HR Services1

HR Services1

Sunday 8 September 2013

Moving ahead-Launch of HR SUCCESS TALK Website

Dear Friends,

I have started this journey in beginning of this year 2013. I started sharing my experience through my blog posts and got lots of appreciation from all you.

I am now taking this initiative to the next level. As you are aware that we already have a HR Forum to discuss HR related matters and member can post their queries and forum members do answers that.

Moving in the same direction, i am pleased to inform you that we have launched our website www.hrsuccesstalk.com with a new look.

I would request all of you to subscribe to my new blog site as all my new blogs will be published on it. You can subscribe by providing your email id under Subscription option available on right side slide panel.

Looking forward of your support in future. Hope I will get same support as I am getting now in my new initiative.

If you are really serious about learning HR and want to grow then visit our web page LEARN HR THROUGH PRACTICAL IMPLEMENTATION

Please visit at www.hrsuccesstalk.com

Wednesday 28 August 2013

HR Challenge-How to identify right fit for your company?



Traditional hiring is outdated now where HR use to line up candidates and ask them to meet hiring manager after asking some routine questions like “Tell me about yourself” or “Why you want to change your job?” etc. HR is now playing a vital role in ensuring that person getting hired should be fit for organization along with technical fitment. HR need to ensure that person hired should also be evaluated on fitment with organization culture to avoid early attrition. Organizations have understand cost of hiring wrong candidate now, who do not fit to company, hence there is always a huge pressure on HR to ensure hiring of a right fit candidate.

Fitment to company culture


Every organization has a culture which is different from other. As HR professional, we should know about our culture well and kind of people who will fit into it. It can be small thing as working hours and kind of flexible work hours which company provides or most important one like career growth path an employee can get in organization.  HR should be sensitive about fitment of a candidate with its organization culture. 

Let’s say, a candidate who has been working in 5 days a week pattern will feel hesitant to join a company which is 6 days a week pattern. Candidate has a life style based on 5 days a week working and suddenly when it changes, he feels un comfort and try to look for change.

If your company culture is driven by outcome and not by number of hours a person spends in office or you may ask a person to work after office hours due to global presence for video calls etc, then you need to see how much a candidate is comfortable with all this. 

If your organization believes in capabilities and not in number of years a person spends in your organization for promotion then you need to ensure that candidate should be motivated to give results and his past experience should reflect the same. Candidate who have grown in same company, meaning being promoted are the one who have proved their capability to deliver. So you can see that angle.

HR should keep their conversation in line to understand fitment of candidate to organization culture. HR needs to take a cautious decision after conversation with candidate. Not necessary that all the aspects should match but no negotiation on critical one.

Profile match is critical


Now a day, a HR professional is successful only when he knows about business and its processes. HR should know what a business unit does and various job profiles present in that business unit. Also what are deliverable of a job profile. This way HR will know what kind of person will fit into.

HR should ensure that candidate is fit for the profile and kind of work person need to do. HR should double check with candidate and ensure profile match. A candidate may agree to do work which he has never done just to grab the offer but HR should identify interest level of candidate before taking final decision.

Recently, we were looking for a person in IT who can take up both desktop and networking level assignment. I come across many candidates who agreed to do the job but during conversation with them I have felt that they actually wanted to go to networking and less interested in desktop level work. Reason was quite simple, they feel that they have already crossed the stage of desktop level engineering. Fair enough. 

Then we decided to find a candidate who is in desktop engineering and have networking certification and looking to make career in networking field. Such candidates will fit to the profile as they have no hesitation in handling desktop level work and learn networking together.

Candidate’s expectation from company is utmost important


It’s not about what a company want, it is also about what a candidate wants. You must have come across many cases where candidate say no to company due to various reason. It can due to profile mismatch, salary expectation, working hours etc. Hence HR should always ask what does a candidate wants from his new job assignment and company. Accordingly HR should take his call. Respect candidate expectation.

Trust me, a good hiring takes time but it is worthy spending time. There are occasions when a candidate is selected from technical rounds but got rejected on HR front. Do not be in hurry to fill your positions to meet your deadline to hire but ensure that hiring should be right fit. 

I would suggest you to do a simple analysis to find out hiring quality. You can make data showing employee left in a particular duration after joining. If number of employees leaving within 6 months are higher- this means that there is something wrong in your hiring process which need your immediate attention.

Please do share your inputs on this.

If you are really serious about learning HR and want to grow then visit our web page LEARN HR THROUGH PRACTICAL IMPLEMENTATION

Sunday 4 August 2013

Mobile Recruitment- Next Generation Recruitment Tool




You must have heard about “Mobile Recruitment” and if you are confused what does it mean then this blog post will help you to understand it better.

