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HR Era, Issue # 50, July 11, 2004

Sharing and Growing

Writing down what we learn thru reading or experience sharpens our own understanding and thinking on the subject. Publishing it adds value because we gain from appreciative as well as critical comments received. Publishing also makes us known amongst fellow professionals and makes our contribution permanent.

We invite you to use HR Era as your medium of self expression, sharing, and growth.
Email your contributions to Alka@HREra.com

CONTENTS

1. Moderator's Message on Golden Jubilee Issue (50th Issue)

2. Fifty Presentations for You - by Alka Bhatnagar

3. Keeping Employees Happy - by Kathleen O’Connor

4. Tomato Soup for the Soul - contributed by Ambar Nanavaty

5. Your Computer's Mouse can Now Read Your Mind - sent by Sanjeev Talegoankar

6. More from HR Era Members

6.1 Confrontation Meeting - An OD Intervention , Vinod T. Bidwaik
6.2 Good to Great - Jim Collins - Book Summary by Rajesh Kamath
6.3 What is Better Than? - sent by V.Satyaseelan

7. Management Lesson - sent by Poonam Chandok

8. Training Programs (India)

9. Best HR Jobs (India)

10. Aims of HR Era, How to Contribute Articles.

HR Era is a Free fortnightly for HR Professionals with 4000 subscribers. To subscribe, simply send an email to HREra-subscribe@yahoogroups.com . Visit our website at http://hrera.com

1. Moderator's Space

To mark the 50th Issue of HR Era, we have increased the number of presentations on our website to 50. Please visit http://geocities.com/hr_era . You will find material to help you in your work, improving conceptual knowledge & managerial skills.

Bosses rarely appreciate. This time they did in my annual review: "You are good in work, we have nothing to tell you about that. We all want to tell you that you don't smile enough." Very difficult to change oneself! Starting this issue, each HR Era issue have some fun & magic!

warm regards

Rajeev B Bhatnagar
Moderator

Rajeev@HRERa.com

2. Fifty Presentations for You - by Alka Bhatnagar

Summary of 25 new Presentations uploaded at http://geocities.com/hr_era is given below.

There is space for 10 more presentations. Please do email me some more of yours for uploading.

We welcome your comments regarding inadvertently missed acknowledgements or copy-rights.

Subject	Number of Presentations
Decision Making	1
Leadership	3
Success as a Manager	2
Team Working	1
Communication	2
Designing Training Programs	1
HR Practices in general ( 1 PDF out of 2)	2
Indian Labor Laws	2
Future of HR Profession (Dr T V Rao)	1
Developing Mission Statement	1
Motivation	3
Negotiation Skills (1 PDF out of 3)	3
Ethics	1
Performance Management (1 PDF out of 2)	2
Project Management	1
Transactional Analysis	2
Organizational Climate Survey Questionnaire	1
PDF files (Self Improvement Ebook, Games for HR, Manual for Organizational Design )	3
Correct Postures for Using PCs	1

Contributed by Alka Bhatnagar
Alka@HREra.com

3. Keeping Employees Happy - by Kathleen O’Connor

Recent research identified the following factors that employees consider necessary to be content at work:

** Learning Opportunities
Explain how you’re going to help employees develop – and then follow through. Don’t make training an afterthought.

** Compensation
It has to be competitive, but employees also want to understand how it works. For instance, if a sales program has certain incentives, staffers want to understand the formulas managers use to arrive at those incentives. If it’s a promotion they’re after, they want to know what they have to do to get it.

** Career potential
Be straight with employees from the beginning. Not everyone can be the CEO, but assure them that you’re committed to helping them grow within the organization.

** Mentors
Employees need and want role models: 60% of those responding said they’d be willing to leave their jobs just to follow their mentors.

** Benefit mix
Offer more than just traditional health and welfare benefits. Adequate time off and flexible work hours can be powerful perks.

** Developing Potential
As I mentioned in the first section, employees want challenges and opportunities for growth. If you provide those opportunities, you’ll improve your staff’s morale as well as its effectiveness. Here are some ideas to help you:

** Place people in “stretch” assignments
People learn best by doing things beyond their skill. Place employees under some pressure; have them work with people who are more experienced than they are or thrust them into a leadership role. (Caution: Provide feedback, coaching and mentoring to anyone you place in a stretch assignment. Pressure without guidance is demoralizing.)

** Take risks.
The best-qualified person isn’t necessarily the best choice. Offer high-potential people assignments they might not be completely ready for.

