and
irritability. These people are ones who have
less difficulty bouncing back after
experiencing life's ups and downs.
So what can we do to manage these
powerful, transient states of mind?
l We must be aware of what is happening
mentally and physically throughout the
day so that we can recognize our
different moods.
l Taking responsibility of our own mood
and stop blaming others or
circumstances.
l Taking personal responsibility of our
state of mind and emotions.
l Thereby learning to communicate
better.
Normally, we will experience warning signs
as our mood changes, such as fluctuations
in energy levels. The more we understand
our patterns, the better we can prepare. For
example, I sometimes feel a dip in energy
midafternoon followed by a mood
downswing. Consequently, I know this is a
bad time to talk to clients and a good time
to do administrative tasks. While some
moods have a physical cause and are
difficult to control, many can be managed.
The key to mood management lies in
handling our moment to- moment
awareness, by using a fundamental
Poonam Dhanavati
psychological strategy called cognitive
shifting. Cognitive shifting is like having a
remote control for our mind, which enables
us to move readily among different states
to optimize our performance. It works
through the use of focus phrases that target
our moods. For example, when we are in a
restless, tense mood, we start to have tense
thoughts. Those thoughts, in turn, aggravate
our mood, which creates a vicious cycle that
can sabotage our performance. To stop it,
we need a focus on a phrase or reminder
that will interrupt the negative mood and
replace it with a more positive state of mind.
So when we are feeling tense or stressed,
we should take deep breaths, say these
words to our self, and take notice of how
they bring our mind back on track by
activating more beneficial feelings and
physical states: "I give myself permission
to feel good." While it might sound strange,
that phrase was carefully chosen to address
our unconscious mind and help break the
deep-rooted scripts that run internally. It is
a powerful reminder that shifts our attention
from unhelpful, unconscious, and habitual
thoughts to helpful, conscious, and
intentional ones. The next step is to "let go
of our worries and feel peaceful in our mind."
This is our natural mood of relaxed
alertness, the foundation for excellent
performance. When we are in a peaceful,
relaxed mood we are more resilient,
focused, and productive. We also are better
able to listen, motivate, and lead others.
In a nutshell to manage mood one should
l Recognize the warning signs. u H
Ms. Poonam Dhanavati is Officer- H R, Bharti Airtel Limited, Bhubaneswar. She can be reached on her e-mail: poonam.dhanavati@bharti.com
SUBSCRIPTION RATES FOR HRD NEWSLETTER
1 Year - Rs. 3,00/- 2 Years - Rs. 550/- 3 Years - Rs. 800/-
5 Years - Rs. 1,200/- 10 Years - Rs. 2,000/- Life - Rs.3,000/-
Please send Account Payee DD for the appropriate amount
in favour of "NATIONAL HRD NETWORK" payable at Hyderabad to:
National HRD Network
506, Sai Siri Sampada, 7-1-29/23 & 24, Leela Nagar, Ameerpet, Hyderabad - 500 016
| HRD News Letter | January 2007, Vol.22, Issue:10 21|

Empathy is the term used to describe the
ability to be able to view a situation or
problem from another's point of view. In
cross-cultural interactions, this means being
able to imagine or experience something
from another's frame of reference or
worldview.
Empathy is not to be confused with
sympathy, although the difference between
the two may appear to be subtle. In showing
sympathy, you attempt to understand
another by imagining how you would feel if
you were in the other person's position. If
this person is from your own culture and
hometown and is someone with whom you
have a lot in common, then what you feel
may infact be a close approximation to what
the other actually is feeling. However, when
communicating with someone from another
culture, sympathy, which is based on an
assumption of similarity, is an ethnocentric
approach. It is ethnocentric because you
have not changed your cultural frame of
reference but have simply assumed others
will be similar to your own. Another important
difference is the purpose that drives the two.
The purpose of sympathy is to find common
ground, shared experiences, and a form of
agreement. The purpose of empathy, on the
other hand, is not about agreeing with
people; it is about trying to fully understand
someone else's perspective, both
emotionally and intellectually.
Is empathy a skill, a behaviour, an attitude,
or a trait? A certain level of empathy can be
developed as a skill and requires attaining
a high level of sensitivity to nonverbal
behaviour. It also requires an attitude of
respect for self and others and an open
mind. Empathy is also a trait in that it forms
a natural part some peoples' behaviour. It
is clear that some people are able to
empathize well while others are not. Daniel
Goleman (1996) suggests that empathy as
a trait is developed in young children from
An overview of Empathy
In international Human
Resources Scenario
around the age of two and a half years. It is
often the result of how a child is raised.
Children whose parents pointed out, while
disciplining them, the distress their
misbehaviour had caused someone else
tended to display more empathetic ability
than those whose parents did not initiate
such training. A child's ability to empathize
is also shaped by seeing how others react
in response to someone else's distress.
Over time children develop their own
repertoire of empathic responses.
I suspect that people in group-oriented
cultures where extended families are the
norm are, in general, more empathetic since
from their earliest years they are made
aware of the effect their actions can have
on other members of the group. It would
make an interesting study to see if this is
the case.
To check your own response, listen to
yourself advising people. If your suggestion
tends to be along the lines of "If I were in
your position I'd…" or "What I think you
should is this…," then you are giving advice
based on the assumption that their world is
similar to your own. However, statements
such as "I wonder what they really think
about…" or "From your point of view it must
appear completely different" are approaches
that indicate you are adopting an empathetic
approach and are trying to understand the
reality inside someone else's head instead
of merely projecting your own.
A key element of empathy is the ability to
see things from different perspectives. If you
want to develop your own empathetic ability,
the key is to direct the focus of your attention
away from yourself and toward the other
person, and to listen without projecting your
understanding of a situation into the other
person's description of it. Try this exercise
to see yourself from another perspective.
Remember back to a time when you had a
disagreement or argument with a friend or
Sambit Kumar Mishra
work colleague. As you recall the situation,
what you said, and how you felt when you
said it, imagine that you have become the
other person listening to you. It usually helps
to physically move to where the other person
was sitting relative to you and to adopt his
posture and body language. Listen to
yourself from the other person's perspective
and see if it affects your previous perception
of the dispute.
I tested this technique a few years ago in
relation to a long and frustrating telephone
sales conversation I had had the previous
month and which had left me angry and
annoyed at the caller's constant questions.
First I played the scenario through from my
perspective, which actually started to get
me wound up all over again. I then got up
and sat in a chair facing where I had just
been and imagined listening to myself at the
other end of the phone. I then imagined
asking one of the questions I remember the
other caller had asked. Again, from his
perspective, I listened to my response. All
of a sudden I realized in a flash of insight
that he had no choice but to respond as he
did because I, not wanting to be drawn into
anything, was defensive, indirect, and
evasive in my replies. The more I listened
to myself, the more I started to appreciate
how confusing my responses must have
been; was I interested in the product or not?
My indirectness had given him no clues at
all, so he had little option but to keep asking
me questions.
Those people who are confident of their
ability to empathize with others tend to be
more relaxed and less defensive when
meeting people for the first time. As a result,
the meeting is easier and less stressful for
the other person, too. To make others more
comfortable around you should be the
general aim of cross-cultural sojourners who
are trying to understand and integrate into
another culture.
u H
Sambit Kumar Mishra is Visiting Faculty at Kushabhau Thakre Vishwavidyalaya, RAIPUR. E-MAIL: sambit_kumar_mishra@rediffmail.com
SORRY
We could not publish the subscription and Advertisement tariff for the NHRD Quarterly Journal on the NHRD
Portal by 15th December 2006 as announced in the December issue of HRD Newsletter due to certain
reasons beyond our control. The inability is sincerely regretted
- Publisher
| HRD News Letter | January 2007, Vol.22, Issue:10 22|

