EKAGRA 2.0

Ekagra 1202 YLUJ

2 NOITIDE

2021: HR IN DRIVER'S SEAT COVID 19 and its impact on

Women and Gender Equality at workplace

PALLAVI TYAGI CHRO - India, Capgemini

MAD MEN

FROM THE EYES OF AN HR

Prof. Ravishankar Kommu

JULY

2021

EDITION 2

FOREWORD

Greetings!

Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the past eighteen months have posed monumental challenges to the business community and people's lives in general throughout the world.

Organizations, small or large, had to not only deal with survival but with new forms of organizational life such as remote work, use of technology to continue the normal routine, providing customers, and serving the society with essential goods and services, among others.

The HR departments of organizations had to deal with a different kind of challenge in serving its customers, namely, its employees. The pandemic has resulted in job losses for many employees, some of whom may be the sole earners for the family. Employees had to deal with a sense of job insecurity and also the ability to manage their work from home, taking care of the ill family members, and even mourning the loss of their close colleagues at work and/or friends and families. Yet, many of these employees working in organizations providing essential and critical services also had to keep the interest of the society in carrying out their work while enduring personal sacrifices.

Their normal routines had been disrupted, emotional and psychological well-being damaged, sometimes permanently. They had to cope with multiple challenges, including keeping their livelihoods intact, supporting their families and friends, and in many cases, not being able to be close to their near and dear when needed.

Much credit must be given to the HR department and its employees for helping the organizations navigate through these tough times with a lot of self-assurance and a clear vision. The HR managers found creative and innovative ways to help the employees and keep their morale high. Countries around the world have successfully learned to deal with the pandemic and are much better prepared today than about eighteen months ago.

Nevertheless, the threat is not over, and the uncertainty is still staring at us. The next set of challenges facing the HR practitioners has to do with institutionalizing some of the newer HR practices such as remote work, collaboration through digital platforms, balancing the socio-emotional needs of the employees resulting from remote work, taking care of the physical and psychological well-being of the employees and finding innovative solutions to various traditional HR activities such as recruitment, onboarding, developing teamwork, etc., in the post-pandemic world. Every challenge provides an opportunity, and the pandemic has provided an opportunity for HR to make its mark even more profound.

Sincerely, Prof. R. Nagarajan Director, IIM Amritsar

JULY

2021

EDITION 2

2021: HR in Driver's Seat A letter from our faculty mentor

- Dr. Vartika Dutta

2020 has been a year that has toppled the life of every individual alive on the face of the earth. In this one year, the world changed completely. Some cracks emerged in three critical zones: the Work Itself, Workplace, and Workforce, and they were all glued and filled by the HR. Most organizations that survived and are thriving with this pace of unprecedented change do not plan to go back to their old ways of conducting in any of the zones mentioned earlier. The crucial differentiator in the organizations which are thriving in the New Normal is their robust HR systems and processes with a vital enabler called digital technology.

Organizations have now understood that HR has to take the driver's seat to manage the changed expectations related to Work, control performance of the employees working in distributed workplaces, and the diverse workforce is experiencing their unique challenges. HR today has become most relevant to the business side of things than ever before. The realization that has dawned upon the leaders across boards is that if they want to succeed in this new normal, they must have a nerve-centre through HR, which can leverage technology to create a responsible business culture. This responsibility is for nurturing a culture of responsiveness, resilience, empathy, and compassion. Whether the employees come back to the office or not, they still contribute to the organization's growth story.

Agility or the "agile" way of working, which is discussed in the technology domain, is now the only strategy for HR. The mindset with which the leadership, C-Suite, and the business functions have now to function with an agile outlook to be prepared to sprint up and mold themselves quickly. The pandemic has presented numerous challenges in front of the organizations and HR systems; processes and rituals have been the ultimate glue to bind everything together. For organizations to come so far given the constant challenges, HR played a significant role in supporting digital transformation by leveraging cloud and emergent technologies; they removed redundant processes and seamlessly worked on ideas to develop the proper learning, development and engagement tools to unlock the true potential of the workforce. Organizations have realized that digital technology is not the only way to do business but also the most important way to deal with internal customers. This zeal of bringing everything back to the New Normal has put HR in the driver's seat to steer the organization towards this new phase.

This edition of "Ekagra" salutes this unified spirit of HR as to how they have pulled all the strings by bringing in a series of interventions in the organizations to align the organizations' mind, body, and spirit in the true sense.

Through the various articles and interview excerpts, we have put in a string of issues and challenges addressed by HR in the COVID world and the way forward in the New Normal. The focus has been on the issues related to DEI, employee loyalty, changes in the leadership orientation and direction, and how leveraging analytics organizations are taking crucial talent decisions. The team has tried to present perspectives to force the readers to take this much-needed pause and reflect on the journey traversed so far and gear up for all the challenges that lie forward.

We sincerely hope that you will find time to read this newsletter and appreciate the effort put in by the Hrithvians!! Do feel free to write back to us for any further comments or suggestions.

Regards,

Vartika Dutta Chairperson, Executive Education IIM Amritsar

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EDITION 2

CONTENTS 5-8

19-20

Interview

Pallavi

excerpt

Tyagi

,

CHRO

-

India

,

HR

Capgemini

of

Trends

-

The

Future

HR

2 More Human to Human Resources 5 COVID 19 and its impact on women & gender equality at the workplace Pallavi Tyagi

9 People analytics playing a part in decision making Prof. Sweta Singh

11 Sailing through the waves: Industrial Relations during the pandemic Dr. Subir Bikas Mitra

13 A Journey to people oriented career Our Alumni's experience Ujjwal Mishra

14 Cinema, Management, and Mad Men Prof. Ravishankar Kommu

17 How will leadership change in the post-pandemic era?

Anveshi Sharma

Cinema

,

14-16 Management

&

MAD MEN

Know and explore about the lessons that can be learnt from the movies about management from the eye of an HR

19 The Future of HR 21 About our Events 22 Team HRithvi 23 Brain Teaser

JULY

2021

0 1 P O T

EDITION 2

More Human to Human Resources

Initiatives taken by companies in India to assist their employees during pandemic

As we all know, the world is fighting against the pandemic; the same has been the situation with business organizations too. The organizations have been going through many uncertainties, and the employees are having a roller coaster ride. A lot of companies were even forced to lay off their employees, and salary cuts were also introduced.

