How to create an effective and Sustainable Model for Training and Development? The term “change” is synonymous with competitiveness in modern world and thus corporate firms are in a position to evolve unique, sustainable and strategic training model for employees that will facilitate the following: On one hand the training process motivates the suitable employees to perform well and makes them perceive their role properly in order to accomplish the enterprise objectives. On the other hand the organisation keeps itself abreast by constantly updating and understanding the training needs through Assessment of the external environment and Expectations of the employees in terms of rewards whether intrinsic or extrinsic. Porter and Lawler Model: The Expectancy Motivation Model of Porter and Lawler serves as an inspiration for effective training. The stress is on The value placed on performance outcome by the individual. The degree to which the individual believes that his efforts will lead to attainment of these rewards. Psychological aspect of this model: Almost all individuals are motivated by money ( by the way, Who doesn’t want money!). But money alone does not serve the purpose of motivation. Job satisfaction is a relative term in that different people find different things or elements motivating them in their work environment leading to job satisfaction. It might be Challenge Good inter personal relationship Pay Perks Culture Excellent leader Pressure Stress and the like… Assessment of training need: The training needs must be assessed by the respective organisations considering the following aspects: To transform the individual from the capacity of learner to executor Instil in him confidence to do the job well Relate his job to rewards so that he will try to excel Give your employees scope for career advancement Incorporate technical and technological innovations as part of your training process Physical, emotional and social elements in the internal as well as the external environment must be taken into consideration while training the workforce. Physical– relates to the physical fitness needed to perform the technical skills Psychological– relates to keeping the morale of the employees high at all points and maintaining an amiable work atmosphere Social– relates to the friendly relationship that should exist between the trainer and the trainees and among the trainees. Usefulness of the model: This model lends its support to the training and development process through three steps or stages. Diagnosis stage- Need analysis Formulation stage- Programme planning Evaluation Diagnosis stage: The interplay of ability and role perception Training brings out EFFICIENT as well as DEFICIENT performers. That is one good thing and also making the employee understand the role he is about to play as part of the organisation. Training through learning is one aspect which imparts knowledge and training is considered to be effective if one’s behaviour is modified as per the expectations and demands of the job. Role perception can be misunderstood by some individuals when they might try to exercise undue authority or overlook their duties and responsibilities. Confinement of authority Superior-Subordinate appraisal procedures Clear HR policy formulations are needed to avoid confusion and chaos in role playing. Formulation stage: The effected change through learning is expected to be retained by the employees throughout the career span in the organisation followed by constant grooming. The stress is on the value of the activity to be learnt Giving feedback  on the progress of employees towards final training objectives Relate the learning activity to increasing, meaningful materials already studied outside the training programme. Evaluation stage: Training evaluation is particularly necessary when the organisation wants to encourage the competitive spirit amongst the trainers and evaluation is considered as a challenge by itself. If the training provided eliminates obstacles...

The Ideology of Corporate Culture What is Corporate Culture: the collective beliefs, value systems, and processes that provide a company with its own unique flavor and attitude. Management Attitude: Globalization has necessitated organizations existing in the corporate business world to respond in a unique way in an attempt to enjoy a competitive edge in the market. Corporate culture is a value that keeps an organization intact and helps in building team spirit amongst the members. It is not possible to specifically describe or delineate the concept of culture, yet, people are aware of its fine and striking presence. Let us say that each corporate firm has a dissimilar but unique culture which embraces the values, norms, beliefs and assumptions of the members of the organization and their behavior. It is also greatly induced by the leadership style and management attitude. Role of Culture: Why do organizations need culture as a milieu? Has culture any role in improving the output? Management uses culture as a means to reach out to the employees in an informal manner, to signify what is expected of them plus what is to be expected from the management. Culture cuts through all the levels of an organization and unites the members or employees, to work towards enterprise objectives in a remarkable manner. It is a sort of identity label on the organization and its interest to promote or espouse the value systems through out the organization. Corporate culture encompasses the following qualities enlisted: Quality driven Presence of an informal atmosphere Open communication Customer centric business model Proper and likable dress code Trust and confidence amid employees Value based management CEOs’ as strategic drivers in setting a candid corporate culture CEO’s naturalness and spontaneity with the employees Gratifying employee welfare and security measures Value systems indicated by the vision and mission statements Codified employee behavior Well devised operating strategies Greater autonomy tomanagers at different levels Rewards and recognitions and so on… https://blog.enplug.com/corporate-culture   Corporate culture is considered to be a dogma, which many organizations utilize as a means to develop and amalgamate prospective employee groups. An employee learns all about the firm, its activities, the role he is supposed to play, information regarding his superiors, training, career advancements or promotions, pay, employee leave procedures and the long range goals of the organization during the time of induction. The firms should capitalize on this incubation period to spruce up the minds of the employees to act in accordance with the desired values expected by the management.   Value Systems: It is inevitable for each and every organization to develop a value system over a period of time based on the founder’s outlook towards business and people working for him. This creates a strong or a weak culture which has an effect on the output or performance of the employees. This also serves as a clear indication whether the organization is proceeding in the right direction. We should never forget that a sound culture eventually aims at achieving the end goals of an organization. The cultural framework of an organization facilitates this process to materialize in a smooth manner. Though intangible in nature, it wields its negative power, when not nurtured appropriately. Flourishing organizations always have pride in their robust cultural back ground, which is a mark of distinction. It definitely shapes up an organization to deliver performance that matches and often surpasses the industry standards. The head of an organization has an important role as a leader as well as a change agent in taking his organization to the next level. The mutual faith and trust between the superior and his subordinates is the anchor point of an organization. Culture – An Intervention Technique: The culture of an...