Now a day, every person has mobile phone and gradually potential candidates are shifting towards smart phones. Smart phones are capable of doing many things. You can surf internet, you can chat, send audio / video and can download various apps (applications) for any purpose. People are using smart mobile phone for almost everything. Smart phones are now taking place of laptops and becoming smarter day by day.

Many industries and companies are using smart phones for their product sale. Reaching to a person through smart phone is easier now a day. Similarly, companies have understood the power of mobile and started using it for purpose of hiring employees. Especially, Companies involved in recruitment business have started using mobile phones for attracting potential candidates. 

Well here is Wikipedia definition of mobile recruitment:

“Mobile Recruiting is the act of finding job candidates actively and passively through the use of mobile career pages and internet recruiting strategies through social platforms. Mobile recruiting is a dynamic and growing industry with over 19% of job seekers using mobile devices to search for jobs. 

Traditionally, recruiters have used tools such as online job boards like Craigslist, but the increase in mobile subscriptions has led to new strategies such as mobile search engine optimization, mobile career pages, and highly targeted mobile recruitment campaigns. 

This has lead to the rise in popularity for mobile recruiting software and social recruiting tools. Most notably, specialized solutions such as Work4 have shown that mobile and social recruiting is an effective method for fulfilling hiring initiatives.”

Let’s see how this works. As mentioned, it is simply about using mobile phone technology in recruitment. 

There are following ways by which mobile technology can be used for recruitment.

Sending SMS to candidate


Use of mobile phone technology can be as simple as sending sms to candidates informing them about suitable job openings. This is the simplest way to use mobile technology. Candidate need not to have smart phone for this. SMS can be received through ordinary phone. Candidates can go online and apply for the job which is mentioned in the sms.

Mobile supported websites


Every company use website for recruitment. Generally companies have a webpage dedicated to recruitment where candidates can view various open positions, upload resume, can know status of their application etc. Job portals have many other options available. 

But normal websites which are opened in web browsers are not compatible at mobile phone. Although, such websites can be opened in smart mobile phones but experience to surf such website on smart mobile is not pleasant. You can try opening normal website on smart phone and you will realize the difference.

Websites are designed especially for usage on mobile phone so that it can be viewed on mobile phone properly so that candidates have a better experience which means more application against an opening.
Recruitment apps for smart phones

You must be using various apps which are available for your smart phone. Recruitment companies have realized power of such apps hence start making apps which can be downloaded to smart phone and through which candidate can login to access job portal where candidate gets are features like view job openings, apply for job etc.

These apps are easy to use and faster than website. Candidate can get notification from recruiter in case of any new suitable position comes.

Beyond Recruitment


Companies are using mobile technology not only for straight recruitment but social recruitment and employee referral. 

Companies through their mobile enabled web sites can connect to their employees all the time where employee can be updates about company’s updated news, watch videos, can refer a friend and even attach linkedin profile of friend. HR gets intimation of such referral on company website and can respond. Employee is aware about status of his referral all the time.

There are various companies which are engaged in mobile recruitment technology and helping others in building mobile enabled tools. This is just a starting of this era and a long to go.

If you are really serious about learning HR and want to grow then visit our web page LEARN HR THROUGH PRACTICAL IMPLEMENTATION

Wednesday 17 July 2013

How to use social media to hire talent for your company?

courtesy :: www.aegisglobal.com

Social media like facebook, twitter, linkedin and few more, are playing important role in our life now a day. You can see your employees busy with their smart phone and surfing social media web sites. These websites are now part of our life. Many companies are using social media websites for various purposes. 

Using social media websites for hiring is one of them. Recruiters have started using these websites to fill their open positions. 

I have personally experienced that using linkedin is great idea, especially when you are looking for a candidate for a senior position in your company. Many senior professionals do not post their resume on job portals like naukri.com, monster.com, timesjob.com etc. You can find them on linkedin or any other social media websites. Recruiter should have ability to search and connect with these professionals through their existing connections and approach them with a job offer.

Sharing couple of points, which can make hiring through social media more effective.

Simply publish open positions of your company on Social media and relevant groups


This is the simplest way to advertise open positions in your company to masses. 