Behavioural Finance-the Buzz
Word Of Bulls And Bears
Abstract
This article makes a modest attempt to
introduce the emerging field "Behavioral
Finance" to the academia and corporate
world especially the Investment
Professionals. The author outlines its origin,
the five Ws and one H of Behavioral Finance,
the distinction between standard finance and
behavioral finance and behavioral finance as
a multidisciplinary approach. The author also
appeals to the academia to explore the areas
in this upcoming field for doctoral thesis, as
there have been few doctoral dissertations
across the world.
INTRODUCTION
Recently,(on 30th November,2006), the author
accidentally hit upon this new word/ field when
she was browsing on the net to download
certain material for her paper presentation on
International Finance at one of the leading
colleges in Tamil Nadu.The very word made
her so inquisitive to delve deep in to the
subject as she has been contemplating on
choosing a topic for her doctoral thesis that
would combine HR and Finance. Eureka! This
word/field she thought was God sent. This
made her write an "Intro" of this field to other
research scholars, academia and financial
experts of corporate arena. Thanks to the
pioneers of B.F- the Noble prize Award
Winners David Kahnman and Vernon Smith
for their work in Experimental economics and
Psychology in the area of decision-making.
What is Behavioral Finance?
"Behavioral Finance attempts to explain and
increase understanding of the reasoning
patterns of investors, including the
emotional processes involved and the
degree to which they influence the decisionmaking
process. Essentially, behavioural
finance attempts to explain the what, why,
and how of finance and investing from a
human perspective."
Richard and Simon
In other words, behavioral finance is a
science that tries to logically reason out and
improve the decisions of the investors. It
does take in to account the cognitive biases
and emotional factors that predominately
influence the judgment process of both
novices and expert investors. Thaler defines
behavioral finance as follows:
"Behavioral finance is a scientific enterprise
trying to understand how markets work….
Behavioral models… rely on actual behavior
found in the lab, tested in the lab, and being
true."
Origin
The following table depicts how behavioral
finance has gradually evolved from 1960s
onwards and how it has become an
interesting and innovative field that has
thrown open doors for further research.
L. Shankari
5Ws and one H of Behavioral Finance
The What: B.F deals with the cognitive
process and the emotional aspects that
govern the the decisions
Of all investors.
The Who: Academia, Research scholars,
Investment Professionals.
The Where: Elaborate research studies have
been published in leading academic
journals, dissertations, books.
The Why: This field has overcome standard
Finance shortcomings.
The When: In 1960s, The field began to take
its roots, started spreading its twigs and
leaves, branches in1970s, 80s, 90s and
2000s.
The How: The Behaviour of investors have
been analyzed using research methods in
Psychology and Finance.
B.F -An interdisciplinary approach
B.F has drawn its principles and practice
from a variety of disciplines such as
Psychology, Socialogy, and Social
Psychology, Finance, Behavioural
Economics and Behavioral Accounting.
Standard Finance and Behavioral
Finance -different spectrums
YEAR AUTHORS
TITLE OF THE THESIS/BOOK
STANDARD BHAVIOURAL
1960s Scott Bauman, Paul Investment experience with less popular stocks, Value
FINANCE FINANCE
slovic James as a determiner of subjective probability, Effects of Single disciplinary Multi-disciplinary
stoner…
general values…. on group decisions,,,
perspective perspective
1970s John W Payne, The role of the basic risk dimensions, Application of Acceptability and Acceptability and
Lawrence Oster, the Risky shift phenomenon to security selection and validity is very high validity not very high
David Dreman.. portfolio management, Psychology and the Stock
as it is an emerging
market Investment strategy beyond random walk..
field.
1980s Daniel Kahn man and Judgment under uncertainty.., Psychological basis Focus on all aspects Emphasis is on
co..,Loren Corotto.. underlying common stock movements..
of business investors' decisionmaking
1990s Robert Haughen, Inefficient Stock Markets…The psychology of
process.
Richard Geist.. Investing…
2000 Roben Shiller, Andrei Shleifer.. Irrational Exuberance, Inefficient Markets…
Conclusion:
2001 Joachim Goldberg, Behavioral Finance, Stock-Market Behavioral Finance,
Days are not far off, for. Behavioral finance
Earl…
Stock Market Psychology…
will become the core discipline and
academia and financial experts would be
2002 Hersh shefrin… Beyond Greed and Fear: Understanding Behavioral vying with each other to recruit people
finance…
specialized in this field.
u H
L. Shankari, Faculty, Sona School Of Management. Salem. E-Mail: saishanpari@yahoo.co.in
| HRD News Letter | January 2007, Vol.22, Issue:10 23|

Tune Your Track Towards
The Path Of Success
To begin with I like to state the saying
"People are different but only those who
make the Difference Succeed". Potentials
and Skills are very important in one's career
and development and of course everyone
possesses it but the creative and strategic
approach towards presenting one's Potential
and Skills becomes the ultimate parameter
for one's success and result of efficiency. A
realistic example: A candidate having
excellent knowledge but fails in the interview
if he doesn't present himself confidently and
effectively within the limited span of time as
per the set parameters of the interviewer. So
individual should be open to mould and
change as per the required situations to
reach the objective.
"Tune and Shift gears as per the given
criteria to meet the Destination"
In order to succeed in our career and
professional life I would like to highlight the
"Concept of S" in a different mode as to adapt
and experience the results in a positive and
challenging way. We know that Hardworking
no longer vital but Smart Working is required
and according to me Strategic Thinking and
Creative approach are two essential gears
required for Smart Working and to develop that
you have to practice the Concept of S in reality.
The 'S' Engine to Gear Your Track…..
Stability
Stabilize your thinking
and start working on
set parameters in a
creative way by
visualizing the
outcomes in reality and
prove the adversities.
Always revert to the
things at initial stage so as to achieve the
objective successfully.
"Stabilize your style of work through
Visualization"
Synergy
Increase your
capabilities based on
the theory of Synergy
where in your
potentials are equal to
more than one
individual. When your
motto and competency increases you start
making the difference and to achieve that
start analyzing your own SWOT analysis
and built strategies based on that.
"Synergize your Competencies based on
your Strengths"
Sustenance
Sustenance refers to
the ultimate support.
Your contributions to
the team and
organization should
be designed in such
a way that it marks in
the minds of the
people about your maximum commitment
and involvement in deriving the issues and
achieving the tasks.
"Support and Contribute more results
than expected"
Systematization
Systematic refers to
step by step procedures.
Extend your working
style in a
methodological and
categorize your
priorities as to not compromise the system
specifications. Systematic working always
increases the productivity and paves path
for new developments. It helps to redesign
the constraints and converts into the
achievable tasks.
"Systemize your methods to rebuilt the
constraints"
Strategize
Strategy and tactics
bridge the gap between
ends and means. Always
depend on targeting of
designing different
Deepa S
strategies for different mission as to achieve
the same and direct your decisions based
on the set directions inspite of obstructions.
Learn to attack the challenges in a desired
focus.
"A strategic decision always ends in
accomplishments"
Synchronize
Synchronize refers to
move or happen at the
same time or speed. It is
always true that one
action is correlated to the
other so try to
synchronize your thoughts and actions
towards the common goal of your job targets
and keep track of associating things and you
will find better way of doing things in reality.
"Synchronize your thoughts and actions
in a focused way"
Spontaneity
Spontaneity refers to
impulse and
immediate response.
Try to work at times
out of box as to bring
out your creativity
and spontaneous
r e a c t i o n .
Spontaneous nature always helps you to
make wonders and to develop this start
working on your right brain activities. It
always highlights your extraordinary
personality.
"Spontaneity leads to amazing results"
u H
Deepa S works as Executive - HR with Videocon Industries Bangalore and she can be reached at deepsshine@rediffmail.com
| HRD News Letter | January 2007, Vol.22, Issue:10 24|