Measures like these have affected the wellbeing of the employees, and there have been emotional repercussions all across the world among the

While fighting the pandemic, organizations have been going through many uncertainties, and the employees are having a roller coaster ride. Various companies have taken measures to ensure that their employees know that they care for them, and their families.

employee community. No one knows what lies in front of them the next day, and this is the time when the companies should come up with various initiatives to instill a sense of confidence among the employees and act empathetically. The importance of emotional intelligence also comes into play at this stage, and various companies have taken various measures to ensure that they send a message to the employees that they care for them and their families and have taken several steps to support them.

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EDITION 2

Let us look into some of those initiatives taken by companies across the globe:

Bumble, the dating app, closed its offices temporarily for a week, giving its 700 employees (including Badoo) a "much-needed break" to recover from covid burnout.

The vacation was granted to de-stress the employees after a 30% increase in the number of paid users across the app.

Tata Steel has decided to pay the monthly salary to all the employees who have passed away due to Covid. The salaries will be paid till the retirement age of 60 years of the deceased. The family of the deceased will be receiving a sum equal to the last salary the employee had drawn before passing away.

The company will also be providing medical benefits and residential facilities to the employees' families.

The company will also take care of the educational expenses of the children of front-line workers who had died due to Covid.

Druva - A cloud data protection unicorn has taken initiatives to ensure the employees' mental and physical wellbeing. It provides the employees with professional counselors and encourages them to keep themselves physically fit during these tough times.

They provide reimbursement for the expenses related to wellness activities like subscriptions for online fitness classes, sports equipment, etc. The company also provides counseling support for expecting and new mothers to deal with stress.

HCL Technologies have broadened the scope of their family assistance program by supporting the families of deceased employees. They provide medical cover for the family for 3 years and will also sponsor the education of the employee's children for 5 years. They have also decided to give training to the spouse of deceased employees in case they are willing to join the company.

PayU – A payment gateway solutions provider has initiated an employee assistance program in collaboration with ComPsych, a leading global provider of employee assistance services. Through this, the company helps the employees by providing them legal guidance, financial resource assistance, etc.

These services are provided in all languages and according to the employee's choice. PayU has also revised its leave policy to ensure that the employees can switch from work and take care of their families if a need arises. A quarantine leave of 14 days is provided if any of the family members are affected.

Capgemini India has formed a Covid Command center which will address all the medical emergencies and the needs related to the availability of ICU, Hospital beds, ventilators, Ambulance service, oxygen concentrator, etc. for the employees and their families.

Employees also have the option to avail their salaries in advance in case of need.

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Swiggy chose to switch to a four-day workweek in May due to an increase of COVID cases in the country. The foodtech giant has decided to acknowledge the tireless work done by its employees at this time of crisis, as well as to assist the employees' physical and mental well-being. Not just this, Swiggy has also allowed its employees the flexibility to pick the days they would want to work. Not only that, but Swiggy has given its employees the option of choosing which days they want to work.

With the majority of employees compelled to work from home, many organizations have saved significantly on office operating costs. Companies such as Shopify decided to pass this on to their remote workers. They promised a "$1,000 stipend" for staff who want to set up home offices.

Airbnb hosts are not employees in the classic sense, yet the majority of them rely exclusively on Airbnb for revenue.

During the pandemic, Airbnb introduced a full refund policy, including the deposit, for guests. This put the hosts in a tight position. Airbnb reacted quickly, establishing a $250 million fund to assist hosts in claiming back 25% of what they would have earned for a typical cancellation.

Ola encourages its employees to devote four hours of their daily time to 'Work for home.' During this period, they need employees to complete household chores and spend quality time with their families.

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COVID 19 and Its Impact on Women and Gender Equality at the Workplace: PALLAVI TYAGI In a place where women have been considered as primary

,

caregivers and homemakers the focus has shifted to

providing equal opportunities

.

for women

We can overcome

various challenges faced by women at the workplace by providing a gender balance

'

.

across employees life cycle

By Pallavi Tyagi

Chief Human Resources Officer India

Capgemini

The global labor force participation rate for women is about 49%, while it is 75% for men. There is a gap of 26%, in developing countries like India the gap will be much higher than this. What can be the reasons behind this huge gap, and how can we overcome this?

One of the biggest challenges for women in the workplace is the shortage of women role models – not just in specific industries, but also at senior levels in organizations. Industries based on the STEM disciplines (science, technology, engineering, and math) present many examples of female representation: the UNESCO Institute for Statistics recently reported that women make up less

than 30% of the world's researchers.

The underlying social norms may compel women to be primary caregivers and homemakers, look down upon males who might be contributing to this work.

There is a U-shaped relationship in India between female labor force participation and education, with the lowest participation rates experienced by women at secondary schooling levels.

Due to urbanization and structural transformation, as households move to the urban areas and the men are shifting out of agriculture, women withdraw from the labor force (reflecting an increased engagement in domestic duties).

To overcome this: More emphasis is needed on promoting investment in smaller towns and locations, which would lead to creating jobs and entrepreneurship opportunities that would make it more accessible to women.