You can post various open positions on these social media websites. Some tips are:

  • Do not post all the open positions in one go: Some social media websites have restriction on number of words in your post. It also look messy when you post details of all open positions in one post and some time people do not look at it due to lengthiness of post. Post one job opening at one time so that people can go through those openings which suits to their profile.
  • Give link of detailed information in the post: You may not be able to write complete detail of position during posting, hence it will be good, if you provide link of webpage (especially from your own company’s website) which describe the position in more detail. This way potential candidate will also have a look at your company website and will learn about your company as well. If you don’t have such link then put required information in the post only but descriptive.
  • Articulation of job opening should be very clear : While articulating a job opening, ensure that it clearly mention what is required from the applicant to avoid not useful applications.
  • Ask your friend/connections to like the post : This will help you to spread it across the connections of your connections or friends of your friends. When a connection of yours likes your post it becomes visible to his connections also. This way it gets spread across more people.
  • Ensure to provide contact details : Do not miss to provide email id or contact number where candidate can approach you for application or clarifications.

You must be aware that post published by you can only be views by your friends or connections. Hence one of the ways which is also mentioned above is to ask your connections to like or share the post to relevant person. 

Another way is to post your job opening on various relevant groups. There are general groups to post job openings and specific group on the kind of skill set you are looking for. Eg. If you are looking for Head HR then you should post your job opening in a group which is meant for Head HR or Senior HR professionals. 

This way you will get better response. You can also ask your colleagues to post job openings in a relevant group where he/she is a member, if required. 

Making connections with people who can be your future candidates

It is a consistent but very effective way. You need to keep connecting with people who can be your potential candidates on regular basis. This may not give you immediate result but when you have people from your domain in your connection list, you can approach them whenever you need to. Also keep interacting with those connections by one or other way so that you are familiar to them. Senior professionals do not express their willingness to change due to many reasons, especially with someone who is not familiar, hence interaction with them will increase chance of openness. 

Also more connections means spread of your general job post will be huge. Hence give some time to networking on web.

Branding your organization image on social media to attract talent 


Candidates (especially experience) are very cautioned about the kind of company they are joining. They inquire about the company and its culture from existing employees or someone who have already worked in the company earlier. In fact, now some of the job portals have started providing option to candidates to link with employees of company where they are applying through social media like shine.com.


This means that employer needs to work on their brand image to attract talent and social media can play very important role in this. If you have a corporate communication team, I believe they must be working on it else you can contribute in branding your company image.

shine.com has come up with their social media integrated version. This tool is inegrated with a tool/ app called myparichay. If you are on facebook ,you can go to app centre and register on this app.

Here is the link to the app directly : https://apps.facebook.com/myparichay/

Once you register to this app, you  can provide your information so that when a recruiter using myparichay can view your profile. Infact, you can search various jobs through this app like you do in other job portals. Good part is that you can see your links who are working in the company where you wish to apply and you can apply through them which in turn increase chances of reviewing your CV by recruiter.


Using paid version of social media for hiring


Now, some of the social media websites have come up with hiring solutions which are paid but worth paying. I have realized that most of job portal database is exhausted now and as recruiter we need to look into alternate solutions and social media is one of them. Recently, I have used linkedin hiring solution for one month to fill a senior position which we were not able to do through job portals. We closed the positions faster. I would also suggest that before you go for a long term contract for any such services you should better try the demo or short period arrangement to test the usefulness for you.

Job portals are still major source of hiring but social media is also registering its presence in hiring field and been rewarding in senior level hiring.

Please share your experience or any other way by which social media can be leveraged for hiring in an organization. I would really appreciate your contribution.

If you are really serious about learning HR and want to grow then visit our web page LEARN HR THROUGH PRACTICAL IMPLEMENTATION

Sunday 30 June 2013

6 Things to keep in mind while taking actions based on outcome of performance management system



We discussed a lot about, what is performance management system, especially matured performance management system and how to build such systems? We also discussed about various actions which we, as HR professionals, should take depending upon performance rating patterns available from month to month. We understand the importance of actions which we should take because this way, we will help organization retain employees who are performing well and get rid of those who are not fit to our expectations even after counselling and giving opportunities to improve.

In this post of mine, I would like to discuss about 6 important things, which you need to keep in mind while taking actions mentioned in my earlier post i.e. Various actions HR should take post performance evaluation of employees.

You have all the data points which indicate performance level of an employee, still there are occasions which need human interpretations, hence sometimes, you have to take decision which are different then what your process suggests. Let review each point one by one.

1. Always give time to new joinees to settle in the system


When a new employee joins organization, he is new to the work culture, processes, project or department he is involved with, hence a new joinee need some time to settle down in the system. You can refer my post- What is Buddy Program and how to design it?- to implement a system which help new joinee settle down in organization.