Retention Strategies
At Corporate Level For Bpo's
Retention of Key employees is critical to
the long-term health and success of any
organization. It is a known fact that retaining
your best employees ensures customer
satisfaction, increased product sales, satisfied
colleagues and reporting staff, effective
succession planning and deeply imbedded
organizational knowledge and learning.
Employee retention matters as organizational
issues such as training time and investment;
lost knowledge; insecure employees and a
costly candidate search are involved. Hence
failing to retain a key employee is a costly
proposition for an organization. Various
estimates suggest that losing a middle
manager in most organizations costs up to
five times of his salary.
Business process outsourcing is the
leveraging of technology vendors to provide
and manage a company's critical and/or noncritical
enterprise applications. Through the
business transformation process of serviceoriented
transformation, which leverages the
technologies and standards of serviceoriented
architecture, companies can
increasingly leverage third party companies
that act as business service providers. ...
The BPOs in India face an enormous
challenge in reducing attrition rate and this
being a nascent industry needs to draw
parallels, examples from other industry
practices as well as develop innovative
Employee Relation Initiatives as highlighted
below. This has been classified into three
groups
1. The Corporate level
2. Managerial/supervisory level
3. Employee Recognition Initiatives
Corporate Level Retention strategies:-
Relevance of Retention Strategies in the
Indian BPO Industry vis-à-vis other
industries is very critical to its existence for
the following reasons -
l
l
l
To bring stability in business and
increase customer service process.
Staff/employee satisfaction translates
directly into money quite quickly in the
BPO industry compared to other
industries.
To reduce the pressure on the recruiting
process.
l Recent acquisition deals both domestic
& overseas by BPOs make it even more
critical to stabilize their back end
operations to service new customers.
A satisfied employee knows clearly what is
expected from him every day at work.
Changing expectations keeps people on the
edge and creates unhealthy stress. This
creates insecurity and makes the employee
feel unsuccessful. An employee's
deliverables at work must be communicated
to him clearly and thoroughly. The quality of
the supervision an employee receives is
critical to employee retention. Frequent
employee complaints center on these areas.
The ability of the employee to speak his or
her mind freely within the organization is
another key factor. Have meetings or dinner
once a month, to share the company's vision,
the industry's growth and where they see
themselves in this scheme of things. Talent
and skill utilization is another environmental
factor your key employees seek in your
workplace. You just need to know their skills,
talent and experience, and take the time to
tap into it. The perception of fairness and
equitable treatment is important.
A common complaint or lament during an exit
interview is that the employee never felt
senior managers knew he/she existed. Senior
managers refer to the president of a small
company or a department or division head
in a larger company. They have to take time
to meet with new employees to learn about
their talents, abilities and skills. Meet with
each employee periodically. They will have
more useful information and keep their
fingers on the pulse of organization. It's a
critical tool to help employees feel welcomed,
acknowledged and loyal. The Senior
Managers to be involved in the recruitment
process if the Recruitment team has
identified potential and cultural fit candidates.
Involve the advisors or team leaders in the
interviewing panels. In Company
presentations to potential candidates
encourage the employees to share their
experiences. Your staff members must feel
rewarded, recognized and appreciated.
Frequently saying thank you goes a long
way. Monetary rewards, bonuses and gifts
make the thank you even more appreciated.
Understandable raises, tied to
Shireesha Devraj, Vishwanath
accomplishments and achievements help to
retain staff. Select the right people in the
first place through behavior-based testing
and competency screening.
Work-life balance policies would have a
positive impact on:
1. Attracting high caliber recruits
2. Retaining skilled employees
3. Reduce recruitment costs
4. Improve employee morale
5. Maintain a competitive edge
6. Listen to employees' ideas; never
ridicule them.
7. Offer performance feedback and praise
good efforts and results.
8. Implement organizational culture
measurement tools like Adversity
Quotient (AQ).
Recognize and celebrate their success.
9. Staff adequately so overtime is
minimized for those who don't want it
and people don't wear themselves out.
10. Get them involved in social causes and
fund drives like Tsunami Disaster Relief.
Provide a meaning or a cause to their
lives.
11. Nurture and celebrate organization
traditions.
12. Communicate goals, roles and
responsibilities so that people know
what is expected of them and feel a part
of the crowd.
Conclusion
The Organization should champion and
shepherd effective human resource
management practices at both the strategic
and day-to-day levels. That is, to be effective,
human resource management practices
must be grounded in two ways. First, they
must reflect company wide commitments as
to how it will manage and relate to its
employees. Secondly, HR must implement
these commitments so that the ideals of the
enterprise and deeds of its agents are
congruent. HR to play a key role in the
development and execution of the Business
Strategy of an Organization It should evolve
from a transactional support role to
partnering in the organization's business
strategy.
Shireesha Devraj,Human Resource Manager,Spectrasoft Technologies. Inc, can be reached at Email : sdevraj@spectrasofttech.com
Mr. K Vishwanath is Dy Manager - IT (SAP) with Reliance Retail, Mumbai and his e-mail is vishwanath.kokkonda@gmail.com
u H
| HRD News Letter | January 2007, Vol.22, Issue:10 25|

Five occasions when you must
communicate face to face
Sunder Ramachandran
Technology has made communication when the boss invites them to their cabin. apology mail would not suffice in a sensitive
simple for most of us. Today most
issue like this. Go to the client's office if
"It's difficult to build rapport over an email; I
clients, colleagues and stakeholders are just
possible without them having to call you and
would feel much better if my boss
a phone call or email away. While these tools
offer an explanation and reassure them of
appreciates me in person" says Ashok
score high on convenience and speed, they
the confidence that they demonstrated when
krishnan a C.A with Nestle.
lack the warmth and emotion that only face
they gave you business. Your client's would
to face communication can provide. Criticising or providing feedback
be pleasantly surprised that you took the
While speed of communication is critical, When you provide feedback over an e-mail time to come and meet them even when
there are some occasions where you must or phone call, the receiver may have a things went wrong.
revive the forgotten art of face to face
communication.
completely different perception about the
relevance of that message. This effect is
"I used to interact with on almost a daily basis
with a client over emails without ever figuring
amplified when you are not communicating
Appreciating employees - Don't replace
out whether the person was male or female.
face to face. The reader or listener may think
the pat on the back with the 'Thank you'
When a report I was supposed to send got
that you are cold and indifferent and that's
and 'Good job' e-mails
delayed, I made a rude comment about a
why you avoid meeting them in person to female colleague which offended the client
Criticising or providing feedback - A face discuss the issue. A face to face meeting who also happened to be a lady" says
to face meeting gives you the opportunity gives you the opportunity to put your point Deepak M.L a Manager with a leading BPO.
to put your point across while being across while being sensitive and diplomatic
sensitive and diplomatic at the same time at the same time.
Resolving conflicts
Assigning a new responsibility - There "I have noticed that employees often use e- Workplace conflicts are common in most
is a great risk of the message getting mails to avoid confronting the real issue. If organisations and the lack of interpersonal
diluted when a responsibility gets
delegated through an e-mail or phone call
an employee fails to meet the target, I would
prefer if they just tell me in person rather
communication only worsens the situation.
It's important to remember that 55% of
than offer an explanation over an e-mail" meaning in an interaction comes from facial
Damage control with Clients - An apology
says Vidhanshu Bansal a Director with Pixel and body language and 38% comes from
mail would not suffice in a sensitive issue
Webtech.
vocal inflection. Only 7% of an interaction's
like failing to meet a client commitment.
meaning is derived from the words
Assigning a new responsibility
Resolving conflicts - Only 7% of an
themselves. So trying to resolve a conflict
interaction's meaning is derived from the
words themselves. So trying to resolve a
There is a great risk of the message getting
diluted when a responsibility gets delegated
over an e-mail or phone call is often a bad
idea.
conflict over phone or e-mail is a bad idea. through an e-mail or phone call. Don't be
"An employee complained about a colleague
surprised if your employees don't show you
Appreciating employees
and copied the senior management on the
a sense of ownership and do not complete
In the words of Helen Keller "We are all
mail. I was surprised to see that mail
tasks on time if you are not communicating
walking with a signboard on our forehead
translating into a flood of mails providing and
face to face. Nonverbal communication,
which reads - Appreciate me". It seems we such as tone of voice, facial gestures, and
seeking explanation. The person who sent
have replaced the pat on the back with the eye contact help individuals understand the
the original mail was just one floor above
'Thank you' and 'Good job' e-mails. There is importance of a task and the need to
the person who was at the receiving end. I
nothing that motivates an employee more complete it on time.
had to sit down with both the employees in
than seeing their boss walk up to them in
person to resolve the conflict." Says
"We rely on conference calls, video
person and appreciate them in front of
Kailasam R a manager with Lufthansa
conferencing and online meetings but I have
everyone.
Airlines.
learnt in my experience that there's nothing
Walk up to your colleague's cabin and thank
them for the great report that they sent or
the presentation that they made recently. I
more impactful than meeting the team in
person" says Delhi based Ashu Gosh, a
Manager with Aviar I.T Consulting
Your communication style says a lot about
you as a professional. In the words of Ralph
Waldo Emerson "You are always under
remember one of my ex bosses who used
examination by people around you, awarding
Damage control with Clients
to call all the team members to his cabin
or denying you very high prizes when you
just to say thanks and pat our back. The
team immediately took a liking for him as
If you haven't provided the product or
service the client expects, you are putting
least think of it." So leave the comfort of your
cubicle and build trustworthy relationships by
most people expect a warning or feedback the relationship with the client at stake. An communicating face to face. u H
Sunder Ramachandran is Managing Partner at W.C.H Solutions, New Delhi. He can be reached at sunder@wchsolutions.com
| HRD News Letter | January 2007, Vol.22, Issue:10 26|

