Udyam 2012: HR Strategies and Leadership

Day 2 started with the thought provoking insights of Prof. T.V Rao on Human Resource Development (HRD). Listening about “Emerging Challenges for the HR Leaders in the globalized corporate landscape” from the father of HRD in India was as mesmerizing for students of IIM Lucknow as it was for student participants from other B Schools, the esteemed Professors of IIM Lucknow, and Industry executives who took part in Udyam 2012. Prof. T.V Rao’s each word of wisdom on the subject illuminated the audience in understanding the roots of the actual problems in the current corporate landscape. Dr. Rao concluded his speech by impressing upon the importance of high value culture for the success of modern organizations and the need to increase the occurrence of two way communication between organizations and employees.

The second debate on Day 2 of Udyam 2012 was focused on “Building leadership and Management Excellence – Spotting young Leaders”. The debate diversely captured the views of the industry stalwarts like Mr. Ashish Kumar Chawla, Country HR Director, ST Microelectronics, Ms. Kavita Rao, HR - Head, Unisys,Ms. Malvika Verma, Sr. VP HR, Max Healthcare,  and Mr. Ashok Bhat, Director of MindShare HR Consultancy Pvt. Ltd.  



Mr. Chawla in his introduction speech stated that the Job of HRD department is to make the employees feel motivated. HRD can’t be separated from the rest of organization as it is one department through which all information or transactions pass within an organization. Ms. Kavita engaged the audience by elaborating on Whys, Whats and Hows of leadership. She explained why an organization does needs a leader and what traits separate a leader from a manager. A leader is visionary and innovative and one who leads his organization to success.

Ms. Malvika Verma, aptly used an anecdote to the need for right recruitment for right position using right hiring policies. She stressed that today’s organizations face two major challenges in terms of hiring right employees and retaining the star performers. Mr. Ashok Bhat emphasized that the role of HRD practices has now more or less settled in the current organizational landscape. We don’t really need an HRD department as HRD practices have become routine for most organizations.

Overall in the end of the debate the respected speakers agreed that the organizations need to understand the need to enhance the leadership quality. It is important to have lateral mobility within organizations as it motivates achievers to perform better to grab underlying opportunities.

The next session was “Rethinking HR Strategy: Impact of social media” by Mr. Vivek Tripathi, Chief Human Resources Officer, Lava International Limited. Mr. Vivek apprised the audience of the challenges faced by employees, recruiters and companies due to the impact of social media. Intricacies of HR strategies entwined with social media evoked good interest among the audience.



Jack Welch once noted – “Globalization has changed us into a company that searches the world, not just to sell or to source, but to find intellectual capital - the world's best talents and greatest ideas.”

In the afternoon session, we had an interesting discussion on "HR challenges due to globalisation of the work force".

The panelists for the discussion were:
Mr. Manmohan Bhutani, VP - People and Operations, Fiserv Global services
Mr. Prashant Bhatnagar, Director- Hiring and Staffing, SapientNitro India
Mr. G V P Rajan, Director, Vardhnam Consulting
The panel discussion was moderated by Dr. Abad Ahmad, Chairman, National Committee at Aga Khan Foundation



The panel felt that the key challenges can be overcome mainly by dealing with ‘Intercultural sensitivities’ adeptly and handling situations with ‘Contextual Awareness’. Clear explicit communication is most important to reach a common understanding. Mr. Bhutani noted that sometimes personal meetings are very essential to experience and understand culture and sensitivities of other nationalities/diverse backgrounds. Mr. Bhatnagar was of the opinion that we should be ‘global’ while being ‘local’. Values may be global but contexts should be local, he opined. He also said that organisation should move towards centers with no center of gravity – meaning an organisation which is completely decentralised in taking decisions with no single center of authority. Mr. G V P Rajan expressed that HR managers have to define global career paths and facilitate aspatial careerists. He also stressed on the need to have appropriate compensation plans and understanding of the local laws while framing local policies for the organisations in various countries.

With this, Udyam 2012 has concluded and we are satisfied with the exposure to various facets of human resources and current challenges. The event has provided excellent food for thought and equipped us with knowledge passed on to us by the eminent industry practitioners that will hold us in good stead in the coming years.

- Shekhar Kumar, Karthik Bharadwaja

Nobody can build you unless you are ready to build yourself!

The second day of Udyam 2012 was kicked off by none other than the father of Human Resource development in the country, Mr. T. V. Rao. The topic of the session was "Emerging challenges for the human resource leadership in the globalized corporate landscape." He started the discussion by illuminating the audience with his talk on the evolution of the human resource department in India. He described how the   first dedicated HR department, comprising  mostly of psychologists and social sciences experts was established in Larsen and Tourbo in 1974 with the sole aim of promoting all round development of employees. In the 1980's most of the US companies renamed their training department to HR department.  Other countries including India followed the trend.

In today's context, Dr. Rao emphasized the fact that the line between family life and professional life is blurring. With employees spending most of their waking hours in office and then carrying office discussions to home, corporations are fast becoming their second families. The real role of HR is to ensure good mental and emotional health of its employees. He further questioned the classical definition of HRD and discussed how most of the classical HR functions such as employee mentoring and development are today taken over by individual line managers. He opined that the focus should now shift from HR Department driven HRD to user driven HRD. Mr. Rao emphasised that the success of HRD function is when it has attained status of self liquidation. It is not needed any more to promote learning among line managers or other employees. It only provides a milieu and mechanisms and learning happens on its own.

