Corporate India is not up to the mark !

Mumbai: At a time when leisure time physical activity — or LTPA, as it is increasingly being called — is emerging as the global mantra for health, urban India seems clued out. A new survey suggests that one of the reasons that Corporate India is sluggish could be the poor levels of physical activity among its white-collar workforce. About 60% of the 17,000 corporate employees who participated in the pan-India survey admitted to exercising three times a week and that, too, for less than 30 minutes at a stretch. The benefit of a brisk walk or the power of 10,000 steps daily in shaping one’s health is clearly not popular as yet here. 

    

In corporate India, the daily step count rarely crosses 3,000. “The average number of steps that urban Indians take would be between 2,500 and 3,000, especially if they don’t take the public transport that entails walking across bridges and platforms,” said Dr Aashish Contractor, a preventive cardiologist at Asian Heart Institute in Bandra Kurla Complex. LTPA is different from a planned exercise regimen. Instead of pumping iron, the World Health Organisation has said people can be healthy by being active — like walking briskly, skipping and swimming— for up to 30 minutes every day. A study in Lancet recently estimated that inactivity caused 6 to 10% of all deaths from major non-communicable diseases such as coronary heart disease, type 2 diabetes, and breast and colon cancers.

WORKOUT JOURNAL 

• Over 60% exercise 3 days a week Over 58% exercise for less than 30 minutes a day 
• Over 77% take less than 10,000 steps a day* 
• Over 43% are sitting for 8 hours or more a day Over 44% rate their sleep as less than restful 94% eat less than 3 pieces of fruit a day 84% eat less than 3 servings of vegetables a day 

*10,000 steps = 6.4 km (approx) 

*17,000 respondents polled across 8 Indian cities 

HEALTH MATTERS Not even 5k steps a day? Sedentary life 

It showed that inactivity caused 5.3% of the 57 million deaths that occurred worldwide in 2008. The idea of underlining the problem was to show that the solution was simple: increase in leisure time physical activity. “Research has shown that leisure time physical activity is beneficial for all,” said Dr Contractor. In fact, the journal of the American College of Sports Medicine has categorized people on the basis of the number of steps they take: people who take less than 5,000 steps a day are sedentary, those who take between 5,000 and 7,500 are low on activity, those taking between 7,500 and 10,000 are somewhat active and the active ones take between 10,000 and 12,000 steps a day. In the 60s, Japanese walking clubs adopted a local pedometer’s nickname for their product —manpo-kei (translated as ten thousand step meter) — as the standard. The Japanese mantra of 10,000 steps a day translates into walking 6.4 km a day. The survey shows as much: 77% of the respondents admitted that they fail to take more than 10,000 steps a day. The reason is not hard to find: around 43% confessed to sitting for eight hours or more a day. Moreover, while doctors say five servings of vegetables and fruits daily can keep heart diseases at bay, the corporate sector is not a follower. Around 94% said they ate less than “3 pieces of fruit” a day and 84% said they ate less than 3 servings of vegetables. 

The Lancet’s special issue on physical activity just ahead of the London Olympics said physical activity is a neglected dimension of prevention and intervention worldwide, especially in low- and middle-income nations. “One problem is that physical activity is often perceived only in the context of controlling obesity.”

Article Credits: Malathy Iyer TNN, Snippets from an article that appeared in the Times of India FP, Mumbai.

Fostering Creativity @ Work

It's a fact that a lot of us work long hours... sometimes six days a week. And then we go to sleep! Which means that majority of the time we are awake is spent in our little cubicle (or a corner office if you have one). Here’s to the thought that the right environment at work goes a long way in fostering creativity and ensuring that organizations have a happy & engaged workforce. After all, if most of the time that we are awake is spent at office, why should that space be boring?