Outstanding Leaders:
The Need of the Hour
Your life shouldn't end up with being a leader;
it should begin with it."
Executive Summary:
Emphasis on management has created an
impression that leadership has perhaps no
role to play in industry. Traditional mind
associates leadership with the military and
political models and finds it irrelevant to the
industrial or business world. Nothing can be
far from reality than this notion.
Management, with all its refinements still
remains only a tool and never can be a
substitute for leadership. People, the most
valuable resource of any organization, can
only be "led" in to giving of their best. They
cannot be managed into such performances.
On the other side of the coin, today the
organization needs what they preach.
Whatever the leaders and best ones in
society do, the commoners follow. This is
the kind of leadership advocated throughout
in the scriptures. The visionary leader must
also be a missionary, extremely practical,
intensively dynamic and capable of
translating dreams of the organization into
reality. This article is the quintessence of
leadership and provides an opportunity to
chew the euphoria of becoming an effective
leader and unravel one's innate qualities.
Elucidation:
In every human activity a leader is needed
to guide. A head of a family is the most
common leader. On the quality of the leader,
depends the progress, happiness and
fortunes of the family.
In all walks of life, be it in the schools,
colleges, factories, in public life, a leader is
a must. If these leaders are good, then they
promote unity, harmony, strength, prosperity
and happiness in society.
* Eminent Contributions:
Several definitions have been put forward
for leadership. In essence, however, these
all agree that leadership is the activity of
influencing people to strive willingly for group
objectives. There is one more general
agreement that Leaders are not necessarily
born, they can be trained.
Several studies have contributed to the
contemporary knowledge on the
dynamics of leadership. More
noteworthy among these have been:
a) Hawthorn studies which concluded that
productivity was more a function of
attitude of workers towards each other
and the attention they received from the
management rather than any facilities
that the management may provide to
improve their working conditions per se.
b) Michigan Studies which identified
leadership styles on the basis of leader
orientation i.e. Employee Oriented and
Production Oriented emphasizing the
need for balancing the two to obtain
optimum results.
Each of these studies has made useful
contribution to the understanding of the
phenomenon of Leadership. It is however
no exaggeration to suggest that the
phenomenon remains less than fully
understood even till date.
And right now, we hope readers would agree
with us that the success or failure of any
organization, company or institution, interalia,
depends on the kind of a leader it has.
* Emergence of Authority:
The authority base of a Leader varies
both on account of personal and
organizational factors. Basically there
are three different sources of authority:
(a) Traditional Authority i.e. the authority
born out of one's position in the
organization. It is also known as
legitimate power.
(b) Authority born out of functional or
technical expertise such as that of a
specialist or an authority on the subject.
It is also called expert power.
(c) Authority derived out of skill in managing
people including those professionally
more qualified than oneself. This is the
true Leadership Authority.
* Effigy of a Leader:
Having accepted that leadership qualities
and abilities can be developed through
diligence, it is necessary to provide a
practical guide to leadership development
processes. Before this, it is necessary for
the potential leader to identify his source of
authority and then deliberately proceed to
acquire the skills and develop the attributes,
which will fit him for the leadership role,
which he or she aspires. Those who draw
L.K.Jena is faculty at HAL Management Academy, Bangalore. e-mail : lkjena@incindia.org;lalatendu_j@rediffmail.com
L.K.Jena
their authority from professional expertise
in their sphere of activity, if they persist with
the preoccupation of technical excellence
and are not prepared to delegate can at best
and up as highly proficient managers.
Leadership skills come out of his functional
mobility and the ability to hire and utilize man
more able than oneself in order to create
and channelise energy, which after all is the
purpose of all leadership.
It is necessary for potential leaders to
develop characteristics of behaviour which
are valued most by subordinates. These
include ability to listen, show consideration,
display trustworthiness and constancy as
well as predictability of behaviour, tolerance
and inter-personal skills including ability to
communicate effectively.
Leadership bestows authority and brings in
its wake responsibility. A good leader
ensures success by fulfilling his
responsibility fully. "Captain's Innings" is not
unfamiliar to the cricket loving Indian people.
In the business and Industrial environment,
a leader must ensure that:
l Objectives exist and are clear
l Organizational structure is sound and
well understood
l Executive responsibility is backed by
authority
l Conformity is discouraged
l Innovation is promoted
l Information flows freely in the
organization
l Happiness is promoted
l Restrictions minimized
l Praise dispensed where deserved
* Enlighten others….Must be an
unending Journey:
Managers in business both big and small
spend between 60 to 90% of their time
dealing with people. Management of people
must therefore be their primary concern if
they wish to use this most valuable and
productive resource placed at their disposal,
to its full potential. Leaders must identify their
own behaviour patterns, value judgments and
utilize their identified strengths to weld their
work force into winning teams. They must
create energy through motivation and then
direct it through leadership to produce
excellence in all their endeavors. u H
| HRD News Letter | January 2007, Vol.22, Issue:10 27|

Stress Among Call Centre
Executives: An Empirical Study
Dr. Zafrul Allam
Abstract
their problems and queries or converting respondents were allowed to take their own
enquiries into sales and thereby creating time to complete the questionnaires. The
The business process outsourcing (BPO)
new clients Example include customer care, responses were scored and put to statistical
industry, dominated in India by the call
post -sales services, technical support, presales
enquiries etc.Whereas, outbound call
analyses for results.
centre segment. The present study is aimed
at ascertaining the levels of stress among
center is responsible for calling customers
Results and Discussion
call centre executives. The sample consisted
for the purpose of telemarketing, collection,
of 50 call centre executives located at
Results indicate that Tension headaches,
pre-sales etc.
Hyderabad. The self made questionnaire
Weakness and Eye problem (physiological)
was administered to gather the STRESS
and Irritability, Feeling tense and poor eating
informations.The obtained data were
habits (psychological) were found more
analyzed by using simple percentage The concept of stress was first introduced among them. The results may be attributed
method. The findings revealed that in the life science by Hans Selye in that most of the executives who joined the
physiological symptoms viz; tension 1936.Stress, concept borrowed from the call center as younger age are not seeing
headaches, weakness and eye problem and natural science, derived from Latin word the long term goal and seeing only short
psychological symptoms i.e; irritability, 'String ere' which means to draw tight. Stress benefits and have euphoric feeling of
feeling tense and poor eating habits was was popularly used in the seventeenth excitements, enthusiasm and pride.
found more among call centre executives. century to mean hardship, strain, adversity However , long hours of work, permanent
This study will give insight to call centre or affliction .It was used in the eighteenth night shifts, irate customer, sudden
management to work on certain aspects of century and nineteen centuries to denote technology changes, routine work,
stress to minimize it for better performance. force, pressure, strain or strong effort with demanding customers, keenly monitoring, ill
reference to an object or person. In treatment by management, time pressure,
WHAT IS CALL CENTER?
engineering and physics, the term implies presuure to complete calls, change in policy
Call centers are central locations for high -
an external force or pressure exerted on /procedure`, threat of outsourcing /
volume calls where customer's and other
something with the intention to distort and consolidation, lack of training ,job insecurity,
telephone call are handled by an
being resisted by the person or object on lesser number of holidays, missing social
organization, sometimes with computer
which it is exerted. In psychophysiology, partying , unable to balance work- family life,
automation. Call centers are used as mailorder
catalog centers, telemarketing call
stress refers to some stimulus resulting in attendance policy, inability to take breaks and
a detectable strain that cannot be pressure to sell services and products are
centers, help sesks and generally large
accommodated by the organism and which the major source of stress among call center
organizations that use the telephone to sell ultimately results in impaired health or executives. Results also suggested that
or service products and services. Diverse behavior. The main objective of this study attrition rate is approximately 30-40% in call
ranges of business use call centers to is to identify the physical as well as center and multiple personality disorders are
interact with their customers. Example psychological symptoms of stress of call the results of stress.
includes utility companies, mail order centre executives.
Conclusions
catalogue firms and customer support for Methodology
computer hardware and software.
In spite of various hazards, in India call
The respondents of the present study were center segments are booming and large
It is like any other office environment where 50 call center executive with a range of age numbers of people are joining it, mostly with
people work, talk on phones and work with
18-31 years selected at Hyderabad. A Selfmade
questionnaire was administered to the courses. Most of the call centers have training
just a graduation or technical diploma
computers. The key differences is that in a
call center there are huge numbers of teams
respondents. The scale consisted of centre and other recreations facilities, but
of people who primarily handle a never -
biographical variables and physiological and stress is inevitable in day to day life and can
ending flow of customer calls. These call
psychological symptoms of stress. Keeping occur at anytime or any moment.
centers have existed for decades but have
in view the objectives of present study Management should continuous put efforts
only really mushroomed in the last five years
simple percentage statistical method used to prevent such kind stress by periodic
or so. The boom has been fuelled by
to analyze the data.The questionnaire was reviews and made strategies to prevent the
advances in technology and shifts towards
administered to 50 call center executive executives from stress.Moreover, it is very
a 24 hour society allowing us to call at any
.Each respondent was contacted personally difficult to reduce absolute stress from
hour of the night or day.
and requested to fill the questionnaire executives but can be minimize by role shifts,
Types of calls are often divided into
outbound and inbound. Inbound call center
handles calls from customers and is
responsible for either retaining existing
without leaving any item and out of ten
physiological and psychological symptoms
of stress you give respond to five most
important stress. They were assured of
work design, proper training related to stress,
and job enrichment, management supports
to their personal life and moral support. Every
study has certain limitations, but has avenues
customers trough appropriate solutions to confidentiality in their responses. The for further future research.
u H
Dr. Zafrul Allam is a Faculty Member, Centre for Organizational Development, Hyderabad Email: zafrulallam@rediffmail.com
| HRD News Letter | January 2007, Vol.22, Issue:10 28|

