HR Headlines: July-08 (Part-3)

Lesson For HR Executives: How To Cope With Attrition
In India, the annual attrition rate is 20-30 per cent across industries. The rate is as high as 44 per cent in BFSI (banking, financial services and insurance) and 35 per cent in BPO (business process outsourcing). Attrition comes with an array of hidden costs such as recruitment costs, selection costs, training costs, cost of covering during the period and opportunity costs. These costs can add up to more than five per cent of an organisation’s operating costs. According to a survey by Global Talent Metrics in partnership with IIM Bangalore and AlignMark, against the popular belief, salary is not the top reason for attrition. The most important reason is lack of career growth opportunities and recognition from supervisors. Clarity on career path, relationship and recognition from supervisor, career growth opportunities and pay, in that order, are the compelling factors that drive attrition. To control attrition, a company should try to select those candidate whose preference and aspirations are in sync with what the company has to offer. Career growth opportunities such as a well-institutionalised job rotation programme along with rewards and recognition can be good retention strategies. Open communication and fair treatment of employees also inspires them to stay back.
Source: 14-07-08 www.thehindu.com Compiled by Amresh Anjan

Naukri.com Incorporates New Features In Resdex
Naukri.com has recently revamped its site to enhance features for recruiters. Its 14-million strong Resume database now helps recruiters recruit faster with the incorporation of the following new features:

• Customizable Search settings that let the user manage search by defined preferences
• Short listing made faster with relevant CVs being pushed to the top
• Option to save searches that allows users to conduct new searches in one click
• Regular CV alerts on saved searches
• Seamless contact flow with one/two clicks to send saved mails & SMS
• Flexibility to search on age, year of graduation, and work authorisation
Source: 18-07-08 Our Bureau Compiled by Amresh Anjan

TCS Fires Employees With Fake CVs
Signaling a strong move to tackle fake CVs, India's largest IT services provider, Tata Consultancy Services, has recently sacked close to 20 employees at its Kolkata centre after it was found that these employees have used fudged resumes to get jobs. All the major IT firms, including Infosys, Satyam and Wipro, and other mid-sized firms are taking a hard stand on fake or fudged resumes. Before TCS, Infosys had asked close to 100 employees to leave in FY07 due to discrepancies found in the resumes. Satyam has also put in place a system that does a background check even before the candidate actually comes and joins the firm. When it comes to fake resumes, banking is the most affected sector followed by IT. According to First Advantage, a leading background screening firm, nearly 30 per cent of all the resumes they screened recently had discrepancies. To tackle this problem industry body Nasscom, created the National Skills Registry, which records a candidate’s personal, academic and employment details.
Source: 14-07-08 Business Standard Compiled by Amresh Anjan

Employment Outlook Dips In Sunrise Sectors
A joint survey by staffing company TeamLease and Synovate has revealed that the Employment Outlook Index for the telecom sector and the banking and financial services industries during the July-September has dipped by 5 and 10 percentage points respectively from last quarter. The survey was conducted over 490 HR managers in Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai, Bangalore, Kolkata and Ahmedabad. The survey also revealed that despite a gloomy hiring mood in major sectors, it remains upbeat among those into information technology and IT-enabled services. Retail, media and FMCG companies are holding steady while banking and telecom are the worst hit sectors.
Source: 15-07-08 in.news.yahoo.com Compiled by Amresh Anjan

Nod For 8 More New IITs
The Union Cabinet has approved the setting up of as many as eight new Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) in the country during the current academic session to impart high quality technical education. The new IITs would be established in Bihar, Andhra Pradesh, Rajasthan, Orissa, Gujarat, Punjab, Himachal Pradesh and Indore in Madhya Pradesh at an estimated cost of Rs 6,080 crore (Rs 60.80 billion). The upcoming IITs will help impart high quality technical education to bright students as hardly 2 per cent of about 300,000 students, who appear in the Joint Entrance Examination get admission. Creation of 30 faculty posts per year in the first three years of establishment of each of the new IITs, has also been approved besides approving the posts of a Director and Registrar.
Source: 17-07-08 www.rediff.com Compiled by Amresh Anjan