Research shows that staff performs better when they’re happily engaged at work and this includes the environment they work in. An office with interesting and creatively done interiors is a compelling reason for people to be able to think out of the box. The right environment pushes employees to think of possibilities, gives them new perspectives to look at things which, is the stepping stone towards innovation and fresh ideas. What if one day, you walk into office and find that the chairs in your meeting room have disappeared? Instead, you find an XBox and a few bean bags or couches? Makes you go WOW right?

It also makes you want to come to work the next day knowing that you are not entering a 'cube farm' or for that matter a dull place. In a market as competitive as ours, if fresh ideas and innovation is the key to success, then the environment in which ideas are developed goes a long way in ensuring this. A cool workspace does more than just take more pictures at work. In fact it can de-stress you (after rush hour traffic) and even inspire you to come up with solutions that work :) 

The 10 Commandments !

No matter the size of your company, having a team of motivated employees is critical to your business success. There are 10 simple ways to ensure your team is enthused, productive and ready to give their all.

Build a foundation: It’s important to build a rock-solid foundation for your employees so they feel invested in the company. Tell them about the history of the business and your vision for the future. Ask them about their expectations and career goals, as well as how you can help them feel like a part of the team. Create a positive environment: Promote an office atmosphere that makes all employees feel worthwhile and important. Keep office doors open, and let folks know they can always approach you with questions or concerns. After all, a happy office is a productive office. Put people on the right path: Most employees are looking for advancement opportunities within their own company. Work with each of them to develop a career growth plan that takes into consideration both their current skills and their future goals. Educate the masses: Help employees improve their professional skills by providing on-the-job training or in-house career development. Allow them to attend workshops and seminars related to the industry. Encourage them to attend adult education classes paid for by the company. Employees will feel you are investing in them, and this will translate into improved job performance. Fun factor: Once in a while, put your work aside and do something nice for the people who work for you. Treat the office to a pizza lunch or take everyone to the movies. These little diversions can go a long way toward improving productivity. Acknowledgement matters: You can make a huge difference in employee morale by simply taking the time to recognize each employee’s contributions and accomplishments, large or small. Be generous with praise. Give out incentives: Offer incentives, either with something small like a gift certificate or something more substantial such as a performance based bonus or salary increase. Also, give out awards such as “Employee of the Month”. Such tokens of appreciation will go far in motivating employees. Deliver what you promise: Getting people to give their all requires following through on promises. If you tell an employee that they will be considered for a bonus if numbers improve or productivity increases, you’d better put your money where your mouth is. Failure to follow through on promises will result in a loss of trust. Helping hand: Help employees reach the next level professionally by providing on-site coaching. Bring in professionals to provide one-on-one counselling, which can help people learn how to overcome personal or professional obstacles on their career paths. Make the right match: You can improve employee motivation by improving employee confidence. Assign individuals with tasks you know they will enjoy or will be particularly good at. An employee who is successful at one thing will have the self-confidence to tackle other projects with renewed energy and excitement.

Source: Allbusiness.com , Expresscomputeronline.com , ET Special Issue, Nov 2011.

The Mera Workspace Contest !

                                 Click on the contest poster to submit your entry ! 
© Never Grow Up. All Rights Reserved. 

Preoccupations : Trust Evidence !

Preoccupations : Trust Evidence for Effective Management

Failure to consider sound evidence repeatedly inflicts unnecessary damage on employee well-being & group performance

Consider this hypothetical situation: You have a serious illness. Your doctor prescribes an intrusive, painful and costly treatment. What she doesn’t say — because she hasn't consulted the research — is that most studies find the treatment ineffective and fraught with negative side effects. You go through the procedure, which doesn’t work. You later find the research your doctor failed to consult. When you ask why, she answers: “Who pays attention to studies? I have years of clinical experience. Besides, the protocol seemed as if it ought to work.” Does that sound like malpractice? It does to us. Fortunately, pressures to practice evidence-based medicine are reducing preventable errors. That isn’t the case, however, in most workplaces, where failure to consider sound evidence repeatedly inflicts unnecessary damage on employee well- being and group performance. It doesn’t have to be that way. Consider the issue of incentive pay. Many people believe that paying for performance will work in virtually any organization, so it is used again and again to solve problems — even where evidence shows it is ineffective. As The New York Times reported in July, a study found that the effort to link incentive pay to student performance “had no positive effect on either student performance or teachers’ attitudes.” But that bad news could have been predicted long before spending all that time and money. After all, the failure of similar efforts to improve school performance has been documented for decades. 