Exit Interview:
Objective & Modus-operandi
Debabrata Dash
Exit Interview is an appropriate & befitting
medium through which useful
information can be captured from the
outgoing employees.These information can
subsequently used for Organisational
Development purpose.For industries where
the employee turnover rate is very high,
interventions can be taken for employee
retention after a systematic analysis of Exit
Interview Report generated based on the
response of the employee.
All activities related to Exit Interview can
be divided to six phases.
1. Framing of Questionnaire
2. Intimation to the respective employee
to attend the interview on scheduled
date, time & place
3. Conduct of the Interview
4. Storing of the relevant information
5. Subsequent Analysis of the response
& appraising the analysis to the
Management
6. Suitable intervention for employee
retention
Employee separation can be attributed
to the following factors:-
A. Superannuation
B. Voluntary Retirement
C. Resignation
D. Termination
For the first three cases,it is absolutely
desirable to go for an exit interview.Before
designing the questionnaire for the
interview,it is essential to consider the
following factors:-
i) The cause for the separation
ii) The tenure of service of the outgoing
employee
iii) The grade of the outgoing employee, his
functional area & expertise
iv) Analysis of the performance reports of
the concerned employee
Before conducting the interview, the
concerned HR person must have a clear
understanding of all the above so that he
can frame more relevant questions .The
employee can be asked to respond to a
series of questions and simultaneously his/
her response can be recorded.
For a senior person leaving the organization
on account of superannuation, focuss
should be given on
1. His/her perception about the
organization
2. Thrust Areas needing the attention of
Management
3. Areas of improvement
4. Specific suggestions if any for growth
& business excellence
5. Unfulfilled assignments
6. Learning Experiences
7. Consent to be associated with the
organization as a trainer/mentor/
counselor/advisor/consultant (given a
chance)
8. Final word of advice
But, compared to the above pattern, focuss
should be shifted to other points if the
employee is leaving on account of
resignation or VR.Here, HR must try the
level best to capture the root cause for
leaving. In such cases, questions should be
based on the following:-
1. Reason for leaving
2. Impression about the organization
3. Significant Contribution
4. Difficulty faced (if any)
5. How the organization could have been
served your interest so that you would
not have thought for leaving the
organization?
6. Willingness to the join the company at
a later stage (given a chance)
The duration of the interview should not be
long enough & it must be conducted before
the final day of leaving so that employee
concerned is not in a hurry .While
conducting the interview, the HR manager
must create the conducive environment in
which the employee will feel free to convey
his frank opinion.One of the big role for HR
here is to express the concern of management
for losing the particular employee.The
employee must get a feel of it.
After the conduct of the interview, the
response of the outgoing employee may be
thoroughly analyzed. A comprehensive
database is quite helpful in storing the
responses of Exit Interview. Multiple
querries can be run utilizing the database.If
the management wants to know particular
information pertaining to the profile of people
leaving,it can be instantly provided.After
storing all the required information, it is
desirable to generate a comprehensive
report which is presented to the
Management for perusal & appropriate
action.
Using the Exit Interview analysis reports,HR
can suggest many developmental
interventions to the Management for
implementation. These include design of
reward & recognisation schemes to the
performers, review of compensation
package & introducing various motivational
schemes to enhance the sense of
belongingness for the organization. The
organization may go for many non-monetary
benefits like initiating a culture building
process by building an environment of trust,
mutual respect & open communication,
interactions through informal get-together to
strenghthen interpersonal relationship.
These interventions will improve the climate
of the organization in which employees will
be committed to contribute for the
organization.
Losing an experienced employee is always
an irreparable loss for any organization.
Hiring a suitable substitute is equally
tough.However if the committed HR team
work diligently for employee retention,it will
be a tremendous achievement !The Exit
Interview may appear to be a simple HR
activity but it has a big role to play.
u H
Mr. Debabrata Dash works with Corporate HR, Nalco, Bhubaneshwar and he can be reached at e-mail: dash.debabrata@rediffmail.com
| HRD News Letter | January 2007, Vol.22, Issue:10 29|