17 Pct Rise In Tech, Science Jobs
According to a study conducted by the 'Manpower Management Centre' for the Centre's Department of Science and Technology, there was a 17 per cent increase in job opportunities in the field while the percentage of students taking up pure sciences remained unchanged at 21 pct. There is a growing concern of a shortage of skilled manpower in industry with students shying away from science courses. The study found that 27,791 Science and Technology vacancies were advertised in the year 2005 and 32,362 vacancies in 2006. Improvement is due to government's efforts to improve science education in schools and to generate S&T employment. As per annual reports of the UGC, a total of 5,612 and 5,549 PhDs in science were awarded during 2003-04 and 2004-05 respectively.
Source: 15-07-08 www.rediff.com Compiled by Amresh Anjan

Retrenching Becomes The Norm Of The Day Across BFSI Firms
After IT majors such as TCS, IBM and Patni, pink slips are flying across banking, financial services and insurance (BFSI) firms. Amid a poor financial scenario and a volatile economy, these firms are retrenching employees ostensibly on account of poor performance. However, employees in these companies believe that downsizing is being done to cut costs. According to HR firm TeamLease Services, some companies have shown the door to as many as 8-10% of their employees in the last few months. The verdict seems to be clear: shape up or ship out.
Source: 15-07-08 www.dnaindia.com Compiled by Amresh Anjan

Change Jobs With Caution
According to industry experts, it is not the best time to change jobs as India Inc is slowing down on recruitments as the Indian economy loses sheen. The sectors such as aviation, BPO and financial services, which were hiring furiously till recently have developed cold feet. Recruitment in manufacturing and infrastructure has also slowed down. Due to rising costs and slimming profits, many airlines are cutting jobs. For instance, Go Air has cut 400 jobs in the last six months whereas Deccan has frozen headcount. In the financial services sector, the stress is now on quality rather than quantity and salary hikes are also low.
Source: 14-07-08 www.hindustantimes.com Compiled by Amresh Anjan

Recruitment Process Outsourcing Gaining Steam
Many medium and large sized organisations in India are resorting to Recruitment Process Outsourcing to take care of their HR functions. RPO is an organised sector and is growing at 40 per cent. The current value of the RPO industry in India is estimated at $2.5 billion. According to estimates, the industry was growing at 100 per cent year-on-year in the last three years. Many organisations are outsourcing their recruitment process right from entry level jobs to save recruitment costs. This also lets human resource professionals of organisations to focus on the core and other HR and strategic issues such as motivation, training and retention of employees.
Source: 14-07-08 www.thehindu.com Compiled by Amresh Anjan

Will Mr Mukesh Ambani Bear International Faculty Salaries At IIM-B?
Chairman and Managing Director of Reliance Industries, Mr Mukesh Ambani, who is also on the governing board of the premier IIM, is understood to have expressed interest in footing the salary bills of international faculty at the Indian Institute of Management, Bangalore. At the institute's recent board meeting, Mr Ambani has insisted that the institute hire international faculty to become world class. Currently, none of the seven IIMs has international faculty on their rolls. The major hindrance in getting international faculty on board is salary. At any IIM, an assistant professor's monthly income is anywhere between Rs 35,000 and Rs 40,000 while an associate professor's monthly income is Rs 40,000-45,000 and a professor's around Rs 54,000. In the US, a professor’s salary is pegged at anywhere between $4,000 (around Rs 180,000) and $5,800 (around Rs 261,000) per month.
Source: 16-07-08 Business Standard Compiled by Amresh Anjan

DA Hike For PSU Employees
In a bid to counter the effect of inflation on officers and employees of central public sector enterprises (CPSEs), the government has hiked their dearness allowance by 5 per cent. The CSPE employees would now get industrial dearness allowance (IDA) at 84.4 per cent of basic pay. Earlier, it was 79.4 per cent of the basic pay, which came into effect on April 1. The decision would benefit all board level executives, below board level officers, employees and workers of central PSUs. The IDA for the PSU staff is reviewed every quarter depending upon the movement of the Consumer Price Index (CPI).
Source: 16-07-08 www.rediff.com Compiled by Amresh Anjan

Goodbye English! BPOs Now Welcome Regional Language Speakers
Indian BPO industry is coming of age and is looking to tap the domestic market after serving clients overseas. Call centres are now welcoming millions of educated Indians from non-English speaking backgrounds to serve local clients. Thus, there is no dearth of job opportunities for bright youngsters speaking Marathi, Gujarati, Assamese, Tamil, Oriya and other vernacular languages. Till recently, fluent English was a must to get a decent call centre job and those with fluency in foreign languages such as French, German, Korean and Spanish, among others, were in greater demand. However, with a surge in sectors such as telecom, banking, insurance, financial services, and retail, which are the top clients of domestic BPOs, there has been a constant rise in the demand for regional language speakers.
Source: 15-07-08 www.dnaindia.com Compiled by Amresh Anjan