It is obvious that new employee will also be given his KRA and evaluation criteria so that he is also clear on organization expectation from him and his deliverable. We can keep lenient target for such employees as compared to other team members who are already settled in the system. I would strongly recommend that new employee should be given minimum 2 months time to settle down before organization start expecting deliverable from him. You can also keep it 3 months, if you feel so. More than 3 months will be too much but it depends upon project and department new employee is deputed to. This means doesn't mean that new employee performance will not be evaluated for first 2 months. New employee’s performance will be evaluated in similar fashion as other team members but actionable suggested for settled employees should not be implemented in case new employee’s rating is less than 3 which means if his performance is not as per expectation. After 2 months or whatever settle period you decide, actions should be taken.

2. Evaluation should be on basis of data points.


Although, matured performance management system, itself means that employees are evaluated on data points. Every employee evaluation criteria is driven from some data point like tracker, daily report, analysis etc. I would like to mention it again to emphasis on importance of data driven approach while evaluating employee performance. As HR, you should be convinced about action taken on employees, basis performance rating and you can only do so when you have data point with you. Employee may approach HR to discuss about such actions and HR should have all relevant data to discuss and take conversation ahead with employee.

3. Be ready for exceptions


As HR, you should understand that same formula may or may not be impactful even if the situation is same. We need to understand circumstance associated with such incidence and take actions applying our experience. Let’s take an example here. A sale person who is associated with company since last 6 months and doing well in terms of his performance suddenly score Rating 1 in 07th month. He has performed very poor due to low sale in that particular month. He has not achieved his target. HR should ask for reason as why an employee doing well suddenly score so low rating. HR comes to know that there was a problem in supply of goods which this sales person need to sale and due to which he couldn't sale much. This is not in control of sales person. In this situation, after discussion with his line manager, HR should recommend for normalization of his rating and make it to 3, so that employee should not be impacted adversely.

4. Follow up with managers to action on suggestion actionable else escalate.


While implementing action post performance evaluation, I have realized that sometimes line managers do not take such actions seriously. It can be due to many reasons- Line managers are busy with operational work, Line manager do not understand importance of these actions, Line manager is not a good leader etc. In such situations, HR should act. We should not think that merely by informing managers to take actions, our work is complete but we should follow up and take status of action taken by line managers and record it. If you feel that line manager, due to any reason, not taking this seriously, you need to escalate the matter above line manager to ensure that action is taken and employee under that line manager should not get impacted. Trust me, if you follow up properly, all line managers will respond back and further you need not to follow that much.

5. Performance rating not necessarily be consecutive but it can be based on pattern


In my earlier post, I have suggested many actions, when an employee gets the same rating on more than one occasion. It is not necessary that second occasion is consecutive to first one. You should refer to the pattern and then take your call. For example, An employee score Rating 2 in first month, as per set process, you along with line manager should counsel employee and find out difficulties faced by employee in executive responsibilities. You record all this in Employee Counselling Form and place it in personnel file of employee. 2nd month, employee scores 3, meaning fit to expectation, hence no action required by HR but 3rd month, this employee scores rating 1. Now his 3rd month rating should be considered occasion two under action on rating 2 and employee should be put under PIP-Performance Improvement Plan.

This also suggest that HR person analyzing performance ratings patterns should take care of examples like above.

6. Keep record of each steps for future reference


Always keep record of each and every stage during performance management and action based on it. You should maintain proper record of Performance ratings- month by month- of each and every employee. You can download template of such format from link-“Performance Rating Tracker Format”. You should also keep record of mails from managers and supporting documents and tracker in support of employee ratings. You should also maintain record of supporting documents which comes in force after you take actions like counselling employee, PIP mail, appreciation mail to employee, incentive paid to employee etc for future reference.

Do visit previous post on performance management to understand better.

If you are really serious about learning HR and want to grow then visit our web page LEARN HR THROUGH PRACTICAL IMPLEMENTATION

Tuesday 25 June 2013

How to design and implement PIP-Performance Improvement Plan policy?


As mentioned in my previous post “Various actions HR should take post performance evaluation of employees”,  it is equally important for HR to take action on employees who are not performing well with help of their line manager and help such employees by all means, so that they start performing well. 

Please note that objective of PIP is not to show out door to employee but to ensure that employee understand seriousness of situation and give his best to come out of it.

Objective is not to show employee out door


Employee should know that organization has identified non performance and would like to help him to get out of non performance. Everyone should know that the objective of PIP is not to show employee out door but to ensure all kind of help is provided to employee by manager and HR. Employee should be given fair chance to talk about concerns / hurdle in executing his responsibility. Manager and HR should answer his concerns and ensure correction if required.