** Remove poor performers.
Managers often tolerate underperformers and that’s a big mistake. Leaving underperformers in place undermines the rest of the staff. It’s difficult to offer growth opportunities to some employees when others clearly can’t handle a challenge.

** A Reward System That Works
After these are in place, you need a plan for positive reinforcement. Here’s how to create an incentive system that will recognize strong performance and encourage excellence:

** Save some incentive dollars for small thank-yous, special events and impromptu awards. Don’t put all your eggs in one big basket that rewards only annually. The problem with long-term systems is that objectives can change. What looked like a great idea in January may not seem so terrific in October.

** Change the incentive system periodically, so that it retains its motivational power. Bonus systems that never change become part of the background. Employees view them as entitlement programs. Review programs regularly (once or twice a year) to make sure staffers don’t take the incentives for granted.

** Match the system to the sophistication of those who work on it. In general, simpler is better. Don’t base incentives on profits if your people don’t understand how they can affect the bottom line.

** Retain Your Staff By Building A Community
Employees leave jobs quite readily, but they don’t blithely leave communities. Smart managers who’ve realized that improve retention rates by creating company-sponsored “social communities” throughout their organization. At some companies, employees can join bridge clubs, golf leagues, investment clubs, softball and basketball teams. The results are encouraging.

People like being a part of a community and will think twice about moving to another company when they will be leaving behind much more than work.

Author: Kathleen O’Connor

Kathleen O’Connor is the owner of the O’Connor Success System which provides professional growth programs for managers and entrepreneurs. To access our free resources, visit her website at http://www.OconnorSuccessSystem.com You can sign up there for your free 4-part mini-course on communication skills and a free subscription to our monthly e-zine, “The Edge.”

511 Avenue of the Americas, #276; New York NY 10011-8436. Phone: (212) 924-9339. Fax: (212) 924-3222. E-mail: Kathleen@OconnorSuccessSystem.com

4. Tomato Soup for the Soul - contributed by Ambar Nanavaty

Selection Process

Is your company having problem recruiting the right persons? Does your company have a problem in recruiting the right person for the right chair?

If yes, try out this simple experiment.

Put around 100 bricks in some particular order in a closed room with an open window. Then send 2-3 candidates into the room and close it from outside. Leave them alone and come back after 6 hours, and then analyze the situation:

* If they are counting and recounting the number of bricks - PUT THEM IN CASH
* If they are arranging the bricks in some other order - PUT THEM IN PLANNING
* If they are throwing the bricks at each other - PUT THEM IN OPERATIONS
* If they are sleeping - PUT THEM IN SECURITY
* If they have broken the bricks into pieces - PUT THEM IN INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY
* If they are sitting idle - PUT THEM IN HRD
* If they are talking to each other and not a brick has moved - PUT THEM IN MANAGEMENT
* If they say they have tried different combinations, yet not a brick has moved - PUT THEM IN SALES
* If they have already left for the day - PUT THEM IN MARKETING

With Apologies to Banta Singh

To: Bill Gates,
USA

Sub: Letter from Banta Singh - Some bugs in my computer

Dear Mr Bill Gates,

This letter is from Banta Singh from Punjab. We have bought a computer for our home and we find some problems which I want to bring to your notice.

After connecting to internet we plan to open e-mail account and whenever we fill the form in Hotmail in password column only ****** comes, but in the rest of the fields whatever we typed comes, but we face this problem only in password field. We checked with hardware vendor Santa Singh and he said that there is no problem in keyboard. Because of this we open the e-mail account with password ***** but I request you to check this as ourselves we do not know what is the password.

We are unable to enter anything after we click the shut down button. There is a button 'start' but there is no stop button. We request you to check this.

We find there is 'Run' in the menu. One of my friend clicked 'run' has ran upto Amritsar. So, we request you to change that to sit so that we can click that by sitting.

One doubt is that any 're-scooter' available in system? As I find only 're-cycle', but I own a scooter at my home.

Also there is 'find' button but it is not working properly. My wife lost the door key and we tried a lot for tracing the key with this 'find', but unable to trace. Is it a bug??

Thanks,
Banta Singh

Contributed by Ambar Nanavaty,
L&T - Ahmedabad. Email: ambar_nana@yahoo.com

5. Your Computer's Mouse can Now Read Your Mind - sent by Sanjeev Talegoankar

Sanjeev has sent a file which will prove that your computer's mouse can read your mind. Please don't believe my words, see for yourself.

Click Here to download MindReader.htm and save it to your hard disk. Then open the file saved in your hard disk and follow the instructions.