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2021

Educational attainment beyond secondary schooling needs to be promoted, along with vocational education and training, which, in turn, increases occupational choices for women.

Efforts are required to reduce the time burden associated with unpaid household work through the provision of childcare and elderly care, as well as sharing of care responsibilities at the household level. Maternity benefits and flexible work arrangements should be offered.

Improving basic infrastructures, such as energy, water, and sanitation, would contribute greatly to making more time available for women's paid work.

A range of legal rights needs to be strengthened, including protection from violence and sexual harassment, equal pay, safe working conditions, nondiscrimination, and representation. Access to social protection is critical to not only support household incomes but to encourage mobility too. Our newly launched policy for domestic abuse offers to build a safe and conducive workplace that would ensure Employee productivity. We enable this practice by providing reasonable support to any Employee, who foresees a threat to his/her physical/ emotional safety or is/has been a survivor of domestic violence.

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channel communication for creating awareness: Dedicating some time to various events, town halls, etc.

Encouraging leaders to talk about this in those connects.

We have diversity champions who are responsible for driving this agenda forward, apart from the D&I team.

We have dedicated Employee Resource Groups who help create awareness on this.

We also organize sessions with external experts for our employees.

We leverage the traditional channels, like emails and announcement mailers, to talk about them.

The D&I team works with

Business units and Functions to ensure that the awareness campaigns are also run at business unit/function levels in addition to the initiatives run centrally.

We have seen a trend that when it comes to hiring, most companies don't hire women for some particular roles. How is Capgemini addressing gender biases that occur during hiring?

Capgemini India is focusing on gender balance across an employee's life cycle and grades.

Disrupting the status quo on gender hire trends is a critical D&I acceleration priority for Capgemini.

Hiring the right talent is a critical element of our vision of being a

Most of the female employees are unaware of the legal rights they possess in the workplace. What actions can we take to educate women about the current laws and female rights and ensure they exercise those rights?

D&I is a priority at Capgemini. We have focused on creating multi-

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2021

Leader for Leaders! We are continuously working towards creating a level playing field for our people and new admissions based on merit. We work on the principle that talent has no gender, age, race, nationality, or sexual orientation; in fact, diversity is a key facet of talent in its own right. Merit selection ensures that selection is based only on a person's ability to perform the work well.

We have a robust recruitment process, which means breaking down barriers, increasing access, and disrupting entrenched oldworld biases, aiming to choose the best person for the job, resulting in a high-quality workforce.

Our policies have been customized to fulfill employee needs, we offer Flexi work, optional and special leave options. Recently, we have also introduced COVID-19 support systems to help impacted employees and their families in effectively combating with the situation. We are also supporting education of our deceased employees whom we have lost due to the ongoing pandemic.

2020 has been called the shecession' due to the extremely high number of

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'women that have left the workforce.

Can you talk a little bit about Capgemini's career comeback initiative "CAPtivate" and its relevance in the post-pandemic era? How is Capgemini ensuring that female employees working with the company are supported during these tough times?

CAPtivate is Capgemini's Career Comeback initiative to support skilled female professionals who want to make a transition back into the workforce. As part of our exclusive, women-only campaign, resumes are invited from enthusiastic and talented women— currently on a career break—who are looking to get back to their careers.

Women who have been away from the

encouraging, to say the least, but has been necessitated by the pandemic. We hope once the pandemic is over and people are ready to come back to work; CAPtivate should be able to help them restart their career journeys.

There are various initiatives focused at each of the employee lifecycles to support our employees. Our familyfriendly policies also aim to ensure that our employees continue to stay.

Can you tell us more about “WinspirE” program and the challenges the company faced while executing it? How did you overcome those challenges?

At Capgemini, India, we have the WinspirE program, which provides equal

We work on the principle that talent has no gender, age, race, nationality, or sexual orientation; diversity is a key facet of talent in its own right. workplace often find that they are overlooked due to the gap in their CVs. CAPtivate is Capgemini's effort to address their experience gap and provide another route to get talented women back into the workplace.

The pandemic has forced many employees to quit jobs due to a variety of reasons. This trend is not very

growth opportunities and favorable working conditions for all colleagues, enabling our women colleagues to achieve their career aspirations and organizational milestones. WinspirE, is globally aligned to the Women@Capgemini program.

The four main goals of the global program are to:

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2021

Encourage culture change to position gender diversity as a business imperative.

Put women at the heart of client relationships to show that we have a gender-diverse workforce.

Address HR Policies, Groupwide, to create flexible working conditions and foster equal opportunities for women.

Provide networking opportunities to share best practices and experiences.

With continuous focus and sustainable programs we have moved the needle with overall increase in Gender balance hiring ratio by up to 50% along with several women focused initiatives that count on our future growth.

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and now it has just been scaled up to almost the entire employee population.

We have leveraged the extra push for flexible working created by the pandemic to reach out to talent that we couldn't earlier.

We have a robust training program for all our new joiners to be ready to be deployed onto actual projects.

One of the key initiatives in this regard has been the Sakhi Drishtikon project.

In an attempt to work towards the same, the Capgemini CSR team has collaborated with Capgemini Cloud Infrastructure Team to support youth from Digital Academies by training and providing them with employment

opportunities. This collaboration is also a step towards creating a sustainable environment for youth from marginalized communities.

The target group consists of unemployed women in the age group of 18-30 years, belonging to disadvantaged, under-represented groups, low-income groups, looking for employment/livelihood opportunities, and those who are pass outs of 2019 and 2020 and could be from Tier 2,3 or even four cities/towns.

,

So far

Capgemini has

offered jobs to more than

500

women through Sakhi

Drishtikon project.

