HR Articles: Apr-11 (Part-5)

For more article, Visit at : www.amreshanjan.co.cc   Infosys To Complete Restructuring In 3-4 Months Infosys is likely to have finalized two European firms for acquisition. It is learnt that the IT major will be pumping in USD 280-300 million for the acquisition which is slated to be completed before July. Sources add that that Infosys has appointed three member panel with Director-HR of the company Mohandas Pai at the helm. The panel will chart out a restructuring blueprint. However, Infosys may go for restructuring only after the succession plans are announced. Infosys is looking to restructure its business into seven key verticals, wherein each vertical will be divided into different horizontals. Sources also say that three to four key vertical heads likely to be shuffled. Infosys is eyeing to complete restructuring in three-four months time. Source : 11-04-11   Moneycontrol.com   Compiled by Amresh Anjan   Providing Jobs To The Young A Challenge For Government: Finance Minister The government has admitted that providing more and better jobs to the young still remains a challenge, even as the Indian economy was back on a high growth path after hit by the global financial crisis for two years. At the annual general meeting of the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII), Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee said his efforts at fiscal consolidation would lead to macroeconomic stability and fuel further high growth that would also lead to more opportunities for the young. But the government alone could not meet the aspirations of the young, he said, seeking the help of industry in this regard. Mr. Mukherjee said a few large sustainable skill development initiatives could be taken up to meet the target of 150 million skilled workers by 2022, set by the National Skill Development Council. He asked CII to take the lead in five to 10 sectors in setting up skill councils in manufacturing, health care and mining. Source : 09-04-11   Business Standard   Compiled by Amresh Anjan   Tier II And III Cities Emerging As Top Job Creation Centres: Assocham Study As tier I cities get congested and costly, tier II and III cities recorded over 60 per cent share in total job creation in the country last financial year, according to the latest Assocham Placement Pattern (APP) study. Tier II and III cities are likely to generate 40 per cent more jobs in the near future, according to the study which analysed trends of job openings in 56 major cities and 32 sectors from a sample of 6.54 lakh employment opportunities generated in last financial year. While 17 tier II cities like Surat, Pune, Bhubaneshwar, Chandigarh and Lucknow cornered 38.8 per cent share in creating 253,702 jobs, 33 tier III cities like Allahabad, Udaipur, Agra, Ajmer, Kota and Meerut accounted for 23 per cent share with 150,391 new jobs in the past one year.Among tier II cities, Surat recorded an 8.8 per cent growth, while Bhubaneshwar and Pune recorded 42.2 per cent and 19.7 per cent growth in job creation. Chandigarh, Lucknow marked 12.2 per cent and 10.8 per cent growth. The growth was 6.68 per cent in Jaipur, 4.33 per cent in Indore, 4 per cent in Nagpur, 3.35 per cent in Kochi, 3.28 per cent in Ludhiana. Source : 12-04-11   Business Standard   Compiled by Amresh Anjan   Indians Warned Against Fake Job Offers From Nigeria The Indian High Commission in Nigeria has stepped in to stem the increasing number of cases of Indians being duped by Nigerians through various promises, including job offers, and has cautioned its citizens to ignore such proposals. In a notice posted on its website, the high commission says that "a number of doctors, teachers, etc., used to work in Nigeria during 1960s to 1980s who are still held in high esteem. However, the situation is no longer the same." "Now few jobs are available in schools, universities, hotels, banks, hospitals for doctors, nurses and laboratory technicians and in the oil industry. Unfortunately, many scam job offers are floating around purportedly for Nigeria or other nearby countries to extract money in the name of visa fees, permit and even deposit or charges for opening a salary account" the report further stated. For genuine jobs, the high commission said, selections are made after a personal interview in India either by the employer or through reputed consultants/recruiting agents. In such cases, employers will send the authorization. Source : 08-04-11   Mangalorean.com   Compiled by Amresh Anjan   TCS Likely To Lead The IT Pack In Revenue Growth The last quarter of the fin¬ancial year is seasonally a sluggish period for IT firms in terms of revenue growth. The same is expected to reflect in the Q4 FY11 financial results of the top four companies. While revenues may increase marginally, operating profit growth may be flat or slightly lower for the tier-I players barring HCL Technologies, say analysts. TCS is expected to lead revenue growth while its nearest rival Infosys is likely to have a weak Q4, a historical phenomenon."Among the top four, HCL Technologies is expected to report the highest quarter-on-quarter net profit growth of about 12 per cent," says Mr. Dipen Shah, senior VP (private client group research) Kotak Securities. Increase in the company's utilisation rates is said to be the main reason. Source : 06-04-11   Financial Chronicle   Compiled by Amresh Anjan   Education Loan Norms To Be Reworked To Cut Bad Debt Millions of students seeking bank loans for higher studies and professional courses may soon get more time to repay after finding a job, but those who don't have sufficient academic credentials and are getting admission through other means such as donation and "quotas" may find it tough to get money from banks. Concerned over a rise in default rates in loans given to students, Indian banks are reworking the existing norms to give such advances. The Indian Banks' Association (IBA), the industry lobby of lenders, has constituted an expert committee under Indian Bank chairman and managing director Mr. T.M. Bhasin to modify the so-called education loan scheme. This scheme was launched in 2001-02 by then finance minister Yashwant Sinha in a budget announcement. It was later modified in 2004-05, when P. Chidambaram was the finance minister. "Since banks are not allowed to ask security for loans (of) up to Rs. 4 lakh under the current scheme, there is a problem in the business. Some of the students are not getting jobs. What we, therefore, intend to do is track students' progress. There is some extension required (for repayment)," Mr. Bhasin said. Source : 12-04-11   Mint   Compiled by Amresh Anjan   Mr. Suresh Vaswani To Lead Dell India The World's second largest personal computer maker Dell India named Mr. Suresh Vaswani as the executive vice president of Dell services applications and BPO business. He will also take over as the chairman of Dell India operations and will be reporting to Mr. Steve Schuckenbrock, President Dell services. Mr Vaswani was earlier joint chief executive of Wipro's IT business. Source : 07-04-11   Hindustan Times   Compiled by Amresh Anjan   HCL Founder Shiv Nadar To Head IIT-Kharagpur's Board Shiv Nadar, founder of software major HCL, was appointed the chairman of the board of governors of the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Kharagpur. IIT-Kharagpur is the only engineering institution from India listed among top 500 universities worldwide in the Shanghai Jiao Tong University's 'Academic Ranking of World Universities'. "It is an honour to be entrusted the responsibility to further advance the global stature this great institution has built already," said Nadar. The HCL founder takes over the chairmanship from B. Muthuraman, vice chairman of Tata Steel. He now increasingly spends his time on the philanthropic initiatives of the not-for-profit Shiv Nadar Foundation.Former chairpersons of IIT-Kharagpur include former West Bengal chief minister B.C. Roy, former chairman and managing director of Tata Steel Russi Mody, chairman emeritus of Ballarpur Industries Ltd. L.M. Thapar, and chairman emeritus of RPG Group R.P. Goenka. Source : 07-04-11   NDTV.com   Compiled by Amresh Anjan   Bharati Airtel Plans Key Reshuffle It's once again reshuffle time at the country's largest telecom firm, Bharti Airtel. The company which is divided into two verticals — India & South Asia and the international business group ever since it acquired the African operations of Kuwaiti telecom firm Zain Telecom — is likely to see a change in responsibilities among its key senior executives.It is said Mr. Atul Bindal, currently president, mobile services, which comes under the India and South Asia vertical, is tipped to take charge as deputy CEO of the international business group under Manoj Kohli. The idea is that he be sufficiently groomed under Mr. Kohli to later take charge as the CEO. That is when Mr. Kohli is likely to return to the corporate office in Delhi with a larger role. Source : 13-04-11   Financial Express   Compiled by Amresh Anjan   Myspace Likely To Prune More Staff To Win Suitors Reports have surfaced that faded social networking star MySpace may cut more staff to be attractive to suitors. A Wall Street Journal report cited unnamed sources as indicating that News Corp might make MySpace leaner for potential buyers including music video service Vevo, China-based Internet Company Tencent, and private equity firms. News Corp has had MySpace sale talks with those companies and with Chris DeWolfe, a founder of the online social networking pioneer. News Corp revealed in January that it was exploring a sale or other "strategic options" for MySpace, the ailing social network which has been eclipsed by Facebook. News Corp's chief operating officer Chase Carey put MySpace on notice in November saying the losses at the social network were "unsustainable." Source : 11-04-11   Financial Express   Compiled by Amresh Anjan   Microsoft Appoints New Marketing Head Microsoft Corp. has appointed Chris Capossela as its chief marketing officer, responsible for the software giant's marketing, advertising and corporate communications. Chris Capossela will replace Ms. Mich Mathews, Microsoft's long-time head of global marketing who announced in March that she will retire this summer. The new chief marketing officer will also take the role of senior vice president of the company's Consumer Channels and Central Marketing Group.The Consumer Channels is a newly-formed group aimed at bringing together Microsoft's retail, mobile operator and distribution teams into one organization. Capossela, a 20-year veteran of Microsoft, once worked as Bill Gates' speech assistant. Source : 08-04-11   Hindustan Times   Compiled by Amresh Anjan   Tata's Trent Hires CEO From UK Almost eight months after Noel Tata stepped down as managing director of Trent, the retail arm of the Tata Group, the company said it had appointed Philip Auld as chief executive officer. MR. Auld is a retail industry veteran from Britain, who has worked with Asda, a WalMart-run supermarket and M&S, a Netherlands-based non-food retailer After Tata left Trent, a five-member core team was formed to look after the operations of the company. Tata continued as non-executive chairman. Source : 08-04-11   Business Standard   Compiled by Amresh Anjan   Priyanka Rishi Joins Mudra West Mudra West a SBU of Mudra India has roped in Priyanka Rishi as senior VP to overlook the FMCG and infrastructure verticals of Mudra West which include some of its biggest clients such as Godrej, HCC, Incredible India and Emami in Mumbai. Apart from this, she will also help with new business developments of the office. Mr. Rishi will report directly to Arijit Ray, president, Mudra West. Source : 08-04-11   Business Standard   Compiled by Amresh Anjan   ISB Students Average Salary Jumps To Rs 18 Lakh Indian School of Business (ISB) announced the placement results of its 2011 batch and the mood was more ecstatic as this time the ISB alumni companies had turned up for the placement process. In addition to this, the school also saw its students receiving the highest number of job offers in the past ten years. The increase in offers was 22 per cent over the last year. Also, average salaries went up by around 10-20 per cent to around Rs 18 lakhs as against the last year's average of Rs 16 lakhs. This year 301 companies made 661 offers to its students. In 2008, the school had witnessed 657 offers from 230 companies. The B-school has, however, refused to divulge the details of the highest salary offered. Source : 07-04-11   Deccan Chronicle   Compiled by Amresh Anjan

