DNA: How small-town grads are getting to improve employability quotient

Friday, Jan 21, 2011, 3:03 IST 

By Priyanka Golikeri 

Chandan Singh was desperate. It had been a while since he left his village in Bihar after completing basic education and landed in Delhi to upgrade his skills so as to bag a decent job.

But despite shelling out Rs45,000 for a course in networking, he had not been able to secure a job that could help cover both his study expenses and daily expenditure.

All he got was a technical support job in a shop selling computer products, for a paltry Rs2,500 per month. Nobody was ready to hire him for a higher package, primarily because of his inability to speak English.

“The pay was not even sufficient to make ends meet in a city like Delhi, forget covering study expenses. All big employers look for English speaking skills,” reminisces Singh.

Having studied in a Hindi medium school in a village in Seetamadhi district, where not one soul spoke English, he could hardly do better.

“People in my place speak Bhojpuri. If I were to break away from the chain of working in sugarcane farms like people back home, I had to build my English quotient and get other skills required in corporate houses.”

As luck would have it, through some acquaintances, Singh found out about a three-month course addressing his requirements. “From Monday to Saturday, for eight hours everyday, trainers helped me enhance my grammar, diction, vocabulary and confidence.”

That course helped him get job offers from firms like Omnia BPO, WNS, IndiGo Airlines, for salaries upwards of Rs9,000 per month. For the last few months, he has been with BPO firm Intelenet Global Services, earning Rs17,000 a month, which he says is a big jump over the meagre amount earned in the shop.

Like Singh, a course in English and corporate etiquette helped MBA student Raghu Rampal get two campus offers from a leading private sector bank and a FMCG company for Rs2.4 lakh a year each.

Just some months ago, Rampal had no knowledge absolutely of how to approach an interview, what to expect from the job, or the importance of corporate decorum.

He feels he could get two job offers only because of the training in English communication and soft skills etc offered in his institute.

“In Jalandhar, English is hardly spoken. So even though I studied in English, conversing in that language is a bit tough. Moreover, corporate etiquette and mannerisms are something we small-towners lack. So this training in college really helped,” says Rampal, who is studying at the City Institute of Management Studies in Jalandhar.

Singh and Rampal are among several youngsters pursuing courses in management, engineering, pharmacy, commerce and hospitality, etc, in places such as Trichy, Shillong, Malda and Moga, who are getting trained to improve their employability quotient.

Every job needs communication with other people and employers are interested in workers who can express themselves clearly, says Deepak Kaistha, CEO, Planman Consulting, an HR firm.

“The lack of basic skills is a serious issue and can be traced to the poor quality of education in rural India.”

Indeed, even in good institutes in small towns, students find it tough to speak English and are clueless about corporate culture, say experts.

“They have no idea how to answer in a job interview, as there is very limited exposure,” says Nivedita Murkhute, who is currently training students at the Manav Rachna International University in Faridabad.

Such training is essential in imbibing a sense of responsibility towards one’s profession and motivation amongst students, says M K B Bhatia, placement head and coordinator, Lala Lajpat Rai Institute of Engineering and Technology in Moga, which is 60 km from the Pakistan border in Punjab.

“It’s a part of our timetable and we hold internal assessments and give marks so that students take it seriously,” says Bhatia.

According to him, the training was started a year ago for about 600-700 students, and the feedback from students so far has been encouraging.

The training centres around soft skills, apart from English communication, industry skills, personality development, all of which help increase the employability quotient, says Amit Bhatia, CEO of Aspire Human Capital Management, a firm providing such training since July 2007.

Aspire, from where Singh and Rampal got their training, aims to train 1 million students from around 100 small towns in Meghalaya, Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Punjab, Haryana and Jammu & Kashmir annually, beginning 2015-16.

“In 2009-10, we had trained 12,000 students and we aim to close this financial year by training 30,000 students. Every year, we will treble the number of students,” says Bhatia.

Aspire doesn’t have training centres of its own. Rather, it sends its trainers to colleges that are interested in partaking of this activity and impart training to the students.

“Till now, of the total students we have trained, about 60% are from engineering, 30% from management and the rest from pharmacy, hospitality and commerce. Post-training, we often bring employers to the institutes,” says Bhatia.

