The Hindu Business Line : Rekindling talent

The need to shift jobs arises as employees' goals change over the years. Which is why companies are constantly putting their staff through training and development, keeping talent glowing.

Time was when one would have been happy to land up in a job that guaranteed employment for life. Then, it was the organisation that took care of its employees' career graph, training needs and development plans.

But not anymore, what with even Government institutions, in some instances, signing up employees through short-term contracts.

Not only that, nowadays "it is not uncommon for professionals to have as many as five or more careers in a lifetime," says David Raj, Assistant Vice-President (Human Resources) of Polaris. "Entrepreneurs change careers by starting new and different businesses. Technical people may move from design and programming into management, marketing, sales and back again. At some point, you might even want to change industries."

The need to shift jobs arises, as employees' goals change over the years. "No plan is foolproof. Undoubtedly, you will find that some of the goals you set five or 10 years ago (or even a few months ago) have changed. You have grown personally or professionally or you have stumbled upon a new opportunity that has changed everything. That is exactly why we need to re-evaluate where we are every year and modify our plan, if necessary."

Of course, the influence of technology and the emergence of the new-age industries have accentuated this phenomenon. According to Saundarya Rajesh, Chief Executive of the Chennai-based HR consulting and recruitment firm, Avtar Career Creators, technology has enabled many HR managers to become ERP experts and has provided such people with a career option in IT. But, that's not the only consideration.

The need for mid-career training may also arise in instances wherein an employee with loads of experience feels the need to upgrade his skills in an increasingly `young' organisation, where every other entrant into the managerial cadre is from the crème de la crème of B-schools and is armed with fresh ideas and the go-getter attitude.

With all these factors in play, the employee of today is increasingly becoming the "owner of his development and career plan," adds David Raj.

This, however, doesn't mean the organisation has no role to play in employees' career development. "Companies are always looking for talent, especially in the new economy system. For example, in Polaris we have several opportunities and intervention to `Spot the Talent' and have been continuously encouraging people to move from one area of specialisation to another," he says.

Arunkumar, Manager - Human Resources, Allsec Technologies, says his organisation has a continuous process of identifying employees who can fulfil the organisation's requirements better with training. The company hasn't recruited anyone in the middle-managerial level in its nearly four years of existence, because it prepares its employees to take up higher responsibilities through training.

Training programmes undertaken to prepare employees for new projects or higher responsibilities can take two forms: Skill and knowledge programmes and those that focus on the softer skills.

While the former is increasingly about new technologies, strategies and domains, the latter focuses on employees' strengths. An example of the latter is Gallup's `strength finder'. According to Ashok Gopal, Regional Practice Leader (Asia-Pacific), Employee Engagement Practice for The Gallup Organization, the first step under this tool is to find "themes that most characterise you". The themes could be `learner', `analytical', `command', `harmony' and `adaptability'. Training would be imparted so that employees can leverage on their strengths.

Saundarya Rajesh says such training programmes have become important, as the need for specialists and super-specialists is more pronounced today than ever before. The advent of MNCs and their intensive, in-house training programmes have become a benchmark for Indian companies. She says many Indian companies are increasingly appointing trainers who constantly monitor the training needs of the employees; their role, thus, has become more "diagnostic" in nature. The "extremely important" function involves the ascertainment of training needs for employees, if any, the type of training needed, the benefits that will accrue and whether any employee should be asked to resign if training fails to make an impact on his/her performance.

She says there are a lot of short-term (`just in time') courses, which promise to make experts out of generalists. Although that's "not really possible", such courses enable one to take the first step towards effecting a career shift, something that would not have been available a decade ago.

These HR experts also believe that the development of soft skills in an employee must be continuous. "Your basic skills, which aren't linked to a particular job, have to be refined from time to time... ideally, it must not be restricted to being a mid-career programme."

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