Fwd: Anna Hazare and his fight for the Lokpal Bill

Dear All,

 

1. Who is Anna Hazare?
An ex-army man. Fought 1965 Indo-Pak War

2. What's so special about him?
He built a village Ralegaon Siddhi in Ahamad Nagar district, Maharashtra
3. So what?
This village is a self-sustained model village. Energy is produced in the village itself from solar power, biofuel and wind mills.
In 1975, it used to be a poverty clad village. Now it is one of the richest village in India. It has become a model for self-sustained, eco-friendly & harmonic village.

4. Ok,...?
This guy, Anna Hazare was awarded Padma Bhushan and is a known figure for his social activities.

5. Really, what is he fighting for?
He is supporting a cause, the amendment of a law to curb corruption in India.
6. How that can be possible?
He is advocating for a Bil, The Lok Pal Bill (The Citizen Ombudsman Bill), that will form an autonomous authority who will make politicians (ministers), beurocrats (IAS/IPS) accountable for their deeds.

8. It's an entirely new thing right..?
In 1972, the bill was proposed by then Law minister Mr. Shanti Bhushan. Since then it has been neglected by the politicians and some are trying to change the bill to suit thier theft (corruption).

7. Oh.. He is going on a hunger strike for that whole thing of passing a Bill ! How can that be possible in such a short span of time?
The first thing he is asking for is: the government should come forward and announce that the bill is going to be passed.
Next, they make a joint committee to DRAFT the LOK PAL BILL. 50% goverment participation and 50% public participation. Because you cant trust the government entirely for making such a bill which does not suit them.

8. Fine, What will happen when this bill is passed?
A LokPal will be appointed at the centre. He will have an autonomous charge, say like the Election Commission of India. In each and every state, Lokayukta will be appointed. The job is to bring all alleged party to trial in case of corruptions within 1 year. Within 2 years, the guilty will be punished. Not like, Bofors scam or Bhopal Gas Tragedy case, that has been going for last 25 years without any result.

9. Is he alone? Whoelse is there in the fight with Anna Hazare?
Baba Ramdev, Ex. IPS Kiran Bedi, Social Activist Swami Agnivesh, RTI activist Arvind Kejriwal and many more.
Prominent personalities like Aamir Khan is supporting his cause.

10. Ok, got it. What can I do?
At least we can spread the message. How?
Putting status message, links, video, changing profile pics.
At least we can support Anna Hazare and the cause for uprooting corruption from India.
At least we can hope that his Hunger Strike does not go in vain.
At least we can pray for his good health.

 

 

Salient features of Jan Lokpal Bill

Drafted by Justice Santosh Hegde, Prashant Bhushan and Arvind Kejriwal, this Bill has been refined on the basis of feedback received from public on website and after series of public consultations. It has also been vetted by and is supported by Shanti Bhushan, J M Lyngdoh, Kiran Bedi, Anna Hazare etc. It was sent to the PM and all CMs on 1st December.

1. An institution called LOKPAL at the centre and LOKAYUKTA in each state will be set up
2. Like Supreme Court and Election Commission, they will be completely independent of the governments. No minister or bureaucrat will be able to influence their investigations.
3. Cases against corrupt people will not linger on for years anymore: Investigations in any case will have to be completed in one year. Trial should be completed in next one year so that the corrupt politician, officer or judge is sent to jail within two years.
4. The loss that a corrupt person caused to the government will be recovered at the time of conviction.
5. How will it help a common citizen: If any work of any citizen is not done in prescribed time in any government office, Lokpal will impose financial penalty on guilty officers, which will be given as compensation to the complainant.
6. So, you could approach Lokpal if your ration card or passport or voter card is not being made or if police is not registering your case or any other work is not being done in prescribed time. Lokpal will have to get it done in a month's time. You could also report any case of corruption to Lokpal like ration being siphoned off, poor quality roads been constructed or panchayat funds being siphoned off. Lokpal will have to complete its investigations in a year, trial will be over in next one year and the guilty will go to jail within two years.
7. But won't the government appoint corrupt and weak people as Lokpal members? That won't be possible because its members will be selected by judges, citizens and constitutional authorities and not by politicians, through a completely transparent and participatory process.
8. What if some officer in Lokpal becomes corrupt? The entire functioning of Lokpal/ Lokayukta will be completely transparent. Any complaint against any officer of Lokpal shall be investigated and the officer dismissed within two months.
9. What will happen to existing anti-corruption agencies? CVC, departmental vigilance and anti-corruption branch of CBI will be merged into Lokpal. Lokpal will have complete powers and machinery to independently investigate and prosecute any officer, judge or politician.

