Author: UnitedHR

Tips on how to recruit employees fitting the company culture

Recruitment is not just to expand a firm’s work force but to increase the proficiency of the firm altogether. Many make a common mistake of judging people by their curriculum vitae and skill sets while overlooking their temperament and character. This often causes workplace tension and results in decline in moral among the work force. The process of recruitment is not just interviewing and selecting the candidates. Just asking some questions randomly or according to the candidate’s curriculum vitae will just not make the cut. Reason is that the candidates may answer it accurately but it will not give you a clear picture of their temperament and mindset. To judge whether a candidate is fit for the culture of your company or not, can be found out by following some interview tips and tricks. Such few pointers are discussed below on how to choose a candidate fitting your company’s culture.

Recruit Employees Fitting The Company Culture

  • The candidates must previous experiences

The candidates must be asked about their previous experiences for a good start as an interviewer, you could always ask the candidates about their past working experiences. This will give him an opportunity to Speak, and for you to judge him, from whatever he speaks. As the candidate enumerates his/her past experiences, many things can be noted from that. For eg , his/her communication skills, Flow of the thought process, his/her abilities to handle things. Further, this can be elaborated by asking, his/her achievements/failures in various jobs. At the back end Interviewer can analyse, how similar or different are these things as compared to the Employer Company.

  • Ask reasons for a “Change”

The reasons of the incumbent, for looking for a Change should always be explored. This will give the Interviewer an insight on, what is it that is hurting/itching the candidate. And whether the same/similar parameters exist in your company. In case such conditions, for which the candidate is running from, are existing in your company also, then the chances of his surviving with your company are less. If so please clarify this point at that time itself, so that if he joins, he knows about these parameters. If the candidate’s reasons for a change are satisfied, then chances of his sticking to your company long term are good.

  • Sceptical approach

Sceptical approach on candidates’ answers is a must The aforesaid point may sometime backfire your true intentions as some sly candidates may grab hold of this opportunity and exaggerate the minor difficulties that they face in their current employment, with an overreacting tendency. These candidates may be weeded out by sceptical questionnaire from your front. This kind of interrogative interview from you & other interviewers would create a pressure on these candidates and would reveal their folly. These candidates treat discipline and deadlines as difficulties which is definitely a pre-requisite for any office work culture.

  • The diligence of the candidates

The above points unfolds the fact that whether the candidates have faced difficult work place experience or not. If the answer is yes then the question that comes up is how the candidate coped up with that situation. Here is where you would get a complete mind set analysis of the candidates. If you get the hint that the candidates have persevered through the tough times all while trying to uphold the moral of the team and deliver the project then the candidates would be a better fit than candidates who have bailed themselves out in such times.

  • The candidates educate

It is mandatory to let the candidates educate about your firm’s work culture after the conclusion of the interview session you must educate the candidates about the code of conduct, ethics and ambience of your firm. These know how must be handed to the candidates in written document of articles and acknowledgement. Well, the document must be served only if the selection is penultimate. Candidates choosing to abide the term of your company will definitely fit its culture.

Wishing you All the Best for a Successful Recruitment.

Being Well Ensures Being Successful: A Workplace Initiative

Maintaining a positive vibe and enthusiastic ambience at workplace is the key for successful business proceedings. Many times it is seen that the physical and mental illness of the staffs affects the growth of the company. The most common cause that damages a firm’s proceedings is non attendance. This is mainly caused by physical weakness, mood disorder, depression or some other illness resulting in drop in performance meter of the employee and degrading of moral at the workplace.

Now, what begs the question is how exactly well being of employee effect the company’s prosperity. It is statistically approved through different office surveys that the employees working under poor conditions and provisions are more susceptible to non attendance and lack of aspiration while in case of well-conditioned employees this disorder is quite low. The former situation likely to deteriorate the turnover of the company while the latter situation will no way degrade the turnover but may also improve the stakes for the firm.

With the business boom happening all over the globe, more and more offices are coming into play meaning more workforce environments are being formed. Under these situations, it is of utmost importance to keep the physical and mental condition of the employees afresh. If the employees are deprived in either of the conditions the drive for accomplishment for the company will slow down. For this very reason, today’s firms are always encouraging their work place employees to keep themselves fit and fine which will ultimately beneficial for creating positive vibe for the firm and in its path of progress. The organizations nowadays are providing their staffs with health check gadgets for their fitness regime, exercise and spa outings, recreational activities and other stuff for the employees’ well being.

employee-wellness

Some of the methods for employee well-being initiative are discussed below

  1. It is important to lookout for employee’s fitness regime

The company can keep track of employees’ fitness through mobile apps and also pass awareness messages and alerts to them during slack.

