The Trouble with Policies

Some policy documents, if not all, were at one point of time confidential!

Can you beat that? Actually, that calls for attention to another issue - what came first - the policy or the management whim?

Well, my take is - its the management whim that came first.

The policy document is but a manifestation of what is convenient to the management of the company.

No, not the CEO - every CEO wishes his workplace to be the ideal one - where every employee who leavesthe office at the end of the day comes back the next morning, and eagerly at that.

How come then? Well, for one, most of the policies are about benefits or administration. While benefits proportionately increase with hierarchy, administration is but a leash that the seniors require to keep things under control.

Incidentally, 'management' qualifies under both these categories as 'beneficiaries' or 'interested parties'.

Policies tend to be uniform at a certain level and below, where as along with the senior level policies come clauses and sub clauses.

A classical example would be the Travel Policy. Employees at entry level through to executive level - travel be AC-II Tier - board and lodge @ Rs. 2000/- per day; but as you go higher, there are stars that get added to the 'lodge' and when you run out of stars, comes the magical word - Actuals!

Mr. Ricardo Semler really turned things on its head and came out with policies that are one liners, a paragraph at most. There are also other companies that have concise statements - "Travel Sensibly" is actually the entire travel policy in a software company.

The fewer the words in a policy document, the more the employees are going to get the impression that they are considered to be responsible adults, capable of being realistic and ethical too.

Another trick with making effective policies is to trash the document and simply build short phrased policies that centre around what is already working - this simple but 'eccentric' method may actually go a long way in winning the confidence of your employees.

The Trouble with Job Descriptions

Do we need Job Descriptions?

I asked this question to myself as I made notes for this blog and sent a message to a friend from college, another architect turned management graduate...

"We, individually do not need Job Descriptions, just teams that know and doing their bit towards achieving some org goals"

Interesting point that, and to boot he said, "Why should I be called a Manager - Planning, we might as well be called Zombies and we would still go about delivering what we already are..."

Individual JDs or team JDs, the classical format or a more customised version, if JDs are to be workable, the credibility of the whole exercise is critical.

The promise of a well thought out JD/Competency exercise can be awe inspiring and yet that so often flatters to deceive - implementation is fraught with challenges, nay its a mine field.

1. Often consultants are lined up and they (rightly so), take the organisation a few steps back namely to 'Job Analysis' and then lead up to 'Person Specification' and then to the real exercise of JDs. Tie that to the competency bit, architecture and all and we have a good 6-8 month project.

2. By the time the exercise takes shape, few if not several critical roles may have undergone a change and then management of this resulting data becomes critical to the credibility of the whole idea/project.

3. Buy-in of the vast majoriy of the employee population who would invariably have little or no clear understanding of the latest Corporate HR - OD intervention. 'IF HR is asking questions about our job, how many times we are expected to step out of office, how often we have to attend meetings, work in teams, etc., THEN they must be upto something...

4. No one external consultant can have a thorough enough understanding of the different functions in any organisation - the complexities are just too many to even pretend such a superhuman consultant exists. Again a threat to the credibility of the project.

5. A JD may easily be relegated to the safety of a folder as a secure document only to be accessed during the annual reviews.

A mechanism that ensures that everyone needs to look at their Job Description on a weekly/periodic basis can go a long way in the Credibility Enhancement of the project.

Also to ensure this one time exercise bears the reward it promises, the above mines could well be anticipated and the internal HR function can, by virtue of its own competence have the 'Job Analysis' and 'Competency Framework' chalked out before bringing the specialists in.

The specialists - us, mere mortals of consultants, can do their articulate best in documenting what the employees of their client are doing and therefore the internal HR team has to ensure that framework is in place. Another essential towards the Credibility Enhancement of the whole exercise.

The Appointment Letter Yardstick

If you are in HR then I urge you to consider this for a moment - How do you appraise the HR function?

Oh! there are many ways -

If training then look at the training mandays, if you are a level 3,4,5 company then you're already looking at the training feedback, ROI etc. Some cooler organisations are also looking at Engagement scores!

If Comp & Ben then let's look at how many realisitc comparisions have been done and implemented.

If its the IR function then look at the overtime hours, contract labour reduction metrics and over all unrest climate.

Ah, there's the word "metrics"... you and I would be looking at this word for the hundredth time and would have used it in our conversations and presentations 101 times. The problem with metrics is akin to the statistics and drunk wala story - using the lampost more for support than for illumination.

So what do we have here? Lets just look at the harmless Appointment Letter.

If you are in HR then you would have invariably faced situations where there is a great candidate (read: referred by the CEO) where in the guy was so good, you get him on board practically overnight, have the joining formalities done on priority and have the recruitment team put together a classy induction schedule.

Even in situations such as this, the Appointment Letter is delayed and if the HR head is lucky, he just gets a call from the CEO after a week saying get it done, mostly HR heads are not lucky though!

Such are the pressures of the HR function that the eternal search and replacement of candidates, the welfare of employees and the general cribbing population just descends on every day of the week, each with their share of the remains of their monday blues. Ever wonder why the HR team wants to work for "at least" half day on the weekend? Thats why!

But the CEO's call notwithstanding, regardless of the HR head's reprimands, the HR function continues to go from one pressure situation to another and soon everyone including the CEO "understands".

But what really can be the trouble with the appointment letter. Just look around and you will find that in most cases the appointment letter is handed over to the new employee at least 3 days if not 5, a week perhaps even longer. Most employees who join the company are happy to receive the offer letter and are almost surprised to receive the appointment letter. Some companies are already issuing 'offer cum appointment' letters and some are issuing them bang on day one, at the end of a busy day of form filling and thats the way it should be.

My hypothesis is that the turnaround time of an employee joining and his appointment letter being handed over to him can be the single most important indicator of how efficiently the HR team is functioning. The appointment letter is the formal contract and is also the least read document by all, employees and the HR folks alike, "kya karen, its the format being used"... thats how they all chirp...

IF the HR team is able to mobilise its resources to ensure that the appointment letter is ready along with the joining kit to be handed over to the new joinee, THEN one can say the HR function is functioning properly. Every HR professional should look for the content that goes into this most important document... Does the fine print turn off the reader? Does the CTC break up as broken down in the contract end up breaking the reader's heart? And the bloke realises its too late to fight over some numbers, that too with HR... Or is the HR function brave enough to talk through the content of the letter and leave no room for shocks, this is possible only perhaps on day one and that is when the Appointment letter should be issued.

Somehow, I have not come across instances where this is considered in workplaces and have been long thinking of it as a potential winner. So, there goes...

If... Then - Why?

If you are reading this, Then I've written something.

If a reason is required for a particular title Then its because these two words practically sum up everything there is and will ever be.

If all the software programmers do not see logic in this Then perhaps the strategists will find merit at least. After all, Kaplan dada and team built their scores on this very premise, urging the top of the pyramid to write down their strategies with these two words...