According to him, the training costs the company about `8,000 per student, which is paid by the colleges, which in turn collect the money from the students as part of their fees. 

The Hindu: Skill Thrill

The need for soft skills is growing, its demand rising. After techies  and the police, the army is looking at soft skills training as an essential tool to enhance job-prospects post-retirement.

SHALINI SHAH

NEW DELHI, January 19, 2011

The Indian Army and Microsoft come together to help jawans face post-retirement life with more skill and confidence

Retirement can be a mixed blessing. Depending on when and from what, it's either a well-earned break after decades of slogging it out or a jump from one kind of effort to another. For jawans of the Indian Army, whose average retirement age is between 38 and 42 years, retirement normally means being hauled back into a job market they chose to keep out of two decades ago.

To address the issue, the Indian Army joined hands with Microsoft in what is known as ‘Project Kshamta', wherein jawans are trained in basic IT skills, spoken English and soft skills. It's been a year since the launch and the third batch of ‘students' had their convocation ceremony at the Army Dental Centre recently.

Karan Bajwa, General Manager - Public Sector, Microsoft India, says the concept for the Indian Army was because of the Army adopting IT in a big way. “A lot of IT projects are happening in the Indian Army. And ultimately these projects have to touch soldiers in some way; they are the final users of technology. They have to use the devices, the applications.” A few questions arose about the need to train people who start seeking jobs well into their forties. Could they be trained in IT as well as spoken English and soft skills? On aspects like how to make a resume, how to prepare for an interview, how to lead a life outside this environment, which is “secure” in its own way.

Soon, a curriculum of 110 hours was created, comprising 30 hours of IT, 80 hours of spoken English and soft skills training. Aiding Microsoft in the training was IndiaCan, a joint initiative of Educomp and Pearson India, with British Council chipping in with the English language module.

The IT module took off from the very basics of computers, “ultimately leading them to a digital lifestyle.”

Central to spreading the influence of the programme was the ‘train the trainer' model. They started with training 1,000 trainers across 47 institutes of the Indian Army in 2010.

“Ultimately, the goal is to create a set of 2,000 trainers; then these people will train the next set and this goes further down the line.” He adds 1,500 personnel have been trained so far, with these going on to train others — a total of 3,200 till date.

Lt. General Mukesh Sabharwal of the Indian Army says identifying jawans who would undergo training was the key.

“A majority is in the infantry, artillery and armour. These are the boys who get in after finishing class X or XII at best. So we realised that English training would be important. We also have a fairly large number out of our 12-lakh-strong Army who are educated; they are graduates who have a fair knowledge of IT. We picked these people, got them together.” Also, personnel likely to retire soon are targeted immediately.

Getting down to plain numbers, he says, “The Dental Corps has only 900-odd people in the entire corps. Forty are already trained as master trainers, so the ratio is quite good. The other places, like the infantry, have 3.5 lakh people and we have something like 300 trainers, so the ratio is large. So those are the areas we have to work on.”

But to what extent can the course attain its objective, when the training is basic and doesn't offer avenues of specialisation? “When a person carries a certificate from Microsoft and from British Council, it does carry weight. It doesn't guarantee a job, but it surely improves the prospects. Even if you can make a difference of a couple of thousands of rupees in their per-month earnings, we'll achieve what we wanted to,” Bajwa replies.

Raj Ranjan and Santosh Kumar are two people who've just received their ‘master trainer' certificates at the convocation. While Ranjan hails from Bihar's Muzaffarpur district, Kumar belongs to Ara.

Citing an example of how Project Kshamta would be of use to him, Ranjan, who is also doing second year of Sociology says, “In dentistry, there is a software called Dentisoft, which we use to enter patient particulars and treatment information. Due to lack of computer knowledge we were unable to do that and usually took the help of colleagues trained in computers. Now I'm self-sufficient. I also teach my colleagues because I know. I'm a master trainer. And I know how to teach.”

Kumar, on the other hand, joined the Army 15 years ago and is an Economics graduate. He is glad that he can now visit a village and deliver lectures with confidence.

