How HR heads are increasingly engaging in ‘fun’ activities with Gen Y to retain talent
He’s
an Indian working with a German multinational corporation who likes
making Latin dance moves. After a long day at work, Arijit Sengupta, the
human resources (HR) head of Adidas India, puts on his dancing shoes to
have fun with his team by doing Zumba, a popular fitness programme
inspired by Latin dance.
HR head and fun? Aren’t HR heads supposed to be a grim, staid and
solemn lot, more comfortable surrounded by the euphemistic jargon
(rightsize, downsize and redundancies) than by gyrating colleagues?
Perhaps not any longer.
“With our core employee base in their 20s, it is pointless to be in a
stiff collar and tie,” says Sengupta, who does Zumba a couple of times a
week at his Gurgaonbased office. The 40-year-old fitness freak also
actively takes part in other fitness activities in the office such as
yoga and CrossFit, a strength and conditioning programme.
Engaging with Gen Y calls for a paradigm shift (guess that’s one
jargon he couldn’t avoid) in approach and HR programmes, he points out.
Sengupta isn’t the only honcho leading from the front to give HR a
human face. Across industries, new age HR heads are shedding
inhibitions, turning stereotypes on their head, doing outlandish stuff,
and most importantly coming out of their hallowed cabins to strike an
emotional chord with employees.
Preaching doesn’t work after all, says Sengupta; walking the talk is
key to make the preaching real. “Gone are the days when in a corner
cabin policies were made and then communicated. The world has become
smaller and closer.”
When Work is Fun
While the nature of an HR job still remains serious, it helps if it
is tempered with a generous dose of fun. Wearing multiple hats, it
seems, is now an integral part of the HR head’s role. And nobody does it
better than Runu Mehta Kesarker of Mad Over Donuts. For the HR head of
the Singapore-based gourmet doughnut brand, which has 54 outlets in
India, spreading cheer is a mandate she takes very seriously.
Sample this: last month, Kesarker got to know that one of her team
members in the sales department had not been in good spirits for some
days. Reason: he was bogged down by loads of work and was under enormous
pressure to meet sales targets.
So, what happens next? Kesarker, along with six others in her team,
goes to the desk of this colleague at around 5.30 in the evening.
Another guy sitting on the desk starts playing loud music on You-Tube.
And all of a sudden, Kesarker starts dancing to Yo Yo Honey Singh’s
“Chaar bottle vodka kaam mera roz ka”. “This was a perfect song to pep
him up as he is a party animal,” recalls the 35-year-old HR head who has
been doing such ‘flash mobs’ over the past six months at her Mumbai
office.
Did her dancing act have an impact? “Absolutely,” she says, “all in
the office, along with this guy, joined me and started dancing. I then
asked him to leave early and go back home and party.”
Flash mobs, once in 15 days, help in lifting the spirits of the
employees and keeping energy levels high. “All of us work in such a
high-pressure job that it becomes crucial to release pressure,” she
says, adding that maintaining relationships also helps in keeping
attrition low. Mad Over Donuts has over 550 employees across the country
and Kesarker heads a 16-member HR team.
There has been a 360-degree turn in the way HR functions, she points
out. And it’s quite apparent with other interesting stuff done by
Kesarker.
One of them is mock awards, a random and surprise award function
which she organizes every month. “The coolie No. 1 of office or the
helping hand award adds fun to the work.” Another offbeat activity is a
game of chor police. Played once a month for over two hours, Kesarker
leads the chor (thief ) team by stealing all the expensive items in the
office and hiding them, and the police (managers in the office) have to
find the stuff within a stipulated time. “This activity helps bring
teams closer and develops bonding,” she says.
But from where did this idea come? A junior manager in the office was
having a hard time with his boss, she recalls. “We also got to know
from his appraisal that something was going wrong and there was a
communication gap.” So Kesarker formed a team of thieves which stole
some stuff from office, including the mobile phone of the boss of this
junior manager, and the entire office was asked to hunt for the items.
“At times grown-ups don’t need lectures or gyaan. If a game conveys the message, then nothing like that,” she says.
Does Kesarker have a message for the HR fraternity? “Work hard and play hard.”
Pramod Kumar Mitra does both. But he has discovered a different route to make a connect with his team — food.
The HR director of Sharda University makes Maggi noodles every
alternate Saturday for his 20-member team. “A team that eats together
stays together,” believes Mitra, who joined the university in 2009. In
organizations, he says, people now work in compartments. “Having food
together helps in breaking the barriers.” So what happens during the
Maggi break? “We discuss and ideate over the food,” says Mitra. Apart
from Maggi, to which plenty of vegetables and egg white are added to
make it a nutritive meal, the 64-year-old foodie also makes brown bread
sandwiches, sprouts and cucumber salad, and fruit salad.
Changing the Image
“Being unusual should be the new usual for the HR guys,” Mitra says.
And the way he behaves has a lot to do with the perception that people
have about HR guys. “People think the HR department is full of sadistic
and egoistic people.” Perhaps the way HR guys carry themselves and their
serious demeanour have added to this perception, but it’s high time it
changes, he adds. Venkatraman Girish of Jubilant FoodWorks, the master
franchise holder of Domino’s and Dunkin’ Donut, is doing his bit to
change the dour image of HR.
Whether it’s enacting the role of the famous baddie of Mr India
(Mogambo) or playing funny Yamraj, the senior vice-president, HR, is
known to do quirky things. “Running HR in a conservative manner might
have served your company well in the ’90s, but it may be inappropriate
and even damaging today,” says Girish.
Confluence, the annual in-house carnival of Jubilant in which the
workforce is divided into groups that vie for top honours in singing,
dancing and drama, has become a quarterly affair from this year.
So, this May, Bollywood was the central theme of Confluence.
Employees were divided into cross-functional communities such as
Avengers, Rockstars and Transformers, and were led by the head of
departments. The teams were provided props and asked to enact a sequence
of scenes and songs from popular movies.
“The event brought some hidden talent off the shelves. Our people
sure have alternative career options ready,” says Girish in a lighter
vein. The biggest plus with such events, if done regularly, is that they
bring everyone under one roof and foster a culture of camaraderie and
fun. They reenergize employees and give them a reason to go that extra
mile during tough times, feels Girish, who heads a 72-member HR team.
All to Retain & Engage Talent
But can HR leaders succeed in altering the perception that they are conservative and risk-averse?
The answer, says Girish, lies with the connotation that fun has in
their minds and a notion that fun ruins credibility. “Fun doesn’t have
to mean frivolous. It doesn’t have to mean silly.” Fun can allow
employees to achieve significant results — it means that although they
take their jobs seriously, they don’t take themselves too seriously, he
adds.
“I have no clue what my team has in store for me this time around,”
says Girish when asked about the character he is going to enact in the
forthcoming Confluence this month. “Hope they don’t give me a baddie
character.”
HR experts feel that companies are pushing the envelope as they have exhausted all ways and means to retain and engage talent.
“Young people love to work in a quirky environment,” says Mohinish
Sinha, leadership and practice leader, Hay Group India, a global
management consulting firm.
While HR has always been doing its bit to get the best out of people,
what has changed over the past few years is the role of HR heads.
“It’s still not a dominant trend but definitely HR heads are taking centre stage,” he adds.
The bottom line of any activity, whether it’s offbeat or plain vanilla stuff, is employee happiness.
“At the end of the day, what matters is if I have brought a smile on the face of employees,” says
Kesarker of Mad Over Donuts. “If that happens, I am the most contended soul on earth.”
The Economic Times
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