The Main reasons why employees leave a company: SOL:Retain and Make them Happy – Human Resources

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There are seven main reasons why employees leave a company:

1. Employees feel the job or workplace is not what they expected.
2. There is a mismatch between the job and person.
3. There is too little coaching and feedback.
4. There are too few growth and advancement opportunities.
5. Employees feel devalued and unrecognized.
6. Employees feel stress from overwork and have a work/life imbalance.
7. There is a loss of trust and confidence in senior leaders.

Here are some effective strategies for motivating and retaining employees:

Instill a positive culture. : First effective strategy for motivating and retaining employees is, there should be healthy office working atmosphere because employees get lot of motivation by good working atmosphere. Working place should be attractively designed and maintained. The working atmosphere should be free from any kind of politics and bad things. Every employee should be happy by his colleague’s growth. It’s very essential that every one must take initiative for doing any type of work. Always be clear in making any rule or policy.

Proper Compensation and benefits: A compensation, benefit or incentives are designed on the performance of employee.Any company or organization is set up for offering quality service to it’s customers, gain profit, reputation in the market and make progress day by day so for getting capable employees who can contribute in attaining all above things an, employee should always see to their needs and reward them for their performance by giving them money or promotion etc. This strategy aids in encouraging employee’s honesty, efficiency, courtesy, and professional pride.

Employees Should Be Independent: If employees do the work in their own style then it can result more beneficial in comparison to the work set on conditions so it’s very necessary that they should be independent as it makes the working environment healthy and light. They should be free to give their suggestions related to any issue related to the work.

Use communication to build credibility. No matter what the size of the organization, communication is central to building and maintaining credibility. Many employers get communication to “flow up” through a team specifically for this use which solicits and/or receives employees’ opinions and suggestions and passes them on to upper management. If there will be proper communication between employee and his colleagues or employee and his employer then he will be able to tell about his problems and concerns regarding various issues. Communication can be done by organizing meetings, giving training and having dialogues

Work Should Be Recognized: If any employee’s work is recognized by his seniors and he gets appraisal or acknowledgment then he gets motivated to do the work with more sincerity. Instead of rewarding money, if few words of praise are said to motivate the employee by his employer then it works a lot. The employer should watch their employees recurrently and when he sees any good work done by his employee then he must praise that employee then only this will motivate them to repeat his performance again and again.


Make employees feel valued. : Employees will go the extra mile if they feel responsible for the results of their work, have a sense of worth in their jobs, believe their jobs make good use of their skills, and receive recognition for their contributions Be ready to give your employees support whenever they have any query or problem. Support by the employer can be given through telephone, by email or on-site. This keeps the employee busy in doing their work with full concentration. Also remember to give respect to the workers, they motivate to work beyond their limits

Encourage referrals and recruit from within. Having current employees offer referrals could help minimize confusion of job expectations. Current employees can realistically describe a position and the environment to the individual he/she is referring. Another way an employer can lessen the impact of turnover is to hire from within, since current employees have already discovered that they are a good fit in the organization

Fun @ work: In effective strategies for motivating and retaining employees, another step is always try to keep the work atmosphere light and full of fun because people like to work in the atmosphere which is enjoyable. As this kind of environment keep the employees motivating and retaining to do the work with full enthusiasm.

Sense Of Responsibility: Everyone is wholly responsible for the action done by him. By providing power to employee for taking the decision makes him sincere towards his work. This is another best way to motivate and retain the employee.

Foster trust and confidence in senior leaders. Develop strong relationships with employees from the start to build trust. Employees have to believe that upper management is competent and that the organization will be successful. An employer has to be able to inspire this confidence and make decisions that reinforce it. An employer cannot say one thing and do another. For example, an employer shouldn’t talk about quality and then push employees to do more work in less time.