In the post-pandemic era, hybrid workplaces will surely gain importance, and the companies will have to concentrate on reskilling of the employees, especially the female workforce who have been lacking behind in the usage of new technology as suggested by various studies. How can the companies tackle this issue effectively to keep their promises and create a diverse and inclusive workplace where women will surely play a key part?

What are the initiatives that Capgemini is planning on this front?

There have been some silver linings associated with the pandemic.

We have had a flexible working policy even before the pandemic,

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People analytics playing a part in decision making

HR Analytics turns out to be a valuable set of capabilities for a firm to invest

.

in

With

rapid

growth

,

decision making to

talent

in

data

driven

the new approaches

management

.

are

becoming

mainstream

By Prof. Sweta Singh, Assistant Professor, OBHR IIM Amritsar

One of the most significant sources of competitive advantage that drives performance and creates value for the organization is their employees and workforce insights, which ‘unsurprisingly’ are often not fully realized by the organizations. The dramatic workplace changes in the VUCA world have made it imperative for organizations to understand people analytics.

They have a more significant role in driving superior employee needs and behavior and are critical for effective HR and business decision-making. While the domain of HR analytics is new, the analyses themselves are not. For a long, research scholars and professionals have used ROI as an outcome to evaluate the impact of HR processes. But, scholars have criticized using ROI as a mandate of HR’s existence for two good reasons: it oversimplifies complex processes and is time-consuming.

Artificial intelligence and advanced technological capabilities provide unique opportunities for human capital to move beyond ROI, scorecards, and dashboards. As a result, the new approaches to talent management are becoming mainstream. An HR Analytics expert identifies meaningful questions about talent management and uses appropriate data to answer those questions. Since good decisions regarding talent management require data accuracy, an HR analytics professional is expected to be a

subject matter expert in research design, scientific ways to evaluate results, and then translating those results into meaningful findings for the business.

But, how should HR approach analysis of critical human capital issues? There are two definite analytical skills required to understand what can or cannot be proven using analytics. These are basic and advanced statistical skills and general analytical skills.

Basic skills include the knowledge of mean, median, standard deviation, regression analysis, and advanced statistics like factor analysis, multivariate analysis, survival analysis helps organizations quantify the impact of HR processes and policies and establish causal links. The general analytical skills are the ability to understand statistical analysis results and communicate the results to HR and line leaders.

Using these skillsets, firms are now conducting employee surveys, doing impact analysis of HR programs, and making decisions about training needs, resource allocation, and targeted coaching sessions, to name a few. In addition, companies like McKinsey are using these techniques beyond retention. Data analytics is now driving strategic decisions regarding performance improvement, diversity and inclusion, and talent acquisition by generating organizationspecific insights for executives.

Organizations have started building their analytics systems, and hence, having in-house analytics expertise has become critical to organizational success. Therefore, HR professionals with knowledge of toolsets like SPSS, R, Python, Tableau, or Qlik are increasingly sought after by organizations for datadriven decision-making in people matters. However, it is increasingly observed that HR has also been disrupted by introducing analytics like other

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management functions. This is because HR professionals and HR consulting firms had always invested considerable effort into developing and administering surveys of various kinds to measure constructs such as job satisfaction, career satisfaction, turnover intentions, employee engagement, etc. In other words, HR was always data-driven or at least evidence-driven. However, the analytics tools have vastly expanded the scope of these data-driven exercises, mainly because organizations now have access to enormous computing power. As a result, analyzing the same data now takes not more than a few clicks for the analyst with the right skills.

While HR Analytics is a valuable set of capabilities for a firm to invest in, several consulting and market research firms have specialized in HR analytics, studying industry-wise, market-wide practices, including practices related to pay and benefits. For example, firms can now purchase compensation reports for their specific industries and design their payment policies. The HR process, which was considered a perennial challenge for HR practitioners, is recruitment and selection, which has been disrupted

by HR analytics. Using sophisticated analytical methods such as sentiment analysis and text analytics, firms can now sort through thousands of applications and shorten the selection process significantly.

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As the successful implementations become more well known, there is likely to be a race towards adopting HR analytics.

While data-driven decision-making is spreading rapidly globally, there is still some way to go before becoming truly ubiquitous. In countries like India, where there are huge masses of human resources, very few firms have the technical wherewithal to engage in HR analytics fully. However, as the successful implementations become more well known, there is likely to be a race towards adopting HR analytics. Those who time the adoption right are likely to maximize benefits and beat the competition.

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Sailing through the waves: Industrial relations during the pandemic With the change in the

,

recent scenario

the

organizations need to be agile and resilient and for the same the HR need to strategize to build and organization that can adapt to the changing

.

circumstances

By Dr. Subir Bikas Mitra Advisor (Law) GAIL (India) Limited COVID-19 pandemic has hit hard lives and livelihoods all across. It is one of the most significant disruptions in recent times, as per the International Labour Organization (ILO). Organizations are facing a challenge in balancing the business continuity and safety and health of the employees. The trajectory of the pandemic has sparked a seismic shift in the workforce. Companies need to be agile and resilient to cope with sudden change. It's time for HR to take the driver's seat and prepare the organization for a radical change. The HR should strategize to craft an agile HR manifesto to reduce resistance & also to align the organization and stakeholders with a new business strategy focusing on people over processes, immediate response to changing scenarios over a long-term structured plan, customer collaboration over rigid contracts, etc.

When the pandemic started in

early 2020, organizations adopted a hybrid working pattern, viz. minimum required numbers working physically and remaining ones working remotely. This aspect was implemented keeping in view People-Centric Policies based on the foundation of Human-Centered design thinking. HRM had the daunting task of managing employee motivation and maintaining a work-life balance even in the wake of falling revenues and profits. The focus has shifted from seeing the entire employees as a microcosm to consider each employee as an individual entity, as the needs and requirements of every individual are unique.

