<div><strong>Maclean Raphael, Executive Director - Human Resources, 3M India & Sri Lanka</strong> was working with Bharat Petroleum as an aviation officer where his job involved taking responsibility for a group of people in his shift. Through his interactions, he discovered that he enjoyed ‘taking care’ of them. The fact that his brother was a HR professional from XLRI also prompted him to switch to HR. Raphael believes outsourcing core HR processes like some organisations have done is not recommended as it is all about people and a personal touch should be maintained above all. <br /><br />Also, Raphael says the HR function should be viewed as an investment centre and not a cost centre, as attracting, engaging and retaining talent ensures creating a strong foundation and future of any organisation. <br /><br /><em>Excerpts</em><br /><strong>What has been the biggest achievement in your career?</strong><br />That is indeed a tough question, because when I look back, in all humility I must confess that every day has been so fulfilling because of the achievements, thanks to the people that I work with. However, if I were to pull out one stand-out achievement and term it as my biggest, it would have to be, without a doubt, growing into my current position and heading the HR function for such a great corporation as 3M and in such a dynamic country like India. <br /><br /><strong>What have been the primary traits/qualities that have helped you attain your present position?</strong><br />Let me share the feedback people around me have given– a pleasing leadership style, extremely dependable, result oriented with a ‘will do it come what may attitude’, a positive and cheerful countenance, a supportive and “wanting-to-help” approach, being open, honest, firm and fair. I would also attribute sheer hard work, common sense, support from family and colleagues, some wonderful bosses, and God’s grace (not necessarily in that order though) as other aspects that have helped me attain success in my current position.<br /><br /><strong>What are the challenges you are facing in the organisation?</strong><br />There are several challenges that are characteristic of any growing organisation, which include enhancing productivity and profitability, prioritising our resources to achieve our business goals, building supervisory and leadership capability, maintaining high morale through challenging and difficult times, engaging, developing and retaining our good people.<br /><br /><strong>What are the steps a company should take to develop and motivate future leaders?</strong><br />First and foremost, a company should have a clear plan as to how it should attract and develop future leaders, what it will do to set expectations right, what the career plan is for employees and what the plan is to develop and grow them into these positions. All this needs to be supported by an open, fair and stringent process to identify people with the right potential, as well as the willingness to trust your people, early in their careers , to handle challenging roles. <br /><br /><strong>What is your rate of attrition? How do you prevent it?</strong><br />The rate of attrition at 3M India has decreased by 6 percentage points over the last 15 months and is well within the industry average. We have initiated several actions to contain it, and they include, strengthening our hiring and on boarding process, engaging with employees, empowering them and allowing them to create their own destinies, trusting them to do a good job, recognizing and rewarding them with competitive salaries, providing them with learning opportunities and growing them in the Company.<br /><strong><br />What sets your company apart from other companies as far as work culture goes?</strong><br />3M has a culture which indeed, sets us apart. We have what is known as the “Minnesota nice” which represents the culture of respect that people have for one another in the organisation. Trust is central to our interactions and we believe in empowering people to find their space, make mistakes and evolve themselves – internally we refer to this as the McKnight principle, i.e., a philosophy that was propounded by William McKnight, 3M’s former CEO& Chairman which has contributed to shaping the culture and DNA of 3M. We also believe in recognizing people and growing them from within. 3M is a highly ethical organization that practisesand believes in doing business the right way. <br /><br /><strong>What is the biggest challenge you face when selecting people?</strong><br />The challenge is to find people who share the same vision and dreams, backed by the right domain expertise, along with the cultural fit. Also, 3M is such a diversified company that it sometimes poses challenges to find the right talent with such unique skill sets.<br /><br /><strong>How do you track employees' satisfaction or dissatisfaction?</strong><br />Whilst we have a Standard Opinion Survey which we conduct once in two years, we also have other forums and systems like the Open House, a Feedback Box, Skip Level Meetings and above all an Open Door Policy where employees are encouraged to approach their seniors & top management in the company and share their concerns. <br /><br /><strong>How has HR been important to the bottom line of the company?</strong><br />At 3M, businesses recognises the critical role and impact that HR has on hiring, on-boarding, compensation, training, development, engagement, retention and growth of employees. Further, HR also contributes in the following ways –</div><div> </div><ul><li>By providing the right environment to enable employees to stay engaged and perform</li><li>By creating the right processes and systems at all people touch point areas</li><li>By building Line Managers to become HR Managers for the respective small group teams</li></ul><div><br />All this directly and indirectly impacts the bottom line of the company. A case in point was last year, when one of our businesses was having high attrition at the beginning of the year. HR worked in tandem with the leaders of that business and increased the retention to a record high by the end of the year, earning a comment from the Country Business Leader who said that the higher retention increased productivity and profitability in a significant manner last year. <br /><br /><strong>How has the downturn affected HR?<br /></strong>The biggest impact of the downturn on HR has been on prioritisation and allocation of limited resources. Business and Functional teams have to achieve challenging targets with limited resources. HR needs to ensure that the morale of the employees and the organization is still maintained at a high level. <br /><br /><strong>How should HR be integrated with the core line of business?<br /></strong>HR has already been integrated with the business teams in 3M. We are well aligned with our business goals and each business has a HR Business Partner who proactively works with them at a strategic level to achieve company goals.<br /><br /><strong>A survey has questioned HR's actual contribution in an organisation. Would you like to comment on it with particular reference to your organisation?</strong><br />In all humility, I’d like to believe that our HR function has been able to integrate with all our 5 business groups and make a difference in 3M. Two things will determine our success, one is the perception of how we have been able to impact our business and functional teams, and second would be the actual metrics that will prove that we have been able to contribute, for e.g. hiring cycle time, hiring costs, on-board feedback, quality of hires, engagement survey scores on various people process & systems, retention scores, training scores, productivity, succession readiness etc. <br /><br /><strong>If you could change three things about HR practices, what would they be?</strong><br />In my years of experience, these are some learnings and insights I can share</div><ul><li>Do not jump the bandwagon and blindly follow what other companies do, but see what is relevant to your organisation</li><li>Understand that HR is not like any other function, and outsourcing core HR processes like some organisations have done is not recommended. HR is about people and it is critical that there is a personal touch and supervision is maintained over some key HR functions/ activities</li><li>The HR function should be viewed as an investment centre and not a cost centre, as attracting, engaging and retaining talent ensures creating a strong foundation and future of any organisation. </li></ul><div><em>As told to </em><strong>Poonam Kumar</strong></div>