A good working atmosphere and proper training are very necessary. There should be support and timely benefit should be rewarded to the employees for encouraging them to give their best in the organization development and progress. These benefits can be given in the form of money, promotion or even if few words of praise are said to the employee then also he will be motivated to do the work enthusiastically

How to prepare HR Budget

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HR Budgeting is a powerful financial tool that can estimate the expenditures made by the HR vertical . This strengthens and allows the HR to control the cost rather than letting it control the HR initiative. The budget is drawn parallel to the goals of the organization. If the organization expands and requires to register a double digit growth in terms of its strength, it percolate to apportion funds in different areas including recruitment , retention, up-skilling, global mobility management and etc. The allocation of funds would be governed by the HR Strategies. The decision makers in an organization remain the main players to approve the budget. The recommendations and inputs are taken from different sources including operation, marketing, logistics and every other vertical within the organization. Macro areas including employee retention, recruitment and training and micro areas including programs designed for incremental benefits are all mapped into one complete budgeting program. It can be zero-based budget with no reference to last year’s expense.

The organization plan is drawn and the HR strategy gets aligned to it. Different expense points are defined followed by the identification of the bottlenecks which may affect the business. Such as sudden business ramp-up by a competitor would lead to a compensation review to arrest attrition. Similarly, every such area which may stand a threat within the HR systems needs to be covered. Allocation would be on the basis of priority and necessity. Few areas such as communication may not require a big budget but is an important and a continuous process. Correspondingly training and retention will have a great attention for a stable organization. In case the company plans to expand, recruitment would remain the primary focus. Legal and statutory will require allocation and follow-up as per the administrative guidelines. A study of the business units and products is important to identify the growth mode. Recognise the problem areas in those units. Emphasise on the HR strategies that can eradicate and improve productivity including time to market, profit-margins etc. This includes increase retention through employee engagement program and the recruitment of top performers. Implement metrics to measure these improvements. The metrics to calculate the ROI should be clear to the HR at all levels so that everyone can ‘think numbers’. Few measures as suggested in HR Management needs to be considered . This include average cost of recruitment per year, average cost of recruitment per staff, average cost of training per year, percentage training cost / sales turnover or productivity, training cost per employee, salary budget ratio / sales turnover, health safety cost per year, human resources cost per sales turnover and compensation and benefit cost / sales turnover per year. This helps in building up the high level report for the CFO to deliberate on it.

The HR Budget would further require the CFO’s approval. HR Specialist suggests certain measures which can be implemented to sell the budget to the CFO. Other than linking it to the organizational goals and emphasizing revenue returns, every program needs to highlight the benefit. Even an assistance package offered to an employee at the point of retrenching, adds to the bottom line. The average or the below average employee is considered as ‘cost’. Hence even when an advance salary of one month is offered to the employee at the time of separation, it still saves the outages for forthcoming months. Hence the cost of outages should be included as revenue. Measure the employee effectiveness program with the increase in profitability. Every engagement expense adds on to the productivity. Besides the training program that amount to up-skilling therefore connected to the profitability. The Budget needs to be in line with the current and future strategies of the organization. If the productivity level within the organization was high last year, the focus this year might be on the logistics and marketing. This year the spending on the human capital might shift into that direction. Finally it needs to include certain pre-emptive measures to mitigate any exigency including calamities such as swine flu, which may require relevant coverage of health benefits and talent deployment.

Every risk needs to be mitigated and loop holes mended. The budgeting program needs to be industry driven. Such as the cost of hire and ROI on training can be curbed if the retention programs are introduced. As explained by Dr. John Sullivan “The CFO from a top firm that I once worked for told me at our first meeting that he “hated” HR people. When I asked him why he said it was because they always used a term he hated, “strategic investment”. “Strategic investment”, to him, meant “putting a lot of money in up front and maybe getting a little return a long time later”. He later added that he also loved to cut the HR budget first because no matter how much you cut it…they still managed to “suck it in” and find a way to maintain all of their existing services”. Therefore the pre-emptive approach to understand the financial measure and implementing them through metrics will prepare a fail-safe  HR Budget.