Actions before putting employee in PIP


In ideal situation, employee should be counselled by HR and manager at very first time when he does not meet company expectation, before putting him under PIP. Download Employee Counselling form.
Also ensure that performance management system is matured i.e. based on data point and not on manager perception else it will be difficult and ill logical for both HR and manager to make employee agree on his non performance.

Communication during PIP should be clear


Communication between employee, HR and manager should be very clear. It is responsibility of HR to ensure communication during PIP should be clear and to the point. 

Once both HR and manager come to conclusion that an employee should be put under PIP due to non performance then there should be a round table discussion with employee.

After discussion, HR should send a mail to employee cc to manager stating about what went wrong with employee’s  performance, what do organization expect from employee and assuring all possible help from organization side. You can download draft of such mail from link “Mail draft-Communicating employee about PIP-Performance Improvement Plan”

Manager should submit week wise progress report of such employees with HR and Head of Department so that everyone is aware. You can download format of such format from link “ Evaluation sheet-Post PIP-Performance Improvement Plan”.

PIP tenure should be relevant


Employee should be aware about tenure of PIP. PIP tenure should be sufficient for employee to achieve target given during PIP otherwise employee will not take it as an opportunity but a step before asking to leave. In such situations, employee will spend his time finding new job rather than achieving target.

Actions at end of PIP tenure


HR and manager should keep note of last date of PIP and have a meeting with employee on outcome of PIP at end of PIP tenure.  There could be three possibilities:

(1) Employee comes out of PIP

Employee meets his targets given during PIP and successfully come out of it. Congratulate the employee and manager. Send mail to employee about the same and keep the copy of such email in employee’s personnel file.

(2) Employee partially achieve target

There could be a case where employee is not able to meet 100% target given during PIP but achieve substantial portion of target. In such cases, both line manager and HR can take a decision to extend PIP tenure of employee so that employee should be given another chance to prove himself.

Employee should be communicated about same along with reason and an email should be sent cc to manager and a copy of such email should be kept in employee’s personnel file for future reference.

(3) Employee do not meet target

In case where employee do not meet target then organization should take hard decision, meaning asking such employees to leave.

WHAT SHOULD BE PIP POLICY?


Below is the draft of PIP policy. You can modify it as per your need.

Performance Improvement Plan ( PIP ) Policy


For all confirmed employee, your manager will initiate corrective action if your performance is unsatisfactory. He/she will discuss the specifics of the problem, recommend changes that you must make to correct the problem, and establish a time frame within which the changes must be made.  If the problem is not corrected within the agreed-upon time frame, your manager may initiate a formal Performance Improvement Plan (PIP), which outlines steps for correcting the areas of deficiency.

Performance Improvement Plan Summary


This is intended to be a brief overview of our PIP Plan. The entire process, including the expectations and potential consequences, will be described in much greater detail to any employee who is put on a PIP.

A PIP is effective immediately when it is presented to an employee. The PIP document describes the areas in need of improvement; including specific, measurable goals and the deadlines for meeting them. The PIP is written to last no more than 12 weeks, with checkpoints at six weeks and at 12 weeks. Basic goal of PIP is to bring improvement in the employee’s performance. The PIP document becomes a permanent entry in the employee's personnel file unless he/she successfully completes the PIP at the six-week checkpoint and requests (via e-mail to his/her manager) to have it removed.
The PIP guideline is provided as a tool for improving performance, but it does not provide a contractual right to be placed on a PIP.

If you are really serious about learning HR and want to grow then visit our web page LEARN HR THROUGH PRACTICAL IMPLEMENTATION

Saturday 22 June 2013

Various actions HR should take post performance evaluation of employees


End objective of a matured performance management system is not to evaluate performance rating of an employee but to take actions basis these ratings. Readers should go through my previous posts on matured performance management system to understand how to build mature performance management system and what do rating scale means which I will refer in my post here.

Below are links of all previous post on matured performance management system:


HR should take action in both cases-(1) where employee is not performing as per expectation and (2) where employee is performing more than expectation

I am sharing one of such model, which I found most effective. Hope it will help you take suitable actions post performance evaluation to strengthen productivity level of your organization at each level.

Actionable on Employee scoring Rating 1 


Rating 1 signifies that performance level of the employee is far below expectation /  poor performance. This is not at all acceptable for any profile (except where employee has joined within 2-3 months). HR should be extra concerned about such cases and take appropriate action along with reporting manager on immediate basis.







Below are suggested actions depending upon number of occasion employee score rating 1.

Ist Occasion :


HR Action : Put employee in PIP (Performance Improvement Plan). To know more about PIP, refer the post- "How to design and implement PIP-Performance Improvement Plan policy?"

