Management Education in India

Ancient India has been a creator and repository of a vast body of knowledge. However we have not been very systematic in documenting that knowledge for various reasons. One of the reasons could be our temperament – to specify more on that front … We pay attention to abstract phenomenon rather than creating or codifying concrete systems or institutions. I think the same plight affects modern management education in
India. The premier institutes (or Tier I Institutes as they are called) have seen compensation levels reaching an astronomical high. At the same time there has been a proportionate increase in the compensation levels at the second rung management institutes as well. However one would like to ask what are the concerted efforts taken to enhance the skill levels of the students ?

I happened to visit as part of the Campus Placement process at least 40 to 45  different Management institutes in 2006-7. Let us leave aside for the time being  variables like availability of slot , compensation levels offered by various companies , profiles offered by the recruiters et al . The general observation was that a) the communication skills of the students were far from satisfactory b) lack of practical skills i.e. accounting knowledge, practical application of concepts for fields like HR. c)lack of awareness of the skill level requirements in the industry . At the same time most of the students came across as extremely confident[ Henry Mintzberg did mention once in his characteristic style that  Confidence without competence  borders on arrogance ]. The students are indeed highly open to all kinds of inputs and moldable . However the industry requires more advanced skills and the students have to go through a steep learning curve .The students per se are not at fault as they have not got the right inputs . As  result the there is a mismatch between the actual yield and the industry expectations . If we take a Systems view of the whole situation then we will have to make changes at the input stage itself so that there is a consequent change in the process and thus the final output . Thus industry will have to actively collaborate with the education sector to create talent for the future. Talent creation itself will become an important HR activity going ahead. Organizations like TCS, Infosys , ICICI have already started collaborating with institutes to evolve specific curriculum that suits their interests . In addition to this there are many institutes that have evolved insurance specific courses( taking cognizance of the booming insurance sector in India ) , institutes like NMIMS at Mumbai have started a focused MBA course in Capital Markets . It is interesting to note that management education in China too is more or less in the same state . However we have long way to go before India is able to regain its status as a centre for higher learning …  

AV

Employee Life Cycle Approach To Manage The HR Function

Employee Life Cycle approach in managing the HR function will help us create a business case for effective management and resource allocation for the function . At an organizational level it will help us to present a robust model for the function and explain neatly how best HR could be aligned to various business processes. Thus it enables us to take both a micro and macro view of the HR function & business and create focused linkages between the two. Employee life cycle would encompass all the activities associated with the employee’s tenure in the organization from selection , recruitment , on boarding , development , learning and separation . In fact our blog is based on the principle of viewing and managing the HR function from an Employee Life Cycle (ELC)point of view. For an HR practitioner this approach can be a vital tool to determine the kind of inputs that need to be given to the employee based on the stage in the employee life cycle to ensure his/ her optimum performance, maintain motivation levels and ensure that suitable developmental inputs are given to the individual. Of course in larger organizations it might be difficult to give individualized attention and there invariably large scale systems driven initiatives would be useful in creating or providing inputs to the employees using an Employee Life Cycle(ELC) approach. There are both individual and organization specific factors  that affect the nature of initiatives and inputs using the Life Cycle approach .The individual specific factors are :

• Demographic profile i.e. details like age , gender etc
• Educational qualifications
• Tenure in the organization
• General aspiration and engagement levels

The organization specific factors that affect the Life cycle approach are :

• Nature of the industry
• Stage of the organization
• Organizational goals – long and short term goals
• Socio economic conditions
• Percentage of jobs , roles that can be categorized as bulk jobs ie that are done by majority of employees i.e. a sales driven organizations , organization having maximum programmer/software developers , organization with a majority percentage of employees  involved in the manufacturing process

Individual specific factors	Organization specific factors
Demographic profile	Nature of the industry
Educational qualifications	Stage of the organization
Tenure in the organization	Organizational goals – long and short term goals
General aspiration and engagement levels	Prevalent Socio economic conditions
	Highest  concentration of jobs in a particular category

