Sunday, 17 February 2013

Shruti Mishra_HRLP013_Transformational IR_Jan 2013




                          Transformational IR_ Maruti Manesar Case_ Shruti Mishra

Maruti Suzuki’s Manesar plant has been under lockout since July 18 when a deadly riot involving the workers and management left a senior HR manager dead and many others severely injured. On August 16 2012, India’s largest car-maker company announced its decision to resume production at the plant from next week after throwing 500 workers out of job due to their involvement in the July 18 violence at the plant on the basis of police charge-sheet against them. The major cause for discontent and violence at Manesar were the concerns of contractual workers.
To begin with Manesar plant was built with the aim of achieving cost effectiveness and increased production and was under the control of Japanese management. The Japanese used to take close control over the day to day activities held at Manesar plant. Moreover, at Manesar the age difference between the supervisors and workers was very less as many diploma holders with only three to four years of experience were hired to cut the costs. Due to this workers had less respect for their supervisors and preferred to treat them as equal. It was evident that the Japanese management only focussed on meeting the growing demand of the market rather than building a shared culture. The reason was that Japanese are patriots and they prefer working for their nation overtime and take pride at it.
A large part of the worker’s population was contract workers and they always felt that they were paid less and are treated differently as the rest rooms and the work areas were not up to the mark and the family related issues were ignored.  Subsequently, there was a lot of focus of Japanese management was on meeting targets due to high demand of hot selling models of the cars which resulted in building a lot of pressure on the workers. Lack of internal equity between the Gurgaon and Manesar plants which included low incentive as percentage of total salary of workers at Manesar than in Gurgaon ignited the fire of outrage between the workers. Moreover, the mediclaim policies were not employee friendly as only specific hospitals and clinics covered under the scheme and it did not include dependent parents which stayed with the employee.
There was communication gap between the Japanese management and the workers as the associates were not able to surface the issues. The grievance redressal mechanism for Associates was not uniform as MUKU union did not have regular communication and did not address the issues faced by Associates. The associates did not have a clear understanding of Union’s functions and there was an influence of outside forces on associates due to lack of internal support. The Japanese management did not paid heed to the needs and issues that supervisors and workers faced and even preferred delaying elections of unions for months. This feeling of disconnect between Japanese management and lack of internal equity between workers at Manesar plant and Gurgaon plant led to the unrest between the workers and management.
Thus this case illustrated the need to have employee friendly policies, internal equity and regular communication between the management and employees. Moreover, it is important for the management to realize the cross cultural issues that exists between the Japanese and the Indian workers.

Thursday, 31 January 2013

Roopali Agarwal_HRLP040_Transformational Industrial relations_Jan 2013


The Maruti Story

There has been an increase in the labour unrest in India. The Manesar incident has shocked everyone in the business fraternity. There are various reasons as to why the management prefers contract labour, it saves production cost, seasonal nature of business, & create employment opportunities for the unskilled labour force. But managing the temporary workforce is even more difficult than the permanent employees. It becomes very difficult to build that trust between the management & the labour union. And it is this reason that led to the death of Mr. Awinash Kumar Dev, General Manager HR, MSIL.

There are various factors that help in building the trust:

Basic needs- the toilets & water coolers far from the working area, less time for break, low salaries which led to low motivation. The hygiene factors were not taken into consideration. The workers were asked to work for long hours.

Communication gap- supervisors were hurt on management & associates direct communication, no clear instructions about holidays.This led to lack of transparency

Work culture- This plays a vital role in building relationships at the work place. There was too much pressure on the Manesar workers for business, the Japanese management being more task oriented put more pressure on the Indian management to increase productivity. Workers told that if the management trusts them then why there is a usage of camera,& leaves were not granted even incase of emergencies. The involvement of family members on get-together parties can help in strengthening the trust.

Systems & policies- It should be simple & easy to understand. Internal & external equality is important for no conflict. There should be no disparity in policies for permanent & contract labours on certain matters.  Profit sharing should be justified, implementation of changes recommended in feedback.

Conclusion: Urgency needs to be created to solve the issue. The management should be proactive & not just term the labour force as part of the family but also act in such a way.