Case Study - 13
'Saamp Bhi Marjaye,
Lathi Bhi Na Toote'
It was 2001. The Management received a
letter containing a charter of demands
from a Union, which was not recognized.
The charter included a hike of 25% in the
salaries of employees, introduction of supply
of two uniforms every year, conveyance
allowance of Rs.200/- p.m., introduction of
incentive bonus, house rent allowance,
education allowance for their children, etc.
The Management was shocked to see the
contents of this letter as they were still
stabilizing.
It is a small village in Andhra Pradesh. There
exists a dairy. It produces about 30,000 lts.
of pasteurized milk daily and supplies to
various towns, some at a distance of over
250 kms. There were two supplies - one in
the early morning and the other in the
evening. The production started only six
years back and the Management was trying
to stabilize their production with some
essential facilities. Luckily, their milk became
popular for its quality and regular delivery.
Milk producers in and around the village
were also benefited due to the regular and
prompt payments made by the Company.
To attract more milk producers, the
Management started introducing some
innovative and better schemes than their
competitors. Introduction of insurance
schemes for cows and buffaloes, insurance
for milk producers against snake bite and
sudden death, distribution of stainless steel
cans, etc. to the highest milk producers were
some of the schemes. Dairy management
is very complicated and difficult compared
to some other businesses. The peculiarity
of the milk industry is that demand for milk
during summer will be very high, but the
supply will be less as the animals cannot
give much milk. Similarly, the milk supply
will be very high during winter months, but
the demand will be less.
First, when the milk is received at the factory
from milk producers, the milk has to be
tested by grading to see whether it can be
processed or not. Then samples will be
taken to decide the price of the milk to be
paid to the milk producers depending upon
the fat content. After chilling the same, it
will be sent to pasteurization. During this
time, it will be standardized by removing the
extra fat and then sent to the packing
machine. Here the milk will come out in
sachets and will be sent to cold storage. After
counting and conducting other formalities, the
sachets will be distributed to various places
for sale. In addition to this, the factory should
have an ice bank tank where the water is
chilled. Another equipment which is
essentially needed for the dairy is, a boiler
to send hot water to the pasteurization plant.
In addition to all these, a generator has to be
maintained due to erratic power supply to the
village. To save some cost, they purchased
a second hand generator which used to give
lot of problems and its maintenance cost was
very high. Very recently, to supply still better
quality of milk, they purchased a
homogenizer at a very high cost. The industry
was in infant stage and struggling to stabilize
the production. If for any reason, the quality
of milk became bad, the consequences
would be disastrous.
Within this short period of its existence, the
workers were slowly influenced by some
trade union leaders, affiliated to left parties.
The workers started wearing black badges,
adopted work to rule and started demanding
from the Management to recognize the
Union. Some four or five workers were
participating actively in these affairs and
started intimidating other colleagues to
follow them. On a particular month, they all
refused to take their payment unless their
demands were met. The Management with
good intentions discussed in depth all the
above problems with the employees and
could succeed. The employees received
their salaries after three days.
Further, Management thought that they
should take immediate steps to improve
R. Dharma Rao, Head, HR, ICBM. He can be reached at: ravidharma_icbm@yahoo.co.in
R. Dharmarao
their industrial relations by improving
communication system, explaining to the
worker groups regarding financial position
of the company and the unethical schemes
being introduced by the competitors,
recognizing the employees as partners of
the company, formation of Joint Committees
with representatives of the Management
and workers for implementation of certain
welfare schemes, introduction of a
suggestion box scheme for increasing the
productivity and to reduce costs, and
initiated a Welfare Fund for the benefit of
the workers. In a span of six months, the
workers were motivated to concentrate on
the production and did not indulge in antimanagement
activities.
However, the unrecognized union sent a
letter to the Management giving a charter
of demands. The CEO thought that he
should discuss with the leaders of the trade
union to make them understand on the
realities as they had already introduced
some welfare schemes for the benefit of the
workers. But at the same time he also
thought that why their internal matters
should be discussed with some outside
parties. This might give them a wrong signal
that they received some recognition. He was
in a fix. By looking at the letter again and
again, the CEO noticed that they used the
same logo of their Company in their letterhead.
He got a clue and wanted to take
action against them legally.
A lawyer's notice was sent to the Union for
using the logo in their letter-head which was
registered under Trade and Merchandise
Marks Act of 1958 and Trade Marks Act of
1999. The lawyer also mentioned in that
letter to pay a compensation of Rs.3,00,000/
- towards the use of logo without permission
and authority. There was no reference at all
in that letter on the charter of demands. The
Union neither paid any money nor took any
interest in the affairs of the workers since
then.
u H
SERVICE AND SACRIFICE
Swami Vivekananda preached nothing but the gospel of service and sacrifice. Throuout the history of the world, you find
grest men making great sacrifices and the mass of mankind enjoy the benefits. If you want to give up everything for your own
salvation, it is nothing great. If you forego your own salvation for the good of the world, you are then God. Think of that.
- Prof. I V Chalapathi Rao in Ancient Wisdom - Modern Insights
| HRD News Letter | January 2007, Vol.22, Issue:10 30|

Book Review
Published by Penguin Books 2006
141 Pages - Price Rs.150/-
Break Free
Debashis Chatterjee
This is one of the best books I have
read in recent times. The book is
unique in many respects. The book is
dedicated to one of his students
Manjunath who gave up his life fighting
malpractices of fuel adulteration by oil
mafia. Whenever Manjunath met his
teacher, he used to repeatedly ask a
question, “Sir, tell me what this life is if
we have nothing to die for?” Unlike his
colleagues who joined multinationals, he
took up a job with Indian Oil Corporation
to supervise the filling stations in
Lakhimpur – Kheri division of Uttar
Pradesh. He took up his job very seriously
as one man missionary and sealed three
filling stations for mixing kerosene with
petrol and diesel. The reward: Six bullets
that rob the song of his life.
The story of the little girl in Kolkata in the
first chapter is touching. A foreigner
requested the author to take him to a slum.
As they entered the slum, children flocked
around with begging hands. One tall girl
raised her hand above those of others. The
foreigner passed a loaf of bread to the
girl's hand and he expected the girl to run
away with the loaf. But to his utter
amazement, he saw the girl tear the loaf
into many pieces giving each child a piece
and kept for herself a small piece.
According to the author this is his best
leadership story. This is how real leaders
liberate themselves and others from
suffering. This little girl of Kolkata teaches
all of us that if you are not part of a
problem, you can never be a part of the
solution.
Another parable in the first chapter where
a CEO hires cannibals to do a job with
clear cut instructions that they should not
devour people while they are on the job is
also very fascinating. One day a cannibal
ate a low level employee and the whole
organization was in turbulence. On
enquiry with the leader of the cannibals,
the CEO came to know that the cannibals
were eating senior managers at the rate
of one manager every day and no one
noticed but the moment a junior employee
Reviewed by K Satyanarayana, Executive Director,
National HRD Network
was missing, every one noticed. The
substance of the parable is that the top
does not contribute much.
In chapter two, the author asks the
readers to study about themselves first
before studying the world. According to
him knowledge of others is wisdom but
knowledge about self is enlightenment. In
this chapter he quotes extensively great
leaders like Gandhi, Albert Einstein,
Narayana Murthy, Peter Senge, Franz
Kafka and others. The author dealt very
well the subject of ‘swadharma’ – the law
of the self.
Chapter three opens with a beautiful
surmise that life can be an extraordinary
adventure and one could become a great
leader when one wants to make a
difference and not merely pursue a career.
His saying to a friend that we must first
walk our walk and talk our talk is very apt
and different than what we normally hear
that we must walk our talk. The way he
explained about Einstein breaking free
and shaping the scientific thinking and
how he himself found his bliss in teaching
and writing after quitting the medical
college are finest illustrations of
inspiration.
Chapter four is about spirit of service,
which is defined as small work done with
great love. The illustration of Mother
Teresa the Nobel Laureate with a
pacemaker in her heart carrying the
authore's brief case which he had
forgotten in her room, climbing down the
stair case is really touching.
In chapter five the author coins a new
word workship which is defined to mean
work as worship and the execution
compass which drives work towards its
highest purpose. In chapter six, while
dealing with the basic needs of the heart,
he says that the leadership in the
twentieth century was about control and
command while in the twenty first century
it is going to be about truth and love. He
quotes Narayana Murthy once again
saying how Infosys realized very early that
aiming for
public good
will result in
private good.
In chapter
seven the
revival of
Rourkela Steel
Plant through
effective
communication
is dealt at length. The Eskimo hunters
turning into drunkards is very interesting.
Dealing with leadership discovery in
chapter eight, the author quoted excellent
examples from the lives of Nelson
Mandela and Verghese Kurien.
In chapter nine dealing with the power of
dreams, the reply of Gandhi to a history
professor who expressed a doubt that if
winning freedom was possible without
violence is really captivating. Gandhi told,
“Professor, your job is to teach history and
my job is to create it.” The author has
quoted extensively from the life of JRD
Tata, Henry Ford and Alexander the great.
Chapter ten deals with change and there
are nine beautiful stories in chapter
eleven. These fascinating and touching
stories are from the lives of great leaders.
Finally in chapter twelve, he deals with
the four types of yoga namely Gnana yoga
with sun as its symbol, karma yoga with
tree as its symbol, bhakti yoga with lotus
as its symbol and Mukti yoga with swan
as its symbol.
It is a difficult book to review as every word
is golden. I must remember that it is a
review and it will not be proper on my part
to reproduce the whole book.
This is basically a self help and an
inspirational book worth reading by every
young person of this country. One can
clearly see the passion of the author and
his concern for public good. Every
educational institute can have multiple
copies of this great book for reading by
its students and teachers. I compliment
Dr. Debashis Chatterjee for writing such
a classic.
Prof. Debashis Chatterjee is Head, Centre for Leadership & Human Values, I.I.M. Lucknow. E-mail : kunurika@iiml.ac.in
| HRD News Letter | January 2007, Vol.22, Issue:10 31|