An apt cartoon - power of (mis)communication!

This is funny, yet apt...

Knowledge@Wharton: Finding Money for Innovation: Develop Those People Skills

Published: January 07, 2009 in Knowledge@Wharton

Innovations typically involve trial, error and outright failure before turning into successful products or services. Thomas Edison, for example, conducted approximately 10,000 failed experiments before perfecting the incandescent light bulb. For decades, leading businesses have willingly shouldered the expense and the risk of innovating as the price of staying ahead of competitors.

But innovating has become a lot tougher lately, according to a panel of technology experts who recently spoke at the University of Pennsylvania's Executive Master's in Technology Management program. With R&D budgets shrinking and markets retrenching in a worldwide economic crisis, the panelists noted, technologists will need more than lab expertise to convince their employers to keep the research funding spigots open. 

Indeed, the ability to communicate well and other "soft skills" are just as important as technological expertise when it comes to selling new ideas to investors or senior management, suggested several members of the panel, which was titled "Street-Smart Innovation to Align Emerging Technology and Business." In addition, future scientists, researchers and program managers should focus on aligning innovative projects with company goals. As panelist Nicholas D. Evans, vice president of the innovation division at Unisys, pointed out, it's much easier to justify budgets for speculative projects that show an obvious commercial benefit to the parent company.

That lesson became painfully obvious this past summer to employees of the storied Bell Labs research group, based in northern New Jersey. Alcatel-Lucent, owner of Bell Labs, all but gutted much of the non-commercial "basic research" performed by the lab. The product of a rocky 2006 merger, struggling Alcatel-Lucent sought to align Bell Labs' operations more closely with the parent's commercial interests in wireless, optics, networking and computer science.

So, how do organizational entrepreneurs keep innovation alive in companies looking to slash costs? And how do start-ups and growth companies attract investors when the rest of the economy is melting? That's another place where those soft skills come in handy. Several of the panelists suggested that while technical people are generally not known for soft skills, those individuals who desire funding to continue their work would do well to acquire them. 

Suzanne Taylor, portfolio director of corporate operations for Unisys, pointed out that budget handlers are also more inclined to favor innovation if it can be shown to cut costs. Innovation department heads must become adept at "making the case for maximizing productivity and reducing waste," Taylor said. This requires excellent communication skills, she added, including the fine art of schmoozing. And the higher up the case is made, the better for the innovator, added Sanjoy Ray, director of global application engineering for pharmaceutical giant Merck. "Executive sponsorship is very powerful. It provides 'air cover.'"Anthony P. Green, a vice president with first-round funding group Ben Franklin Technology Partners, said he frequently sees entrepreneurs stumble because they lack such skills. All too often, entrepreneurs come across as rude, dismissive and disrespectful to audiences of potential investors, thereby "infuriating the investment community." Panelist Eric F. Bernstein, a laser surgeon, dermatologist and technology entrepreneur, echoed that point. "Business is all about relationships. They need to like your idea, but they also need to like you." 

From Nanotech to Alternative Energy

The panelists agreed that amid the ruins of the current economy lie vast opportunities. The question is: Where?  

Bernstein, who is involved as an investor in four companies, said a huge opportunity exists in digitizing and networking medical information. Medicine is a final frontier for information technology as paper records contribute to the escalating costs and delays of healthcare. Green also sees possibilities in nanotechnology, which involves engineering at the atomic level. Some products have already come to market, but the technology has yet to reach its commercial promise. Bioethicists have noted that nanotech presents a host of as-yet unanswered questions, including the issue of what it will mean to be human if, as predicted, "nanobots" are developed to attack disease and enhance performance. "If [nanotechnology] is really as disruptive as biotech was, it will make a big difference," said Green, a self-described "veteran of the biotech wars."

Alternative energy, which had been gaining steam in 2008, has been undermined as an investment because the global slowdown has resulted in lower prices for traditional fossil fuels, the panelists said. That makes alternative energy projects tougher to justify to jittery lenders, who bank on the projects being cost competitive with fuels such as oil and natural gas. "The ills of Western banks mean, inevitably, that the supply of debt finance for wind farms, solar parks, biofuel plants and the like will be less plentiful, and more expensive, in the months ahead than it has been in the last two years," notes a recent report by New Energy Finance, a research firm that covers the deal-making environment for renewable energy projects. On the other hand, President-elect Barack Obama has pledged to devote much of his economic stimulus plan to investments in green technologies.