Saturday, 26 January 2013

Sujatha NJ_HRLP024_Transformational Industrial Relations



Introduction
People are the biggest asset of a company, hence manpower safe guard is more than just taking care of their basic needs. Maruthi is one such example of the extent in which an unattended labour force can get violent. The tragedy of losing Mr Awinash Kumar Dev, General Manager HR of Maruti Suzuki India Ltd has led to this study of what happened in Maruthi? Why was there so much distress? And such an unacceptable violent move and motive of workers and What happened to the workers? How can we help solve this?

Case Facts and Analysis

The loss was incomparable to anything; however let us look at the case facts to know more about the situation, from different perspectives

    Ø  Dual management at the top level : Japanese and Indian management system brought in a huge culture difference within the organisation. As Japanese style was low with emotional quotient, highly structured operations, micro management and a closed system which was not open for feedback and suggestions from other employees. Whereas, Indian management lacked empowerment, hence was unable to influence the system. Stringent policies and lack for clear communication increased all the difference between the labour force and management.

    Ø  Piled up labour concerns : The dual structure was supposed to get two different cultures together to construct a best environment, instead the differences has only worsen the situation. This has led to the following consequences:
o   The degree of accountability has increased with two different reporting managers, One from Japan and the other from India
o   Increased production capacity in manesar, made the workers demand for more wages
o   Age difference between supervisor and associates is low, to enable to more collaborative work environment. This disturbed the equity of the workmen, as the associates would not listen to the supervisors and hence production is obstructed
o   Employees on contract suffered the most as they had to struggle for their livelihood

    Ø  Lack of job security: Mostly with the contract workers, job security was a big concern. They did not get any benefits like gratuity, provident fund or annuity. They could be sacked anytime and suffered a lot to even survive in their current work.

The few issues highlighted above gives a gist of what happened in Maruthi, Manesar. A lot has gone beyond control, piled up aggression and hunger for clarity and money led to such dreadful event. To avoid such an event to happen in the future, we suggest for a step wise approach like the following:

1.       Get the pulse : Organisation study, ‘as is’ analysis of the situation to get the pulse
2.       Divide and Plan : break the whole issue into small pieces and prioritize them. Plan your course of action according to the priority list
3.       Attack to solve one by one : now we work on solving the concerns one by one using a detailed and structured approach
4.       Future loop : Forecast and develop keeping the future in mind. BE PROACTIVE.

Tuesday, 15 January 2013

Megha Gupta_HRLP41_SelfLeadership`


Megha Gupta_HRLP41_SelfLeadership
In  Anil sir ‘s class we have discussed about what all needs it requires to become a great leader. We focused how various elements of brain envisages us to become a great leader. We discussed about the frame work  for making crucial decisions in life, how the most important choices in our life is based on our upbringing and education , how fear stop us from taking decisions and from becoming creative, the ladder of inference and judgment, emotional intelligence and  its relevance , state of being happy and how to form a strong community.
It is important to understand and have a purpose of life. Life without purpose is a directionless life without any motive. To understand the purpose of life it is important to first understand ourselves and align  it with the important choices we make in our lives. Sometimes inspite of having everything we are still unhappy because we don’t enjoy what we are doing and we don’t have a purpose of life.
After going and understanding the sessions after going home I pondered over the purpose of my life , my highs and lows and the most important people of my life. During my trip to sidhbari and my visit to village we met few kids . These kids performed various activities like some small presentation, dance and music performances etc. in front of us.  One of them was a girl who was 10 year old who delivered an amazing  speech  in English on “how tobacco is injurious to health”.  I was amazed at her confidence  level and her presentation style.  After talking to her and the other kids  I realized that these kids have big dreams in life and to achieve those dreams they are ready to strive hard and do whatever to make things happen. It was the most precious moment to witness the dreams in these kids eyes and the emotional connect they had among them. After coming back I realized that all of us have dreams and how we realize and understand those dreams and how we finally crave to achieve them.
I also realized the emotional intelligence among these children.  Even though these kids were quite young there was self awareness and it helped them to relate with each other and build trust among themselves. I also thought that that  these kids exemplified and honoured the gifts they have and they are in the process of finding out cause of their life that would give them joy and happiness. At such an early age they were utilizing the unique gifts which they possess and spreading happiness among them. It is very important to follow a mission of life and strive hard to achieve it and also important to take care of the most important thing and most important people while accomplishing that mission.