He categorized leaders into the following four categories:

Doers: This class of people (around 80%) need explicit push in the form of Job Descriptions, Job Specifications or WBS.
Achievers: These leaders not only do what is asked for but some more
Visionaries: These leaders have all the characteristics of achievers and they achieve results faster by applying their own thinking. They see opportunities in problems. He explained this class with the example of Dr. Verghese Kurien (Amul revolution)
Missionaries: These people are wedded to work and undertake everything with absolute single minded purpose.

In the 70s and 80s, technology was scarce and hence it was the main strategic variable based on which companies competed. In current times, human talent is in short supply and thus it is the new strategic variable. In today's world it is easy to buy talent but it is very difficult to develop and nurture talent from within. Mr. Rao believed that buying talent would lead to poaching of talent. The present day manager has to plan for long term but deliver results in short run. Since there is no fixed formula to achieve that, every manager has to develop his own heuristics. In the present context, every manager has to manage multiple stake holders including his direct boss. Dr Rao gave two golden rules to better manage bosses - give your suggestions to him only before he has taken any decision. Any suggestion after he took a decision is taken as an open criticism.

He winded the session with 7 strategic challenges faced by HR today

HR should think ahead of the CEO.
HR should influence the CEO's thinking.
HR must restructure their role appropriately.
HR must work on developing leaders and leadership.
HR should focus on continuous learning, including learnings from gen Y.
HR must inculcate values and culture in all employees.
HR must work on developing intellectual capital of the orgranization.
He said that it is easy to determine a company's intellectual capital (Market capital-book value) but it is very difficult for an individual to calculate his intellectual capital. Dr. Rao shared his HRD mantra of "a person's IC is no where except his own mind."

The biggest take away from this session is that no matter which technology, domain or industry we eventually land in, we all need to develop strong HRD skills to become efficient managers.

By Nikhil Bhargava (Media Committee)

Udyam 2012 - Emerging Challenges for the HR Leaders in the Globalized Corporate Landscape

It was indeed a great honor and pleasure to host such an august gathering that has come together under the aegis of Udyam 2012. An endeavor of the Executive management students, Udyam – is an annual summit hosted at the NOIDA campus and serves as a platform in bringing together eminent personalities and stalwarts from the corporate world, government and society to churn out and discuss ground breaking ideas and thoughts that would help shape the future of the industry, society and nation at large. It provides a unique opportunity for the students to interact with and learn from the vast bounty of knowledge and wisdom shared by the leading practitioners from their respective fields and thus help prepare them for a meaningful and enriching career in the industry. Continuing along the same lines, this year, Udyam 2012 would encompass discussions on Emerging Challenges for the HR Leaders in the Globalized Corporate Landscape.

Opening panel discussion on “Employee engagement on business performance” was anchored by Mark Lynn, from DD News.Eminent panelists Mr. Jacob Jacob - Chief People Officer, Apollo Hospitals, Priyanka Anand - Vice President - HR & Organisation, Ericsson, Ms. Savitha Nair  - Director - Human Resource, Sulekha  and Mr. Shrinivas Sastri - Vice President & Head India HR, BirlaSoft and Mr. Vineet Sharma -Director HR, Indus Valley Partners,voiced their opinion on this subject. Soliciting feedback from employees, substantiating that with an action plan and communicating it progress back to the employees will close the loop of employee engagement. Defining a clear career path in terms of technology skills as well as soft skills with active involvement by the employee is a norm in current scenario. Panel concluded the discussion by highlighting the importance of employee engagement in sustainable growth of organizations.



In session 2 of Udyam, an esteemed panel of Industry stalwarts discussed “Innovation and employee satisfaction through non monetary measures”. The panel included inspiring leaders such as Mr. Rajeev Bhadauria, Director Group HR, Jindal Steel and Power Limited, Mr. Ajay Bhasin , Regional HR Manager, Britannia, Mr. Anuricha Teotia, Deputy General Manager, Technopak, Mr. Ajay Bhasin, Regional HR Manager,Britania. Sharat Chander, Director at Press Information Bureau, Ministry of Information and Broadcasting played the role of panel moderator.

The speakers talked about the intangible benefits that could motivate the employees. Even during the selection process for middle to senior management professionals, special focus needs to be given to identify the values which the person cherishes. Fulfillment of these values will prove to be the best way to motivate the employee. The very insightful discussion concluded by resounding ovation from audience. Elite panelists convinced students of IIM Lucknow, Noida campus that monetary benefits alone cannot drive employee to excellence. Employee’s excellence is in his own drive to evolve as a leader in organization.



A star performer can be great at what he or she does, but do they have what it takes to succeed in the higher level position is a vital question that every manager can ask themselves before they arrive at a final decision. With this as backdrop, session 3 on "The dilemma of years of experience v/s star performers" was initiated. Discussion was anchored by Mark Lynn, from DD News. Panel members were Mr.Vasant Sanzgiri - Group Head Human Resources, Shapoorji Pallonji , Ms.Pooja Arya, DGM HR , IBM  and Prof. Punam Sehgal.Discussion revolved around the importance of rewarding star performers by putting them in fast track and complexities created in the workforce management due to this change in leadership dynamics. Panel highlighted the need of fast tracking and its increasing level of acceptance due to the results they deliver.

Day was packed with lot of insightful thoughts being talked about and the students enjoyed every bit of it. They called it a day with great expectations about the upcoming sessions in Udyam 2012- Day 2.

- Parag Deshpande, Bijumohan R, Siddharth Asthana