Operation Camouflage

by Amit Sidham

  This time there was a much bigger applause than the one for the question.

  EMPLOYEE 3: Sir, how will the appraisals and career progression work in the new style of working?

  AAKASH: There is a fundamental flaw in the current appraisal system. I have never concurred with the force fitting of the employees into the Bell curve. Any company while recruiting recruits the best of people, the so called A raters. Then how come within a year’s time less than 20% remain A raters and majority fall in the B and C rating category? Is the company so inefficient that it converts an A rater to a C rater within a year? We are getting rid of this unfair practice. An employee will get a rating commensurate to his performance and never will a rating be enforced for the sake of a Bell curve. I will always prefer to have all A’s instead of C’s in the team. Just to save a few bucks in the increments, I will not allow the practice of force fitting a B or a C. I believe we have to collectively compete with our competitors and not individually amongst ourselves.

  Speaking about career progression, with all employees performing well and ‘Once with us Always with us’ policy, we will also shift towards time-based promotions up to a certain level in the organization.

  With his answer Aakash had not just touched the sore spot in today’s corporate system, but also uprooted the employee unfriendly practice and sowed the seeds for a fair one. This time not just the entire stadium, but all the employees at different locations stood up together and showered a standing ovation.

  EMPLOYEE 3: Thank you very much Sir. Your understanding of the employee perspective and clarity of solutions towards the same are really admirable. I would also appreciate if you could let us know about the promotions after that certain level, as in senior management roles. Normally the organization structure will be like a pyramid. Big base at the bottom and small and tapered at the top. With time based promotions and once with us always with us policy, everyone will expect to be at the senior management roles after a certain period of time. How does the organization plan to address this future challenge?

  AAKASH: Glad that you asked. First of all, this is a situation that does not get addressed even with people switching jobs. Most of the people work till the age of sixty but not everyone retires as a CEO either in the same company or even after changing multiple companies. The career progression model that I explained is not completely new. The Indian Armed Forces are a living example of the same. Starting as a Lieutenant, Officers receive a time-bound promotion up to a Lieutenant Colonel level followed by a selection procedure thereafter. And the Army is one of the most successful organizations today – in terms of motivation levels, in terms of job satisfaction in terms of camaraderie. So will be the case with us, time-bound promotions till a certain level and a selection procedure thereafter. With opportunities for leading many nature conservation projects we also anticipate, some employees opting out of corporate life and taking up a full time social responsibility. Of course this will be a salaried role. These options will maintain the pyramid.

  EMPLOYEE 4 (THROUGH VC): Sir, I am Ankit speaking from Delhi and I am from HR. I have a specific question related to my function. With no attrition, no lateral recruitments, best policies already in place what will be the role of HR?

  Stadium was once again filled with Laughter.

  AAKASH: Well, the HR role in our organization becomes even more critical in keeping the employees in a ‘Motivated Effective’ state. You will have to always keep thinking about new ways to keep the employee engagement high not just with their job but with the organization. Hope that answers your question.

  EMPLOYEE 4: Yes Sir. Thank you very much. This gives a completely new dimension to the role of HR.

  EMPLOYEE 5: Sir, what about employee safety? We understand that to support the mission, at times the core team takes steps which might not be considered appropriate by the law. Will the employees also be expected to take such steps?

  AAKASH: No. None of the employees will have to do any work that goes against the law of the land.

  EMPLOYEE 6: Sir, can I ask a personal question?

  AAKASH: You may. But I reserve the right to answer. Go ahead.

  EMPLOYEE 6: Sir, how are you all dealing with this change? From being in a state of hiding, working under someone else to becoming the most powerful people overnight.

  AAKASH: Things have not happened just like that. They have been made to happen, the way they are now. We have not become powerful overnight. We have been growing stronger day by day, just that the world has come to know about it just now. But as it was a conscious choice, we were completely prepared for it.

  The spontaneous questions also continued for more than hundred and Aakash answered each one of them patiently. This session was also coming to an end.

  EMPLOYEE 114: Sir, there has been no communication from Aaditya Sir so far. Any particular reason?

  AAKASH: Why, already bored with me?

  Aakash’s response took the employee by surprise.

  AAKASH: Relax, just joking.

  The stadium broke out into laughter.

  AAKASH: We believe in keeping the message short and crisp. No point in overloading the employees with unnecessary information just for the sake of formalities. Whatever communication was required, I have done it through my mail and this townhall. If there is something still unanswered, the session is not yet over. Yes…But if you have something specifically against me, feel free to write him a mail directly.

  EMPLOYEE 114: No Sir, I didn’t mean that. Please don’t mis…

  AAKASH: No need to panic, just kidding (smiles). But hope your question is answered.

  EMPLOYEE 114: Yes Sir. Thank you.

  EMPLOYEE 115: Sir, these two days have been overwhelming. It’s beyond imagination that a company can actually be so employee friendly. The only apprehension now is ‘All this sounds too good to be true.’

  Seeing that Aakash had also been in a jovial mode during the previous question, this employee received an applause.