Sent by Sanjeev Talegoankar

Manager Pers & HR, Transline India Business Solutions Pvt Limited, 23-A, Shivaji Marg, 3rd Floor, New Delhi - 110015. Phone 25916899, Cell 9899121388. sanjeev@translineindia.com ,
www.translineindia.com

6. More from HR Era Members

6.1 Confrontation Meeting - An OD Intervention , Vinod T. Bidwaik

Vinod has given a detailed, step-by-step description of Confrontation Meeting. Confrontation Meeting is a quick OD Intervention (or "action oriented method of planned change," as Vinod calls it). The activity allows entire management group, composed of individual from all levels of the organization to take a quick reading on its own health and within matter of hours to set action plan for improving it.

I must warn, those facilitating it in their respective organization, should preferably have long experience like Vinod. Anyway, plan it carefully in detail, sell it to your top-management, and after completion really follow up on Action Plans - your credibility will double.

Vinod is moderator of HRGExclusive on Yahoogroups.

6.2 Good to Great - Jim Collins - Book Summary by Rajesh Kamath

Dear All,

Good afternoon,

I recd. the Book Summary of "Good to Great' (by Jim Collins) fm two separate sources. Some of you may have already read this book, but for the rest of us, I have culled simply a brief idea of the book ( though there is much more available ) which is based on practical and assiduous research. I am sure you will find this interesting and useful to think about. If anyone is interested,I also hv the detailed Book extract.

Regards,
Rajesh

kamath.rajesh@mahindra.com

6.3 What is Better Than? - sent by V.Satyaseelan

This is a very original speech delivered by Butch Jimenez to the University of Phillipine's Diliman Class 2003. He tell us what is better than hardworking hard, what is better than dreaming, what is better than vision. Is a bit long, but definitely worth reading.......

V.Satyaseelan , Sr. DGM, Larsen & Toubro, Chennai

7. Management Lesson - sent by Poonam Chandok

The new yuppie Manager walked up to the CEO beaming like a million suns together.

"Good Morning BOSS!"

"Morning Young Man. What do you have for me today?"

"As a matter of fact boss, I have a wonderful idea to push up the speed of Operations by 200%"

The CEO gave an encouraging smile, which effectively masked the sympathy he felt for the young manager, "Excellent! Sit down and shoot!". Perching himself on the edge of the chair in excitement, the Manager took off, "Boss, I've been noticing that we have been trying to use a lot of Management Tools in our work. 360 degree appraisals, Balanced Scorecards, Predictive Indices, Pareto Analysis, Root Cause Analysis, COPC, CMM, Time Study, ISO, Six Sigma - the whole lot. I do not see any use for them at all. why don't we throw all these out of the nearest window and get on with Operations which is our main business anyway"

The CEO nodded in a knowing manner and said, "Splendid idea really. Before we go ahead and implement this, there is a small errand you need to do for me"

"Sure Boss! Anything Just anything"

The CEO put his hand in his inside shirt pocket and extracted a knotted pouch. Pulling the strings apart, he took out a white stone smaller than his palm.

"Go to the market early tomorrow and try to ascertain the price of this stone from people in different trades. But do not sell this. We will meet the day after"

"Done!"

The next day, the yuppie was up nice and early and reached the market. The first person he saw was a young fisher maid who had just spread out her wares.

"Welcome Young man, like some fresh fish for breakfast"

"No Thanks. But would you like to buy this stone from me"

The girl grew angry. "Cursed that I am, my first customer of the day turned out to be a troublemaker like you. Be gone or should I call my dad?"

The Manager muttered a hasty apology and moved on, seriously doubting his CEO's intentions.

The next shop he came to was a doll maker's. When he showed the stone and repeated his question, the doll maker said, "With a bit of polish, the stone will make a good crown for one of the bigger dolls. I can give you five rupees for it"

"Thanks" said the young man and moved on and reached a hairdressing saloon.

The barber smiled in appreciation of the stone and said, "That will be a good whetstone to sharpen my razor. Take fifty rupees for that"

Similarly, various other tradesmen and merchants offered higher prices for the same stone for their own reasons. Finally, the yuppie entered the jeweler's shop at the end of the market and proffered the stone. The jeweler's eyes popped out of their sockets.

"That is the largest and the best diamond I have ever seen in thirty years of this business. I can buy it from you for five million rupees. But please hold for a few days for I need to sell off all my property including this shop and all its contents"

A bit surprised, the Manager met the CEO the next day and narrated his experiences.