Here is another example: Research has shown that stable membership is a hallmark of effective work teams. People with more experience, working together, typically communicate and coordinate more effectively. Although this effect is seen in studies of everything from product development teams to airplane cockpit crews, managers often can’t resist the temptation to rotate people in and out to minimize costs and make scheduling easier. 

Another workplace danger is excessive self-confidence, which can help people rise to positions of power but can also render them less effective leaders. Overconfident decision-makers use a practice that is ineffective for most others — but they believe they are so talented that the usual findings don’t apply to them. In medicine, the evidence-based movement arose in response to thousands of deaths and billions of wasted dollars that could have been averted by applying proven practices. Similarly, in other fields, the growing pile of studies on the human and financial costs of employee disengagement, management distrust, poor group dynamics, faulty incentive schemes and other preventable damage suggests a need for an evidence-based management movement. Some organizations are leading the way. It’s time for many more to follow suit. 

Jeffrey Pfeffer and Robert Sutton are professors at Stanford : The New York Times / Condensed from the ET Mumbai 13 Sept.

Insights into WLB & Gen Y

Balance it right!

• A startling 85% of recruiters say that candidates turn down job offers from employers that aren’t work-life balance-friendly. According to a work-life balance survey 80 per cent of executives say that work-life balance as a parameter plays a vital role during the job search process. 
• Work-life balance today directly impacts the retention of top executive talent. An unhealthy work-life balance leads to increased stress, strain on personal relationships and a lack of personal fulfilment. All of these factors will push executives towards greener pastures. Other aspects like compensation and perks are of a transactional nature. 
• According to some, the degree at which work-life balance influences the decision of a job-seeker is closely linked to one’s age and the nature of the role the employee has chosen to perform. 
• According to the AESC survey, two-thirds of companies are developing programmes to help top candidates boost their family time without sacrificing their careers.

Making it work :) 

• Time-out: It is an efficient tool by which every employee is given an opportunity to choose time-out during work hours.This can be followed on a daily/weekly basis depending on the nature of the business. An employee can take 30-45 minutes of time-out to read, listen to music, play an indoor game, take a nap, exercise, practice yoga, watch a movie, etc. But at the same time, the employee must be within the company premises at a dedicated space allocated to pursue such activities. 
• Child care: It’s necessary to develop a children’s programme for working mothers/fathers wherein companies need to invest in a separate space where a working parent can spend time with their kid/kids during work hours. A progressive firm needs to make arrangements w.r.t school pick-up/drop and other basic amenities in the form of indoor games, stationary, food, etc. 
• Personalize your workspace: The offices are likely to provide much more than just a cubicle. You will find the office space designed to take care of employees’ “needs” beyond work. 
• Work-exchange: Creating a “trading place” where employees can opt to pursue something that they aspire to pursue (read: hobby) will foster positive results. 

How Gen Y today defines and perceives work-life balance?

• The Gen Y job-seeker has different priorities/aspirations. Experts say that besides a good salary, they show concern w.r.t flexible working. “While compensation, career growth, importance of the task performed, etc are important, work-life balance assures employees that they will work in a conducive environment"
• “The whole phenomenon of ‘my own space’ seems to be the flavour of the day, especially for Gen Y,” According to a recent study across Asia Pacific, work-life balance is the single largest contributor to the Gen Y group of employees who are anticipating a change in their career in the next five years. 
• On being asked the reason for not having aspirations to advance to an executive position, they again attributed as the impact it would have on their work-life balance as the prime reason. 