Tuesday, 8 January 2013

Maruti Story: Reality from Rear Glass by ShubhraAgarwal_HRLP020


The gruesome violence at Maruti Manesar plant has left the entire Business and specifically HR fraternity in shock. To analyze the root cause of this outburst it is important to first understand the conditions, environment, employee views at Manesar plant.
Brief about Manesar Plant:
·         Manesar plant started by Suzuki to create a model plant to show low cost and high production.
·         Better Systems & Best Technology at Manesar Plant.
·         Younger worker and supervisor population to achieve low cost.
·         High work pressure as all hot selling models got shifted to Manesar plant.
·         High percentage of contract employees.
Feelings and views about people at various levels of organization.
·         Japanese Management
o   Emotional quotient needs to be improved.
o   Working style not aligned to Indian sensitivities.
o   More flexibility required in their approach towards work and people.
·         Indian Management
o   Centralized power and authority.
o   Missing action and empowerment.
o   Tightened communication channel.
o   Unable to understand workforce and their issues.
·         Supervisors
o   Lack of understanding between supervisors and associates.
o   No proper action on supervisors’ feedback by Senior management.
o   No respect from associates.
·         Associates
o   Highly dissatisfied with the policies at Manesar
o   Upset  with disparity between Gurgoan and Manesar Plant salaries.
o   Under high work pressure.
o   Comparison with Honda plant in Manesar.
o   Unhappy with housing and medical policies.
o   Desperately wants a separate workmen union in the plant.

Well it is clear from the above data points that Top Japanese management moved focus from relationship orientation to task orientation as Maruti India became a large profit center for them. There was too much of micro management by Japanese in order to achieve targets and profits. Above all they completely ignored the cultural sensitivities which is why they created a wide cultural gap. In a cross cultural environment it is very important to collaborate with the other’s culture very maturely in order to create a best of both working culture. Secondly in this Maruti incident it is very important to understand the importance of achieving efficiency without hampering the effectiveness of the system. In Manesar, Maruti had best of machinery and techniques but they completely ignored the human part of it. They hired a young population as associates to attain low cost. The age of all these associates lies between 21-25 and to add on that they all were hired from same nearby villages and towns rather than a healthy mix and match of diversity from India. This young workforce was aggressive and impulsive in their thinking and handling matters with management.
 Again in to order to achieve numbers some very basic needs of workers were overlooked which with time created friction and frustration. A lot of contractual labour in the plant created an environment with fear of job insecurity and discontentment due to inequity in pay. The physiological needs of safety, transportation, washrooms, drinking water, and other needs like work hours etc. were also not met which added fuel to the fire.
 Also, the poor management of trade unions and MUKU led to detachment and disconnect amongst the workforce and management. The inability of MUKU adds to the frustration of associates. Furthermore the sense of pride and achievement of being associated with Maruti Manesar plant was overtaken by harsh deadlines and work pressure. To add to the discontentment of associates the handicapped Indian management also got failed to play a proactive and balanced role of true facilitator and collaborative decision maker.
In the end I would say the reason for this unfortunate violence was lack of trust, communication and commitment. The success mantra for any organization is to create a secure and trustworthy environment to work for its employees. The culture in any organization should be more of people focused than task focused because its people who decides the success and growth for any organization not the machines. Therefore its important to create an environment which is transparent and believes in the participative involvement in decision making and creation of policies.

Thursday, 3 January 2013

Akshi Gakhar_Transforming IR_HRLP011



After hearing the insides into Maruti Suzuki, I learnt that if there is a discontent or dissatisfaction among the employees it can be felt. There was negativity among the employees. Management wanted to renew the work culture in Maruti Suzuki. They didn’t have trust in the management nor did they have any pride in being associated with the organization.
Manesar Plant in the past, was a high performing, high quality production plant. It had an inspired workforce and celebrated festivals together. They had the best systems and technology to carry on their work. Associates were efficient and enthusiastic about their work.
The Manesar plant of Maruti Suzuki was closely monitored and operated by Japanese. There was a high number of contract labour in the organization at associate level. Gurgaon and Manesar plant had a different culture, Manesar plant was more focused on efficiency, quality and effectiveness whereas Gurgaon was more focused on people. They most high selling cars were produced in this plant which increased the pressure on volumes and operations. Incentives were also low as compared to Gurgaon plant. Medical, performance and reward system was also not constructed well. There was less communication, no grievance were handled or given importance. There was a disconnection between Gurgaon and Manesar plant as there was no frequent interaction.
There was no feeling of belongingness among the employees. They were not happy with the policies or procedure in place. In case they had a grievance there was no one they could address to. This all led to frustration among the employees and resulted in serious consequences. It can be said that management could see the conflict coming. It was necessary to do something in a positive way to make up for it.