  1. Keep the employees busy in extracurricular activities

By arranging periodical recreational activities like sports and others in the veil of competition will ignite workplace rivalry and keep them tracked on fitness regime.

  1. 3. Encourage healthy living among the staff

Companies are aware today that the health care costs are increasing day by day and healthy employees will bring in higher efficiency and hence healthy production. It is imperative to take proper care in order to maintain wellness of the employees. The following steps could be taken to encourage good health among the staff:

  • Blood tests can be regularly organised by the companies for the employees.
  • A doctor can be called upon to talk on issues related to health care.
  • Yoga classes/camps can be conducted.

 

  1. It is important to give employees a vitality boost every now and then

The firm needs to do all to keep the moral high in the work place to spread the business further. Occasional remodelling of the work place will light up the employees’ moods and inspire them to work more efficiently; let’s face it everyone wants something new in the daily grind.

  1. The all purpose office will realise dream

The people nowadays are fitness aware but restrict themselves to equipment exercise like gymming, swimming, aerobics, cycling etc. The offices providing these facilities along with recreation centres and nutritional yet good meals as amenities will definitely get cent percent dedication and efforts from their employees, catapulting the firm to the next level.

 

How To Protect One’s Brand On The Social Media

The social media is the trending and the most liked mass communication platform of today’s world. Almost anybody and everybody linked to the internet is part of some of the social media sites. From people to companies and from institutes to governments everyone is on the social networking for either spreading awareness or promoting brand or any other purpose. But like everything, social media also has its own set of perils. Social media is also a platform for deliberate cyber crimes that could tarnish ones brand identity and set up fraud accounts for financial benefits.

But for this, one should not restrain from promoting one’s brand because that will harm the progress of the business. To avoid such predicament the firm should take steps to protect the welfare of its brand. Some such steps are discussed below.

protect-smo

  1. The firm should devise a sound social media policy

By implementing a social media policy the firm will have a clear method of operation on the social media platform that will ensure protection of brand form malicious attacks and campaigns. Social media policy is a set of rule and regulations of the firm that all the works must abide by. This can be defined as a summed up form of different notions like mission and vision of the firm, social responsibility of the firm, security and industrial protocols of the firm, brand practises and guidelines and lastly, the firm laws.

  1. The firm should educate its employees accordingly

The social media policy of a firm will be able to protect the brand only when the employees are knowledgeable about it. The taskforce must be made aware of the brand’s social media policy, its pros and cons and risk management schemes.

  1. The password should be a difficult one

The easiest way to compromise one’s social account is by protecting it by a very predictable run on the mill password. Password is the primary wall of defence for social media account and it must be made almost inexpendable, if not completely. The ways to secure a password are to make it complex by lengthening it while incorporating special characters and alphanumeric. Two factor login, where one has to pass through two gateways like password and Captcha/OTP, or centralized password managers can also be used to secure the social account.

  1. The firm must have a social activity monitoring system

The monitoring system will serve for both looking out for fraudulent activities and keeping track of promotion of brand and traffic inflow in the account. The monitoring system will also facilitate customer reporting and post approval systems in order to keep vigilance on brand defamation and impersonation.

  1. The firm must stop hashtag hijackers beforehand

Hashtags are campaigning part of a brand identity and hijackers use them to defame a brand’s name by circulating ill rumours. The firm could prevent such happenings by promoting all possible hashtags from the very start of any campaigning with a neutral yet positive vibe.

Well when all said and done, a social media contingency plan must be placed at heart’s space at all times, because it is better to prevent such happenings than to cure them. After all, a brand’s identity is its main asset.

The Hiring Graph To Go Up , Next Quarter- Good News For The Industry

After prolonged slump, hiring in India expected to bounce back next quarter.

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The net employment outlook for the October to December quarter stands at 19 percent. The outlook for the same quarter last year was 30 percent. Hiring prospects are 4 percentage points stronger as compared to the previous quarter.

The survey covered 5,005 employers across India.

Sector-wise, the services sector is expected to see the highest growth in employees with an outlook of 12 percent. Services are followed by the transportation and utilities sector at 20 percent.

The remaining sectors – mining & construction, public administration & education, wholesale & retail and insurance & real estate – will also see positive growth in hiring, the survey said.

Region-wise, all four regions expect to see an increase in employment with North topping the list with an outlook of 27 percent. Inthe south and west, the employment outlook is 20 percent and 15 percent respectively.

The East has the worst outlook at 7 percent.

WhatsApp Image 2017-09-13 at 12.27.35 PM

The survey further indicates that large and medium-sized employers report positive hiring plans with an employment outlook of 19 percent while for small businesses the outlook is 17 percent.