 

--
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This email (including any attachments) is intended for the sole use of the intended recipient/s and may contain material that is CONFIDENTIAL AND PRIVATE INFORMATION. Any review or reliance by others or copying or distribution or forwarding of any or all of the contents in this message is STRICTLY PROHIBITED. If you are not the intended recipient, please contact the sender by email and delete all copies; your cooperation in this regard is appreciated.
Thanks:
Amresh Anjan

Visit me at: http://amreshanjan.co.cc/

#  Please don't print this Email unless you really need to - this will preserve trees on planet earth.

Fwd: About your "Enact India's stringent anti-corruption law - the people's Jan Lokpal Bill" petition signature

Hi,

I wanted to draw your attention to this important petition that I recently signed:

"Enact India's stringent anti-corruption law - the people's Jan Lokpal Bill"
http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/janlokpalbill/

I really think this is an important cause, and I'd like to encourage you to add your signature, too. It's free and takes just a few seconds of your time.

Thanks!
------------------------------

Amresh Anjan

HR Articles: Apr-11 (Part-4)

For more article, Visit at : www.amreshanjan.co.cc   After Two Years Of Pay Cuts, LN Mittal Gets Raise In 2010 Lakshmi Mittal, the Chairman and CEO of the world's largest steel-maker Arcelor Mittal, earned a 11 per cent hike in his base salary in 2010, after suffering pay cuts in the previous two consecutive years. Mr. Mittal earned a base salary of USD 1.65 million in 2010, compared to USD 1.49 million in the previous year, according to Arcelor Mittal's annual report. In the previous two years, the company had given a pay cut to its entire board, including Mr. Mittal, as the firm lost money amid slumping steel sales. In addition, Mr. Mittal's daughter, Vanisha Mittal Bhatia, received a base salary of USD 172,000 in 2010, up from USD 164,000 in the previous year. Mr. Mittal's other peers on the board - Narayanan Vaghul, Wilbur L Ross, Lewis B Kaden, Francois Pinault, Antoine Spillmann and HRH Prince Guillaume - also witnessed a hike in their base salaries in 2010. Source : 27-03-11   Yahoo.com   Compiled by Amresh Anjan HCL Chief Sees India At The Crossroad Vineet Nayar, chief executive of software exporter HCL Technologies, dismisses complaints about corruption in India as a distraction, arguing that the real question the country needs to ask is whether it is becoming more or less globally competitive. In a world where consumption patterns in the U.S. and Europe are at an all time low, even as they continue to hit new peaks in emerging markets, and where power bases are shifting from the West to emerging markets like China, Brazil and India, "country competitiveness is very important because you can either be used like China is using India for consumption [of Chinese exports]," says Mr. Nayar. For any country to be in the running, its people need to be skilled, with high school courses and vocational training that match the demands of the real world. He noted that India's substandard education system is graduating 450,000 engineers annually, a majority of whom are not employable.The government also needs to offer incentives to attract investment to create new industries — in both services and manufacturing, Mr. Nayar says. He refers to his own industry, which was helped by the government 10 years ago and today is a $50 billion industry. That, he says, was the last real effort along those lines. Source : 30-03-11   Wall Street Journal   Compiled by Amresh Anjan BSNL Appoints A K Garg As Human Resource Director State-run telecom company Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited (BSNL) today announced appointment of Mr. A K Garg on the post of Director (Human Resource).The post was lying vacant after retirement of Mr. Gopal Das on February 28. Mr. Das retired as chairman and managing director of the organization and was simultaneously holding the charge of Director (HR) as well. Prior to joining as Director (H R), Mr. Garg served as the Chief General Manager at Kolkata Telephone. He joined the Department of Telecom Group services in 1977. Source : 01-04-11   MSN.com   Compiled by Amresh Anjan Bihar MLA's Salaries, Allowances Hiked The Bihar government has hiked the salary of legislators by three times with effect from April 1, 2011.The decision was taken at a cabinet meeting presided by Chief Minister Nitish Kumar. As per the revised pay structure, the members of the two houses of the state legislature will now draw a salary of Rs 25,000 per month as against Rs 8,000 per month they drew last year .The legislators would also receive constituency allowance of Rs 25,000 per month, up from Rs 12,000, besides stationary allowance of Rs 8,000 per month, increased from Rs 2,000 per month. Each MLA will get an additional allowance of Rs 15,000 per month, up from Rs 10,000 per month, for payment to their assistants, he said Source : 31-03-11   Indian Express   Compiled by Amresh Anjan Microsoft Poaches Oracle Honcho In a high profile poaching of top executives in the Indian IT industry, software giant Microsoft has snared Oracle India's Managing Director Bhaskar Pramanik. Mr. Pramanik has been named as the chairman of Microsoft India. Prior to the current role, Pramanik served as Managing Director for Oracle India and Sun Microsystems. Source : 29-03-11   Hindustan Times   Compiled by Amresh Anjan Religare Arm Sacks Five Staff In a fresh instance of employees breaking rules in financial company, Religare Housing Development Finance Corporation — part of Religare Finvest Limited—sacked five employees following irregularities in the disbursement of loans. "The management committee and audit committee of Religare Finvest Limited — our NBFC (non-banking financial company) arm has decided to terminate five people with immediate effect owing to certain procedural lapses on their part," said the company representative. The company said that three of those sacked were frontline sales staff while the others were managerial supervisors. Source : 29-03-11   Hindustan Times   Compiled by Amresh Anjan Sundaram Rajgopal Is The Fourth Executive To Quit DB Realty DB Realty, the Mumbai-based realty firm whose co-promoter Shahid Balwa is behind bars for his alleged involvement in the 2G spectrum scam, has informed BSE that Sundaram Rajgopal, a director with the company, has resigned. Mr. Rajgopal, who also heads India operations of private equity firm Starwood Capital, had resigned from the board on March 21. Industry insiders point out that Starwood Capital had plans to invest in DB Realty's Bandra project. However, now it appears that the deal is not happening. This seems to be the main reason for Mr. Rajgopal's exit. Rajgopal is the fourth executive to resign DB Realty following the investigations by the CBI in the scam. DB Realty's stock on Monday plummeted