At workplaces, the biggest concern of the employers was to prevent their employees from getting infected and providing medical assistance and other support to those who got infected. It called for the imposition of strict safety protocols in accordance with

the government guidelines. Other challenges were to sustain the compensation & benefits as existing pre-COVID times. Instances have been reported where organizations had to reduce their employees' salaries, apart from downsizing the workforce. This impacted the Public Sector Undertakings (PSUs) nonetheless. Flowing from the Government guidelines, there is a linkage between the profitability of a PSU with the compensation & benefits. As part of this, the profitability of the PSUs is to be reviewed every three years. Suppose the ratio of the additional impact of salary to the average profits of the previous three years goes up. In that case, the perks, allowances, and incentive payments are to be reduced concomitantly. Going by the provisional results, many PSUs are experiencing a fall in profits during the Financial Year 2020-21. Thus, keeping employees committed during these challenging times

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poses a severe challenge for organizations spanning all the sectors.

Employees, on the other end, are concerned about the safety and well-being of their family members.

Leading organizations like GAIL take care of the objective medical needs of the employees and their family members, including post-COVID therapeutic measures. To provide the best medical care, GAIL has a tie-up with Apollo Hospitals for providing medical care to the patients undergoing treatment in home isolation. Employees have been facing anxiety issues also during the pandemic on account of their colleagues, family members, and close ones getting infected. In order to address the same, GAIL took an employee outreach initiative in terms of which HR officers were in touch with the employees at various locations.

The pandemic called for evolved HR policies based on the premise of extreme compassion and empathy.

The need of the hour was to address the genuine concerns of the employees and take care of their well-being. It called for a slew of measures by the organizations. A case in point here is GAIL, which responded to the challenges posed by the pandemic by adopting a host of HR policies. The overall aim of

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the measures taken was the welfare of all the employees and maintaining a friendly industrial relation during this turmoil and pain. The various initiatives undertaken during the last year are as under: Several employees who had proceeded out-of-station prior to the commencement of nationwide lockdown couldn't return to their respective places of posting. All such employees were treated 'on duty' until they could reach back their separate posting on resumption of transportation services.

The leave rules were suitably amended to incorporate the impact of COVID-19. Provision of Special Casual Leave for the employees getting infected was introduced.

Employees who are required to quarantine themselves on account of any official visit are allowed to work from home for the period of quarantine.

Employees have been allowed reimbursement for procuring preventive items for COVID-19, such as oximeters, BP measuring instruments, glucometers, masks, sanitizers, disinfectants, face shields, etc.

They have initiated vaccination camps for the employees and their

Organizations are required to show vibrancy/resilience & cultural sensitivity. family members and comprehensive relief measures for the dependents of the deceased employees. The relief measures include medical coverage until the notional date of retirement of the concerned employee, sponsoring the education of dependent children up to postgraduation level, and allowing company quarters. These measures aim to assist the grieving family members who lost their near ones in the line of duty.

Another crucial dimension of the industrial relations aspect was how the organizations took care of the outsourced workforce and migrant workers. It is essential to take good care of them as they are also a significant contributor to its revenue.

GAIL took the lead in this direction.

The outsourced workers who could not attend the duties due to lockdown restrictions were treated on duty and paid wages accordingly. In plants/installations, where migrant contractual workers were required for the safe and smooth running of operations, GAIL made adequate arrangements for their stay, etc., to ensure overall business continuity. Even apprentices engaged in GAIL have been allowed a full stipend without any deduction for the period of absence from the workplace.

As we all know, we're still not out of the woods. The pandemic has still not gone away. Hence, the biggest concern for the leadership is to keep the employees engaged/motivated/connected, and productive throughout while meeting the ever-evolving business challenges. Further, to cope with this situation, organizations require to show vibrancy/resilience & cultural sensitivity.

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A Journey to People-Oriented career '

Our Alumni s Experience

So, I have always had an inclination towards the nontechnical side, even during my engineering. I used to try out different domains of work through projects or internships but had not decided on what I would want to pursue. However, in 2017, I got the opportunity to work for Pridestaff, New Jersey, for a month when I was visiting my aunt there. This was a recruitment and staffing firm, and although my time there was very short, I really enjoyed moments when a candidate's face would light up when he/she would be informed of a new job or moments where you are doing a background check through some candidate's references, and his/her previous boss starts telling an exciting story about the person. That is where I first got interested in HR. During my MBA, I was hesitant in going towards HR at first because of the uncertainty in placements in this domain. I was very confused when it came to choosing my majors and minors as well. It was a blessing for me that I had a wonderful guide in the form of Vartika ma'am, who inspired me to stick to what I love and continue improving myself daily.

Unfortunately, 2020 turned out to be the year of the bat, and me being the risk-averse person I am, decided to keep both HR and Marketing as my majors in the 2nd year.

I still had my doubts, though, and so the best way out of them was to actually experience what it is like to work in an HR role. Since our classes had been delayed in the light of the pandemic, I got the opportunity to do a 2nd internship, this time in the HR function as a Generalist. I enjoyed it immensely, and the amount of learning that I was able to gather concreted my resolve in going towards HR. This was followed by another live project in the Compensation and Benefits department, and there I learned the extent of success an organization can achieve when you have HR strategies linked to business strategies. The shift from productoriented to people-oriented was not just immensely fulfilling to me internally but also very motivating.

Currently, I am really fortunate to be working in a Strategic HR role, and seeing the effects of one's actions unfold is a really beautiful thing.

UJJWAL MISHRA PGP 05, IIM Amritsar

,

HR Strategist

TRB Group

His inspiration throughout the journey

-

Happiness can be found even in the darkest of times, if one only remembers to turn on the light.