24/7 Customer Trims 450 Staff In Gurgaon
The California-based call centre operator, 24/7 Customer, the Los Gatos, has sacked 450 employees in its Gurgaon centre after a European client ended its outsourcing contract. The BPO has centres in Gurgaon, Bangalore, Chennai and Hyderabad in India. The company is said to be assisting those terminated to find employment elsewhere. About 70% of them are believed to have already taken up the options given. Earlier this year, 24/7 Customer had announced that it wanted to ramp up its global workforce to 10,000 from 7,500 with major hiring in India, Manila and Guatemala. Recently, US-based Keane sacked 400 personnel in India and in May, Sapient Corp terminated services of 160 employees in its Bangalore, Noida and Gurgaon centres.
Source: 16-07-08 www.dnaindia.com Compiled by Amresh Anjan

Former Samsung Chief Handed 3-Year Suspended Jail Term
A South Korean lower court has awarded a suspended 3-year jail sentence to former Samsung Group Chief Mr Lee Kun-hee for tax evasion. He has also been fined 110 billion won (Rs470 crore). However, he has been absolved of the charges of breach of trust and illegal issuance of convertible bonds. Just a month before this, head of Hyundai Motor was given a suspended three-year jail sentence for fraud. After being indicted, Mr Lee stepped down in April from his top roles in the group and flagship Samsung Electronics.
Source: 16-07-08 www.livemint.com Compiled by Amresh Anjan

BBC Investigation Uncovers Indian Illegal Immigration Network
A BBC undercover probe has exposed a network of people which allegedly runs illegal human trafficking. The network provides forged or stolen identity papers to illegal immigrants of Indian origin, mostly Punjabis, and helps them secure a job in Britain. The network, operating in the west London suburb of Southall, entices hundreds of illegal immigrants from India through cheap housing, fakes documents and poorly paid jobs. During the investigation, a team of BBC’s undercover reporters filmed a man who called himself ‘Vicki´. He was open about the fake documents he could obtain, and boasted about servicing customers in Sheffield, Bradford and Coventry.
Source: 17-07-08 www.livemint.com Compiled by Amresh Anjan

Porsche Appoints Mr Rod Wallace As MD For India Operations
Mr Rod Wallace has been appointed as the new Managing Director by Porsche Cars India, the Indian arm of the global automobile major. He possesses nearly 30 years of experience in the industry. At Porsche, he would be responsible for overseeing the company's initiatives and operations in the growing Indian automobile market. Earlier, Mr Wallace was handling responsibilities in South Africa.
Source: 15-07-08 www.dnaindia.com Compiled by Amresh Anjan

JetLite CEO To Quit Barely Three Months After Joining
Just three months after joining the budget carrier JetLite, Finnish CEO Mr Maunu von Lueders is planning to quit the organization. This move comes at a time when its parent Jet Airways intends to merge the back-end operations to cut costs. Mr Lueders joined the wholly-owned subsidiary on April 5 this year replacing Mr Garry Kingshott whose contract of three years came to an end.
Source: 17-07-08 Business Standard Compiled by Amresh Anjan

Morgan Stanley Appoints Ms Neena Prasad
Morgan Stanley has appointed Ms Neena Prasad in the firm’s Private Wealth Management (PWM) division in India as a private wealth advisor for the northern region. Prior to this, she has worked with Salomon Smith Barney in New Delhi as chief representative for India, GE Capital (commercial finance) in addition to BNP Paribas and ING in Private Banking.
Source: 15-07-08 www.livemint.com Compiled by Amresh Anjan

Subhiksha Gets A New Sr President
The leading Indian discount retail chain Subhiksha has hired Mr Mr K.V. Ramachandra as Senior President. Prior to joining Subhiksha, he was Managing Director of Korean confectionery major Lotte India Corporation Ltd. At Subhiksha, he will be responsible for the company’s proposed retail venture — ‘Home Electronics’, which will include consumer electronics and home appliances. Before joining Lotte India, Mr Ramachandra has worked with Pepsi India as Director Sales, and the Dubai-based Jumbo Electronics as General Manager.
Source: 15-07-08 www.thehindubusinessline.com


Compiled by Amresh Anjan