Table 1 

The Employee Life Cycle is to be used in any organization keeping the individual and organization specific factors in mind . In a large MNC it can be used to draw a region specific plan followed by country and unit specific plan . The priorities and variables might change from region to region but the key drivers and philosophy behind the initiatives would be largely uniform and driven by the core thought processes prevalent in the organization and the HR function .In the ITES/BPO /IT industry in India characterized by a projectised environment , relatively younger workforce who can be easily molded and trained the Employee Life Cycle(ELC) approach calls for a unique  set of initiatives and processes. The HR strategy  and approach has to be designed in such a way  that it should  ensure  steady sourcing amidst the high attrition rates, evolution of industry specific  employee engagement activities , launching various platforms for quick recognition , keeping compensation and other benefits competitive  et al .

At this juncture we posit a model based on the Employee Life Cycle and Organizational Life Stage . We propose that different Organizational Life Stages call for varied interventions at each stage of the ELC. The table below further explains this comment .

Employee Life Cycle and Organizational Life Stage Model  

ELC Stages	Emerging organization	Mature organization
Recruitment	Maximum thrust	Moderate thrust
On Boarding	Extremely crucial activity that is being defined	Established activity
Retention	To evolve individual and sometimes organization  specific initiatives	Systemic initiatives for retention
Development	Evolve individual specific plans . Plan and implement the approach for developmental activities	Use of more sophisticated systems and existence of a well defined philosophy
Analytics	Importance to base level metrics i.e. number of hires vis a vis applicants	*Metrics defined for all ELC stages *Use of more advanced measurement systems

Table II 

Thus the ELC approach is both a well planned and flexible route that can add great value to the organization . It is the HR practitioner’s and organization’s viewpoint that can help yield greater or leaser value with the aid of this approach . We can add rigor to the model with a) live examples from a cross section of the industry b)link the interventions to the actual value they are able to bring to the create – both tangible and intangible c)make a conscious use of the model in the planning and budgeting phase . 

The HR architecture would thus   be vastly different in a mature organization as  compared to an emerging organization as the Employee Life Cycle stages would vary a lot and hence the building blocks of the HR framework would be different . The importance given to each stage of the Employee Life Cycle would vary depending on the organizational stage. A start up would demand lot of importance to the recruitment and selection stage whilst a more mature organization with a stable recruitment process will imply that adequate attention is given to the retention and employee development stage. The Industry Life Cycle too will affect the functioning of the Employee Life cycle. When the industry as such is going through the throes of change the organization and consequently the HR function too has to realign its focus and  provide employees with the tools to  operate in the New World . A good example to prove this point would be the case of all the old economy companies in post liberalization India(after 1991). In all the traditional growth sectors like  pharmaceutical , automobile etc  there was a huge thrust on Change management with BPR(Business Process Reengineering ) , TQM(Total Quality Management ) , Downsizing/ Rightsizing being the order of the day and thus  the focus of HR shifted to employee communication , learning and development and closely partnering businesses to implement the change initiatives . Thus a whole host of internal and extraneous factors have the potential to shape the Employee Life Cycle approach. Further the  ITES(IT enabled services) sector HR practices and approach would be different from  Old Economy companies  . Thus both the nature of the industry and the organizational life cycle would affect the functioning of Employee Life Cycle approach.  

The Employee Life Cycle approach is an effective  way to delineate even complex HR processes and strategy . All the HR initiatives and goals can be categorized  under the various stages of the Employee Life cycle . This will act as a ready reckoner to indicate the kind of resources , time,  energy we plan to spend on the various stages . It  will further help us evolve a focused HR plan and align that plan with speed to the larger organizational goals . The ELC   approach is very dynamic and open to imbibe and implement  various influences. Hence it becomes a very practical tool for the HR practitioner to  capture the external forces, organizational stimuli and link them  to the overall HR strategy .