Globally, India’s hiring pace has fallen slightly as compared to other countries. The strongest hiring trend is visible in Japan with an outlook of 23 percent. Taiwan (22 percent), Costa Rica (19 percent), India follows Japan in the ranking.

“Fourth quarter forecasts are mostly positive with employers in 42 of 43 countries and territories expecting workforces to grow by varying margins over the next three months. Only employers in Switzerland forecast a flat fourth-quarter hiring pace,” the survey said.

In the July-September quarter, hiring in India was at a 12-year-low due to stress in the telecom and IT sector and the global scenario, a previous survey by the Manpower Group said.

Credit Source: http://www.moneycontrol.com

Workforce diversity — Still a long way to go!!

Diversity was never in more limelight than it is today. This is so because lagging behind in incorporating diversity is not considered just the unwillingness to spend money, but it denotes that the management doesn’t want to march to the tune.

Yes, the organization gets the image of “slow-to-change.” There is a direct impact of this on the company image and employee engagement.

In light of this, more and more companies are reviewing their diversity programs and making necessary changes to rebuild and revive the same. Those who have never taken it seriously in the past are also working on it seriously.

Experts say that diversity ROI is difficult to calculate if you look at it from the perspective of tangible benefit. However, there are innumerable intangible benefits in the long run.

All this ultimately helps in building the corporate image and establishing the company as a serious player in the field of workforce diversity.

The definition of diversity has changed

Workforce Diversity

Before we have a dip test of a few leading companies of global stature, let’s understand how diversity today is different from the past?

It is no longer restricted to creating a workspace inclusive of gender, race, and sexual orientation. Rather, it has extended up to including talents with different problem-solving skills as well.

Companies with a future-thinking perspective understand the dangers of ignoring diversity. Hence, they constantly review their retention and hiring practices.

Even the standard operating norms also get changed from time to time to include and accommodate the changing diversity scenario.

Does it mean ‘all is well’ everywhere? Well, looking at a few cases that hit the news headlines recently, it doesn’t seem so. There have been many cases where big companies were found ignoring the basic diversity norms.

Case #1: Google and Facebook

Well, one of the biggest name today is “Google!” According to the annual diversity report published by the company, the tech giant is far behind as far as diversity is concerned.

The company is largely dominated by male employees (white).  Asians contribute almost 30 percent, and African Americans are about two percent.

Facebook also shares the similar trends.   The diversity report published last year revealed that the half of the workforce is white and hardly two percent are African American.

Though both giants officially assured that concrete steps will be taken to increase diversity, the real impact can be seen after looking at the subsequent reports.

Since there will be pressure to release the data publically, we can assume that something better will emerge in the coming years.

The trends have been similar for decades. Hence, it will take some time to change the situation.  It will be possible only if companies put sincere and honest efforts to correct the disparity.

SOME LOCAL FLAVOUR-

Case #2: Bajaj Allianz General Insurance and Pepsico India

Indian companies are realizing the importance of workforce diversity more today as compared to the old days. Bajaj Allianz runs all-women branch which focuses on female employees to make them insurance experts. However, there is still a long way to go as far as implementing diversity up to the fullest extent.

Pepsico India has almost one-fourth women employees and even at the higher management levels the company has sufficient representation of Women.

As far as other diversities are concerned, they are not much significant in India. For example, racial diversity doesn’t exist at all and diversity based on the sexual orientation is still a taboo in the Indian society.

Hence, the studies conducted in our country are predominantly focused on the gender diversity. In companies like Pepsico India, the corporate policy looks women with a unique perspective and approach. The HR feels that the significant representation of women helps in healthier, well-balanced teams and better decisions.

Research projects conducted by top-rated organizations such as McKinsey point out that companies that strive for gender diversity are more likely to have better returns than the national industry medians as compared to those who don’t bother about gender diversity at all.

Bajaj Allianz HR feels that gender diversity gives an opportunity to tap the vast talent pool of women. The company calls it a ‘win-win’ situation for all.

It is a fact that companies are looking for a change in their perspective and making sincere and honest efforts as well.

Conclusion

It is needless to say that in spite of so many claims and commitments by corporate houses about maintaining workforce diversity in their respective organizations, still there is a long way to go.

If we see such a pity situation in the biggest companies in the world, it is difficult to imagine the same in small and medium level companies.

With the focus on diversity worldwide, companies are altering their hiring and retention policies accordingly. Experts feel that it is more of an attitude issue than policy.

Even if you make stringent norms about it, the situation will not change unless there is a change in the mindset of the people.

Hopefully, the situation will change eventually, and we will see more dynamic and diverse workforce everywhere.