CRM - Six Steps
From Customer Service
CRM encompasses the capabilities,
methodologies that support an enterprise in
managing the customer relationships. The
general purpose of CRM is to enable
organizations to better manage their
customers through the introduction of reliable
systems, processes and procedures.
One of the ongoing challenges, that the
business are facing today are optimizing
customer satisfaction & developing
Customer Relationship Management.
There are six steps to make the customer
service effective.
I) Importance of a clear customer
experience strategy.
II) Selecting the Correct People
III) Developing, Motivating and Managing
your People
IV) Establishing Effective Service Delivery
Processes
V) Building in Continuous Improvement
VI) Ensuring Managers are the key change
- agents
I) The importance of a clear Customer
Experience Strategy.
To establish a good strategy certain key
practices required are:
o Understand the overall organizational
vision and mission.
o Define the organization customer
service direction slogan and values.
o Ensure customer service is defined as
a key responsibility for the business/
department.
o Share the customer experience strategy
via a comprehensive communication
program.
o Ensure that this strategy does not
conflict with other business strategies.
o As consultants, it is amazing how often
we hear organizations say, "Improving
customer service is a priority, and we
are also introducing stringent cost -
cutting measures".
II) Selecting the Correct People:
It's really head to teach an elephant to
dance.
When recruiting employees to provide
customer service, the process often tends
to concentrate more on functional
expertise, technical competence and
knowledge rather than interpersonal skills.
However, lack of right attitude can
drastically impact client satisfaction levels.
Therefore in selecting the right people,
1. Define the critical job requirements.
2. Develop scenario based interviews/
assignment centers to screen and
select candidates.
3. Involve multiple team members in hiring
process.
4. Ensure evaluation is based on objective,
not the subjective "be like me" criteria.
III) Developing, Motivating and
Managing Your People:
Even though you have hired the right
people, there is still a need to reorient
them into organizations customer
relationship culture and define key
communication skills. In call centers and
technical support departments, there is
a tendency to rely on technical/functional
skills and neglect interpersonal skills
development. This can result in providing
acceptable material service, the more
tangible aspect, yet unacceptable
personal service, and the competitive
differentiator.
To build customer relationship culture,
it is important to:
1. Provide training in key areas required
to deliver exceptional personal service.
2. Reinforce their skills using on going
coaching & feed back.
3. Measure current performance levels.
4. Reward performance using a
combination of monetary and nonmonetary
recognition.
IV) Establishing Effective Service
Delivery Processes:
Effective processes and procedures
provide the foundation for smoothing or
inhibiting the material service element
of the customer interaction. The critical
elements in ensuring a positive material
customer experience are:
a. Mapping the service delivery processes.
b. Evaluating critical success points in the
process.
c. Defining service standards and
objectives for these essential points.
P. Sugunakar Reddy and T. Vijaya
d. Establishing service delivery
procedures to optimize material service.
e. Creating service legal agreements to
smooth internal service delivery.
V) Building in Continuous Improvement:
No matter how effective the service
delivery processes, or well trained the
service deliverers, things go wrong.
Products have faults. Customers get
frustrated. The organizations that build
around managing the customer
experience are able to resolve these
issues effectively. This process is known,
as "recovery" is an important differentiator
in building customer loyalty. In order to
recover effectively, it is necessary to:
o Actively seek customer feedback and
complaints; you cannot improve if you
don't know what went wrong in the first
place.
o Train staffs how to handle customer
complaints effectively, using the correct
mix of empathizing, apologizing and
resolution.
u H
P. Sugunakar Reddy and T. Vijaya, faculty of business management, Vaagdevi P.G. College, and can be reached at
peddisugunakar_reddy@yahoo.co.in; vijji02@gmail.com
o
o
Make sure the real problem is solved.
Focus on proactive (prevention) as well
as reactive (cure) problem solving.
VI) Ensuring Managers are the key
change - agents:
As consultants, we observe that senior
management often has the vision,
intention and commitment to introduce
a comprehensive, customer relationship
management system, but the 'make or
break' element is in involving middle
management in change process, and
empowering them to be the key change
agents.
To do this it is important to:
o Engage the management team early
and often in the process.
o Involve management members in
articulating customer experience strategy.
o Use managers as facilitators when
rolling out interpersonal skills training.
o Reward managers on establishing,
monitoring and updating service
delivery processes.
o
Ensure managers are able to act as an
example to their teams.
| HRD News Letter | January 2007, Vol.22, Issue:10 32|

Chapter News
AGRA
On 24th November 2006 a meeting was held
at BMAS Engineering College Agra. An
interactive session on “Ethics in
Management” was conducted by Dr.
A.K.Gupta, Principal BMAS Engineering
College Agra. Chapter President Col (Dr)
C.K.Singh introduced the speaker to the
audience. Dr. Gupta gave due emphasis on
integration of Indian Ethos and Value
System which to some extent are being
eroded in view of the fast changing values
and ethics in our cultural and social
environment in view of the mad race for
material prosperity that too at any cost He
also reminded the management fraternity
and industrialists for exercising due caution
quoting Mahatma gandhi’s words that since
‘there is enough for the men’s need not for
men’s greed’ hence ‘Knowledge without
character and business without morality’
may lead to ward’s disastrous
consequences NHRDN memento was
presented to the speaker by student
member Miss Rupali Singh.
NHRDN Agra chapter has also been active
with the health, hygine, education,
sustainable livelihood and education. On 11th
November a medical camp was organized
at the village Pingri under the supervision of
Dr. Arvind Jain along with the team of doctors
for the better quality of life and to raise their
ecomomic standard. NHRDN members and
management students motivated to use their
learning of management for raising the quality
of life in rural area.
BANGALORE
Dayananda Sagar Business Management
School was abuzz with verve on the 28th of
October 2006. NHRD Bangalore conducted
the annual HR student project extravaganza
TRIADS 2006 there in which colleges in and
around Bangalore nominated summer
projects of their students.
The first round consisted of the project
synopses being judged by
Mr.N.Seetharaman (Sr.DGM HRD, BEL),
Mr.Vithal Acharya (Manager HR, HCL
Technologies) and Mr.Vivek Subramanian
(Sr.Manager, OTD, ORACLE India). Ten
shortlisted entries were invited to make the
presentation on the D day. These were
funneled to five entries by Mr.Krishna Setlur
(VP HR, Samsung India), Mr.Nagendra Rao
(VP HR, AVIVA), Mr.Rajasekhar Kaza (VP
HR, JPM Chase India) and Ms.Shabari
Madappa (Sr.Manager HR, Texas
Instruments) after a three hour gruelling
question and answer session.
Concurrently, a session on Career
Management was anchored by Dr.Pallab
Bandyopadhyay (CPO, Cambridge
Solutions) followed by a very interactive
panel discussion moderated by Dr.Gopal
Mahapatra (Director OTD, ORACLE India)
which included Dr.Subhash Sharma (Dean
IBA) and Dr.Ranganathan (Principal
DSBMS). The panel presented their
contrasting views on the transition that
students of business face while moving to
the corporates.
The final round of presentations were judged
by a panel that consisted of Mr.Sudheesh
Venkatesh (VP HR TESCO), Mr.George
Selvam (Prime Servant 5SEprises) and
Mr.Raj Malenta (VP HR, Kennametal Widia).
A team consisting of students from IIMB
then made a guest presentation to the
audience on a model that they constructed
considering their experiences during
internship.
Prize distribution followed with the honours
being won by Ms.Neha Sinha (Christ
College), Ms.Hannah Shobitha (XIME) and
Ms.Aparna Nandakumar (IBA). St.Joseph's
college won for the second time, the Rolling
Shield for the best Academic Institution.
Mr.P.N.Sarangi of Tata Steel won the Rolling
Shield for the best Corporate Guide &
M.Vinayak Bhat of Christ College won the
Rolling Shield for the best Academic Guide.
The Rolling Shield for the best Corporate
was not awarded to anybody this time.
A team consisting of Mr.DT (Subhash)
Devare, Dr.Gopal Mahapatra,
Mr.Gopalakrishna Gubbi, Mr.Kubera, Mr.SV
Raghunandan, Ms. Yashoda, Mr.S.Naga
Siddharth and others ably supported by
students from DSBMS pulled off the second
edition of TRIADS.
-S.Naga Siddharth (HCL Technologies)
HOSUR
Hosur Chapter arranged a Session on "HR
Challenges" by Mr. Ramchandra Rao,
Senior Vice President, Hinduja Group on 19
Dec 06 and the meeting was attended by
more than 60 members. Prof. P.Janaki
Ramudu welcomed the gathering and Vice
President Mr. . Sathya Parsa introduced the
speaker of the day.
Mr. Rao said that HR is facing many
challenges today. Acquiring and retaining
talent is one of the major challenges facing
the industries. While most of us feel that
situation will only get worse, Mr. Rao feels
otherwise. Through a very lucid and logical
presentation, he convinced the audience
that there is no dearth of people in India;
one only needs to go to the right places,
identify gold lying in rocks, polish it and put
it to use. He quoted example after example
of how good people have been hired from
slums and made to speak English with
foreign accent. The talk was very absorbing
as Ram kept on throwing small tit-bits
involving common sense. The talk was
followed by incisive questions and brilliant
answers Even though the session was
scheduled for an hour, it went on for more
than 1.5 hours.
About the Speaker: Mr. Rao obrained his
MBA in Personnel Management & Industrial
Relations from XLRI, Jamshedpur in 1980.
He started his career with Indian Aluminum
Company, Ltd. (Indal) with whom he was
associated for over 5 years. He then joined
Blow Plast Ltd and spent over 13 years with
them. Prior to taking up his current
assignment. Mr. Rao was working with
Wockhardt Ltd. as Vice President - Human
Resources, A memento was presented to
the speaker on behalf of the Chapter.
While delivering the 'summing up and vote
of Thanks', Chapter President Bring Bhoon
reiterated the benefits of net working and
how we can utilize the opportunity. He
thanked the speaker for sparing time to
address the members.
HYDERABAD
Welcome to New Members
Permanent Members
A P GAS POWER CORPORATION
Represented by
Venkateswara Reddy D, Vice President
(F&A)
Raja Mogili A DR, Company Secretary
Life Membership
Vijay Bhashker C, Sec & Correspondent,
Madanapalle Instt of Tech
Mir Ashfaq Zaheer, Chairman, Russells
Spoken English
Kaiser Shaker, C E O, Stargates
Sandeep Ranjan, Regional Manager, Indian
School of Business
Babu Vittal, DGM - HR, JDA
| HRD News Letter | January 2007, Vol.22, Issue:10 33|