― Albus Dumbledore

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Cinema, Management, and Mad Men

By Prof. Ravishankar V. Kommu Assistant Professor, OBHR IIM Amritsar

We are surrounded by films and television today.

Since the advent of the audio-visual medium at the turn of the 20th century, human beings across the world have been smitten and fascinated by it. Almost instantly, film as a medium assimilated within itself several art forms, and stories were being picturized and distributed across the world. We in India weren't to be left behind either. Films became an integral part of our lives. We watch them, discuss them, follow film stars, hope for their success, wonder about their failures, are nostalgic about films from our childhood, and yet get excited about those yet to be released.

Television, even though it arrived a little late in India, has also played its part. From the days of Chanakya in Doordarshan to Family Man on Prime (If that can be called television), the form of serialized storytelling using television as a medium has evolved. Like the narrative techniques, the media we consume said stories have also evolved over the years.

As students of Management, the business of films is of instant interest to us. We want to learn from the business of cinema and see if we can extrapolate to other industries. We also want to see if filmmakers deal with the age-old problems of business management differently. Aside from cinema, films and television also aid us with stories of events from history and the present and enrich our discourses.

They become a part of our language sometimes; scenes and characters are the best way to describe some otherwise tricky things to convey. But can cinema, in its many forms, really teach us something we do not already know about Management itself?

Are we modest enough to admit that filmmakers, these glorified carnies, know something about Management and the corporate world better than we do? We must be.

Like every other walk of life, the corporate world gets its fair share of depiction in films and television.

The corporate world is mimicked, mocked, imitated, and sometimes dramatized in films. However, the essential faculty of artists is their comprehension of human nature. Either consciously or unintentionally, films also portray some of the most profound conflicts of human existence and their manifestation in our workplaces and places of business. When we genuinely listen to our artists about their visualizations of our work areas, we are better able to understand our own motivations. As a result, we are also able to do our jobs better. We may use some films as 'case studies' for illustrating what we already know. Still, the actual value of films is in how we incorporate their social commentary into our organizations' visions.

Are we modest enough to admit

,

that filmmakers

,

carnies

these glorified

know something about

Management and the corporate

?

world better than we do

We must

.

be

Many films and TV shows do a fine job of holding a mirror to how corporations conduct themselves, but a show that I always like to quote in my classes, much to the chagrin of students who haven't really heard much of them is Mad Men. A show about advertising executives in the 1950s and 60s in New York gets a lot right. To begin with, the costumes, the hairstyles, and

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the sets are pretty authentic. What is even more precise is the inequality of the times, between genders and races. The events of the 1960s in America, particularly concerning the civil rights movement, had a strong bearing on the conduct of American businesses, which paved the way for women and minorities to participate in the workplace on an equal footing with white men in America. The show, of course, does a fine job portraying the social churn of the times as well. As we see Peggy Olson, one of the protagonists, go from secretary to senior copywriter in a hyper-masculine workplace, we reflect upon where we are today with respect to women at work.

However, Mad Men is more than a depiction of its times. Its principal protagonist is Don Draper, Head of Creative at the advertising agency in which the show is set. He is successful at his job, has a picture-perfect family of a wife and two kids, is exceptionally handsome, and belongs to the generation of executives who revolutionized the way products were marketed via advertisements in print and electronic media. However, Don Draper is, in reality, Dick Whitman, who took the name of his superior officer in the Korean war after killing him and deserting the battlefield. Dick Whitman's traumatic childhood in a brothel and subsequently in a foster home is a matter of intense shame to him.

Nevertheless, he chooses to forget all of it and move on with his life, with his new identity, reminiscent of the other great American character Jay Gatsby.

However, as much as Don Draper wants to forget, his past keeps coming back to haunt him, and Don Draper continues to suffer psychologically and, as a result, becomes an alcoholic and is unfaithful to his wife.

Throughout his struggles, Don Draper continues to be successful at work. However, his worldview is reflected in the kind of copy he writes. "The universe is indifferent", he proclaims and continues to behave accordingly. Every once in a while, Don Draper slips into being Dick Whitman and is anxious about his 'performance' as the perfect Don Draper. However, while Don Draper is seen as the ideal example at his workplace, many other white men struggle to maintain the facade differently.

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Many have pointed out that this is symbolic of the whiteness that is elusive even for most white men, who have to talk and act a certain way to be a part of the 'inner circle'. This, of course, is a matter of reflection for us today too. Is a specific 'performance' expected from individuals before they are accepted into the 'inner circle'? Who do we see as the ideal corporate executive in India? Do they have their social histories? Where do they come from? Do we implicitly accept their identities as the default for positions of power?

As the show progresses, Don Draper comes to terms with his reality and slowly reconciles his past with his present by introducing his children to people who knew him as Dick Whitman. As Don Draper achieves inner peace, he is able to produce his most remarkable work, a commercial for Coca-Cola that seeks to unite the world in the hope of a better future.

Unfortunately, Don Draper's denial of his past is also a metaphor for America's denial of her history, where

topics such as slavery and the persecution of Native Americans were brushed aside, and the American dream was aggressively marketed to its youth. As Fareed Zakaria says, the American dream is the same as the Chinese dream or the Indian dream or South American dream; it is nothing but a world where every individual's future is in their own hands. But, as Mad Men shows us, there is more to a social imaginary than individual agency and talent.

To us, Mad Men is a warning and a reminder. The people who work in any organization are members of society first. This means they carry within them social divides and conflict, which they are, of course, trying their best to cover up, as they 'perform' their 'professional' duties. Instead of continuing to push the conflicts down the line, it is better to come to terms with our past and the realities of the present so we can imagine and pursue a better future.