HOW TO Crack an interview

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First of all, you want to make sure that people have the necessary intellectual skills to do the job. Second, you want to see if people have a track record of actually getting stuff done. Then, third, you want to look for people who are thoughtful and that tie into learning and being self-aware”. It’s important to know the interviewer’s perspective as it is quintessential to land a job .The preparations made before the interview are focussed on what is required for the job. The real exploration begins with first round, where it is confirmed if the candidate is interested in the role or not. The trick to utilise this step is by probing. The information received may primarily be on the periphery. If any detailed information about the KRA is not shared. Suggestion including what the role would be , needs to be made. This leaves a room for correction by the interviewer, which would offer necessary information to the interviewee. Preparation taken before the interview is from an external perspective. Even though there are many sources to prepare for the probable question including internet, peer group, mentoring and etc. The answers would require to be altered to fit the role . Few areas to be covered during the interview are as discussed below:

Attention trap: Read the body language of the interviewer. If they are drawn to read the resume, its positive. If they are distracted with any other actions such as taking telephone calls during the interview or looking away. Remain humble and breathe. When they attend back to you, paraphrase what were the last few lines discussed before the distraction and then take it ahead. It will demonstrate that the interviewee is accommodating and not hostile.

Answers Trap: If the interviewer asks questions its imperative to answer it followed by a suggestion in that area. Often, they may not probe, but expect the interviewee to come up with more relevant data towards the role.

Acknowledgement: Paraphrasing the discussions shows attention. This needs to be coupled with data towards the strength of the candidate maintaining the focus on the role. For e.g.:  A detailed discussion on the technical questions measuring the depth of the interviewee’s knowledge requires to be  followed by the certain inputs,  made by the interviewee including,  few escalations handled in the area. This would establish the level of the knowledge for the interviewee.

Areas of concern: Often the interviewer may have a bias towards the role. They may look for an archetype such as aggressive for sales, people orientation for HR and process oriented for operation. It’s important to identify those biases early. In addition to that several questions would be asked towards the problem areas of the last employee working on the role or the current problem in the project. Such as, if an interviewer constantly questions on client communication or timely project completion, the interviewee needs to understand that this is a problem area. Hence offer solution based answers. Share what the interviewee had done or would do in similar situation and how it would help the current role.

Stress interview: Few interviews are built around creating stress on the interviewee to find the resilience and true nature. The best approach to it would be, the moment the interviewer starts building stress by constantly asking question with escalating complexities, gives non-verbal ques of being unsatisfied with the answer or keep cutting in between, worst make a derogatory remark. It’s quintessential to stay focussed. Do not get panicked even if the answer is not known. Use the structured answering approach by using the tree diagram and return to the point made by the interviewer. Keep the answers directed to the knowledge gained about the interview so far.

Finally end the interview by sharing the understanding about the role gained so far. Agreeableness is objective.  If an interviewee saves few questions for the end related to the future opportunity in the job and share certain training program planned towards it. It shows interest towards the role. Certain questions including hobbies are often asked unintentionally. Yet measured ,as the activities taken up during the free time , can add on to the personal effectiveness hence contribute to the role. The interviewer tends to predict the future behaviour of the employee through the discussion. Malcolm Gladwell, in Most likely to succeed wrote , “A prediction, in a field where prediction is not possible, is no more than a prejudice”.  Yet identifying the structure for the prediction can help cracking the interview.