by 14% to close at a 52-week low of Rs 83.4. Source : 29-03-11   Hindustan Times   Compiled by Amresh Anjan Air India May Freeze Salary Hikes Of Employees Cash-strapped Air India Ltd is considering a freeze on salary hikes and additional allowances to employees until the process of its merger with Indian Airlines is completed. Mr. Arvind Jadhav, chairman and managing director of Air India, the company formed by the merger of the two state-owned carriers, asked workers in a letter to cooperate in the "gigantic task of turning around Air India". The national flag carrier has accumulated a loss of at least Rs. 13,300 crore since the merger began in 2007. It is implementing a financial turnaround plan prepared by Deloitte Consulting India Pvt. Ltd. Source : 29-03-11   Livemint   Compiled by Amresh Anjan US Businesses Add 201,000 Jobs In March US businesses continued to take on new workers in March, boosting the longer-term hiring trend and pointing to a firming recovery in the labour market. The private sector added 201,000 jobs in March, according to ADP's National Employment Report. The increase was in line with economists' expectations and slightly less than February's revised gain of 208,000 jobs.ADP said the report "removes any remaining doubts about private non-farm payroll employment accelerated heading into 2011", noting that the average monthly increase over the past four months was 211,000, more than triple the average monthly gain of 74,000 jobs from August until November last year. Source : 30-03-11   Moneycontrol.com   Compiled by Amresh Anjan Organized Sector To Create 1.6 mn New Jobs The organized sector in India is set to create about 1.6 million new jobs in 2011, reveals the Ma Foi Randstad Employment Trends Survey (METS), a study on the Indian employment trends and opportunities. The survey indicates that in nearly 650 companies across 13 industry sectors in eight major cities most employers are optimistic about their hiring plans for the current year. In early 2010, METS predicated that creation of one million jobs for the year and nearly 1.13 million jobs were created during the year, with healthcare (2.5 lakh), hospitality (1.60 lakh) and real estate (1.29 lakh) sectors leading the pack. The three metros — Mumbai, Delhi & NCR and Chennai — took the top three places generating a total of 2.55 lakh jobs. Source : 31-03-11   The Hindu   Compiled by Amresh Anjan Takeover Warning For Firms Resisting New EPF Rate Even as the companies are declining to pay the 9.5% interest rate on EPF, the employee provident fund organisation (EPFO), which scrutinizes revenues of 239 organizations, is cautioning the corporates with a takeover clause under the EPF Act. A day before the central board of trustees meets, the EPFO analysis shows that most of the trusts 'have a surplus and could pay the higher rate. According to the Employees Federation of India, 40 of the 42 had submitted that they would suffer losses if they were made to pay higher EPF rates. But EPFO analysis of the same differs."Our review from field offices reveals most of the companies are in a position to pay. We were able to analyse 12 of the 42 companies EFI named and found at least five can pay the 9.5% interest on accounts," a senior EPFO official commented Source : 30-03-11   Hindustan Times   Compiled by Amresh Anjan Indian Companies Created 2500 Jobs In The US: CII Indian companies operating in the US have created over 2,500 jobs in America since 2005 on account of buyouts of the US firms, says a study. According to a CII study, nearly two-third of Indian firms, which have operations in the US, have generated 2,585 jobs in America in the last six years due to their acquisition of US firms. Since 2005, Indian firms have acquired various American companies with a total deal size of about USD six billion. The survey was based on 35 CII–India Business Forum member companies, representing sectors such as Pharma, Telecom, Healthcare and Energy among others. In all, these Indian companies employ more than 60,000 people across 40 states of the US and an overwhelming majority of employees in these firms are American citizens. Source : 30-03-11   Financial Chronicle   Compiled by Amresh Anjan Himanshu Kapania Replaces Sanjeev Aga As Idea Cellular MD In a change of guard at Aditya Birla group flagship firm Idea Cellular, Himanshu Kapania has taken over as Managing Director replacing Sanjeev Aga. Mr. Kapania was the Chief Operating Officer of Idea Cellular, which is facing a tough time in completion of its merger with Spice Telecom despite acquiring it nearly two years ago. Mr. Aga, who is credited with launching Idea Cellular, will continue as a director on the board of the company. He was appointed as the Managing Director of Idea Cellular for a period of five years effective from November 1, 2006. According to the company's 2009-10 annual report, Mr. Aga received Rs 6 crore in remuneration (inclusive of salary, benefits, bonuses and pension). Mr. Aga was paid a sum of Rs 1.84 crore as a performance incentive in that year. He is on the board of 6 other companies and the Vice Chairman of the Cellular Operators Association of India (COAI). Source : 05-04-11   Business Standard   Compiled by Amresh Anjan IT Sector To See Tapered Salary Hikes In 2011 Companies across sectors including IT may be bullish about hiring plans but there is not much of good news for job seekers and employees on the wage front. Margin pressures, changing business dynamics and currency issues will taper salary increases in 2011, say industry experts. "Though the organised sector is optimistic about hiring, the same is not the case about wage bills," said Mr. E Balaji, managing director and chief executive officer of Ma Foi Randstad. According to the report, organised sector in India is set to create about 16,00,000 jobs this year. The top three recruiters — healthcare, hospitality and manufacturing alone are estimated to create about 7,00,000 jobs. IT and IT enabled services are expected to generate 1,83,000 new jobs over a base of 19,00,000. Source : 03-03-11   Financial Chronicle   Compiled by Amresh Anjan Delhi Budget : 14000 Jobs In Government Schools In keeping with the children-friendly Budget, Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit announced 14,000 vacancies for the teaching staff in government schools — the largest job opening in government sector in a long time. The move is aimed at complementing Delhi government's efforts towards increasing infrastructure for implementation of the Right to Education Act. The posts of principals, post-graduate teachers, trained graduate teachers, lab assistants, assistant teachers, computer science teachers and administrative staff will be up for grabs. The government also announced 30 new school buildings — it will spend Rs 270 crores on construction of schools. Rs 40 crore has been sanctioned for new computer labs in government schools. Source : 23-03-11   Indian Express   Compiled by Amresh Anjan