The CEO smiled benignly and said, "Young man, All the Management tools are like the stone I gave you. If you understand their value and use them, you will see the precious diamond in them. If not, you will be like the poor, ignorant fisher maid who could not recognize its value at all"

"I am sorry," said the young manager, returning the pouch to the CEO.

The CEO winked and said, "Keep that with you. After I retire and you occupy this seat, you will need it to explain the value of Management tools to some young Manager with a deep distrust of them"

Moral: - The value of all management tools lies in the way they are used. By using them, these tools do not get glorified. On the contrary, it is Operations that stands to gain by making its job better.

Sent by Poonam Chandok,

Sr Manager, HR, Wockhart, Email: Poonam.Chandok@biostadt.net

8. Training Programs (India)

Profit by Persuation, New Delhi & Mumbai, Jul 2004

Dear Friend,

"Leadership is the art of getting someone to do something you want done because he wants to do it."
- Dwight D. Eisenhower

This art is also called Persuasion, an art that is vastly improved by strategy. That is why my forthcoming management development programmes are on the theme Profit by Persuasion.

It is an unique programme with strong focus on conceptual frameworks and how to use them, unlike the usual skill oriented workshops. To be held in Delhi and Mumbai, the two one-day programmes will be titled Negotiating Strategically (16 July in Delhi and 23 July in Mumbai) and Selling Strategically (Delhi: 17 July, Mumbai: 24 July). You will find programme content, methodology and other useful information in the brochure which I can email to you. They will help you decide on participation by your company.

With every good wish,
V.N. Bhattacharya
Management Consultant

_______________________
Villa # 300, Palm Meadows 2
Airport - Whitefield Road
Bangalore 560 066, India.
Tel: 080-2847 5817; 98450 58034
E-mail: vnbhattacharya@vsnl.com
Homepage: http://www.geocities.com/vnbhattacharya

Creativity, Hyderabad, New Delhi, Bangalore, Mumbai; Jul & Aug 2004

Hi All!

Creativity is generating ideas. Innovation is turning ideas into useful products, services and processes. Creative Thinking is not a talent, it is a skill that can be learned. It empowers people, adding strength to their natural abilities, improving teamwork, productivity and profit.
Think outside the box about everyday issues!

Dr. Edward de Bono is regarded by many as the leading world authority in the field of creativity.
"Ideas are the currency of success. They separate you from your competition." - Dr. Edward de Bono, creator of Lateral Thinking

Good thinking has tremendous power - the power to challenge, the power to influence . . . the power to change.

"The quality of our thinking determines the quality of our future." -
Dr. Edward de Bono, creator of Six Thinking Hats®

We are pleased to announce De Bono's Lateral Thinking & Six Thinking
Hats public seminar, conducted by Master Trainer Dr.Sunil Gupta for
the following cities:

LATERAL THINKING

Hyderabad : 17th July at TAJ,Krishna
New Delhi: 24th August - MARRIOT -
Mumbai: 26th August - JW MARRIOT -
Bangalore: 28th August - TAJ.

SIX THINKING HATS

New Delhi: 23rd August - MARRIOT
Mumbai: 25th August - JW MARRIOT
Bangalore: 27th August - TAJ

So, if you're still groping to be Creative & need to get results what better way other than learning De Bono's time tested tools from a certified Master Trainer right here in your City!

We have the opportunity to Learn to "Out think" Your Competition. There is nothing more exciting than thinking of a new idea. There is nothing more rewarding than solving a problem. There is nothing more useful than making a good decision that helps you meet your goal !

For more information or to register call 011-26221828/9810225295/9811630393/51629369 or email at:
genesis_events@hotmail.com / genesiseventsindia@genesiseventsindia.com or visit our website
genesiseventsindia.com for update on the Open Workshops.

Best Regards,

Sona Shahani,
Co-ordination Head,
GENESIS EVENTS INDIA

INSTITUTE OF HRD
BANGALORE

Presents
A Two Days National Conference on
Competency Mapping, Assessment & Development
July 23-24, 2004, The Leela palace, Airport Road, Bangalore- 8

Dr. Palan a renowned Authour,Speaker, Trainer & Consultant from Malaysia will be inaugurating the Two Days National Conference on Competency Mapping, Assessment & Development, July 23-24, 2004, The Leela palace, Airport Road, Bangalore- 8.

Dr.Palan has worked in 28 countries for distinguished and progressive organisations. He is the Chairman of Specialist Management Resources Sdn Bhd, an ISO 9001 certified company with a 26 year track record. He also leads the firm’s associate company – SMR HR Technologies, a Multimedia Super Corridor Company.

