A common problem plaguing head honchos of small and big organizations alike
is that of dissatisfied employees, which urges them to look for better options
elsewhere. But this can be taken care of.
Let me start with an interesting episode, which happened with me while
interviewing a prospective senior marketing executive for my organization.
Normal industry practice while recruiting the sales personnel is that it is
important to link the remunerations with the target achievement.
Hence, an obvious question is the quantum of business this person will be
able to generate for the company. The exasperating answer by this average
looking person, probably from a small town within a 300km radius of Delhi was
"If I were capable of generating business on my own, then sorry I would not
have been here seeking a job, but would have been better running my own
enterprise."
Trust
me, my ears were not prepared to hear this answer and my impromptu reaction was
then why have you come here? He quickly retorted, "Sir, the level at which
you are considering to recruit me, I can only be part of your organization and
contribute in maintaining the existing business."
I was not prepared to take it further from this youngster, because here there
was a person half my age and experience educating me on areas where I am
supposedly a stalwart. The candidate was rejected on account of smartness.
The moral of the story is that the biggest stumbling block for growth in a
small enterprise is the entrepreneur himself, because he will not tolerate a
person smarter than him with the fear of being usurped.
It's all about loving your employees
Every entrepreneur at some stage of his business progress realizes that he
cannot remain a pivot of the organization. He dreams of delegating duties, in
the interest of the company's growth.
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Subsequently, he is faced with the problem of team selection and retention.
As per industry statistics, entrepreneurs are either technically qualified or
are people with commercial or management background.
Now, tackling issues related to manpower and its productivity, which are
otherwise so important for growth, take a back seat owing to no formal training
on the subject. Moreover, situations of employee absenteeism, inefficiency,
de-motivation, u-productivity and dissatisfaction are common.
Conventional techniques adopted by larger organizations to attract good human
resource and promise growth oriented career like allowances, ESOP
and share holding are unaffordable for modest enterprises. Every enterprise has
to adopt ingenuity to arrive at apropos manpower solutions.
Above all is the human touch, which most of us don't recognize. Treatment
meted to staff is inhuman and with a mechanical approach our assumption is that
efficiency of a human being is constant over the day like a machine in a factory
churning out jobs.
In light of the importance of human resource in the contemporary competitive
business environment, it is mandatory to have somebody qualified doing the full
time job of human administration and pepping. I am greatly inspired by the
analogy I heard at a seminar, where the organizational staff was compared to the
wheels of a vehicle and the inflation of the wheels to motivational levels of
the personnel.
The comparison was that if the wheels of a vehicle are not properly inflated,
on high cruising speeds, there is a chance of either a burst or over heating.
This could result in higher fuel consumption. Similarly, a de-motivated staff
can bring the organization to a grinding halt or may result into that unaccepted
drag.
Regular interactions with team
Periodic unofficial interaction between staff and their families in the form
of organization-sponsored events have positive results. Regular recognition for
outstanding contribution is a must. Moreover such recognition should be in the
presence of entire the organization to have best results.
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The recognition may not be just for numerical gains to the company, but more
desirable should be personal qualities of sincerity, punctuality, mannerisms,
etiquette and discipline. Today we need to cultivate personal traits, which are
admired by the society as whole and not just aggression, which leads to
impatience and rivalry and negativity.
As drivers of the organization, entrepreneurs have the prime task of creating
a healthy ecosystem for personal continuity and growth. An anecdote, which is
very pertinent, is by the famous physicist Archimedes, 'Give me a place to
stand and I can move the world'. This saying highlights the significance of
levers, which all of us have studied in our school days. I will take the liberty
to restate it by saying, "Give me a dedicated, efficient team and I shall
be an MNC."Â
Saket Kapur is the MD of Delhi-based Green Vision.