HR Articles: Apr-11 (Part-3)

For more article, Visit at : www.amreshanjan.co.cc   Health Sector Facing Severe Shortage Of Personnel The status of medical services for children is becoming a matter of concern in Assam even as the State Government seeks to expand its healthcare infrastructure. A severe shortage of human resource has undermined the Health Department's attempts at improvement, and doctors and nurses are under stress as workload increases manifold. Those acquainted with the prevailing situation fear that the challenges of providing healthcare services will only increase as new medical colleges and hospitals come up without the required number of doctors and nurses with specialised background in child care. In Guwahati Medical College Hospital, the paediatrics department needs more doctors and nurses as it is seeing an increasing footfall in patients who are in need of both outdoor and indoor facilities. For reasons best known to the authorities, the department at present is functioning with only one Professor. Source : 27-03-11   Assam Tribune   Compiled by Amresh Anjan Protesting Workers At GM's Halol Unit Get International 'Moral' Support The employees' strike at General Motors' (GM) Halol plant has got international support. The Indian National Trade Union Congress (Intuc) claimed that the International Metalworkers' Federation (IMF) has extended moral support to the Gujarat Kamdar Mandal-backed workers' strike at the factory. Intuc Gujarat president Mr. Nihil Mehta said, "IMF has extended their moral support to the workers' strike at the Halol plant. They operate unions in GM plants across the world. GM India's top man Karl Slym is on his way from the UK and will reach Halol tomorrow. "Intuc has received a mail from IMF South Asian office expressing solidarity with the strike.The IMF letter says, "We appreciate your valiant efforts to uphold workers' rights. IMF extends its solidarity and support to struggling General Motors workers. IMF will also inform about this struggle to its international affiliates." Geneva-headquartered IMF represents the collective interests of 25 million metalworkers from more than 200 unions in 100 countries. Source : 24-03-11   Business Standard   Compiled by Amresh Anjan Kerala Based IT Professionals Have Been Asked To Return To Japan Employees of Kerala-based IT companies contracted to work in Japan have been asked to return to work. These employees had left the country in the wake of a devastating earthquake and tsunami and fears of a radiation leak from a crippled nuclear power plant.Nearly half a dozen Kerala-based IT companies have their working operations in Japan. There has been no official communication to the 100-odd employees, either from the companies here or in Japan, who have returned. This has, however, been communicated to them unofficially. Source : 27-03-11   SIfy.com   Compiled by Amresh Anjan ICAI Wants Entry-Level Salary For CA professionals to be raised Companies which wish to recruit fresh Chartered Accountants (CA's) will now have to shell out more as the Institite of Chartered Accountants of India (ICAI) has decided to advocate a 50 per cent hike in floor salary package for new accountants. This means, minimum pay for freshly minted accountants will work out at Rs 75,000 per month. Last year the floor was Rs 50,000 per month. "New CAs get solid grounding while doing their article ship and are good at managing a business environment. The compensation should reflect the talent they possess," said G Ramaswamy, President, ICAI.Of a total student strength of 5,300, the institute has placed 1,800 students so far. The highest salary at the institute has been offered to three students with an annual package of Rs 67.5 lakh offered by Olam International in Singapore. Last year the highest salary package offered at smaller centres was Rs 7.4 lakh which has gone up to Rs 9.05 lakh this year. Source : 28-03-11   Business Standard   Compiled by Amresh Anjan EXL Says 8-9% Salary Hike For India-Based Staff Good times seem to be rolling for BPO employees. Offshore BPO firm EXL Service Holdings is looking at an average salary hike of 8-9 per cent per cent for its India-based employees this year. For non-India employees, the salary increments will range from 2-3 per cent in case of its US staff and 7-8 per cent for the Philippines. "We are in the process of finalizing the salary increments for 2011. The hike will probably be about 8-9 per cent, which is slightly more than the usual average. Since the inflation in India is higher this year, there is a bit of catching up to do," Mr Rohit Kapoor, President and CEO of the company said. As on December 31, 2010, EXL's global headcount stood at 12,700 employees. The wage hikes will be handed out next month. Source : 27-03-11   Hindu Business Line   Compiled by Amresh Anjan Wipro's CEO Is Among The Highest Paid CEO's In The Indian IT Services With an annual remuneration limit of Rs 10 crore, Mr. T K Kurien, the recently-appointed Chief Executive Officer of Wipro's information technology business, has become the highest paid executive (excluding stock options) in the Indian IT services segment. With a target to get the IT business back on growth, Mr. Kurien will get a salary in the range of Rs 3 crore to Rs 10 crore per annum. According to the statement by the company on the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE), Mr. Kurien has been appointed the CEO for five years. His salary will include periodic increments as may be approved by the board within the above limits and will also include variable pay (based on performance criterion) among other benefits Source : 22-03-11   Business Standard   Compiled by Amresh Anjan Nasscom In Tax Relief Plea The National Association of Software and Services Companies (Nasscom) has requested the government for relief to small and medium IT units under the proposed direct tax code (DTC) to offset the impact of the termination of the STPI (Software Technology Park of India) scheme. Nasscom president Som Mittal said a memorandum had been submitted to the government seeking fresh incentives based on the location, innovation or employee potential of the small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in tier 2 and tier 3 cities."With the end of the STPI benefit from March, we expect the government to offer tax exemptions to support SMEs because they are the ones who are driving innovation in the industry. The interim offer of investment-based incentives is not very useful as the IT industry works on human capital and, hence, incentives should be focused on relief for human resources,' Mr.' Mittal said. He said the country faced a negative trade balance, which could be improved by infotech. "India needs to focus on IT exports to offset the trade balance and technology offers high value-added exports." The $76-billion IT/BPO industry was disappointed over the government's reluctance to continue the STPI scheme. Besides, the Centre has brought SEZs under minimum alternative tax (MAT) in the budget, which will hit IT units. Nasscom expects the industry to grow 16-18 per cent in 