Why did you choose HR as your professional field?
I come from a business family and even in my early years I was clear that I wanted to carve out my own identity – beyond the opportunities available at home.
Upon finishing my schooling, I enrolled at the College of Vocational Studies, University of Delhi, primarily because it offered industry relevant courses that appealed to me. Their course in Industrial Relations and Personnel Management was the most sought after one and out of curiosity I opted for it. And what’s more, I continued to top the class throughout the duration of the course. I had found my calling. And the rest as they say, is history. In the years that followed, my hunger for learning also saw me pursue degrees in labour laws and management with an HR specialization.
Looking back, I feel that pursuing human resources as career option was the best decision in my life, since it has truly helped me make a difference in the lives of the people I’ve worked with in the past few years.
How, where and when did you start your career, specifically in HR?
In my first job, I started out as a Management Trainee with Gati, one of India’s largest logistics company. After completing rotational assignments in most functions – including Sales and Operations – I finally landed a role as the Human Resources Manager for the company’s NBFC called TCI Finance Limited. I couldn’t have been happier as my education was put to the best use possible!
Describe the initial years of your career in a few sentences – what were the challenges you faced, what were the areas you enjoyed the most, the lessons learnt during the initial years.
Till date I believe that challenges, rather how you respond to them, is what defines your career trajectory. And I never lacked them! From the very beginning of my career, I was trusted with roles that had me working on all aspects of the function. Right from my first job where I was the only HR professional in TCI Finance, to my next role in GE India Design Centre where I joined to set up the initial team of 30 Engineers in 1998 and grew it to 1200 engineers over the next five years.
In every challenge I saw an opportunity to teach myself something new and explore new dimensions of my profession – be it recruitment, training, compensation, performance evaluations, employee engagement or simply managing change. And honestly, I thoroughly enjoyed this process.
Especially in my role with GE, I had to learn enough about various fields of engineering to be able to interview and assess candidates effectively. An uphill task for someone without any background in technical education, to say the least.
My biggest lesson, which I fortunately learnt in my early years, was that each initiative and every change can only be a success if you view it from the employee lens and are able to connect them to it.
What might be described as the best moment of your HR career?
In my current assignment as the HR Leader for Encore India, I saw an opportunity to improve the existing rewards and recognition framework. I shared my ideas with the global HR leadership which actually resulted in me being asked to lead a project to revamp the reward and recognition program for Encore worldwide!
To realize this project meant that I worked closely with a cross functional think tank to design a product that would resonate with employees across geographies and cultures. And it had to be attractive enough to garner a pull factor as well. In the process, I heard many different perspectives, developed new understanding of the business requirements – and this when I thought I’d seen it all! One never really stops learning… a useful insight, something we all know, yet tend to forget with the years.
Coming back to the story, the tough part was driving the core team to a consensus and serving a dish which appealed to everyone’s palette. And yes, several tough call had to be taken. The design underwent many reiterations and changes, and each opinion added towards building a great finished product. Power of collaboration is something that I can never emphasize enough. By the end of it all we had what we call Encore Honors, an online rewards
and recognition program, which can be accessed by all employees across the globe. This has driven our merit driven and people-centric culture to new heights by making the rewards and recognition process more transparent and easier to understand. Again a key learning here is that people want quick and simple tools – this is the day and age of social media where user interfaces are getting simpler and we need to ensure that our in house tools reflect the same appropriately too.
How has the above described “best moment” transformed you personally and professionally?
The transformation happened in several ways. Firstly, I learned leadership means listening to and inspiring people to action. Only then can you lead a global, cross functional team and build a consensus on a critical issue. Secondly, it boosted my confidence that I could connect with different perspectives and develop a solution that worked for one and all. Thirdly, this taught me that whether in your professional space or personal life, one doesn’t have to wait for things to stall – if you see an opportunity for improvement go after it. Own it. Fix it. Maintain it. Create a culture around it for it to be sustainable. And this will one day surely become your legacy!
Some key guidance and advice you would like to suggest to HR practitioners to enable them to have their best moments.
Here is my heartfelt advice. Sometimes we keep waiting for that one big project or opportunity that will help us maximize our potential, yet remain oblivious to our day to day tasks. Often failing to understand that big opportunities arise from our routine work.
If we truly have an eye for detail, if we truly believe in excellence, if we truly care for people as HR professionals, there will be many such opportunities that will present themselves. Right before our eyes, lost in the mundane. All we need to do is make the best use of our abilities on the tasks at hand and the universe will conspire… Like they say – I believe in luck and I have learnt that the harder I work, the luckier I seem to get!