This post is a series of snippets from the ascent and various other reports that has been compiled to share insights into work life balance, looking at things that work and managing a young a vibrant workforce in the years to come ! 

Pay Not the First Priority Anymore?

Would you nix a high-paying job offer if it fails to assure career growth opportunities? According to a recent survey, the modern-day job-seeker is doing just that...

India Inc today is a fragment of an ever-changing corporate scenario and as its dynamics evolve, employees and job-seekers find their aspirations and incentives shifting. Mercer’s ‘What’s Working’ survey validates that out of 13 possible reward elements, Indian respondents say that career advancement is their most important reward element. Base pay is the second-most important followed by training opportunities. “Reward points in today’s scenario get far more complicated than the good old days, where you would have a son coming home to his parents with a box of sweets, proclaiming his salary hike, followed by the entire family breaking into a song and dance of how their lives have changed for good. Today’s youth demands are more focussed, planned and diverse. A macro point of view for reward schemes seems quite simple and can be generalised, but as you look closer, rewards need to be personalised and customised to suit needs and desires.”

So, what is it that makes career advancement the most sought-after reward element? 

“In a hyper-growth environment, ‘growth’ is the mantra for business success. For an employee, their organisation or manager working with them on a career development plan is imperative to their personal and professional growth. From an organisation’s perspective, career advancement is important for retention as also for attracting talented employees to the workplace. It increases employee engagement levels as well.” 

    

“Career advancement is one way in which employees believe that they can stay relevant. It ensures that employees can keep up with the changes. The age at which one becomes obsolete and redundant is decreasing. Hence, rather than chasing basic pay, employees understand the need to be relevant and have a ‘career’.” After career advancement and base pay, the third most sought-after career incentive was training opportunities, thus revealing that India Inc employees don’t just aspire to accomplish a good career, but also want to get better at what they do. 

Consequently, whether the bait for climbing up the corporate ladder is training opportunities, career advancement incentives or basic pay, one cannot refute the fact that India Inc today is more motivated than ever to be on top of their game. 

Condensed from the Times Ascent 07 September 2011

Help Employees Balance Home & Office

Stress At Work

Help Employees Balance Home and Office

Win-win situation: Employees who can balance roles are likely to be more productive and less stressed

How many times have we had a colleague at work who is bogged down by stress, not directly linked to workplace? Ira Mohanty was one such colleague. She woke up at 5 am, sent her two children to school and then by 9 am, was at her laptop answering mails and attending to work-related calls. From 1 pm onwards, Ira kept looking at the clock and from 2.30 pm, we could hear raised voices from her cubicle as she called home and shouted at her children who just kept watching television and did not finish their homework. They were home with easy-going grandparents and did their own thing till the parents returned home. And Ira is not alone. At the water cooler or in the cafeteria and even in the lift, one hears snatches of conversation on these lines: Kids these days are so opinionated… only does what she wants to do… eats only chips and noodles… refuses to dress by herself or polish her shoes… hates going to school… spends too much time on the net… has become a virtual stranger… difficult and moody… and so on. 

More and more parents are coping with the challenges of how to manage professional and personal lives — how to be better parents, how to stay abreast of what is happening with their children in schools and their social lives, how to be there for them in their time of need while juggling their careers and job-related challenges. All of us grapple with balancing multiple roles but our biggest responsibility is towards the next generation. Being a parent, I could empathise with them, but the enormity of the issue came to light last month when in a focused group discussion, the members of our Global Work Life (GWL) team broached the subject of having parenting workshops to help colleagues and other employees cope with different issues. These issues stemmed from the fact that most employees have nuclear families where care givers may not be part of the family system. The findings of the 2010 Global Work Life Issues (GWLI) Survey, conducted among IBM employees, indicate that almost half (46%) of IBM India employees have a child under the age of 18. Among parents of children 0-5 years old, 12% have their child cared for at home by a nanny, babysitter or maid. 