2011-12 and offer up to 2.4 lakh jobs. An average salary hike of 10-12 per cent across the board is also likely in this year. Source : 25-03-11   The Telegraph   Compiled by Amresh Anjan Disney Shareholders Re-Elect Steve Jobs On Board Shareholders of The Walt Disney Co re-elected its entire board including Apple Inc CEO Steve Jobs, despite concerns over his health and his poor attendance at company board meetings. Proxy advisory firm Glass Lewis & Co had recommended voting against Mr. Jobs' re-election because he failed to attend 75% of the board meetings in fiscal 2010.Steve Jobs became Disney's largest shareholder after it purchased Pixar Animation Studios in 2006 for $7.4 billion in stock. Source : 27-03-11   Hindustan Times   Compiled by Amresh Anjan Indian IT Industry Must Look For New Highs India's Information Technology industry is set to close the current financial year with $75 billion in revenues — of which as much as $60 billion will be in exports, according to the National Association of Software and Service Companies (Nasscom). What's more, the association expects 16 to 18% growth in the new fiscal year. The number of jobs added by the IT and IT-enabled services industries in the current year is estimated at 2,40,000 and a similar number is expected in the new fiscal year as well. Source : 27-03-11   Hindustan Times   Compiled by Amresh Anjan Child's Education Expenditure Has Gone Up by 168% In 6 Yrs: Assocham Parents' annual spending on a child's education has risen by over 168% to Rs 94,000 between 2005 and 2011, a study by Assocham said. In 2005, the education expenditure was about Rs 35,000 a year. The expenses have increased due to hike in tuition fees, books, uniform, transportation, tuitions and extra-curricular activities.The chamber surveyed about 2,000 parents, with a minimum salary of Rs 7 lakh annually, in major cities like Delhi, Mumbai and Kolkata. The rising cost of education has become a major cause of worry for parents with a majority of them spending more than 18-20 lakh on average on a child's schooling, the study said. The cost of education is increasing every year, parallel to the inflation, it added. The general inflation in February was 8.31%.The parents' annual income, on an average, has risen up to 32% in the past six years, the study said. It also said that majority of parents believe it is difficult for a single parent to fund a child's education. Source : 27-03-11   Hindustan Times   Compiled by Amresh Anjan College Fees To Go Up By 10% After Every 3 Years The cost of higher education is going to be steep soon. A 10% fee hike every three years in on cards as the vice-chancellors (V-Cs) of the central and state universities have recommended this as a measure to meet the financial requirements of the universities. Discussing the models of financing higher education at a national level conference organized by University Grants Commission (UGC) and Human Resource Development Ministry (HRD), over 200 V-Cs agreed that the central and state universities may be statutorily required to adopt revision of fee structure payable by the students by at least 10% for every three year period. The recommendations are yet to be approved by the HRD ministry in case of central universities, while for state universities, the state governments will have a final say. A similar recommendation for a steep fee hike for Indian Institutes of Technology (IIT) students was shot down by HRD minister Kapil Sibal recently. On education reforms, the VCs recommended a semester system to be implemented across all universities with a credits-based system. To attract good quality of faculty, it was suggested incentive structures to be introduced to attract and retain quality faculty, particularly in state universities and institutions in remote rural areas. To prevent brain drain, Indian universities could also be encouraged to engage with foreign universities for tie-ups between departments, for faculty exchanges, student exchanges and so on. Source : 28-03-11   DNA   Compiled by Amresh Anjan NTPC CMD Gets Re-Elected As Scope Chairman Arup Roy Choudhury, CMD of NTPC has been reelected as the chairman of SCOPE the apex body of public enterprises. He will be the chairman of SCOPE for the period between 2011 and 2013. Mr. Arup Roy Choudhury has had a career spanning over 32 years of contribution in the field of engineering, strategic management and business leadership. Source : 28-03-11   Financial Express   Compiled by Amresh Anjan Industry Upbeat Despite Inflation: Says CII Ascon Survey Over one-third of the 121 manufacturing sectors tracked by a CII-Ascon survey projected a growth of above 20 per cent for fiscal 2010-11 despite the rise in interest cost and inflation. The reason for the decline in the number of sectors showing "high growth" between 10 per cent and 20 per cent to 26 per cent this fiscal from 30 per cent in 2009-10 was stated to be their shifting to the "excellent category", the survey said. Source : 27-03-11   The Telegraph   Compiled by Amresh Anjan Rajat Gupta Quits From ISB's Chairmanship Mr Rajat Gupta, Chairman, Executive Board of Indian School of Business (ISB), has requested the board to relieve him of his responsibilities. "Mr Gupta has requested the ISB Executive Board to relieve him of his board responsibilities till his pending matter with the US Securities Exchange Commission (SEC) is resolved,'' the Hyderabad-based premier business school said . The request of Mr Gupta and the appointment of the new Chairman would be tabled at the upcoming Board meeting on April 2, 2011. Mr Gupta had a long-association with ISB as he has been Chairing the board of ISB since its inception about 10 years ago. He was said to have "bailed out" ISB when it faced a tough time in finding placements to its entire batch of students during the economic downturn. Source : 21-03-11   Hindu Business Line   Compiled by Amresh Anjan Soaring inflation forces IIM-A to increase fees by 5% Persistently high inflation has forced the Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad (IIM-A), to increase fees for its various courses by a little more than 5%, the third hike by the premier business school in the past three years. With this, the fee for the institute's flagship programme, the post- graduate programme in management (PGP), is Rs 14.45 lakh for the batch 2011-13.The PGP fee stood at Rs 13.7 lakh for the academic term 2010-2012. It was Rs 11.5 lakh in 2008-10 and was raised to Rs 12.5 lakh in 2009-11Another important course the institute offers is a one-year programme in management for executives (PGPX), which will now cost Rs 20.31 lakh. It has been increased by about Rs 1 lakh."We had to hike the fees to meet the increasing cost caused by high inflation. However, this rise is still roughly half the inflation rate," IIM-A director Samir Barua said.The business school does not receive government funding to run its programmes because such financing is limited to developing infrastructure for accommodating students under the other backward classes quota. Source : 27-03-11   Hindustan Times   Compiled by Amresh Anjan