Wednesday, 2 January 2013

NitikaThakral_HRLP021_TransformationalIndustrialRelations


Tragedy case of Manesar  Maruti plant helps us to introspect the importance of task focus versus employee focus, satisfied employees and satisfied customers in terms of cause-effect relationship and the role of effective HR in a organization which is way beyond being just another formality of arranging meetings and planning recruitments.
The gruesome act was a sum total of unrest at various levels in the organization.
Japanese Management
  • ·         Emotional quotient was very low
  • ·         Action on feedback was not taken
  • ·         More focus on system and processes
  • ·         Micro management

Indian Management
  • ·         Missing action and empowerment
  • ·         Lesser degree of influence
  • ·         Inability to understand workforce
  • ·         Tightened Communication channel

Supervisors
  • ·         Decreased understanding of supervisors and associated
  • ·         Sandwiched between management and associates
  • ·         Witnessed disrespect from associates

Associates
  • ·         Felt cheated by the management
  • ·         Union was the only solution according to them
  • ·         Dissatisfied with systems and policies
  • ·         Work pressure was quite high

Considering the above factors at different levels in the organization I can conclude the relationship between productivity and employee satisfaction in the following way:

Productivity and profitability is the overall objective of any organization. Among the various variables determining productivity is employee satisfaction.
Employee satisfaction has various independent variables:

Motivation: Management has to keep the employee force motivated to get the best results. It needs to identify the factors which keep its employees motivated and it also gives a clear picture of the areas which need to be worked upon. Like Maruti ignored the security, hygiene needs( far off toilets, water coolers), leverage on the sense of pride the associates already had and created trust deficit.

Work Culture:  Organization should build a culture of trust and transparency.  Employee should feel happy to go to work place, good interpersonal relationship between superiors and subordinates. Management should be participative in nature and should provide work life balance.  Maruti  put excessive pressure  on workers with extended shifts. Supervisor and management showed unfavorable behavior towards associates.

Fair System and Policies: Policies and systems should be modified with respect to workforce dynamics, geographic, economical and social factors. Policies should be kept simple and easy to understand. Proper communication/educating workers on systems and policies should be done in order to avoid misinterpretations which in turn lead to mistrust. Policies should be fair in terms of work and compensation and should be equitable internally and externally. Manesar had the best systems and policies of Japanese but failed to tailor it to local associates, lack of communication on policies and system, no evaluation was done for the improvement steps implemented post strike, no laid down system for grievance addressal was there and feedback was not taken seriously. Gurgaon and Manesar had different management style and salary structures.

Conclusion:  As it is rightly said ‘Prevention is better than cure’, every organization should measure its pulse form time to time. Should set up proper evaluation methodology for every system and process and should give utmost importance to the ‘Human Resource’ that is the lifeline of any system or process. Every organization should build a culture that suits the collective goals of management and employees.  The end result should be of management and employees being on same page either through participative management or positive collective bargaining through unions.

Tuesday, 1 January 2013

Industrial Relations_Maruti_N_BALAJI_HRLP002



Maruti has maximum market share in India, they are known for their after sales service. But they have failed to maintain the workplace peace. Rather than saying it as the maruti’s failure, it is the eye opener for Indian auto industry that relies mainly on the contract labor.
Most of auto industries have started following organization structure
Why organizations go for contract labor?
1) Cost saving –Salary cost ,admin cost & production cost
2) Seasonal nature of job
3) Provide employment to unskilled labor
4) Reducing the ownership at workplace
5) To avoid union problems
Everything has changed with time. Earlier, when you are employed in an organization, you are considered to be permanent. There was no term like permanent, temporary & contract. These are the inventions by the great HR leaders. This helped in increasing the profits of business many times but improper of execution of systems will have adverse effects as faced by maruti .

