5th National HR Conclave Organized by KSOM in association with NHRDN

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5th National HR Conclave Organized by KSOM in association with NHRDN

KIIT School of Management organised the 5th National HR Conclave on 23rd of August, 2014 on the theme “Psychological Contract – A Competitive Advantage”. The conclave was inaugurated by Mr. Ambarish Dasgupta, Partner and Head of Management Consulting, KPMG; Dr Sumit Chowdhary, President, Reliance Jio, Dr. Sanjay Muthal, Executive Director, RGF Management Search and Ms. Paramita Mohapatra, President, NHRDN Bhubaneswar Chapter.

The theme is important from an Employer- Employee relationship perspective in today’s dynamic market conditions. Given the rapidly evolving employment conditions, the Psychological Contract deals with the unwritten and undefined understanding between an employer and the employee, which forms a key part of their relationship.

Ms. Paramita Mohapatra introduced the conclave theme to the audience, underlining relevance of Psychological Contract in organizations.

Delivering the keynote address, Mr. Ambarish Dasgupta threw light on the importance of unadulterated honesty, sincerity to objectives and complete dispassion towards oneself. He also opined that Psychological Contract is an oxymoron and one should compete only with one’s dishonesty.

Dr. Sumit Chowdhary spoke about the concepts of success and career and added that a “leadership stance” and being a “possibletarian” – someone who is optimistic and is willing to take on seemingly impossible challenges – is the way forward.

Dr. Sanjay Muthal, spoke about the uniqueness of KIIT & KISS as on organization for serving the society. He suggested that students have an “abundant” mindset and respect themselves. In respect to the theme, he emphasised on the point that instead of having exit interviews companies should rather conduct ‘stay-in’ interviews, asking people what makes them continue with their organizations.

The inaugural ceremony was also graced by Prof. N L Mitra, Chancellor, KIIT University, Prof P.P. Mathur, Vice Chancellor, KIIT University, Prof Anil Bajpai, Director, KSOM. On the occasion, a souvenir was released containing articles and messages by corporate leaders, academicians and students.

A Panel Discussion on the theme was held with renowned panelists like Mr. Rajeshwar Tripathi, Chief People Officer, Automotive & Farm Equipment sector, Mahindra & Mahindra; Mr. Satyadeep Mishra, Head of HR – Logistics & Control at RBS; Mr Rohit Kapoor, Geo HR Director and Academia Program Director, Dassault Systemes and Dr Sanjay Muthal. It was a diversified discussion with respect to geography, market and industry. The core of Psychological Contract is the unexpressed obligations of the employer and the employees which should be reciprocated and should be worked upon in line with their passion and strengths, without expecting anything tangible in return.

There were more than 10 workshops conducted during the Conclave on topics like “Proactive Alignment of the Employee/ Employer Perspective”, “Business ethics theory of whistle blowing and organization social responsibility”, covering several aspects of Human Resource Management.

The conclave was a part of the three National Level events in the areas of HR, Marketing and Finance conducted by KSOM, to bring the industry closer to the academia and create exchange of ideas and practices.

5th-conclave-Psychological-Contract-KSOM

The Workshops conducted were as follows:

Workshop I:  Proactive Alignment of Employee/ Employer Perspective

Conducted by: Mr. P.C. Panigrahi, VP-HR and Administration, JMC Projects

Summary:

Mr. Panigrahi laid the groundwork for the topic by sharing his own experience from the Industry.

He emphasized the importance of empowering employees for proactive behaviour in the new lean, de-layered and downsized organizations. In such an organization the individual carries more weight. The importance of discretion and proactive alignment was also established during the course of the workshop.

Workshop II: Business Ethics Theory of Whistle Blowing and Organizational Social Responsibility

Conducted by: Mr. Ravi Thilagan, Head HR at FSS Technologies and Mr. V.Manjunath Rao, Vice President at Ceat Tyres

Summary:

The workshop started with the note that ‘Trust’ is one of the core ingredients in today’s workplaces. This underlying message was further substantiated with videos, real life scenarios, case discussions and examples from the industry.