HR Articles: Apr-11 (Part-2)

For more article, Visit at : www.amreshanjan.co.cc   Indian IT Staff In Japan May Get To Return Home As quake-hit Japan finds itself in a nuclear emergency, Indian IT professionals working in software majors like Infosys, Wipro, TCS and HCL Technologies in the island nation have been given a choice to return home. The big four together have over 1,000 software professionals based in Japan. We are continuously monitoring the developments in Japan. However, we are giving an option to families of employees to return to India and we will help facilitate the same," said Saurabh Govil, Senior Vice-President, HR, Wipro Technologies. Infosys spokesperson said that recent reports on Japan's nuclear reactor do warrant concern. "We are taking appropriate action to keep our employees safe. In cases where employees and their families have expressed a desire to return temporarily to safety we are facilitating their travel," the Infosys spokesperson said in a statement. Source : 16-03-11   Hindustan Times   Compiled by Amresh Anjan XIMB To Roll Out Global Programme In Sept-11 Xavier Institute of Management-Bhubaneswar (XIMB), one of the premier B-schools in the country, has decided to roll out a one-year Global Management programme from September this year. This full-time, interactive management programme, spanning across three continents- Asia, Europe and USA, will be offered by XIMB in collaboration with Antwerp Management School and Fordham Graduate School of Business-New York. Under this unique programme, the students will spend four months each at XIMB, Antwerp Management School and Fordham Graduate School of Business-New York. Source : 16-03-11   Business Standard   Compiled by Amresh Anjan Disabled Jawans Cannot Be Sacked In a landmark ruling that would benefit lakhs of defence personnel who are disabled after suffering injuries while on duty and are mercilessly dismissed from service, the Delhi High Court said it just cannot be done unless they are found unfit for any job. Sending a copy of the judgment to the home ministry, the court asked it to "be more rational and logical" and ensure that paramilitary forces frame a uniform policy while dealing with disabled personnel. A bench headed by Justice Pradeep Nandrajog directed identification of less strenuous job for handicapped jawans. The court said, "The home ministry shall take a policy decision in this regard. They are to be rational and logical and frame uniform policies pertaining to rehabilitation and/or retention in service of all personnel serving under different central paramilitary forces". Source : 17-03-11   Hindustan Times   Compiled by Amresh Anjan Lenovo India Appoints A New Marketing Head Computer hardware manufacturer Lenovo India has appointed Shailendra Katyal as the Marketing Head. Earlier, Mr. Katyal was category head, personal care brands, Marico. In an official communiqué, the company says that Mr.Katyal will handle the Lenovo master brand and lead marketing activities for the three business segments - consumer, relational and SMB (small and medium business). His primary mandate will be to aggressively grow Lenovo's brand preference in the consumer and SOHO (small office, home office) segments. Source : 18-03-11   Afaqs.com   Compiled by Amresh Anjan Bank Of America Names Mukesh Ambani To Its Board Bank of America Corp (BofA) named its first non-American board member, Mukesh Ambani, as a director of the largest U.S. bank by assets. His appointment is the latest step in Bank of America's transformation into a more globally-focused company after acquiring investment bank Merrill Lynch & Co in 2008. At its investor day on March 8, the bank's management team stressed the company will continue expanding its operations overseas after focusing for years on domestic banking. Mr. Ambani becomes BofA's 14th director and will stand for election at the bank's annual meeting in May. Source : 18-03-11   SIfy.com   Compiled by Amresh Anjan Tesco Planning To Transfer More Jobs To India Tesco plans to move hundreds of jobs to India to support its central European operations According to the Economic Times, the jobs will be shifted to its unit in Bangalore - Tesco Hindustan Service Centre (THSC) - in an effort to cut costs. The THSC carries out a host of technology and business-intensive projects to enhance the operations of Tesco's worldwide chain of stores. The centre, which was established in 2004 and has around 4,500 employees at present, provides IT services, finance, accounting, design, research and analytics services and processes the payrolls of thousands of Tesco employees globally. Source : 17-03-11   kamcity.com   Compiled by Amresh Anjan Career Satisfaction At Workplace, A Study By Accenture A research done by Accenture explored career satisfaction, aspirations and factors for career advancement of professionals to help create new opportunities and achieve job satisfaction for employees . The study was conducted in November 2010 and surveyed 3,400 business executives from medium to large organizations across 29 countries, including 100 from India. According to those surveyed in India, 38 per cent are satisfied and not looking for new job opportunities and a close 37 per cent are looking for job opportunities outside the company. Germany ranked highest with 64 per cent satisfied with their current job. Also countries like China (40 per cent); Brazil (41 per cent); US (47 per cent) and UK (38 per cent) of those surveyed were satisfied with their current jobs and not looking out for new opportunities. Source : 16-03-11   Deccan Herald   Compiled by Amresh Anjan GE To Invest $50m In R&D In India GE Healthcare has introduced two small, affordable cardiac care products, designed and developed in India for the Indian market. The company, which anticipates $400 million revenue from India in 2011, said it will invest about $50 million in R&D over 3 years to develop India-specific products. According to the company, the two products, GE Mac 600 and GE Vivid P3, are lower in price by 80 per cent, and 50 per cent, respectively, compared with similar quality and performance products, and are manufactured without compromising on clinical capability. Source : 17-03-11   Financial Chronicle   Compiled by Amresh Anjan Medtronic To Hire 600 People In India Leading U.S medical device maker Medtronic plans to hire more than 600 people in India as the company expects business from emerging markets to increase in the coming years."We plan to increase head count in India from current 235 employees to 850 over the next five years," a spokesperson, from the company's headquarter in Minneapolis said.The American major has a high growth rate of 15 to 30 per cent in emerging markets including India. About 9 to 10 per cent of the company's total revenues are from emerging markets and this is expected to go up to 20 per cent in the next ten years, the spokesperson said."Hiring (in India will be) in all areas with a view to increasing patient access," he said. Medtronic has been present in India for over three decades and is headquartered in Mumbai. The company also has nine regional offices across the country including in Delhi, Ahmedabad, Kolkata, Hyderabad, Bangalore and Chennai, according to its website. Source : 13-03-11   Indian Express   Compiled by Amresh Anjan Air India To Probe Licences Of All Its Pilots Air India has constituted a three-member committee to check the qualifications of all its pilots after a news channel exposes how a pilot is flying the national carrier using forged papers. Civil Aviation Minister Vayalar Ravi said that all those including any insider involved in the fake pilot licence scam would not be spared.Former Air India Executive Director (Communication) Jitendra Bhargava said that the airline faces enormous pressure in the selection of pilots and sometimes money plays a huge role. Source : 15-03-11   CNN IBN   Compiled by Amresh Anjan Vijay Kumar New COO of Sun TV Mr. Kalanithi Maran promoted Sun Television Network has appointed Mr K Vijay Kumar as its Chief Operating Officer (COO).Mr Kumar, joined Sun TV in 1993 as Senior Vice President at the network. His appointment would take effect immediately as he replaces Mr Ajay Vidyasagar who has recently resigned from the post Source : 13-03-11   Hindu Business Line   Compiled by Amresh Anjan Volkswagen India MD's Quits As Europe's largest auto manufacturer, Volkswagen, looks to enhance its market footprint in India, the company continues to witness the exit of two senior level management. Former deputy managing director and the public face of Toyota Kirloskar Motor K K Swamy, who was brought on-board to oversee and assist the India operation, has quit. Elevated to managing director and vice-president at Volkswagen India after quitting Toyota in mid 2008, he served the company for just about 30 months after being at Toyota Kirloskar for nearly 10 years. Makham Dhalivaal, appointed managing director of Volkswagen passenger cars (India) just after Swamy's appointment, is also believed to have quit the company. Mr. Dhalivaal who was the global director of network development at Bentley Motors had replaced Andreas Prinz at Volkswagen India. He was largely associated with the launch of the Jetta, a D-segment car introduced in 2008. Source : 19-03-11   Business Standard   Compiled by Amresh Anjan Inflation Effect: Entry Level Salaries Go Up 40% With day-to-day living turning costlier, companies have raised salaries by as much as 40 per cent especially at junior levels, say experts. In recent times, inflation has been at high levels due to soaring prices of essential commodities."Inflation has affected the salary hikes towards the higher side," says executive search firm GlobalHunt's director Mr. Sunil Goel .Last month, inflation climbed to 8.31 per cent as compared to 8.23 per cent in January. Food inflation stood at 9.42 per cent in the week ended March 5.As such, attrition rates along with inflation had prompted companies to enhance the overall basic salary structures by "15-20 per cent at all the employment levels", Gi Staffing Services' Branch Head (Mumbai) Swapnil Jain said. Source : 21-03-11   NDTV.com   Compiled by Amresh Anjan Strong Economic Data Points To More Hiring In US Factories are producing more cars, computers and household appliances, and applications for unemployment benefits over the past four weeks are at the lowest point since summer 2008.Economic data released in March will be the second straight month of strong job growth. These reports have helped Wall Street rebound a day after the market suffered its biggest drop in seven months."We have a lot of momentum in the U.S. economy right now," said Kurt Karl, chief economist at Swiss Re. "That's good, particularly since we're going to be challenged by higher oil prices" and the impact of Japan's earthquake and nuclear crisis. A key reason for the brighter outlook is that factory production increased in February for the sixth straight month. The Federal Reserve said production of cars and auto parts jumped 4.2 percent, nearly matching January's gain. Production of furniture, electronics and appliances all rose. Manufacturing output has grown in all but four months since the recession ended in June 2009. And manufacturers have created 190,000 jobs over the past year, the highest 12-month total for that group since 1998. Last month alone factories added 33,000 net new jobs. Source : 21-03-11   Sify.com   Compiled by Amresh Anjan Infosys Not To Shut Japan Operations IT major Infosys Technologies has informed that it will not be shutting down its office in Japan and will continue to service clients via their off-shore locations including India, Shanghai and Singapore. So far, more than 200 of its Indian employees have returned and the remaining staffs including local employees have been given the option to work from home and their office in Osaka.Infosys, which has over 400 employees located out of Tokyo, Nagoya and Osaka, sees minimal impact on its business from the recent crisis in Japan as its exposure to the region is about 1% of its total revenue. S Gopalakrishnan, chief executive, Infosys, said "The direct business impact from the Japan crisis will be minimal on revenue and over a period of time but we don't see an immediate impact. However, the company is also concerned about an indirect impact globally on IT spends if the Japanese nuclear crisis is a sustained problem. Source : 16-03-11   Financial Express   Compiled by Amresh Anjan