Another 14% of these parents have their child cared for by a relative (other than their spouse or partner). "In-home" care by a maid or nanny can be quite flexible and affordable, but may also be very unreliable and of poor quality. Caregivers often lack knowledge of child development and have poor social-relationship and literacy skills. Parents using this type of care reported the lowest satisfaction rates in the GWLI survey compared to parents whose child was cared for by a relative or in a child care centre. Employees across the world are sharing similar concerns about managing work and family. Magazines and the Internet provide information and counsel, elders at home advise you differently while friends have a totally contrary opinion. 

So how do you cope? We put together a panel of experts in child care and decided to host parenting workshops for parents to address their queries and discuss issues relating to their children. The workshops stressed that it is equal responsibility, which means both the father and the mother have to be involved in child rearing, as against the misconception that only the mother is responsible. What parents at work learned were different aspects of quality parenting, like laughing with the child, spending time with the child, playing with her/him, listening to what the child has to say and not just existing together in front of the television set. Care givers must also be equipped with basic information to handle difficult situations at home. Employees who can balance roles are likely to be more productive and less stressed, so it is a win-win both for the organisation and the individual. A workplace that encourages an individual to balance different roles is likely to have a happier and more productive workforce. 

The author is Diversity Manager at IBM India, South Asia Source : ET Mumbai 06 September 2011

What your HR will never tell you Directly !

About your Resume!

1. “Once you’re unemployed more than six months, you’re considered pretty much unemployable. We assume that other people have already passed you over, so we don’t want anything to do with you.” –Cynthia Shapiro, Author

2. “When it comes to getting a job, who you know really does matter. No matter how nice your résumé is or how great your experience may be, it’s all about connections.” –HR director at a health-care facility.

3. “If you’re trying to get a job at a specific company, often the best thing to do is to avoid HR entirely. Find someone at the company you know, or go straight to the hiring manager.” –Shauna Moerke, an HR administrator

4. “People assume someone’s reading their cover letter. I haven’t read one in 11 years.” –HR director at a financial services firm

5. “We will judge you based on your e-mail address. Especially if it’s something inappropriate like kinkyboots101@hotmail.com or johnnylikestodrink@gmail.com.” –Rich DeMatteo,

6. “There’s a myth out there that a résumé has to be one page. So people send their résumé in a two-point font. Nobody is going to read that.” –HR director at a financial services firm

7. “I always read résumés from the bottom up. And I have no problem with a two-page résumé, but three pages is pushing it.” –Sharlyn Lauby, HR consultant

8. “Most of us use applicant-tracking systems that scan résumés for key words. The secret to getting your résumé through the system is to pull key words directly from the job description and put them on. The more matches you have, the more likely your résumé will get picked and actually seen by a real person.” –Chris Ferdinandi, HR professional

About the Job Interview!

1. “It’s amazing when people come in for an interview and say, ‘Can you tell me about your business?’ Seriously, people. There’s an Internet. Look it up.” –HR professional

2. “A lot of managers don’t want to hire people with young kids, and they use all sorts of tricks to find that out, illegally. One woman kept a picture of two really cute children on her desk even though she didn’t have children [hoping job candidates would ask about them]. Another guy used to walk people out to their car to see whether they had car seats.” –Cynthia Shapiro,

3. “Is it harder to get the job if you’re fat? Absolutely. Hiring managers make quick judgments based on stereotypes.  They’re just following George Clooney’s character in Up in the Air, who said ‘I stereotype. It’s faster.’” –Suzanne Lucas, a former HR executive

4. “I once had a hiring manager who refused to hire someone because the job required her to be on call one weekend a month and she had talked in the interview about how much she goes to church. Another candidate didn’t get hired because the manager was worried that the car he drove wasn’t nice enough.” –HR professional at a midsize firm

5. “Don’t just silence your phone for the interview. Turn it all the way off.” –Sharlyn Lauby, HR consultant

6. “If you’ve got a weak handshake, I make a note of it.” –HR manager 

7. “If you’re a candidate and the hiring manager spends 45 minutes talking about himself, the company or his Harley, let him. He’s going to come out of the interview saying you’re a great candidate.”  –Kris Dunn, chief human resources officer

[Condensed from Reader’s Digest Magazine, April 2011] 

Work Place Festivities !