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How will Leadership change in the post-pandemic era?

The distinct traits that are required to be revived in organisations are

:

empathy

flexibility and adaptability of belonging

.

,

,

managing hybrid teams

humility

,

active listening

,

, sense

By Anveshi Sharma MBA 06 Batch, IIM Amritsar The world as we know has been changed by COVID19. Our work environment is no exception. The epidemic has clearly altered our way of thinking and working, and our leaders must adapt in order to lead effectively in this new era of turmoil. If we've learned anything from this global pandemic, it's that leadership counts. It matters more than ever before for several businesses facing grim horizons as our country attempts to emerge from forced repose and

mend a damaged economy. We've seen certain leadership traits and strategies that have had a big impact across the pandemic. To resuscitate and restore business activities, firms employ four specific leadership attributes.

Empathy True leaders perform many roles, and once employees come back to work, they will now serve as counselors.

Moreover, the pandemic has had such a dramatic and life-altering impact on many people that many workers will be working while mourning the loss of a loved one. Leaders (at all levels of the organization) should not only have a natural sense of when a team member needs to be referred to an Employee Assistance Program (EAP), but also take a break from a meeting that has shifted into a dysfunctional conflict or usually involves some sincere words of encouragement at the end of a long day. They'll also need to be sensitive when considering changes to long-standing processes and procedures (including sick leave, leave, telecommuting, and so on) in order to fully adjust to their organization's and their own new normal. Those who aren't inherently empathic should surround themselves with others who can help them bridge the gap. Unfortunately, a few bland, cold responses or decisions during this time can have tragic consequences for an organization's understandably vulnerable psyche.

Managing Hybrid Teams Many firms have determined that establishing, managing, and supporting a more extensive virtual working infrastructure and environment can decrease operational costs and produce efficiencies and

nytimes

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competencies, which is a silver lining in this unanticipated distant working experience. Moreover, since many employees have already become habituated to saving money on commuting and spending more quality time with their families, which has never happened before, remote working expectations are projected to increase. Companies are now striving to modify their office premises in order to meet the changing demands of their staff. Managing hybrid and non-co-located teams necessitates facility and infrastructure adjustments, as well as a paradigm shift in the day-to-day operations of any firm. Leaders cannot afford to sit back and must guarantee that their virtual teams meet on a regular basis; else, workstreams would disintegrate.

Flexibility and Adaptability Consider how, in the weeks leading up to March 22, 2020, when the country began to shut down, none of us could have predicted such severe and broad action.

However, in the face of unprecedented uncertainty, leaders must resist the need to "hold to a choice" in order to be purposeful and decide instead to be willing to assess new facts, information, and inputs on a regular basis, as well as alter direction if required.

Companies can continue operations based on a logical and well-thought-out plan, but if (God forbid) a pandemic breaks out in their building, they must be emotionally prepared to shift course, regardless of the current stance they may have just executed or spent countless hours preparing. For these executives, even a tiny delay in shifting course can have disastrous effects on their company's profitability, if not their employees' health.

Humility Unfortunately, leadership is frequently expected to be all-knowing and make flawless decisions; nevertheless, we must remember that they are just as human and imperfect as the rest of us. One of the biggest mistakes a leader can make in these uncertain times is to be presumptuous or make decisions solely based on gut. When a good leader is unsure about a subject, they are supposed to seek professional advice. As a result, humility will be pretty valuable. It is a sign of an excellent leader to respond to a tricky problem with "I don't know, but I will find out more about it" or to step down from the stage and allow an expert to respond.

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Active Listening As executives return to their offices, elevators, and conference rooms where employees are already very anxious, it becomes critical for them to listen to their people. Indeed, this could be one of those rare instances where the organization's next steps are dictated by public opinion rather than hierarchy. Can the business, for example, reopen in the traditional sense if employees or customers fear for their safety and refuse to come? The choice to reopen is one of several that should be made when the leaders have their ears to the ground and are well informed about the employees' issues, priorities, and suggestions.

Stephan Schmitz

Sense of belonging Managers must cultivate a sense of belonging among their teams. Employees want to be valued, treated fairly, involved in the group, and connected to the more significant aims of the company. Working remotely can exacerbate feelings of isolation.

Therefore managers of virtual teams should make an effort to foster a sense of belonging and connection. It can be accomplished by ensuring that everyone in your company feels free to express themselves.

These aren't the only qualities that count for leaders in the post-covid era, but they are some of the most important ones. Many of these characteristics were once thought to be secondary, nice-to-have qualities.

However, it is currently regarded as primary. In these times of unsettling ambiguity and collective anguish, it has become imperative for leaders to lead organizations. This leadership style will be necessary not only at the top of the firm but at every level of human connection.

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People Matters

The Future of HR

By Team HRithvi

Hybrid Workplace

Power of People Analytics

During the pandemic, most of the companies have opted for and have come up with various work-from-home or remote working policies. It is expected that this virtual work is here to stay. A hybrid workplace model is a system in which the employees come to the office occasionally, and they do the rest of the work from the comfort of their homes. This model has ensured a much smoother workflow within the companies. This kind of workplace helps companies reduce their operational costs and spend on developing physical office spaces.

Employees won’t feel like they are being micromanaged, and they will be motivated and can lead to increased productivity.

Proper care needs to be taken while developing a hybrid workplace as it involves a cultural shift, and the change management has to be effectively done, and HR should play a crucial role there.

Agility is what the organizations will be concentrating on in the coming days. An organization needs to be prepared for its challenges, and it will have to adjust accordingly. Here comes the role of people analytics. The HR department needs to keep track of and asses in a continuous manner whom they need, where they need, and for what period do they need a particular employee. By using people analytics, the managers will be able to identify the relationships between various employees, and also, patterns in those relationships. People analytics can help the management develop a better one on one relationship with the employees, and they will also be getting a better idea of how to manage and reward different types of employees.