Indian labor Unions History

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The Indian labor movement is more than 150 years old, with its origin in the 1850s and 1870s. But it gained momentum in 1918 when the Madras labor union was formed with mill workers as members. The formation of the All India Trade Union congress (AITUC) in 1920 gave a fillip to the organized labor movement in India. A series of agitations and strikes happened during the early years of unionization in different parts of the country. The focus of the unions was to end exploitation of workers in factories and other workplaces like mines, Trade union also participated in the freedom struggle against the colonial rule. National leaders like Mahatma Gandhi were active in the trade union movement. The introduction of the Trade Union Act of 1926 provided the required legal framework for unions.
The changes in the political landscape of India resulted in the AITUC splitting into the Indian National Trade Union Congress (INTUC) in 1947 followed by the formation of the Hindustan Mazdoor Sabha (HMS) in 1948. Later political events like the split in the Indian National Congress and the communist party also resulted in formation of corresponding unions. Thus, in India, politically connected unions became a regular feature. The election of communist government in states like Kerala and West Bengal gave a flip to the labor movement in the states.
With the support of political parties and the elected governments, the public sector companies and many private companies became heavily unionized. What followed in the 1960s and 1970s was a rise in trade union activity leading to strikes and lockouts. Though the imposition of emergency in 1975 led to the suspension of trade union rights and a sudden fall in trade union activity (many prominent opposition trade union leaders were jailed during the emergency period), post emergency the activities picked up. Under pressure from trade unions, in 1976 the Industrial Disputes Act was amended making it mandatory for firms employing more than 300 workmen to take prior government permission before retrenching workmen.
The failure of the Bombay textile strike (started in 1981) led by independent trade union leader Dutta Samant marked another shift in the labor unions. Nonpolitical unions focused on members’ requirements alone became a reality. After the first wave of economic liberalization in 1984, the approach of unions also started to change. By that time the profile of their members also changed with more people wanting better living conditions, rather than those led by larger political ideology. Private sector unions became increasingly open to productivity linked agreements that were later accepted by the public sector unions also. The powerful banking sector trade unions allowed the introduction of computers in a limited scale. They extracted a price for this in terms of extra payment. In many workplaces there was a marked shift towards adopting a collaborative approach rather than a confrontationist approach.
The next phase of economic reforms introduced in 1992 focused on the opening of the economy and integrating with global economic forces. Privatization of state owned enterprises and the closing down of unviable ones were part of reform package. The voluntary retirement scheme (VRS) became a legal option for firms to separate excess employees on mutual agreement. The national renewal fund (NRF) was established to help firms adjust to the new economy realities. Currently, many traditional unions both in public and private sectors have recognized the significance of market forces and competition and are prepared to work with the management to increase competitiveness. While the industry and investors demanded reforming the labor to introduce more flexibility and the hire and fire, due to opposition from national unions such progress could not be made.
The emerging new generation IT / ITES sector saw firms where labor union activity was absent. The career and professional growth focused employees showed antipathy toward unions and their employers went ahead to ensure good conditions of work. Though there have been discussions about introducing trade union activity in the new sectors, not much progress could not be made. Similar non-union firms are functional in the traditionally unionized sectors like manufacturing and services (for example the new private banks are completely trade union free)

Sign in & Access Multiple Google / Gmail Accounts at Once from the same Browser

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Google introduced a new feature which lets you sign in and access two  different Gmail / Google accounts at once on the same browser.  Most of us have more than one email Id which we use for different purposes. Previously , one can login to only one account at a time through one browser. This new feature eliminates the need of signing out or using a different browser for using other account. Here is the procedure to use multiple accounts in the same browser at the same time..

• Go to google.com/accounts
• Navigate to Multiple sign-in option – “Use multiple Google Accounts in the same web browse” and turn it on.
• Sign into your first account.
• After that, you can sign in with up to two additional accounts using the new accounts menu.

After enabling it, You can open  and use multiple Gmail / Google accounts in different tabs of the same browser. The feature can also be disabled by going to the above path and turning it off.
Although the multiple account sign-in feature is available for users, it doesn’t support all Google services like like Blogger and Picasa Web Albums, etc. For these services, the default account will be the first account you signed into. As of now, This feature is supported App Engine, Code, Calendar, Gmail, Reader, Sites and Voice and is restricted to desktop broswers and cannot be enabled on your mobile phones.