But in times like these, is there any money for enterprising business people with superb ideas in these fields? Are angels and venture capitalists still in the game? Green conceded that "it's brutal" for those seeking early stage, non-seed funding. "No one is funding at the $1 million level," he said. The problem surfacing right now is that full-blown venture capital groups want to deal only with requests in the $6 million to $8 million range. "Not everybody needs or wants that" amount to get a business to the next stage, he said.

Where the Toys Are

Jim Senior, a speechwriter for Unisys who was the panel moderator, noted that cost-conscious executives might want to carefully consider any cuts they make to innovation departments if they are interested in retaining top talent. Many brilliant and highly marketable technologists will remain in an otherwise unremarkable place if the company has the financial muscle to invest capital in labs and equipment. Senior recounted the story of one researcher who was asked why he stayed at a large bureaucratic company. His response: "Because you have all the toys."

According to Wharton marketing professor George S. Day, many well-known companies remain committed to innovation in spite of downturns and earnings myopia. "There are some companies that see beyond that and continuously invest in innovation and growth," said Day, co-director of Wharton's Mack Center for Technological Innovation. "The best known ones are Samsung, American Express, Nokia. These companies are not cutting back on innovation.... We're not just talking about products and services, but about customer experience." For example, American Express last year invested $50 million in its "Chairman's Innovation Fund," money that is reserved for financing employee ideas to improve the business long-term. "

Since true innovation entails uncertainty, as opposed to quantifiable risk, there will always be an element of vision, entrepreneurship and faith involved," noted Mack Center research director Paul J.H. Schoemaker. "The C-suite recognizes that business is about taking risks and that not everything can be analytically proved or supported when venturing into the unknown. Too often, companies focus on incremental innovation -- since it is more predictable and less disruptive."

What's more, Schoemaker said, a difficult economic climate is an ideal time to diagnose defects that may have gone unnoticed when the economy was stronger. "Tough times present an opportunity to assess systemic weakness in one's industry, company and leadership team," said Schoemaker, who is also an adjunct professor of marketing at Wharton. "Just think of a sport like golf or tennis. When conditions are tough, the weaknesses in your game will show more clearly." His advice: "Use the bad times to conduct a deep self-audit."

WSJ: Leadership Styles

Adapted from the upcoming “The Wall Street Journal Guide to Management” by Alan Murray, published by Harper Business.

Leadership is less about your needs, and more about the needs of the people and the organization you are leading. Leadership styles are not something to be tried on like so many suits, to see which fits. Rather, they should be adapted to the particular demands of the situation, the particular requirements of the people involved and the particular challenges facing the organization.

In the book “Primal Leadership,” Daniel Goleman, who popularized the notion of “Emotional Intelligence,” describes six different styles of leadership. The most effective leaders can move among these styles, adopting the one that meets the needs of the moment. They can all become part of the leader’s repertoire.

Visionary. This style is most appropriate when an organization needs a new direction. Its goal is to move people towards a new set of shared dreams. “Visionary leaders articulate where a group is going, but not how it will get there – setting people free to innovate, experiment, take calculated risks,” write Mr. Goleman and his coauthors.

Coaching. This one-on-one style focuses on developing individuals, showing them how to improve their performance, and helping to connect their goals to the goals of the organization. Coaching works best, Mr. Goleman writes, “with employees who show initiative and want more professional development.” But it can backfire if it’s perceived as “micromanaging” an employee, and undermines his or her self-confidence.

Affiliative. This style emphasizes the importance of team work, and creates harmony in a group by connecting people to each other. Mr. Goleman argues this approach is particularly valuable “when trying to heighten team harmony, increase morale, improve communication or repair broken trust in an organization.” But he warns against using it alone, since its emphasis on group praise can allow poor performance to go uncorrected. “Employees may perceive,” he writes, “that mediocrity is tolerated.”