  AAKASH: (Smiling) Well, do you have any other option but to believe it? By now you would have clearly understood that I do not have to build castles in the air to get my work done. Hence your decision will have to be based on the communication and commitments that I have made without getting concerned about the veracity of those. If you subscribe to the views expressed by me then you should continue with us, if you do not then you should exercise the exit option.

  EMPLOYEE 115: Thank You Sir. I don’t think there could have been a better answer.

  SANJANA: Any more questions… So, if we do not have any further questions we will end this session on the second day itself instead of the planned three days. I would like to take this opportunity to thank Aakash Sir for his time and for the clarity provided and also thank all the employees for making it over the weekend and on a short notice. You all are now requested to let your respective HR point of contact know your decisions at the earliest. I think with this clarity you need not have to wait till the end of one month. Thank you once again.

  And with this the townhall came to an end. Sanjana was now confident that barring a few, all the other employees would stay.

  Chapter 13

  THE NEW COMPANY

  As requested by Sanjana at the end of the townhall, employees really did not wait for the end of one month. Immediately from next day employees had started communicating their decision. Within the next three days more than sixty percent employees had communicated their willingness to continue with the GALAXY group. When an excited Sanjana apprised this to Aakash, he simply refused to look at the numbers. He knew the numbers were incomplete and interpreting any conclusions from them now would be misleading. Hardly a handful of employees had expressed their desire to exercise the exit option.

  While anyone looking at that information would have been happy, Sanjana could not comprehend what was going on in Aakash’s mind. Aakash knew majority of those wanting to leave would be communicating their decision only on the last day. Whether none or
a quarter or a half or all of the balance forty percent employees leave was to be seen.

  10th June’ 2015

  By 4 pm Sanjana had received the decisions of each of the employee, number running over a lakh. She looked at the information on her screen and was shocked. The number of employees wanting to leave was much more than what she had thought looking at the responses in the first three days after the townhall. She was now able to relate to what Aakash was thinking on that day. She quickly ran a few commands to analyse the data and the results she got were even more alarming. With a dejected feeling she sat back in her chair, pushing the back rest as far as it could go. She had to communicate this information to Aakash now but didn’t know how to break this news to him.

  Retaining anyone at this stage was not her responsibility. She knew this very well but still, looking at the numbers she herself had felt disappointed and was just wondering how Aakash would react to this information. Finally gathering courage she clicked on the send button and saw the mail going out of her mailbox. After two minutes she called Aakash and spoke to him, ‘Sir, we have bad news. Eighteen percent of the employees have expressed the desire to exit and even worse almost all of them are A and B raters. If this happens we will be losing the best of our lot.’

  While she knew Aakash did not subscribe to the forced rating philosophy, at the end of the day the A and B raters were at least marginally better than the others. And losing majority of them could be disturbing to any HR Head.

  ‘Hmmm. So, results are slightly better than what I had anticipated,’ quipped Aakash.

  Sanjana was now really startled. Aakash’s reaction was nowhere close to what she had expected. She had expected Aakash to shout, to ask how this was possible. Expected him to say that two days of townhall had gone in a vain. Expected an outrage at the thought of losing the crème de la crème. But here was Aakash calm and composed as she had mostly seen him and one who was actually happy that the results were better than his anticipation. She asked ‘Pardon me Sir, but I really don’t get you. You had actually anticipated worse results?’

  ‘Yes. What percentage of people are given an A rating and a B rating in the current appraisal system?’ asked Aakash.

  ‘10% get an A and 20% get a B, 60% get a C and balance 10% get a D or E.’ Sanjana replied quickly.

  ‘Does that answer your question? By forcing a C or below rating on the 70% employees, the system has made the 30% A and B raters think they are significantly better than the rest. It’s natural for them to feel that their meritocracy would not be valued in the framework of a time-bound promotions and they as well as a perceived average performer will progress at the same pace. And with Once with us Always with us policy they would be stuck up here and grow at an average pace as compared to a fast track career progression they might see in another organization. They would feel that their expertise, their skillset would be more valued in an organization where the individual contribution has more weightage than the team results’ answered Aakash.

  ‘Now I get it Sir. This is a real eye opener for me. I had never thought that perils of the Bell curve system could be so dangerous. What do we do now sir? How do we retain these people? HR can do counselling. Can we also work out an interim increment for these employees? With that I am sure we will be able to prevent many of them from leaving’ said Sanjana.

  ‘Who says we retain these people? We live to our word. Initiate arrangements to get these people employed as disclosed during the townhall. Fill up these positions internally through promotions. This way there will be vacant positions only at the bottom rung of the ladder which we will fill up through freshers.’ Replied Aakash.

  Sanjana was now perplexed. She had earlier seen HR Heads having sleepless nights for weeks during incidences of mass exits of teams with employee strength of less than fifty. And here there were not fifty or hundred or a thousand but more than eighteen thousand employees leaving at the same time and still the HR Head being as calm as she had always seen him.