AV

Talent Management discussion

I think Talent Management is a key topic of discussion across the HR community . However there are varied opinions held by people about the concept and its application . From an application view point we think that HR functions can be categorized under the umbrella of Talent Management and can be divided further into -planning ,acquiring, maintaining, retaining and developing . Jac Fitzenz( ref : How to Measure Human Resource Management (3rd Edition) by Jac Fitz-enz ) has added another dimension to it ie analytics . For convenience sake we can look at the three key functions under the big Brand Talent Management . They are talent acquisition , talent retention and talent development . With the global talent hunt on for varied profiles the common refrain that one hears is- Yes there are people but where are the right people ? Tapping these right people itself is a  key challenge and may be a hiring manager’s nightmare or most creative project ( ref:How to Become a Talent Magnet: Getting Talented People to Work for You by Mike Johnson  ). It is refreshing to view HR from Talent Management perspective. It helps us to a) build a framework around the disparate practices b)helps us to be more specific and accurate in any of the initiatives that we take up as practitioners c)gives us a sense of direction and an idiom to express both the day to day and long term initiatives  and planning being carried out in the function.

We examine the critical issue of Talent Acquisition in the Indian context . Whilst it is an important job there are many issues and challenges around the role of the Talent Acquisition team itself and they are :

a)many do not understand its criticality in the organizational context b) it becomes a whole lot transactional c) it becomes repetitive and monotonous taking into consideration the huge churn rate  d) organization themselves view hiring / sourcing departments as very operational units meant to take instructions and implement .

So are we talking of brain dead people who will only take inputs and process the information according to a well defined pattern … well it is for the individual organization to figure out what  kind of model they follow and as a result decide  the kind of people they want in the talent acquisition team .All in all Talent Acquisition is a critical role and we do need people there who understand business, have a working knowledge of the HR function ie structured interviewing processes and tools , competencies , various job elements  etc. Also one cannot forget the fact that in the race for establishing  huge organizations in a short period of time we might sacrifice various quality processes associated with the talent acquisition process as the emphasis is on getting the headcount in place within the specified timelines.

Talent Retention

This is an area where right from the CEO to the line manager everyone can add a lot of value with their orientation , willingness and ability to allocate resources and most importantly a  sound realization that these practices go a long way in adding to the bottomline .These practices could range from sound on boarding to processes and practices that bind the disparate elements  of an organization i.e. rewards and recognition programs , effective use of intranet, seamless HR service delivery  ,knowledge management initiatives etc . The key element here is also to have a conducive work environment where superior – subordinate relations, peer relationships are both personally and professionally value adding to the individual .Also a lot of initiatives will evolve over a period of time as the organization grows and HR will have to design  lot of industry specific practices .

Talent Development

This involves identifying the developmental needs of the employees in the context of the larger organizational goals and the individual career aspirations . The initiatives under this heading range from classroom learning , e-learning , leadership development and management development practices like career development , succession planning ,stretch assignments , job rotation etc. As competition gets fierce it is highly essential that companies design  , and implement practices that suit both the organization and individual .Here one will have to examine the larger organizational goals and the approach or philosophy one wants to adopt towards any developmental exercise let it be a competency based approach or an approach driven by the needs that emanate from the annual performance evaluation exercise . Once the goals are evolved  and approach is firmed up then one has to embark on the path of actually evolving a framework that converts  into actionables the gaps that are to be bridged and the new skills that need to be acquired .There would be various developmental tools or initiatives that would be used for this transformation  process ie converting the needs into deliverables .

Thus there are three concepts under the talent management framework to enable us to understand the approach and implement it in day to day practice . There is plethora of information and resources available for understanding this approach  . We can recommend the websites of SHRM(www.shrm.org) , CIPD(http://www.cipd.org)and The Talent Management Handbook by Lance and Dorothy Berger to  carry this thought thread ahead ….

 

AV

Introduction

Our aim : To present differing viewpoints on a range of HR topics by transcending borders of various kinds- national, intellectual , cultural

In the background :  Inquiry/ Contemplation/ Discussions

Vehicles: Article/reviews/ critiques and a growing knowledge base

For whom : The busy HR practitioner and the inquisitive HR student

Who are we : 2 opinionated HR practitioners in 2 corners of the world.

We invite you to challenge our view points and share yours…Welcome to our blog…

Employee Life cycle