Democratic. This style draws on people’s knowledge and skills, and creates a group commitment to the resulting goals. It works best when the direction the organization should take is unclear, and the leader needs to tap the collective wisdom of the group. Mr. Goleman warns that this consensus-building approach can be disastrous in times of crisis, when urgent events demand quick decisions.

Pacesetting. In this style, the leader sets high standards for performance. He or she is “obsessive about doing things better and faster, and asks the same of everyone.” But Mr. Goleman warns this style should be used sparingly, because it can undercut morale and make people feel as if they are failing. “Our data shows that, more often than not, pacesetting poisons the climate,” he writes.

Commanding. This is classic model of “military” style leadership – probably the most often used, but the least often effective. Because it rarely involves praise and frequently employs criticism, it undercuts morale and job satisfaction. Mr. Goleman argues it is only effective in a crisis, when an urgent turnaround is needed. Even the modern military has come to recognize its limited usefulness.

NASSCOM: Need for soft skills in Global Engineering Services

Dr. Sharatkumar Variyar, Competency Development Head, QuEST

Introduction

In this article we will go deep into one specific industry - Global Engineering Services” and use it as an example to conclude that there is no “one size fits all” solution for managing soft-skills.  Soft-skills get developed and matured in the course of time and a soft-skills practitioner has to deal with “Variance”- lots and lots of it… There is no one solution to deal with this variance.

The universe of global engineering services is in a state of constant flux as technology and business keeps changing adding to the demographic shift.  A significant proportion of population in the US (people born between 1945-64, known as the Baby Boomers) and the same generation in other developed nations like UK, France, Germany, Italy & Japan had opted for aerospace/automotive and mechanical engineering as a career; the subsequent generations of engineers (people born after 1965) opted for service and knowledge oriented careers like IT services, etc. The Baby Boomers are now retiring; this, combined with the fact that colleges & universities in the developed nations are turning out far lesser engineering and aeronautical graduates, creates a big demand for mechanical engineers and aeronautical graduates.

The engineering services universe is connected to another big universe called “manufacturing” and it is inevitable that all such engineers in services need to have a working knowledge of manufacturing to be truly effective in their roles.

The word ‘Services’ in Global engineering services implies the commonality to other service businesses and industries.  Thereby customer relationship management and communication are important and value is perceived based on overall “experience” and “ambience” at all touch-points and not just on the service or product delivered.

Direct Stakeholders

If you take a look at the Indian context the key stakeholders involved in skill building policy include academia, governmental agencies, private training organizations, CII, NASSCOM, industries, service providers, non-governmental agencies and of-course a young and dynamic new-generation student community. The young generation is a lot more confident, has excellent access to education and information tend to be more self-sufficient and independent, much more tolerant to alien ideas, values and thought streams, a lot better in team–building and bonding and last but not the least, highly informed and conscious of social, political and environmental issues.

The civil and military segments of the Aerospace industry are enjoying robust growth, with the current global spend in the product engineering market being estimated at $ 60-70 billion worldwide, and growing to $ 80 - 90 billion by 2020. India has the potential to win 5% to 20% of this business, depending on this country’s state of readiness to take on the opportunities.

A study by Booz Allen Hamilton for NASSCOM on Globalization of Engineering Services states that the demand for engineers in the aerospace, mechanical and electrical engineering disciplines is expected to double from what it was 10 years ago. This gives rise to a big opportunity for engineering students to opt for aerospace, electrical and mechanical engineering as a career option.

The value of off-shored engineering services in Aerospace in India is currently estimated to be about $ 700-800 million, and is expected to grow to $3 billion by 2020. If manufacturing is also included, this can rise to $ 10-12 billion by 2020. Primary drivers for this increased sourcing of aerospace engineering and manufactured items is India’s Offset policy, along with the lack of resources in the developed countries, and the need to reduce costs and “Time to Market”.

However there is not much material available on the skills demanded in the highly time-conscious global engineering services sector, given this scenario and this article intends to bridge some of those gaps.