Satisfaction Versus Money!!!!

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The eternal dilemma between money and job satisfaction continues to vex individuals even today.

Few are lucky to find a dream job that is enjoyable and also pays well. Most of us mortal souls are forced to pick between two greatly divergent interests – many and job satisfaction.

At some point in their career most job seekers are forced to prioritize one over the other. This choice is not an easy one. The big bucks are tempting but at the risk of being stuck in an uninteresting job. The greatly polarized needs of security and satisfaction are difficult to balance. Countless surveys have been done on the topic, but human psyche is not as predictable. 

Money matters

Call it pragmatic or just plain practical – but money matters. The basic requirement of a job is that it should secure you financially. The income should pay the bills and put food on the table. It is doubtful anyone can be happy with a satisfying job but an empty bank balance.

Money makes the world go round. Job satisfaction is personal happiness. It cannot be shared. Be it medical bills, education or daily provisions, the family needs money. An individual should secure his or her family first. Those at start of their career mirror similar views. The need to gain independence form their parents and families is great. In the quest for self sufficiency money becomes a key concern. 

Unlike money which is tangible and finite satisfaction is a rather ambiguous ideal. It is foolhardy to chase an ephemeral dream. Job satisfaction is not a constant concept. Hard cash is an assured, while pursuing happiness is usually just a pipe dream. 

Those prioritizing money tend to separate their profession from their passion. I work to earn money, I engage in hobbies for personal satisfaction. The line between two should remain distinct. When people try to satiate their souls through their career the questions of choice erupts.

Satisfaction Speaks

Most people who take up a job for money do not last. We have observed that they slack off lose interest and become a liability in the team. Those who work for love of their job are noticeably more dynamic and interested so our company makes it a point to find recruits who are not joining only for the money. Job satisfaction is a greater priority than money. It directly affects efficiency, motivation and involvement in the job. Money is simply a subset of the same.

Twenty nine year old Engineer and MBA yet this spunky girl is chasing her dreams as a theatre artist. I spent two years stuck in a job I disliked for sheer monetary reasons. Ultimately money can’t hold you to a job. The need for job satisfaction is very great. Today, this spunky girl may not be earning the big bucks but loves her work. I am proud and involved with what I do. Money and success cannot remain elusive.

The Common ground

Perhaps these seemingly divergent concepts aren’t all that dissociated after all. It is not difficult to find a common ground between the money and satisfaction. You just need to know where to look. Do your job to the best of your ability. Enjoy it and the money will follow. 

Psychologist agrees I have seen several cases of patients suffering from stress and anxiety due to inability to priorities one over another. I always encourage patients to pick personal satisfaction. In case where the individual is unable to leave a job due to monetary reasons he is encouraged to engage in a hobby along with work. Or perhaps find an aspect of their work that complements their personal interest and build on this. However, in most cases it is lack of confidence that encourages people to pick money security over satisfaction. 

The challenge is to unite these divergent priorities and build on this common ground.

Things To Know Before You Become An Entrepreneur

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 Things To Know Before You Become An Entrepreneur



Taking a leap into entrepreneurship is like riding a bike for the very first time. Although it can be fun and exciting, there are consequences such as falling on the ground and getting hurt. To prevent yourself from being hurt why don’t you look at the following blog and help yourself from not falling and not getting hurt. After-all “Prevention is better than cure”.



Let’s take a glance at them. Just 8 simplest things you need to keep in mind which you’d not regret for later.



1. You don’t need to be a Jack of all trades



Be focused. Don’t grab too much from your hands at a time from a container. The more you grab, the more it becomes difficult to let your hand out from the mouth of container and then you are in vain. Greed is the worst thing in a man’s life which may even lead him to his destruction. So, do your work. One at a time, don’t run your mind in all directions. Be focused and determined. After-all, people are good at one thing not at all of them at once.