Manager Action : Counsel the employee and explain objective of PIP to employee along with HR.

You can download it from link “Post PIP Evaluation format”

IInd Occasion :


HR Action : Ask employee to go.

Manager Action : Communicate employee along with HR and exit from system.

Actionable on Employee scoring Rating 2


Rating 2 signifies that performance level of the employee is below expectation but can be improved after some training or counseling. 










Below are suggested actions depending upon number of occasion employee score rating 2.

Ist Occasion :


HR Action : Counseling of employee- Employee should be counseled along with manager. Employee should be given fair chance to mention obstacles in performing duties. Manager and HR should try to resolve concern raised by employee so that employee can perform. Whole process of counseling should be properly documented and counseling form should be filled, which should be signed by employee, manager and HR. Filled counseling form should be kept in personnel file of employee for future reference. 

You can download format of Employee Counseling Form format.

Manager Action : Manager need to be present in such counseling session and has to find solutions of problem stated by employee and resolve them.

IInd Occasion :


HR Action : Put employee in PIP (Performance Improvement Plan).

Manager Action : Counsel the employee and explain objective of PIP to employee along with HR.

IIIrd Occasion :


HR Action : Ask employee to go.

Manager Action : Communicate employee along with HR and exit from system.

Actionable on Employee scoring Rating 4 or 5


Rating 4 or 5 signifies that performance level of the employee is above expectation.








Below are suggested actions depending upon number of occasion employee score rating 4 or 5.

Ist Occasion :


When employee scores rating 4 or 5 for first time, it implies that employee has started performing well. I believe there is no need to take any substantial step when employee scores rating 4 or 5 for first time. Still below action should be taken so that employee is motivated to perform well.

HR Action : Appreciation mail can be sent to all employees group email id mentioning name of employees who have scored rating 4 or 5. You can also mention name or place photograph of such employees on Wall of Fame.

Manager Action: Manager should also appreciate team member verbally or written. Manager can also appreciate team member during team meeting etc.


IInd Occasion: 

When an employee score rating 4 or 5 again for second time then HR should take substantial action such as follows.

HR Action : Rewarding employee in some way. HR can decide way of rewarding employee after due approval from management. You can give monetary incentive to employee or gift vouchers etc.  Also you can publish list of such employees who have achieved incentive.

Manager Action : No as such action is required by manager.

IIIrd Occasion:


Such team members are asset to organization and organization should spend time and efforts to make them ready for next level.

HR Action : Discussion with team member in presence of manager to understand what are his expectation from organization and how he want to grow professionally.

Manager Action: After discussion with employee, manager and HR should internally discuss on possibility of profiles where they want to grow these employees professionally. Framing career road map of such employees in organization.

IVth and more Occasion:


HR Action : At this point of time, we will know where we want to take such employees then HR should plan for various training program for them so that they can be groomed for such profiles.

Manager Action:  Manager should be part of action taken by HR. At the same time, manager should allow and make employee free for such training programs otherwise there is no point of organizing training programs which employee will not attained. 

Actionable on Employee scoring Rating 3


Rating 3 signifies that performance level of the employee is fit to expectation meaning employee is doing what he is suppose to do. Hence there should be no action required as such from HR and manager.






Actionable when there is a difference of 2 or more ratings of an employee



HR should also do some analysis of performance rating patterns and take actions accordingly. If an employee’s rating gets changed by 2 rating scales (Eg. In March employee’s rating was 3 and in April his rating is 5 or vice versa) then HR should definitely clarify the same from manager and ensure data points in support of that.


Actionable when Bell curve is not matching for a department or project


HR should also prepare bell curve of a particular project or department and share findings of analysis with manager and project Head. In case of higher deviation clarification should be taken or advise to manager accordingly.






I have also made a spreadsheet of above suggested actionable and you can refer link “Actionable by HR post performance evaluation” to download it.



If you are really serious about learning HR and want to grow then visit our web page LEARN HR THROUGH PRACTICAL IMPLEMENTATION


Monday 17 June 2013

How to design a suitable sales incentive policy for your company Sales force?



 Every company has a sales force to sale its products and services. We all know that a motivated and self driven sales force can contribute a lot in financial growth of the company. A well structured incentive scheme for such sales force can act as a catalyst to ignite the fire of desire to over achieve their targets. Same way, a poorly designed incentive scheme can be just a scheme for sales force and can demotivate them. Hence as HR, we need to play important role while designing such incentive schemes for our sales force and for that matter for any profile in the company. In this post, we are concentrating more on incentive scheme for sales force hence I will keep my discussion around it only. I think we design most of incentive schemes for our sales team.

