Helping `minds' to grow
* An interesting article on how Mind Tree Consulting has addressed its HR issue and nurtured lateral hires from other companies to grow roots in their company.
* Handling lateral hires requires a higher degree of sensitivity than managing fresh talent, who anyway go through induction and probation.
* Business grows at a rapid pace and people come from different backgrounds and cultures (just like in an arboretum). Lateral hires have to feel the intrinsic warmth of the company, which is growing bigger everyday.
* Arboretum essentially helps 'minds' deal with things such as assimilation, expectation management, project allocation through reverse bidding etc.
* The dictionary says - "Arboretum" is a place for study and exhibition of trees.
* While it is more relevant for the new age industries, with the economy growing by leaps and bounds, it appears that even traditional industries will face the pinch of HR issues, sooner or later, with a growing scarcity of good quality people.
Regards.
- Dilip
------------ ------------------------ ------------------------
Source: BL, 20-03-2006
Helping `minds' to grow
Anjali Prayag
MindTree hand-holds new hires so they can put down roots in the company.
About 20 km away from Bangalore, tucked away in the green environs of the Global Village, stands an arboretum. It's a protected park, no doubt, but the only difference is that it houses IT talent from across the world.
Several MindTree `minds' (employees are called `minds' here) that have been chosen from other environs (read that as lateral hires from other companies) are being nurtured to grow roots in this Bangalore-based company.
MindTree's Arboretum was designed to function in the same way as the botanical one. "Here we nurture people who have joined us from various companies," says Sanjay Shelvankar, Program Director, MindTree Consulting.
Handling lateral hires requires a higher degree of sensitivity than managing fresh talent, who anyway go through induction and probation , he feels.
Though Arboretum was created to take care of this issue, there was another result: equally beneficial to the company.
A couple of years ago, the company noticed that a higher number of exits happened during the first six months of a lateral hire's tenure here. Infant mortality among middle management is a serious issue and if left untreated, could lead to a dangerous situation, a real talent crisis in middle management.
Says Srish Kulkarni, Program Director, MindTree Consulting, who, along with Shelvankar, conceived of and kicked off the Arboretum idea, "an induction programme might do well to introduce the new entrant to the company, but we realised that a more thorough process of assimilation through explicit attention and strong bonding is necessary. And this paved the way for the Arboretum programme."
The company realised that this was a pointer to another brewing problem: The business was growing at a rapid pace. People come from different backgrounds and cultures (just like in an arboretum). "Lateral hires have to feel the intrinsic warmth of the company, which is growing bigger everyday.
MindTree currently has around 2,500 `minds' working in two development centres. And MindTree wanted to retain the `small company' environment where lateral hires are not lost in the sea of `minds.' "We start with helping them with simple things such as creating e-mail IDs, profiles, etc," says Shelvankar.
Then comes the crucial three-week programme where new minds are taught about the company's value systems. The hand-holding goes on for one appraisal cycle or one full year where new minds can talk to Shelvankar or Kulkarni about any of their problems with the company. Problems could be anything: from an unfulfilled promise by HR, or continuous extension of projects abroad, or total mismatch of talent and job profile.
Arboretum essentially helps `minds' deal with things such as assimilation, expectation management, project allocation through reverse bidding, etc.
Kulkarni explains the way the Arboretum works: "Every week we have 20-30 minds joining the Arboretum.
This is for all lateral hires, whether they are hired for projects, management, administration or HR," he says. In fact, at any point of time, there are 80 `minds' nurturing their aspirations at the Arboretum. Lateral hires range from one-year experience up to 18 years experience.
"And this is across all disciplines, from programming to HR to marketing to project management," he says. About 1,360 people have been groomed through Arboretum and this year Shelvankar and Kulkarni expect to groom at least 2,000 people.
Tangible benefits
This is what Puneet Jetli, General Manager, People Function, MindTree Consulting, has to say on the benefits of the arboretum initiative:
On how it has helped put a lid on attrition: The initiative has helped in increasing engagement and reducing attrition amongst new lateral hires. Before the launch of Arboretum, over 50 per cent of the people leaving MindTree were doing so before completion of one year with us. This number has now dropped to below 40 per cent.
In addition, the overall employee satisfaction of new lateral hires has also gone up substantially in the last 16 months.
On whether Arboretum influences the `talent pool' chosen for the company: Arboretum does not directly influence the kind of talent pool chosen for the company. However it is an important feedback mechanism for the organisation to identify common reasons for people leaving us within one year of joining.
This indirectly leads to improvement in our talent acquisition process and in the quality of hiring.
On employee response to the concept: MindTree Minds are truly proud of Arboretum. It is not only seen as a mechanism to assimilate and engage lateral hires but also as another manifestation of innovative and people-caring practices at MindTree.