2. Don’t focus on bad, focus on good



Positivity is the key to success. Once you lose hope or start de-motivating yourself you can always see things around you getting worse. And so, we should always focus on our good and not on our bad. The more good we think, the more happy we stay and the more we progress then.



3. Never under-estimate your parents



Though your parents may not belong to an entrepreneurial background; but always remember- they are more experienced, more knowledgeable than what you are. They have experienced the world more than you. So, listen to them and always ask them for an advice.




4. There is no such word as “trying”



Trying... is for failures. Winners always say- “done”. Being an entrepreneur, how can one have a casual attitude towards work? Trying depicts a care-free nature for work which is not at all acceptable from an entrepreneur. The reality is, if you need money to survive then you better figure out a way to succeed. Failing won’t make you rich. So every time you fail, don’t pat yourself on the back because you tried… instead learn from your mistakes so you’ll improve your odds of succeeding the next time.



5. Little is the new big



You’re going to get excited every time you meet a celebrity. And no, I don’t mean Lady Gaga. I mean anyone in your industry that is looked highly upon. Every time you meet one of these celebrities you shouldn’t get star struck because the majority of the celebrities you meet won’t care about you. So don’t focus on networking with celebrities, network with the average Joes. They will spread the word about you and your company to everyone else. And when a lot of those average Joes talk about you, the celebrities will have no choice but to listen.



6. Compliments are free



Never hesitate or think before giving compliments to your employees. They love to hear their work being appreciated. During Monday through Thursday you can give them criticism and keep on pushing them, but you have to be respectful at the same time. Yelling at your team won’t solve anything; you have to be proactive at helping them improve. At the same time, you have to be willing to take criticism from your team because it isn’t fair to dish it, if you can’t take it.



7. Don’t be afraid of confrontation



Confrontation in the business world doesn’t lead to fist fights like it does in elementary school. Instead it helps make things move along. It helps the company move forward in positive fashion. As, life can never be stagnant so can never a stagnant business grow.



8. You eat what you measure



One of the first things you’ll do when you start your first company is that you’ll setup metrics. These metrics will help you determine how your company is doing, right? You’ll probably end up measuring metrics like page-views, visitor counts, and time on website. So what’s the problem with these metrics? Well, if all those metrics improve, it doesn’t necessarily mean that you’ll make more money. If you start tracking metrics that aren’t important to your business, you’ll focus on improving them when it won’t necessarily make you more money. So instead of wasting your efforts on metrics that aren’t important, make sure you start tracking what’s really important, such as your revenue per marketing channel or your conversion rate.

what the skills required by Business Consultant

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Business Consultant

Skills

Business consultants must have good analytical, problem solving and communication skills. They must be confident individuals as they will be providing advice and guidance to mom and pop shops as well as Fortune 500 companies. They must be computer savvy and stay abreast on current technologies as sometimes certain technology must be implemented into the overall success of the organization. They must have good writing skills and be adaptable to change.

Environment

Business consultants may travel extensively to organizations requiring their assistance. They may spend a lot of time in front of the computer looking at data and numbers to analyze any issues in the organization's system. They may spend a lot of time in meetings communicating with managers, CEOs and business owners of small to large businesses. They may work long hours and must be versatile and flexible due to companies having different work hours and work conditions.

Education

Most business consultants have bachelor degrees in business management, economics or finance. For business consultants to gain higher salaries--depending on the organization they are working for--they can obtain a Master's in Business Administration (MBA). Though rare, business consultants can also earn a DBA which is a Doctorate in Business Administration. Business consultants can also get internships in business consulting firms and can become certified as management consultants by passing a series of written and oral tests from the Institute for Management Consultants.

Salary

Salaries can range depending on education and experience. Based on PayScale.com the median income for business consultants is approximately $64,126 as of May 2010. The location and region can also affect the salary of a business consultant.