Throughout my career, I have learnt following things to keep in mind while framing incentive policy for sales force. These are also useful tips to keep in mind for designing any kind of incentive policy. Let’s have a look at each one, one by one.

It should be based on facts and figures


Before you design an incentive policy, you better get the data in place. You should collect at least last 12 months data to see pattern of sales happening in each month. If your company has presence in more than one city, then you can also take city-wise and month-wise sales data both in terms of quantity and revenue. This will help you to understand, how each region does in terms of sales?

You can calculate average, minimum, maximum and median of all 12 months sales data. You need to carefully observe the sales pattern, like how many times average of all 12 months was met in last 12 months, how many times company did above or below average. Once you have all this data in place, you can easily determine starting level and next levels of sales incentive plan. 

You should do it for each region as each region data will be different. These facts and figure will help you in putting your incentive scheme strongly in front of sale team and team will not think that scheme is made ill logically but in a logical way, considering all data points. Hence it is easier for them to accept and adopt it. Please note, until sale team adopts incentive scheme in positive way, they will not put their 100% efforts to make this a success hence their buy-in is very important.

Sale projection should also be kept in mind


As it is important to see, what we have done in history as organization in a particular region, same way, it is also important that we should know that what the sales projection in future. Here, sales head can contribute a lot. Sales head knows total leads in hand, hot leads, cold leads etc. Basis which, Sales head can project sales projection in coming quarters. 

You should also keep this in mind and incorporate such inputs in your incentive plan. For example, if last 12 month’s sale average is 1000 and projection by Sale head in next quarter is 1500 then you cannot simply make starting level of incentive scheme as 1000+. It has to be somewhere from 1250+ product sale. This way you have considered both historical data and projection.

Also keep individual sales person capability in mind

You also need to consider individual person’s sale record and capability to sale. A high performer can easily achieve your given targets and can claim higher incentive if you make easy targets for him. Same way, a sale person not doing well, will not be able to achieve anything even if the incentive scheme is on basis of data points.

But, you can also not make different incentive scheme for different person. It has to be identical for a group of sale team. You can certainly make different incentive slabs for sale teams located at different regions or working on different product but it has to be identical in same group. 

Idea should be ensuring sales team earn more


Idea while designing an incentive policy should never be to not to give but it should always be giving more to sales team if they sale more. This way it is WIN-WIN for both individual and organization. But at the same time, it should not be designed in such a way that sale team can achieve it easily with normal efforts. Incentive scheme should motivate them to do little extra than their normal efforts. Please note that sale team also gets salary other than incentive for sale. They also need to justify their salary hence there should be a minimum target which they need to achieve. Incentive scheme should start after that normal target.

Ensure that incentive should not eat up major portion of your profit margin


You need to also ensure that incentive you are paying for a sale should not be that much that it eats up your profit margin substantially. Hence incentive payable against each sales slab should be evaluated considering this. You can also check what is the total amount you are paying on same sale? Example, you might have incentive scheme for individual on a particular sale and at the same time you are also giving incentive to team lead and project manager on same sales in some way hence total impact of incentive paid on particular sale should be kept in mind.

Check 360 degree impact of incentive scheme


An incentive scheme can be linked with other ongoing policies or scheme in the company. Hence as HR, you need to ensure addressing all such impacts on other existing scheme or policy. Example, if a sale person already have some incentive scheme which is similar to new incentive scheme which you are planning to launch then you need to make it clear which one will be applicable.

Launch incentive scheme for limited period to test


There could be situations when you are not sure about success of incentive scheme which you are planning to launch then it is better to launch this scheme for limited period like 3 months. By doing so, you will be able to evaluate success of incentive scheme. If incentive scheme do well, then you can continue with it else you can review the incentive scheme and re launch with changes.



Take all stakeholders in confidence before launching the scheme


Ensure that all stakeholders should be involved before finalization of incentive policy and give their buy-in. This will help you to implement the policy and impact will be much higher. These stakeholders can also give you valid inputs and suggestions which will help improving the incentive scheme and making it more robust so that there is less loop holes in your incentive scheme designing. It is better that all such things should be addressed in your scheme during designing phase as it is difficult to make changes in your incentive scheme again and again after launch. It also gives bad impression about planning team.

Articulate the incentive policy clearly


As mentioned in my previous post on “Do’s and Don’t while making or reviewing Company HR Policies” articulation of incentive scheme will be very important. It is written document and will be referred in case of any clarification and concern raised by anyone in future. You may or may not be present at that point of time hence ensure you draft the incentive scheme in such a way that all aspects which can come up should be clear.