Indirect stake-holders

When it comes to the engineering services sector, the other stake-holders include customers, customers’ customers, governments, nationalities, environmentalists, Mother Nature, including the emergence of a new set of demographies, population distribution by age and the like.  Customers are natural stakeholders since they are your lifeline as a service industry.  In turn the services provided to these customers form part of a bigger supply chain for engineering leading to manufacturing.  The moment you expand your universe to the compulsions of this larger group, you tend to think of the real budgetary pressures they have, the lead time on logistics and infrastructure surrounding the product you are working on, the lead time on staffing to run and manage this infrastructure and what is core or non-core to their respective businesses as they go about out-sourcing.  The impact of all this is that you have to work with a sense of urgency, do things right first time, on time, minimize defects, in short - deliver consistently a very high level of quality.

Soft-skills – Universal phenomena

It is widely documented and well-known that there is a real challenge on the demand side on sourcing people with relevant soft-skills to address this complex requirement.  For various reasons, it is increasingly becoming difficult to allocate trained resources on the job without supplemental soft-skills training.  Engineers, taken as a professional, tend to be less endowed with soft-skill than some other disciplines.  The highly advanced mathematical, analytical brain may not be much of a communicator.  Whether you are in the United States, Mexico, India, China, Poland, anywhere, this is a common issue.  

Of late many engineering courses have included compulsory subjects that address soft-skills, and also other co-curricular avenues that reinforce such skillsincluding project works in teams, study groups and so forth.   In India too continuous work is being done on curriculum development and deployment that addresses these soft-skills.  On the professional soft-skills consulting front, several behavior profiling instruments, most of them proprietary have been devised that profile people and identify their dominant style and behavioral patterns.  The accuracy of these assessments are getting more and more refined based on years of cumulative data that gets added.

The classical book “The Unwritten Laws of Engineering” published by the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME), with ideas dating back to 1944 from W.J.King and revised and enlarged by James G Skakoon, clearly shows that the softer and practical attributes of engineering work have endured across generations.  The instructions include areas such as self management, being proactive, assertive, keeping commitments, relating to supervisor, always keep records, being clear and concise in documentation, tips for an engineering manager, and professional ethics.

A look at contemporary industry practices

A Harvard University study revealed that 85% of jobs & promotions happened because of the candidate’s attitude and only 15% due to the facts and figures he packed under his belt. Within the Indian industry, there is a definite move towards backward integrating academics with the soft-skill needs including communication and team working.  

Industries have started collaborating in a structured way with academia thereby resulting in a mutual win-win for both.  However this symbiosis becomes possible whenever there is an assured number of recruitments that the participating industry can commit to and is difficult to sustain otherwise. Through evaluation rigor prior to on-boarding, there is some control on the quality of the incumbents.  Some popular mantras include “hire for attitude – train for skills” and “hire for learning ability”.  

English knowledge comes across as a major gap at many campus-recruitment avenues.  The on-boarding exercise is usually elaborate and includes a reinforcement and alignment to customer specific hygiene factors on engineering proficiencies. These hygiene factors include specific areas such as honesty, integrity, forthrightness in admitting mistakes, willingness to seek help,  attention to detail and assertiveness manifesting as an ability to say NO when appropriate.  The engineering services industry demands flexibility to adapt to changing and adverse situations.

There is at least a three month window before full productivity of fresh candidates resulting in a “sail or sink” situation for the freshers.  It is usually impossible to fit freshers into mission critical projects.  Carefully designed competency assessment, customized training and evaluation, maintaining a graded competency dictionary and role profile for all careers, periodic competency assessment and profiling are the infrastructural support to meet this requirement.  For example, the competency based soft-skills interview consists of leading questions that draw out previous behavior demonstrated along four dimensions “situation”, “task”, “action” and “results”, leading to a fairly reliable assessment.

At various stages of the career, the soft-skills requirements keep varying.  The scope and impact of roles keep increasing as careers progress and therefore the specific interventions and methods to augment soft-skills need to be carefully planned, based on budgets available.  A learning map published to employees helps to keep them conscious and aware of behavior expected at their level and at the next higher level.  It is theoretically impossible to have all-rounders.  At lower stages in career, competency gaps can be bridged through training interventions, but at senior levels of career, dominant strengths have to be focused on and developed.  The approach of bridging competency gaps may not work out at senior levels.  Similarly during recruitment, the weightage ascribed to the soft-skills is different across various bands of seniority, usually classified as execution, coordination, managing, leading and strategizing.