People analytics will thus ensure that the organization can create a culture of better decision-making.

People analytics is 50% cold, hard statistics and 50% common sense

- Ross Sparkman

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Inclusion will be Inextricable

The companies will have to develop various policies to ensure that they are inclusive in nature, and they will surely come up with more initiatives to ensure inclusion and equity, and such a workplace will easily be able to attain diversity. Another main concern that companies face in this regard is to ensure to bridge the gap between employees belonging to different generations. Companies need to ensure that the needs of Gen Z and current employees are met, and fairness and equity are embedded into the organization. If the company fails to do this, it will have to face many negative consequences in this new era where diversity, inclusion, and equity are valued like never before.

Companies must ensure that a mix of people from different backgrounds within the talent pipeline, recruitment managers, HR leaders, etc., should play a strategic role to support and execute these initiatives.

The Future of HR Reinventing Employee Experience

Jeannie Phan

In the pre covid era, a potential employee for a company will have to go through selection processes, onboarding, employee orientation etc. which will involve person-to-person interactions. It is expected that this will change entirely in the coming days, and most of these processes will occur without having any real-life interactions. This is where the HR department will have to come up with new models of virtual employee experience. They will have to incorporate every aspect, including work-life balance, connection, collaboration, and employee well-being, and will have to ensure employee satisfaction to gain maximum productivity.

Companies are coming up with virtual team-building activities, and some firms have even introduced online buddy programs for effective mentoring. Thus developing a virtual employee experience policy is definitely going to be crucial for the HR departments in the coming days.

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About our Events

Jan'21 - March'21

'

uHRvi

Women s Day

In the month of January, we completed the two rounds of our quiz series "uHRvi". The questions were framed such that it can test the knowledge that students gained during their time in the institute. It also assessed their industry knowledge and the latest trends in HR. The students benefitted from the quiz by realizing the areas they lack in and the areas where they needed to put in more effort. The event witnesses an enthusiastic participation from the students.

For establishment of equity at workplace in terms of compensation as well as power, it is crucial that the women as well as their counterparts are acquainted to regulations that are in place for the upliftment of the women in society. To test the knowledge of the youth and make them aware of the issues and measures taken related to women in workplace as well as in daily life, a quiz was conducted by the HRithvi (HR Club) of IIM Amritsar. It gave insights about how far women have reached in the past few decades. The quiz highlighted the accomplishments of the women and the various regulations that are in place for the women of our country.

AArunya

5.0

Sanrachna

As a part of AArunya -The annual management, cultural, and sports fest of IIM Amritsar, we organized an event Sanrachna - The HR business planning competition that allowed the participants to strategize the working of the organization as an HR. The participants were provided with a real-life business scenario of a start-up organization, and the teams had to present a concrete HR Business plan to address various critical issues related to the Talent Life cycle in the organization. The participants submitted a preliminary report on the same, based on which they qualified for the final round, andhad to present their plan in front of the judging panel on the day of the event.

The judging panel included - Jai Ballani - Managing Partner, Executive Access | Sweta Singh - Assistant Professor, IIM Amritsar | Divya Tripathi - Assistant Professor, IIM Amritsar Netritva

During AArunya, we organized Netritva – A simulation game by Lead Pro which provided high potential leaders and the leadership business fundamentals needed to advance into positions of greater responsibility within the organisation. The qualifying round was a quiz revolving around the HR field to test the knowledge about HR management. The second round consisted of a time bound simulation game where teams had to make real-time decisions testing their competencies in communication & collaboration, performance management, and adaptive leadership styles.

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HRithvi Team

Dr. Vartika Dutta Faculty Mentor, HRithvi Assistant Professor, OBHR

Senior Coordinators

Alisha Ramteke

Anjali

Kugan R

Nithin Babu K

Vishal S

A heartfelt thanks to the

Contributors

Muthuraman A

Farheen Kausar

Snehil Kumar

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Brain Teaser

JULY

ACROSS

down

1. The ______ workplace model that combines aspects of remote working and in-office working.

3. _______ theory opines that workers can be rewarded based on their rank in an organization, explaining the reason why large salaries are paid to senior executives.

6. The ________ effect refers to the tendency to recall information presented at the start of a list better than information at the middle or end.

7. Tuckman's model identifies the five stages of team development which are forming, storming, ________, performing, and adjourning 10. An appraisal method aiming at combining the benefits of narrative critical incidents and quantified ratings by anchoring a quantified scale with specific narrative examples of good and poor performance.

11. _______ is a set of demonstrable characteristics and skills that enable, and improve the efficiency of, performance of a job.

2. The ADDIE model of instructional design is a fivestep process to developing iterative learning and training activities. The 5 steps are Analysis, Design, ______, Implementation, and Evaluation.

4. Output delivered by an individual in relation to a given role during a particular period under the set of circumstances operating at that point of time.

5. _______ power is the power a person receives as a result of his or her position in the formal hierarchy of an organization 8. A person working with you has a grandiose image of himself and he likes excessive admiration from colleagues. What kind of a personality trait within the “Dark Triad'' is the person displaying?

9. Experienced advertisers use the AIDA framework while making job advertisements. AIDA stands for Attention, Interest, Desire, and _____.

Kindly mail the solutions athrithvi@iimamritsar.ac.in

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People of IIM Amritsar

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Learn & Lead with HRithvi

ANYONE CAN HOLD THE HELM WHEN THE SEA IS CALM.

— Publilius Syrus

Write us at hrithvi@iimamritsar.ac.in