Are You Happy with Your Job What is your attitude towards Job? How many of us go to work with cheery attitude and positive framework of mind. Most of us treat work as a duty or accountability. Either way it does not solve the purpose. If you treat job as a duty, there can never be any enjoyment attached to it. In case of accountability, you work to reach some targets without any passion for the job or you spend most of your time dreading the thought of reporting to your superior. Without involvement and love, any job is not complete and people experience only “Job Satis-friction“and not satisfaction. Have you thought about it? Scenario in Developing Countries: In most of the developing countries the proportion of dissatisfied group dominates the satisfied set of employees. This is because preference and priority is to earn the daily bread rather than achieving anything big. Well, this attitude shall be attributed to the low income group where without work their lives cannot go on. But the bottom line remains the same, the work should be satisfying. So, what are the terms? Also See: Performance Appraisal High Income Group: In high income group and higher level jobs where the work is very challenging, we see that the employees are very much satisfied with their work. They need constant battles to win over and are provided with such an environment that puts their think tanks into full use. But is it enough to keep them satisfied; no, the reward system has to be equally compensatory. Rewards in terms of pay, perks, recognition, appreciation, social status, awards and what not. So, how do we correlate satisfaction factor with productivity? The organization has to maximize the positive relationship between performance and reward systems. Also See: How to Handle Attrition 30 Simple Ways to Make Your Employees Happier Repetitive and Monotonous Jobs: Repetitive and monotonous jobs make a person dull headed and a stereotype; his enthusiasm is absorbed to the extent that he fails to understand and rejuvenate his skills. The job content should provide at least some sort of cheer and interest to the performing individual. Say for instance, you manufacture plain paper cups, if you decide to incorporate some floral designs on the covers; you very well witness a fresh whiff of enthusiasm amongst your work force. Such is the power of variety and change that brings cheer into human lives and attitude. If you are a terrific boss everybody will like you but if you are a source of terror, chances are there that there is a high turnover ratio in your company. People after all expect certain level of consideration and warmth from their bosses. Organizations must make the individuals perceive their roles properly to affirm satisfaction and to avoid conflicts. Career Advancement: Courtesy – Roscostretch Career advancement is what most of the people aspire and when they don’t find any scope for advancement their interest in the job gradually decreases. Merit versus experience factor also has its say over deciding the next probable candidate for promotion. The top level management, especially the human resource department must ensure the employees with a supportive environment that paves the road for collaborative effort and in turn internal satisfaction. Job Satisfaction: Job satisfaction has to be considered from a broader perspective that encompasses all the independent and dependent variables that affect the nature of a particular job. This is very vital to an organization as job dissatisfaction leads to absenteeism, high turn over or attrition and decline in productivity. A dissatisfied employee is always a pain who can create problems by voicing his protest, gathering the union, neglecting his work or quitting. To avoid friction in the minds of...