HR Articles: Apr-11 (Part-1)

For more article, Visit at : www.amreshanjan.co.cc     Survey Predicts 13% Salary Rise This Year Salary rise of Indian employees would be among the highest in the world in 2011. According to a survey by global HR consultancy group Aon Hewitt, salary rise in India for 2011 is projected to be around 12.9 per cent higher than those received in 2010, which were at 11.7 per cent. Also, the double-digit salary increases would continue for the next couple of years and is expected to be 12-15 per cent across industries, the survey says. India is followed by China and the Philippines, which have salary rise projections of nine per cent and seven per cent, respectively. The findings mirror the optimism of the country with the GDP poised to grow at an above target of nine per cent, the survey says. According to the survey, engineering services, automotive, energy and infrastructure industries, which rely heavily on domestic investment and consumption, top the salary increase charts for the second year in a row. Source : 10-03-11   Business Standard   Compiled by Amresh Anjan Ex-Raymond President joins OCM India Textile firm OCM India announced the appointment of Mr. S K Singhal as the new Chief Executive Officer of the company. The company, which is owned by US-based global private equity firm W L Ross announced that Mr. Singhal has joined OCM after a 30-year stint with leading textile firm Raymond. Mr. Singhal was heading the entire textile business of Raymond as the President (Textiles), where he oversaw the expansion of the firm's manufacturing facilities, the near doubling of the textile division's topline, transition to SAP and expansion of retail networks. Source : 11-03-11   Indian Express   Compiled by Amresh Anjan TCS Rocks Indian BPO King Genpact Throne The frontrunner in the Indian BPO sector, Genpact, has reason to worry. The country's largest software exporter, Tata Consultancy Services, is fast catching up, with strategic acquisitions, strong patronage by its backbone IT business and big-ticket deals shrinking the BPO revenue gap between the two companies. That gap was $471 million in calendar year 2008 and has now narrowed to $226 million. While the TCS BPO unit has posted a three-year compound annual growth rate of 40% since 2007, Genpact's BPO business' CAGR for the same period is 20%. Source : 10-03-11   Indian Express   Compiled by Amresh Anjan Makeover For Engineering PG Curriculum Soon A fresh curriculum awaits engineering students joining their post-graduate academic programmes this June. The revision — which comes after a gap of 10 years – will be in line with the international best practices and will have increased focus on research. The curriculum will incorporate courses in research methodologies and experimental methods, along with design and analysis. Experimental methods will include students validating their theories and postulates.This move is seen as an attempt to improve the quality of engineering at the post graduation level in the country by changing the approach towards teaching the subject at the post graduate level. Source : 10-03-11   Financial Express   Compiled by Amresh Anjan FOX New Chief Urged Employee To Lie It was an incendiary allegation and a mystery of great intrigue in the media world as the publishing house Ms Judith Regan was fired by Harper Collins in 2006.She claimed that a senior executive at its parent company, News Corporation had encouraged her to lie two years ago to the federal investigators who were vetting Bernard B Kerik for the job of homeland security secretary. Source : 26-02-11   Business Standard   Compiled by Amresh Anjan AOL To Slash 900 Jobs In India, US Former internet giant AOL is to slash 700 jobs in India and a further 200 in the US in the wake of its $315 million deal to buy the Huffington Post news site. The staff in India generally provides back-end support for AOL's network, and 300 of the cut positions jobs will be outsourced. The US redundancies will come from the company's content and technology departments. The job cuts underscore the transition AOL is undergoing as it seeks to reinvent itself as a premier content company. AOL once dominated internet access in the US, but its position began to slide with the growth of broadband soon after its disastrous 2000 mega-merger with Time-Warner and AOL was spun off from the media giant in 2009. Source : 11-03-11   SIfy.com   Compiled by Amresh Anjan Bangladesh Business Chambers Pledge Jobs To Arab-Returnees Bangladesh's business chambers have pledged jobs for thousands of workers being repatriated from Arab countries in an effort to ease the blow to the economy that has workers' remittances as a major earning source. Pledges were made by leaders of the Federation of Bangladesh Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FBCCI) Thursday as a plane brought back home bodies of four workers who had drowned on Greek shores in a bid to escape being brought home. Bangladesh has millions working across nations in the Middle East and Northern Africa. Last year, the expatriates remitted $11 billion to Bangladesh, of which $100 million came from Libya. Source : 11-03-11   sify.com   Compiled by Amresh Anjan Hero Group Appoints Wolf Olins India's largest two wheeler maker Hero Honda Motors Ltd (HHML) has announced that it has roped in global brand and innovation specialist, Wolff Olins to create a new identity after the exit of Honda from the joint venture. The company is working on a new brand identity in its totality. This includes the brand architecture, brand name, brand logo and brand positioning. Source : 11-03-11   Financial Express   Compiled by Amresh Anjan Samsung India Appoints New CMO South Korean technology giant Samsung India announced the appointment of Mr. Elkana Ezekiel as its Chief Marketing Officer. Mr. Ezekiel was earlier with Johnson and Johnson as VP- Marketing and looked after the company's marketing and brand strategies across 15 countries in Asia Pacific. Source : 11-03-11   Hindustan Times   Compiled by Amresh Anjan Not Enough Skilled Personnel Taking Mining Jobs, Says CII The Confederation of Indian Industry has said the Indian mining sector would face a shortage of skilled personnel of up to 2,200 people over the next decade and a half. The sector contributes around three per cent of Gross Domestic Product and employs around 900,000 people. Based on the estimated demand and the current supply from various educational institutes, a demand-supply gap of around 1,500 is expected during 2009-2017 (short term) and 2,200 during 2009-2025 (long term).The report projects the human resource requirement after mapping available employment and identifying skill gaps. Source : 14-03-11   Business Standard   Compiled by Amresh Anjan Firms Outsourcing Entire Hiring To Private Recruiters With all-time high attrition rates and shortage of skills making companies go into a hiring mode, recruitment process outsourcing (RPO) services are gaining popularity in India. Companies such as MphasiS, Wipro, Accenture and others are outsourcing a big chunk of their hiring process to recruitment services vendors to bring in more efficiency, both in terms of candidate appraisal and costs. It also helps them cut overall recruitment time. Typically, an RPO deal starts with the service vendor first receiving the requirement from clients. The same is discussed with the technical managers and the requirement is broken into primary, secondary, mandatory and preferred skills.The next step involves the client evaluating the technical competency of the vendor's panel members to give the final nod. Once this is done, the process of sourcing, short listing and scheduling of candidates for telephonic interview is initiated. The conversation is then recorded and the interview valuation sheet is collected along with call-transcript. Finally, the candidate profile, evaluation sheet and the recording is shared with the client and the schedule of the shortlisted candidate is prepared for the final technical round of discussion. This is followed by the HR round with the client to complete the hiring process. The RPO partner has access and is expected to comply with all internal tools and process, including employee referrals of its customer. Source : 08-03-11   DNA   Compiled by Amresh Anjan General Motors CFO Chris Liddell to leave company General Motors Co announced that Chief Financial Officer Chris Liddell will leave the U.S. automaker a little more than a year after joining. Mr. Liddell, 52, will leave GM on April 1. He joined the company in January 2010 and led its financial and accounting operations on a global basis. Mr. Dan Ammann will succeed Mr. Liddell as CFO. The 38-year-old executive, who joined GM in March 2010, is currently vice president, finance and treasurer. Source : 12-03-11   Financial Express   Compiled by Amresh Anjan Indian IT To Add 230,000 Workers in 2011: Deolitte The Indian IT industry will add over 2.3lakh employees in 2011 and will clock revenues of $72 billion by the end of the year, as per consulting firm Deolitte. The report released by Deolitte also added that revenues from the IT and BPO industry will account for 5.8% of country's gross domestic product (GDP). Source : 14-03-11   Hindustan Times   Compiled by Amresh Anjan XLRI Ties Up With Santa Clara University To Promote Entrepreneurship The XLRI School of Business & Human Resources has signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with California-based Santa Clara University (SCU) to promote and foster social entrepreneurship in the country.The two institutes have decided to collaborate whereby XLRI is to be the Indian partner to manage and support Global Social Benefit Incubator (GSBI), the signature programme of the Center for Science, Technology & Society (CSTS) of Santa Clara University. Each year GSBI screens and selects around 15-20 social ventures from across the globe and incubates them by providing technical inputs, mentoring support and some grants to make them investor-ready. Since its inception in 2003 there have been about 30 GSBI alumni social ventures in India, which include some of the globally well-known organisations such as Gram Vikas, Jaipur Rugs, Drishtee, Mother Earth, Husk Power Systems, Video Volunteers, Naandi Foundation, etc. Source : 14-03-11   Financial Express   Compiled by Amresh Anjan Rising Trend In Staff Spend Public Sector Undertakings' (PSUs) staff spends increased by 15.6% during April-December 2010. This is revealed in a study of 53 PSUs (central and states, but excluding banks and NBFCs) for the periods, April-Dec 2010 and April-Dec 2009.The higher staff cost (R30,883 crore) in the current financial year comes against the backdrop of a 5.3% fall in employee expenditure in April-Dec 2009 to R 26,705 crore. The total expenditure of these PSUs was also higher this year—up 21.6% to R 6.84 lakh crore—compared to an 18.8% decline to R5.62 lakh crore during April-Dec '09. The staff cost-to-total expenditure and staff cost-to-sales increased from 4.07% to 4.51% and 3.75% to 4.01%, respectively, for the nine-month period in the last two years. Among the PSUs, the highest increase in staff cost was seen at Gujarat State Petronet, where it rose 105.7% during April-Dec '10 from a negative 15.7% during April-Dec. Source : 14-03-11   Financial Express   Compiled by Amresh Anjan Income Tax To Make Staff Work Less Taxing In a bid to reduce the burden on officials, the Income Tax Department is planning to outsource record management to private entities. Under the proposal, a private party will handle the department's records, including returns and those pertaining to tax disputes. The main task of the private player will be to maintain records of income tax returns filed manually and management of records pertaining to scrutiny cases and tax disputes at various levels. Department officials will oversee the work. A central team will look after the implementation of record management and local teams at different commissionerates will operate at the ground level. It will be an assembly line system, with I-T officials working as the front office. Source : 14-03-11   Business Standard   Compiled by Amresh Anjan