Workshop III: Attracting and Retaining Workforce with Psychological Contracts in Multi-generational Workforce

Conducted by: Mr. Rajeshwar Tripathi and Ms. Ayesha, Chief People Officers at Mahindra and Mahindra and by Mr. K. Sai Kumar, Director and Head-HR in Ericsson

Summary:

In this highly interactive workshop, the industry experts shed light on the problems that arise due to generation gaps. An interesting insight revealed by Mr. Tripathi was that the changing nature of the Psychological Contract is more a function of the generation than work trends. There were some interesting counter questions and queries from the students which added to the richness of the discussion.

Workshop IV: Re-Define Engagement: Focus on Passion and Holistic Work Environment

Conducted by: Mr. Srikrishna Bhave, Director-HR at Forbes and Mr. P. V. Vasanthakumar, CHRO at AVT Group of Companies

Summary:

This interaction-based workshop started with personal experience sharing by the industry experts and the common problems they faced while recruiting from the workforce comprised majorly of the millennial. The importance of passion being the mother of all value creation was a recurrent theme in the discussion.

Workshop V: Leadership/Managing Expectation during Times of Complexity and Change

Conducted by: Mr. Sudhir Dhar, Head-HR and Mr. Pragnesh Patel, Director-HR at Motilal Oswal

Summary:

The workshop was activity based starting with an ice-breaking session between two groups of students at a time. Further, the participants were divided into several groups and asked to identify certain characteristics of their team members in their first meeting; and then the second meeting and so on. At the end of the activity, they were asked to compare all the observations for a final analysis. The intention of the activity was to establish the importance of intelligent observation, empathy, and perception.

Workshop VI: Multiple Topics

Conducted by: Mr. Asit Mohapatra, CHRO, Raymond on the topic “Attracting & Retaining Workforce with Psychological Contracts in Multi-generational Workforce” and Mr. Sanjay Rao, Director-HR, Owens Corning on the topic “Environment Employers and Employees Want to Invest in”

Summary:

This workshop stressed on the business value of good employer-employee relationship. A role playing exercise was designed where students were divided into two groups and were given several real life situations. After the situations were described to them, students were asked to play the roles of employees and employers. The exercise brought out several finer aspects of the relationship and helped students appreciate the positions and perspectives of the two roles.

Workshop VII: Super Manager/Super Spy: Use of Technology in Monitoring Employee Conduct

Conducted by: Mr. Mukul Chopra, Head–Engagement and HR Strategy, Aircel

Summary:

Several aspects of technology-driven employee monitoring was discussed in the workshop; for example, the necessity of spying in current times. He touched upon the utilitarian as well as the moral side of the argument. Several questions posed by students on topics such as employee productivity and effect of spying on the working conditions were discussed during the workshop.

Workshop VIII: Facilitating Career U-turn, Embarrassing No More

Conducted by: Mr. V S Vats, VP and Head-Human Resources, Voyants Solutions Pvt. Ltd and Dr. Sumit Chowdhury, President, Reliance Jio

Summary:

This workshop started with the industry experts talking about the importance of skilled employees even after they leave the organization. A rich discussion followed centered around themes such as work culture, attitude towards the reporting manager and employee-employer negotiation. It moved on to the importance of companies being receptive and mature enough to graciously facilitate the return of employees willing to join back. Being an interesting topic and a very emerging one, it saw enthusiastic student participation.

Workshop IX: Multiple Topics

Conducted by: Mr. Rohit Kapoor, Geo HR Director and Academia Program Director, Dassault Systems on “Indecent Disclosure: Whistleblower Ethics, Consequentialism & Necessity”, and Ms. Renu Khanna, Head-Leadership Program, Tech Mahindra on “Leadership & Psychological Contracting”

Summary:                                                                                                                                                  

Whistle blowing is a very touchy topic for the corporate and many have formed their own committees to handle this carefully. With the advent of social media channels, company fear that employees might completely bypass their own mechanisms to handle whistle blowing and directly reach a public medium. The nuances of this sensitive topic were discussed in great detail followed by a question-answer session where student sought clarity on the current industry practices and the ethical issues surrounding such an activity.

Workshop X: Tool of Prediction and Predictability Creates Trust: What Happens when it is breached

Conducted by: Mr. Anirudha Khekale, Head-HR Emerson Process System

Summary:

In this activity based workshop, students were divided into different groups and each group was asked to write down at least 30 necessary objectives for today’s managers. The subtle use of the Contract as a tool for predicting and mapping predictability was discussed along with the consequences of breach of trust for the employee-employer relationship.