WORKPLACE FESTIVITIES

Festivals have become a big part of the office culture nowadays. In the first of the two-part series, Mithila Mehta explores how organisations today celebrate festivals, outlining the professional implications. India is a country that loves its festivals and this sentiment extends to the workplace as well. Most organisations celebrate festive occasions with all the rituals and traditions in an extremely enthusiastic manner. "My organisation celebrates all major festivals, right from Holi to Eid, Parsi New Year, Christmas and Diwali. The HR department does an excellent job planning the festivities," says Suruchi Baliga, a journalist. Apart from the traditional celebrations, organisations are organising festivals in innovative ways. "Last year, we had a secret santa game at work. Everyone was assigned a colleague and you had to be his/ her secret santa for a week," shares Seema Koshi, a media research analyst. 

Today, occasions like Valentine's Day are also being celebrated. "On Valentine's Day, we had a red dress code. There were huge heart-shaped decorations, and the canteen made heart shaped cakes. It was meticulously done," recalls Baliga. Koshi shares how her organisation celebrates Children's Day by asking employees to bring their young ones to work. "Last year, we had about fifty kids at the office. We played games, saw an animated movie and had a party," she says. 

DASH OF COLOUR 

Festive celebrations at workplace are most welcome because they provide a respite from the routine. "Let's face it; office does tend to get monotonous at times. Festivals add a dash of fun and colour. It gives us something to look forward to," says Bharat Ramanujan, senior copywriter at an ad agency. For the organisation, festive celebrations can go a long way in building a happy, positive corporate culture. This is important in today's context, when organisations are more people-focussed than ever before. Says Samay Taneja, HR manager with an IT solutions company, "We get an opportunity to bond with our employees in a more informal setting.” Interestingly, the globalised nature of organisations is also reflected in the festivals and events being celebrated. "A few years ago, the focus was only on Indian festivals and ceremonies. However, now international days like St Patrick's Day, the year of the rabbit and the Chinese new year is celebrated,” informs Ramanujan. 

BREAKING BARRIERS 

Festive celebrations at the workplace help break existing hierarchies and boundaries. "This is one of the few occasions when people let their guard down and are willing to mingle. The entire mood is light and laidback. The usual office rules don't apply, and everyday dynamics are ignored," expresses Upasana Jain, risk analyst at a FMCG company. Agrees Baliga, "The entire organisational hierarchy is suspended. You can simply go up to the CEO and wish him. It is the perfect networking opportunity. Not only is the upper management approachable and 'around', but you have a perfect reason to strike up a conversation." At most workplaces, employees rarely get an opportunity to interact with colleagues from other departments. Festive occasions allow that as well. "We tend to become very comfortable in our own departments, forgetting to consider the organisation as a whole. So when there's a festival, it feels really nice to have everyone together. The same finance guys who I bicker with everyday are singing and dancing with me,” laughs Koshi. 

WE'VE GOT TALENT 

Festive occasions are also a chance to shed the sober and serious office appearance. It is also a platform to showcase some of your talents at the workplace. "I make the most intricately beautiful rangolis. So, during the Diwali celebrations, I offered to make a rangoli for my office. Colleagues, who had never spoken to me before, got to know me," says Jain. If you're an excellent organiser, help plan the event. If you cook well, carry some festive goodies to work. In this manner, festivals needn't just be about the holidays they bring, but also about fun at the work place.

[Mumbai Mirror, August 29,2011]