HYDERABAD CHAPTER PROGRAMMES
January 2007
04-01-07 - 6.30 pm Ravi Prakash K, Sr. Consultant, HRD Global Consultant, will speak on
HRD Network
"HR Branding Strategies"
11-01-07 - 6.30 pm Raghavendra Rao G, VP & Head Global Operation, BHRIGUS Software
Hotel Tureeya Grand India Ltd., will speak on "Service Excellence-HR Challenges & Strategies "
Opp: Life Style
18-01-07 - 6.30 pm Ravindra Varma P V S, Asst. GM - HR, Matrix Laboratories - HR QUIZ
HRD Network
25-01-07 - 6.30 pm Mr. Umesh Mani, Managing Director, Edge Solutions, will speak on
HRD Network
"Customer Partenerships"
February 2007
01-02-07 - 6.30 pm Dr. A K Sukla, Professor of Community Medicine, Shadon Medical College
HRD Network
will speak on "Strategy for Stress management and prevention of chronic
diseases".
08-02-07 - 6.30 pm Mr. Saumen Chekraborty, CFO, Dr. Reddy's Labs, will speak on
Hotel Tureeya Grand "Passion as Differentiator".
15-02-07 - 6.30 pm Y. Satyanarayana, Dy.Commissioner (Legal), Commissioner of Commercial
HRD Network
Taxes, will speak on "Empowering Belief - The key to enriched life"
22-02-07 - 6.30 pm Col V R K Prasad, Dean ICFAI School of HRD, Will speak on “Z Theory”
HRD Network
NAGPUR
This is a well known fact that biggest assets
for an IT/ITES industry are it's people. It is
people who matters for a company to start
and grow and mark its presence. Quality of
people is the biggest parameter to benchmark
the potential of a region for logical
development and growth especially in context
of IT. IT as an industry will have Human Assets
as an quintessence part of its success story.
With much publicized figures and predictions
from Gartner and many others available it is
clear that opportunities are going to be
immense what will matter for this industry to
sustain this rate of growth is supply of skilled
people. Future destinations for growth would
not only restrict to metro cities but extend to
Tier-2 cities. Tier -2 cities as a place for IT
destination could be zeroed only if they
passes the resource availability litmus test.
Similar scenario exists in Nagpur as in other
Tier -2 cities. Many of these cities have been
education hub for past many decades.
Candidates across India, find Tier-2 cities
in their radar as one of the preferred pace
for quality education with relatively less
expense sheet. The ecosystem in these
cities has become very favorable for
increasing number of engineering graduates
passing out every year but the emphasis
remained confined to education industry and
this huge pool of talent generated migrated
to other metro destinations. With graduates
in multiples of thousands passing out every
year and critical mass of experienced IT
professionals in thousands available, the
stage is all set for Tier-2 cities to witness
the IT revolution similar to other destinations.
There is no second thought about the
capabilities of Talent in these regions. The
passion and extra ordinary will to achieve
technological breakthroughs always helps
companies in this region to deliver best
services to its esteemed clients. What is
required is only the opportunity and platform
for Talent to contribute and grow. There is
also a sense of high degree of satisfaction
for people because of getting the best of
work-life balance. Professionals are
appreciating the quality time for family and
personal endeavors apart from work, this
makes Tier-2 cities more lucrative place to
work and enjoy life. Proper opportunities
coupled with innovative HR practices would
easily transform talent of these regions to
become better Human Assets for
organizations.
The trend is Cleary visible with increasing
number of blue chip companies showing
interest in Tier-2 cities talent and
encouraging initiatives by organizations like
NASSCOM and NHRD would provide
impetus to the growth and make destination
Tier-2 cities as basket full of opportunities
for HR.
Monthly Meeting
LECTURE ON "INDIAN WISDOM IN
MANAGEMENT" On 02 Dec 06, NHRDN
Sir, I am afraid you would have to find an
alternative. I am sure you remember one of
the conditions your esteemed company
insisted before discussing merger - "it
would have to be a paperless office!"
Hope it is of standard required.
Nagpur Chapter in association with
Priyadarshini Engineering College Nagpur
organized a lecture by Dr. SV Gole, a
renowned professor of Industrial
Engineering of RKNEC Nagpur. Dr. Gole
spoke on Indian wisdom in modern
management. He interrelated the
management with various teachings from
Bhagwad Geeta, which gives one the true
guidelines to manage one self and the
organization in efficient manner along with
meeting the social obligations. Prof.
Shantanu Kulkarni, Secy Nagpur Chapter
introduced the speaker.
WARANGAL
NHRDN, Warangal Chapter and Department
of HRM co organized an evening on 18th
November 2006 at university arts and science
college seminar hall on the theme "HR IS A
STRATEGIC PARTNER IN THE BUSINESS
GROWTH OF AN ORGANIZATION" The
resource person was Mr. G.V.S.GURUNADH,
Director HR-Capital IQ Information Systems
(I) Ltd.
The Talked emphasized on the changing role
of HR functions, Strategies, and prominence
as it is vital from the point human capital
management and ROI for the organizational
growth as they are the business drivers, who
quantify in monetary terms, who defines the
strategies and the industry ultimately gets
benefits from the HR.
The Talk was presided by the Warangal
chapter president Dr Banda Prakash, Director,
Alluri institute of management sciences,
affiliated to Kakatiya University Warangal
Mr. T.Moses Christopher, Principal Alluri
institute of management sciences, affiliated
to Kakatiya University Warangal gave the
opening address regarding the HR Strategies,
Followed by Prof G.Sreenivas Reddy, Principal
University Arts and science college, Kakatiya
University Warangal, who emphasized on the
importance of human capital in the growth of
the organization.
The talk had an overwhelming response,
which was interactive in nature. The Dean of
the Commerce and Business management
Department Prof G.V.Bhavani Prasad,
businessmen, academicians, students form
various college, executives from various walks
attended.
CARTOON CORNER BY COL DEOGIRIKAR, INDORE
| HRD News Letter | January 2007, Vol.22, Issue:10 34|

| HRD News Letter | January 2007, Vol.22, Issue:10 35|

| HRD News Letter | January 2007, Vol.22, Issue:10 36|