Recent developments

The top challenges based on a study across four engineering service industries in India revealed, “Not asking enough questions”, “Assuming customer / authority figure is always right”, “Being afraid to ask questions” and “Assuming everything is understood based on whatever customer has told us”.

Recent challenges of globalization are proving that the weightage for technical excellence towards overall effectiveness has reduced making way for newer skills like knowledge of interacting with trans-national cultures, business etiquette, expected and acceptable behavior in new geographies, handling telecons, graphic communication including use of annotations with pictures, conducting walk-through WebEx sessions and so forth.  Traditional soft-skills continue to be relevant and these include adaptability, open-mindedness, problem solving, decision making, communication skills, self learning and knowledge discovery, empathy and team work, motivation, attitude and a spirit of enquiry.  “Attitude” is a word encompassing several factors,  need for taking initiative, perseverance in adversity and motivating others.  The thinking faculty is something that will really help create a world-class work-force.  The thinking workforce continuously tries to explore the “why”, not just “what”.  Going beyond “why”, the doors of innovation are opened up through imagination and asking the question “what if” and then following it through in a structured way.

As an illustration, the changing business scenario today has resulted in specific soft-skills assuming importance as shown below:

Table: Services Skills Linkage

BUSINESS PARADIGMS IN ENGINEERING SERVICES	SOFT-SKILLS DEMANDED BY THESE PARADIGMS
Project management	Team work
Knowledge management	Written English, writing skills
Integrated product teams (IPT), Concurrent engineering	Spoken English, verbal communication
Quality systems and processes	Mindset, attitude, attention to details, assertiveness, integrity
Global project teams	Business etiquettes, cultural sensitivity
Rapid changes in business and technology	Stress (self ) management
Innovation / Productivity improvement	Open, inquisitive mind, creativity

Leadership Development

All aspects of leadership development relevant to any knowledge industry apply even in the sphere of engineering services and is therefore not elaborated in detail.  The selection process has to be rigorous and the development of these selected candidates has to be planned and executed carefully.  Quality time from the top management time and support to this program is the strongest factor that can bring about break-through improvements and flowering of potentialities.   Apart from this niche group, the single biggest transition in the entire career of an engineer is the transition from individual contributor to people manager and apart from leadership development, this particular transition during promotions needs careful attention.

Once they don the role of leaders, they have to become role models, walk the talk and drive in several hygiene factors.  These include such attributes critical to business like decisiveness, attention to details, quality mindset, global outlook, business acumen, change championship, ownership and accountability.

Conclusion

In these changing times, there is no one method to fit all situations.  However a little thought will reveal a very important conclusion - the process of effectively imparting soft-skills or any other skill for that matter depends on professing three fundamental competencies  “Communication skills”, “Psychology” and of course “Subject matter knowledge” .  For examples, if you are trying to communicate to a young generation on the need for a “green” lifestyle, the approach you follow in imparting this message has to draw on “excellent communication skills”, include the compulsions of consequences of decisions they can relate to, and of course be technically convincing, supported with data and evidences.  This is a vast area of work and only an organization-wide concerted effort can bring change of the scale that is required today.

India needs to exploit soft skills

By Richard Rekhy

Jul 19 2010

It takes 20 years to build a reputation and five minutes to ruin it. If you think about that, you’ll do things differently — Warren Buffett

As we rummage thr-ough history, we find that India is not an emerging economy, but a re-emerging economy. If we go back in time, we had the world’s first university at Takshashila in 700 BC and a global university in Nalanda in the fourth century. We led the world in astronomy, mathematics and medicine. We were a global power at the turn of the 18th century. But India being a tolerant nation allowed itself to be invaded and lost its cutting edge.

Today, India has an historic opportunity to claim its rightful place. But will India be able to assert itself on the global stage? Will the pride of this resurgent India emerge to counter factors that affect our image?