* Handling lateral hires requires a higher degree of sensitivity than managing fresh talent, who anyway go through induction and probation.
* Business grows at a rapid pace and people come from different backgrounds and cultures (just like in an arboretum). Lateral hires have to feel the intrinsic warmth of the company, which is growing bigger everyday.
* Arboretum essentially helps 'minds' deal with things such as assimilation, expectation management, project allocation through reverse bidding etc.
* The dictionary says - "Arboretum" is a place for study and exhibition of trees.
* While it is more relevant for the new age industries, with the economy growing by leaps and bounds, it appears that even traditional industries will face the pinch of HR issues, sooner or later, with a growing scarcity of good quality people.
Regards.
- Dilip
------------ ------------------------ ------------------------
Source: BL, 20-03-2006
Helping `minds' to grow
Anjali Prayag
MindTree hand-holds new hires so they can put down roots in the company.
About 20 km away from Bangalore, tucked away in the green environs of the Global Village, stands an arboretum. It's a protected park, no doubt, but the only difference is that it houses IT talent from across the world.
Several MindTree `minds' (employees are called `minds' here) that have been chosen from other environs (read that as lateral hires from other companies) are being nurtured to grow roots in this Bangalore-based company.
MindTree's Arboretum was designed to function in the same way as the botanical one. "Here we nurture people who have joined us from various companies," says Sanjay Shelvankar, Program Director, MindTree Consulting.
Handling lateral hires requires a higher degree of sensitivity than managing fresh talent, who anyway go through induction and probation , he feels.
Though Arboretum was created to take care of this issue, there was another result: equally beneficial to the company.
A couple of years ago, the company noticed that a higher number of exits happened during the first six months of a lateral hire's tenure here. Infant mortality among middle management is a serious issue and if left untreated, could lead to a dangerous situation, a real talent crisis in middle management.
Says Srish Kulkarni, Program Director, MindTree Consulting, who, along with Shelvankar, conceived of and kicked off the Arboretum idea, "an induction programme might do well to introduce the new entrant to the company, but we realised that a more thorough process of assimilation through explicit attention and strong bonding is necessary. And this paved the way for the Arboretum programme."
The company realised that this was a pointer to another brewing problem: The business was growing at a rapid pace. People come from different backgrounds and cultures (just like in an arboretum). "Lateral hires have to feel the intrinsic warmth of the company, which is growing bigger everyday.
MindTree currently has around 2,500 `minds' working in two development centres. And MindTree wanted to retain the `small company' environment where lateral hires are not lost in the sea of `minds.' "We start with helping them with simple things such as creating e-mail IDs, profiles, etc," says Shelvankar.
Then comes the crucial three-week programme where new minds are taught about the company's value systems. The hand-holding goes on for one appraisal cycle or one full year where new minds can talk to Shelvankar or Kulkarni about any of their problems with the company. Problems could be anything: from an unfulfilled promise by HR, or continuous extension of projects abroad, or total mismatch of talent and job profile.
Arboretum essentially helps `minds' deal with things such as assimilation, expectation management, project allocation through reverse bidding, etc.
Kulkarni explains the way the Arboretum works: "Every week we have 20-30 minds joining the Arboretum.
This is for all lateral hires, whether they are hired for projects, management, administration or HR," he says. In fact, at any point of time, there are 80 `minds' nurturing their aspirations at the Arboretum. Lateral hires range from one-year experience up to 18 years experience.
"And this is across all disciplines, from programming to HR to marketing to project management," he says. About 1,360 people have been groomed through Arboretum and this year Shelvankar and Kulkarni expect to groom at least 2,000 people.
Tangible benefits
This is what Puneet Jetli, General Manager, People Function, MindTree Consulting, has to say on the benefits of the arboretum initiative:
On how it has helped put a lid on attrition: The initiative has helped in increasing engagement and reducing attrition amongst new lateral hires. Before the launch of Arboretum, over 50 per cent of the people leaving MindTree were doing so before completion of one year with us. This number has now dropped to below 40 per cent.
In addition, the overall employee satisfaction of new lateral hires has also gone up substantially in the last 16 months.
On whether Arboretum influences the `talent pool' chosen for the company: Arboretum does not directly influence the kind of talent pool chosen for the company. However it is an important feedback mechanism for the organisation to identify common reasons for people leaving us within one year of joining.
This indirectly leads to improvement in our talent acquisition process and in the quality of hiring.
On employee response to the concept: MindTree Minds are truly proud of Arboretum. It is not only seen as a mechanism to assimilate and engage lateral hires but also as another manifestation of innovative and people-caring practices at MindTree.
posted by Dilip at
3:44 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
Subscribe to Post Comments [Atom]
<< Home