Changes in the society
 The meaning of work has changed along with changes in the society. During ancient Greeks and Romans, work was simply a curse. In primitive Christianity, work had little intrinsic value or importance, but was instrumental in promoting health of body and soul. But later development conceded that work is a form of service to God, now work is considered as the social status by which you are recognized in the society. The kind of employer and the work what we do also adds value to your social respect.
In the case of an Employer, he is not only expected to work, need to follow the core values of the business, which is the indirect driver of the business. Values can be defined as generalized and social desirability of modes of conduct. The value concept is a powerful one because it can be meaningfully employed at all levels of social analysis – cultural, societal, institutional, organizational, group and individual. Values can have a major impact on how employees approach their work and on their feelings about their jobs and the organization itself and consequently influence the work culture of the organization.
Economy has pushed the employer to behave different:
 In the growing economy like India the main focus of the business is to increase its productivity and expand its profitability. In general most of the industries in manufacturing sector are driven by production. However, productivity, especially in the short term is decisively affected by the employee’s attitude towards work, which in turn is clearly determined by the manner in which their work places are organized and run by management. This is mainly because of the change in focus from Man to machine by which they are lagging in human factors at work place, which may lead to adverse effects in future.
The organization is brainy enough to find out all the possible way to reduce the cost , they introduced the concept of temporary labor, which has became the real threat to organization in long run .In few industries the % of temporary workmen has increased more than 50% ,few rough side of using temporary workmen and their effects to organization are ,
1)      They are paid much less than the regular employee’s-this would lead to inequality ,since two groups of people are doing the same activity but one gets paid higher than the other as a result they are tend to have negative attitude towards work .
2)      Lack of Job security and ownership – Apart from the bias shown in terms of compensation system, contract workers have no job security and they don’t even get basic benefits like gratuity, provident fund and health insurance.
 Here-in lies the importance of work culture and values in the organizations. A developing economy like India can achieve its peak of advancement if it can increase its Productivity appreciably and not at the cost of human values.
Taking in to consideration of Maruti which had faced a huge Industrial relation failure causing a loss of over Rs2500 crore for the company. The main objectives of IR are,
A.      To safeguard the interest of labor and management by securing the highest level of mutual understanding and good-will among all those sections in the industry which participate in the process of production.
B.      B. To avoid industrial conflict or strife and develop harmonious relations, which are an essential factor in the productivity of workers and the industrial progress of a country.
They failed to achieve both the objectives.
The main cause of labour problem in MSIL is because of the following reasons,
1)      Cultural difference
2)      Organization structure
3)      Temporary workmen selection
Cultural difference:
Maruti has a blend of both Indian and Japanese culture and they claim to have the positives of both the culture, manesar being a new plant it claimed to have dominated influence of Japanese culture. Though they may claim to manage well but practically Indian and Japanese culture are far apart. Their sense of discipline, dedication, working hours, punctuality and expectations are completely different.
As reported by many HR leaders this cultural difference has triggered the problem . but according to me there many organization who follow that culture and able to manage their workforce in a much better way e.g TVS,FORD,SUNDARAM FASTERNERS and there many organization who tried to implement the same but failed to maintain the peace at workplace .Eg ASHOK LEYLAND,TITAN ,PRICOL and many more.
Its not the culture wihich caused the problem. Even here it’s the execution of the system which failed.  

Organization structure:
                Cost and wages is continuously increasing and running the business profitable is a tough task .every company is finding out ways to reduce the operating cost and improve productivity, maruti found its way through temporary workmen. Maruti has temporary workmen strength of more than 50%. Though this can lead to huge cost saving but it may also lead to this kind of disastrous incident leading to huge loss for the organization. Temporary workmen and the regular employee do the same work but they have a huge wage disparity causing disputes inside the organization.
Temporary workmen selection:
People of Haryana have seen a dramatic transformation in the way of living .Land prices have increased as gurgaon has become the industrial hub by which people have become rich overnight selling their lands. Blue collar workers who came from these region lacked tolerance and aggressive in their expectations and even in the way they approached management. Generally people who come for temporary job are the one who struggle for livelihood due to this mismatch organization maruti suffered lot of conflicts and demand raised by them were beyond expectation.
Poor wage hikes and increasing inflation has triggered them further, resulting in an impatient and violence attack in the industry causing a huge personal and infrastructure loss to the organization.