Introduction
In this rapidly changing business world, the landscape of business is undergoing a sea change. In order to achieve greater degree of competitiveness in the global markets competency based HRM is gaining momentum. The competency based approach is becoming popular as it provides effective solutions for many Human resources related issues. This approach can help the HR professionals in leveraging the HR for enhancing organizational effectiveness. Many world class companies have successfully implemented the competency approach and immensely benefited in terms of business performance. This two day workshop focuses on competency Mapping, competency assessment and competency development, which can be integrated with HRM functions for greater organizational competitiveness. Competency approach is very beneficial for all organizations to realize the business results through people and especially for those who want to introduce innovative solutions like P-CMM, TQM, KM and Assessment Centres.

Conference Topics
The conference will deliberate on the following aspects of
1. Significance and Advantages of Competency Approach for effective HRM.
2. Conceptual framework of Competency mapping, assessment and development.
3. Understanding & defining competencies.
4. Designing a Competency model.
5. Effective competency mapping.
6. Approaches to Competency Assessment
7. Strategies for competency Development.
8. Case studies and experience sharing in competency mapping.

Conference Particulars
Dates : July 23-24,2004 (Fri & Sat)
Time : 9:30 a.m to 5:30 p.m.
Venue : The Leela Palace, Airport Road, Bangalore-8

Workshop Fee:
For Single Nomination : Rs. 4700/- per participant
For Groups of Three or more : Rs. 4500/- per participant.

Panel of Resource Persons
Mr. Prasad TGC, Vice president & Business head, MindTree Consulting
Mr. Girish Nair, Vice President- HR, Aztec Software
Mr. M.R.Chandramowly, Ex-VP-HR, Praxair, & Director, Medha Dimensions
Mr. D.T.Devare, HR & Management Consultant.
Mr. Sudheesh Venkatesh, Head-HR, Tesco, India
Mr. Narayanan Nair, Head-HR, Global Exchange Services.
Ms. Uma Venkatram, Director, HR REDUX

Paper Presentations:
The will be sessions of paper presentations from Wipro, WNS, Baan,Honeywell,L& T Infotech, HAL and others

Registration Options:
Option 1:
Kindly send Nomination letter along with D.D./ Cheque in favour of Institute of HRD, Bangalore to the address mentioned
below.

Option 2:
Kindly send Nomination letter by E-mail immediately. The registration fee by D.D./Cheques in favour of Institute of HRD,
Bangalore can be sent along with the delegate(s) on the programme day.

Option 3:
Visit our website www.ihrd.net and do online registration.

Accommodation:
For details regarding hotel in various cities and the tariff structure kindly visit: www.timescity.com

For a Printed Brochure.
In case you need a printed brochure of the workshop kindly send us the complete postal address.

For more Details Contact : B. Nandini ( Ph: 080-23436406, 23549645, 51244291 )
.
Regards

J.Reuban
Co-ordinator

INSTITUTE OF HRD
# 12, I Floor, 80 Feet Road
Near UTI Bank
R.T.Nagar Post
Bangalore- 560 032, India
Phone: 080-23436406, 23549645,51244291
E-mail: ihrd@vsnl.net
www.ihrd.net

9. Best HR Jobs (India)

SN	Position	Location	Industry	Profile
1.	Head – HR (Rs 800 crores company / SBU of a diversified Group)	Mumbai	Diversified Corporate House	MBAs with 10-15 years experience in HR.
2.	Training Manager	Mumbai	Insurance	MBAs with 4-5 years experience in HR.
3.	Manager HR	Delhi / Bangalore	Insurance	MBAs with 1-3 years experience in HR.

Pls. send your resume to soniagolani@mcgmumbai.com / resume@mcgmumbai.com

022-26101900 / 56964063

www.mcgmumbai.com

Management Consultants Group

Sonia Golani
Management Consultants Group
022-26101900 / 56964063
www.mcgmumbai.com

9. Aims of HR Era, How to Contribute Articles, Legal Stuff.

Aims of HR Era:
It aims to enhance CAREER GROWTH of its readers by bringing to them practices & ideas they can apply in their work, opportunities to network with other Professionals, training opportunities, jobs available, and techniques for self-management.

Contribute Articles & Other Contents:
Contributions from readers are wholeheartedly solicited. Contributions are the things that enable sharing of learnings. Lead Article should be about 800 words, others 400 words. Please send details about yourself also as we would like to post them along with the article. Kindly note, no honorarium is paid now! Please email contributions to Alka@HREra.com

Visit our Website at http://hrera.com