How HR Department Can Take A Bigger Role In Driving Growth

Creating a great workplace for employees is the need of the hour and can help corporate entities to grow at a faster pace. This was the broad opinion of panelists discussing human resource issues at the first session of BW HR Excellence Awards event on Tuesday (04 October).

"The young force these days do not look at a job as a vocation any more, but as a road to realise their aspirations. The company, therefore, has to keep growing its own aspirations and strategies to keep up with their speed and improving capabilities," said Anurag Batra, Chairman and Editor-in-Chief, Businessworld, during his inaugural address at the event.

Human resource, or human capital as it should be preferably termed given its direct correlation with driving profit, thrives in an atmosphere that is relevant and effective.

These days the definition of 'great' has changed as the young people do not believe they are hired. They think they are co-opting as well as volunteering for the holistic purpose of the organisation and enriching themselves.

"Therefore the company has to change focus from long-set to adaptive processes, help guys to take more responsibility much faster," said Rajesh Padmanabhan, Group CHRO, Welspun.

The multi-generation workforce requires a multi-strategy. Showing the soul, culture and values of the company in open terms helps to build a great workplace. That role has to be taken on by a leader. Either the HR head or the CEO should lead from the front.

Sanjay Behl, CEO, Raymond India, said: "CEO has a huge role in clarify and simplify the role each employee has. He has to constantly communicate with the employees with a clear focus on higher purpose for of the company."

In inspirational leadership, CEO would sit at the centre not top. However, this new attitude coming in with the Gen Y has to be accepted.

"It is important to avoid narcissism at the workplace, and therein lies the role of the CHRO," said Dr Nitin Balwani, Dean, Planning and Development, IFIM.

The session was moderated by Prasenjit Bhattacharya, CEO, Great Places to Work. It was evident that technology cannot drive ideation, creativity, emotion and ethics. It is humans who will process these, and design policies.

Human resource department should be in synchronisation with all other teams that it will be able to predict the work attributes of each team, management or otherwise. This will challenge the credibility of each team, and drive work.