  Sanjana asked, ‘I fail to understand Sir. Doesn’t this put a question mark on HR? First thousands of employees decide to leave and second we do nothing to retain them.’

  ‘My decisions are based on principles. An outcome does not change my decision. You will understand in two months. For the time being just do as I say,’ replied Aakash.

  With no other option Sanjana replied, ‘Ok Sir.’

  ‘Sir, should we look at merging and restructuring of entities to create some shared functions amongst different entities and optimize the positions?’ asked Sanjana.

  ‘Organizational restructuring has to happen basis the organizational objectives and requirements, not basis man power availability. Right now just focus on filling the vacant positions,’ replied Aakash.

  ‘OK Sir. Thank you. I will initiate actions as discussed’ saying so, Sanjana disconnected the call.

  ‘I will never be able to understand Aakash’ Sanjana said to herself.

  10th August’ 2015

  The exit process happened as committed. All the employees desiring to leave were absorbed by their erstwhile parent group. Being A and B raters the companies were ready to welcome the talent with open arms. They were also happy with the joining bonus and untimely double digit increment received as a result of this movement. In contrast, those who had decided to stay back did not receive any retention bonus and received just a 5% increment effective 11th August’ 2015.

  Those who decided to stay back were divided into two schools of thought. Some were optimistic about their careers and some felt, ‘Rest of the things aside but working with a company managed by an NGO definitely did not seem financially rewarding. The bosses had announced for themselves an infinity package which they hardly used. So it was very likely that the employees would be given examples of their bosses and expected to live a simple life. They too had an option of leaving but they had chosen this. Had they fallen into a trap? Was their decision right?’ Adding fuel to the fire of their thoughts was the fact that, after the townhall, they had not received any communication from Aakash or Aadi. Not even a Welcome or Thank you mail on conveying their decision to stay back.

  On that day, i.e. exactly three months from the time of Aakash’s mail, a combined farewell had been arranged at each office for all out going employees of that particular location.

  Next day was going to be Day 1 for the new company. The transition had already happened on paper. But in spirit, Day 1 was going to be the day when ‘Once with us, Always with us’ came into existence.

  And few hours before the end of the day, all the employees had received an invite in their Inbox ‘Opening Address by Aaditya at 9 am, 11th August’ 2015.’ The suspense about the future of the employees who choose to stay back was about to open. Was it going to be good or bad, If good how good and if bad how bad? Their anxiety levels were higher than the levels during the last over of an India Pakistan cricket match.

  Chapter 14

  AADITYA’S OPENING ADDRESS

  11th August’ 2015

  With the previous session hosted by Aakash at Mumbai, this session was hosted at Bengaluru, the city with the second largest number of employees. All the Bengaluru employees came at the Chinnaswamy stadium and video conferencing arrangements were made in the dining halls of offices at other locations. Five minutes before 9 am, everyone had settled into their seats and waited anxiously for the session to begin.

  Sanjana walked in with Aakash and Aaditya and everyone stood up in their seats to welcome the three of them. As like the previous session, all formalities were kept aside.

  SANJANA: Good Morning everyone and a warm welcome to all of you. We are privileged to have with us Mr. Aaditya, our Chief Executive Officer, fondly referred to as ‘Chief’ by the core team of GALAXY and Mr. Aakash, Head of HR whom we have already met during the last session. I know how anxious you all are to hear him and hence without taking any further time of yours I invite our Chief to address us. Sir, Please.

  AADITYA: Than
ks Sanjana. Good morning everyone. I officially welcome you all in to the GALAXY group. I would like to thank each one of you for believing in our vision, supporting our purpose by staying back and with a commitment of always being with us in today’s competitive, job hopping world. Hence it is our duty to ensure that your association with us always remains worthwhile.

  Many of you would be aware about the 4 P’s of Marketing viz Product, Price, Place, Promotion. Similarly there are 4 P’s of job satisfaction. No need to feel anxious. I know none of you have heard it before, as that’s my own creation and never published before. They are Position, Profile, Package and Posting.

  Position stands for Position of the company in the market and your position within the company. All our companies have admirable positions in the market. Most of our companies are market leaders in the segment they operate and others which are not are in the top two or three. But we do not just stop at that. I want all of you to feel proud of the company that you are working for. I want to make our companies the best place to work and outsiders to aspire working with us. You will start seeing the improvements in that direction, improvement in employee friendly index from today itself. The surveys might take time to reflect this, but I want each one of you to walk into your offices with your heads high thinking that you are entering a company which is on its way to become the best place to work.

  Regarding your position in the company, I cannot afford to have a dissatisfied employee in the company and keep him till retirement. So, we are starting an initiative today where any person who feels basis years of experience he is at a position lower than where he should have actually been, discusses this with HR. HR looks into the case and if the employee claim is justified, steps will be taken to bring in the correction. For some of you it would have already happened during filling of vacant positions created due to outgoing employees. Where’s Ankit from HR team at Delhi? You had asked Aakash a question about the role of HR? I hope you don’t come back to him complaining about excess work now.