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Friday 14 June 2013

How to measure ROI (Return on Investment) of training programs in your organization?


One of the challenging tasks, which very few HR professionals dare to do is to determine ROI of training program. I was one of them for around initial 8 years of my professional experience. I use to conduct training programs, take feedback from participants, update my training calendar and that’s it. I never thought of determining ROI of training programs, which I have conducted in my organization. Later on, I realized that all efforts put in by me and my team is of no use, if we can’t measure ROI (Return on Investment) of training. We should know whether we have achieved our objective or not? If not, then where we were wrong and redo it. If yes, then how much and how it is benefiting organization as well as individual?

Management is also interested to know about returns they got after investing so much money on various training programs conducted across organization. 

Today, I am sharing my experience on how to determine ROI of training programs. As mentioned in my previous post “How to get best out of training programs conducted in your organization?” training programs are conducted to enhance knowledge of participants, developing skills in participants or moving them to a particular behavioral change.  Hence we should keep in mind the type of training program we have conducted to find ways to determine ROI.

You can measure ROI of training in following ways:


  • Enhancement in Learning / Knowledge gain of participants
  • Positive change in behavior of participants
  • Impact on business due to skill development of participants
  • Return on investment of training program


Enhancement in Learning / Knowledge gain of participants


After conducting a training program, which focus on enhancing knowledge of participants, you should evaluate impact in the terms of knowledge increase among participants. You can do it simply, by taking pre and post test of participants and measuring improvement in their knowledge. 

For example, if you have to conduct a training, on Awareness of AIDS-HIV (Download presentation on AIDS-HIV), you can design two question papers- one for pre test and second for post test. Download sample test paper to evaluate effectiveness of training on AIDS-HIV.

You can see the impact of the same by comparison of both pre and post test marks. You can download spreadsheet to determine effectiveness of knowledge based training programs.


Positive change in behavior of participants


In case of training based on behavioral change, you can check participants applying those behaviors, taught during training, in their day to day to operation. Also you can see degree of application of such behavior before or after training program. 

As trainer, you can observe it by yourself, while participants are on shop floor or you can also take help of their supervisors to give their inputs. It is time consuming process and trainer or training co-ordinator spends good amount of time in evaluating each and every person.

For example, if you have conducted a training program on customer relationship for a team of sales person who are suppose to sale mobile phones on mobile counter, then you can prepare a list of behavior taught to them during training program and evaluate them on application of those behaviors when they are live on sale counter.

You can evaluate them on following behaviors. 
  • Greeting customer in nice way
  • Listening customer queries/ requirement/ grievance before replying
  • Keeping calm even if customer is angry on you
  • Addressing customer as SIR And MADAM
  • Getting customer feedback form filled by customer
  • Thanking customer for visiting you



Impact on business due to skill development of participants

Every training program, directly or indirectly, should impact business in some way whether it is to enhance knowledge, change behavior or develop skill, it should lead to increase in company business. You should determine impact of training on business. It has to be tangible. Only tangible impact can be quantified. Also there are non-tangible impacts of training on business.                                                  




Tangible impact of training can be determined by improvement in followings:
  • Increase in sales
  • Reduction in wastage
  • Increase in quality of production / work
  • Increase in production
  • Increase in Customer satisfaction rating
  • Increase Turn around time of an activity
  • Reduction in error while working


Non Tangible impact of training can be determined by improvement in followings:
  • Increase in customer delight
  • Increase in Job satisfaction of our employees
  • Effective communication etc


Return on investment of training program



I would not suggest you to determine ROI of each and every training program. I would suggest that first of all you should find out training programs, for which you want to determine ROI. 

You can choose such training programs keeping following in mind:

  • How much time, energy and money, company has spent on a particular training program?
  • How important this training program is for achieving company objective. 

This way, you will choose training programs where management is keen to know ROI and these programs impacts organization overall growth. I have shared an example of a training program on computer skill during time when banks were going automated in my previous post. These kinds of programs should be evaluated and ROI should be determined.

You can determine ROI by following method:

ROI = ( Net Benefit from training program / Cost of training program ) x 100

Example:

Cost of training program on running a new machine     : Rs 20,000/-

Benefit in production after training program (in a year) : Rs 2,00,000/-

Net Benefit = 2,00,000- 20,000

ROI = ( (2,00,000-20000) /  20,000) x 100 = 900%

You can also visit Training and Development section of our HR Forum www.hrsuccesstalk.com  to find out many other things about training and download useful material.



If you are really serious about learning HR and want to grow then visit our web page LEARN HR THROUGH PRACTICAL IMPLEMENTATION