How to Grade Your Employees on Their Performance Performance appraisal is the process of obtaining, analyzing and recording information about the relative worth of an employee. Organizational Development: Organizational Development denotes an overall and comprehensive development of an organization supported by the entire team of employees working for that organization. A useful technique in the management process that serves as a measure of performance and productivity is “performance evaluation” or performance appraisal. Performance refers to the degree of accomplishment of the task that makes up an individual’s job.     Performance appraisal serves the following purpose: To assess the present levels of employee performance. To understand the future needs in training and development based on the strengths and weaknesses of the employees. To provide feedback on their performance. Serves as a basis for reward allocation, such as, increase in pay scale, promotions and many other decisions like, confirmations, transfer, demotion etc. , Establishes performance standards and offers scope for improvement. Acts as a motivational tool for workers to perform better. Checks and facilitates employees who exhibit poor performance. Also assesses behavioral pattern of the employees. People who work for big corporate companies identify themselves with the objectives of the company and expect feedback, either in the form of a compliment or criticism. Compliments act as morale boosters to perform better and criticism though initially might puncture the ego, induces the potential to perform, to prove oneself. Managers should never be reluctant on their part to appraise subordinates on the job expectations and demands. In an activity as important as managing, there must be no pitfalls to measure performance as accurately as possible.   The Appraisal Process: The next important aspect in the appraisal process would be deciding the content to be appraised. Individual task outcomes where performance is evaluated on the outcomes delivered by the individuals, evaluation of personal characteristics and traits or behavior are done to rate the employees as to where they stand in terms of performance.   Appraisal Techniques: The widely used managerial technique in the appraisal process is evaluating performance against verifiable objectives, which truly makes sense, because the employees would be blind folded if they don’t have the right direction to proceed. Evaluation can be done in a comprehensive, periodic or continuous fashion. It all depends on the nature of work done, company practice and other situational factors. Say, for instance, performance review can be done after the completion of a major project, that makes sense, doesn’t it?   Periodical reviews: Formal reviews can be supplemented and supported with frequent and short informal reviews, for the superior- subordinate relationship to prosper and to keep communication channels open. All said and done, performance review based on verifiable objectives, although gives better vision and clarity, doesn’t allow the manager or subordinate to grow individually. It does not help in personality development, the emphasis ever being focused on accomplishing the operating objectives.   The 360 Degree Apparaisal: The latest approach of performance evaluation is the 360 degree appraisal that well suits the managerial cadre. It provides for performance feedback from the full circle of daily contact, that a manager might have, ranging from customers, peers, subordinates, boss etc. , This also fits into organizations that have introduced teams, employee participation and total quality management...

MBO BY PETER DRUCKER Peter Ferdinand Drucker was an influential writer, management consultant, and self-described “social ecologist. Harvard Business Review honored Drucker in the June 2004 with his seventh McKinsey Award for his article, “What Makes an Effective Executive”, the most awarded to one person. The Concept of MBO: Management by objectives was a concept introduced by the doyen of management, Peter Drucker. This concept involves formulation of objectives for the entire organization and which are then broken down into divisional, departmental and finally individual objectives. Objectives are decided on the basis of mutual consultation between managers and employees at the departmental and divisional levels and thus it can be appropriately called an integration of top down and bottom up approaches in management. The specific aim is to make the employees participate in decision making and thus motivate them to perform better. Management by objectives follows a step-by-step procedure that ensures the feasibility of the action plans decided upon. Realistic and achievable plans are set. Activities to be preformed are identified. Logical relationship between the sequences of activities is laid down. Time frame and cost frame are fixed. Resources to be allocated are decided upon. Salient features of the process: Self control and Self direction: The workers exhibit keen self control in that, they self appraise their performance that results in intrinsic motivation. Setting short goals and periodical review to match the current performance with the expected standards greatly boosts the performance of each and every individual and gives him the necessary drive to accomplish the assigned tasks. Periodic progress review: This helps to correct errors and deviations if any. This review is done by managers of higher levels in a constructive way and adequate counseling and guidance can be given to the subordinates to bridge the shortfall if any, in performance. This is possible only when there exists a mutual understanding between the superior and subordinates to find reasons and solve problems together. Reviews need not necessarily pinpoint errors but also revise future plans and actions. The major emphasis of management by objectives lies in its result oriented approach. What is the relationship between management by objectives and motivation? Motivation of an employee can be brought about by financial incentives such as bonus, increments, pay and perks or non-financial incentives such as recognition, appreciation and additional responsibilities. But nothing can equal self-motivation which makes an employee perform with aplomb. As management by objectives is directly linked with goal-setting, performance becomes better and better as the goals are set at a higher level. It involves complete participation from the employees’ end and when specific goals are set by mutual consent of workers and management, the results are magnificent. Many firms practice management by objectives to promote harmony and sense of belonging in the minds of employees as a result of which there is remarkable improvement in performance and productivity. The focus is on improving the job design and work module to make the jobs more meaningful, interesting and...