Building Brand India is an imperative we cannot afford to ignore. This is because a nation’s brand is a powerful means of value creation and global leadership. There are several benefits to building a strong brand. Strong brands evoke an emotive bond among people and nations. This translates into huge benefits — from greater goodwill to an upswing in tourism, from growing exports and increased investments. Brands generate trust, confidence and continued association. Once a nation is associated with a set of attributes, anything from that country is treated as a natural brand extension.

To understand what defines a successful brand we need to understand what constitutes the brand. A brand is a synergy of various elements; it is an optimum mix of quality, innovation, value, global presence, adaptability, trust and reliability. A brand is the essence or promise of what will be delivered or experienced.

India has managed to create this remarkable essence. Intensive competition is opening new opportunities in the developed world to skills and entrepreneurship from other parts of the globe. This is not utopia. It is a vision steeped in reality. India has the brand capital —ours is a country where four-fifths of the population is young, and will continue to be young. We have one of the highest arable land acreages in the world that is richly endowed with water and sunshine. We are blessed with varied agro climatic zones. Our farmers are intelligent and enterprising. Our manufacturing is getting competitive. Fifteen of the world’s major automobile manufacturers are already sourcing components from India. Some of our leading pharmaceutical units are addressing global market opportunities. We have very capable scientists, engineers, chemists, biologists, doctors, nurses and teachers. Our ability to grasp business processes is impressive. Above all, our people power is enormous.

From an economically global outlook, India has joined the elite club of international currencies. The new rupee symbol, which was approved by the cabinet, reflects that the Indian currency is finally making its presence felt on the international scene. Though symbolic, it is a big statement. The symbol would lend a distinctive character and identity to the currency and further highlight the strength and global face of the Indian economy.

It is increasingly axiomatic today that the old calculations of hard power are no longer sufficient to guide a country’s conduct in world affairs. India’s soft power have become much more important. Bollywood, Indian art, literature, fashion and cuisines, the values of Ashok, Akbar and Gandhi, and the pluralism of our civilisation constitute our soft power.

The 21st century will be a world in which the use of hard power carries with it the odium of mass global public disapproval, whereas soft power, which lends itself more easily to the information era, will constitute a country’s principal asset. Soft power is not about conquering others, but about being yourself.

India produces various kinds of cultures, including the films of Bollywood. Bollywood is bringing its brand of glitzy entertainment not just to the Indian diaspora in the US, the UK or Canada, but around the globe. Indian celebrities are the face of international brands. Like Shahrukh Khan being the brand ambassador for Tag Heuer is a way in which India demonstrates its soft power.

There is potential to carefully exploit those soft and mystical aspects of India, like yoga and ayurveda. Some say these stereotypes should be avoided. I think the real value to a country is added when soft powers are leveraged and a global footprint is created around them.

On the downside, there are a number of challenges and threats, many being addressed slowly: poor infrastructure, inclusive growth, states developing at different speeds and a reputation for corruption and red tape. These issues should be addressed on a national level and not treated as an individual problem. In the 21st century, you have to compete on ideas. A Deutsche Bank advert said, “Ideas are capital. The rest is just money.” Brand India is an idea at the right place at the right time. The rest is just history.

Few nations have the growth potential that India already enjoys. India holds the promise of a most successful future… —Kluas Schwab

The Soft Skills of Global Managers

6/5/2006

by Glenn Rifkin

While top performance usually is what gets global managers their international assignments, soft skills may be more important. An excerpt from Harvard Management Update.

Despite nearly two decades of corporate globalization efforts, many organizations still struggle to find managers who are comfortable and effective in the increasingly global economy. Most suffer both from a lack of cultural awareness when dealing with employees and partners overseas and from a lack of experience managing increasingly complex processes over long distances.

Though a few insightful corporate giants such as General Electric, Cisco Systems, and Intel have made strides in developing successful global managers, many human resources leaders and senior executives continue to be frustrated with the available skills and resources.

But why is it so difficult to develop effective global managers? The answers are as complex as the world's geographies. Each company has its own specific needs and challenges, and every country presents a unique and rapidly changing landscape in which work must be accomplished.

But even so, there are steps companies and managers can take to better prepare for the challenges of managing globally. Our focus here is threefold: (1) to develop a clearer understanding of the challenges of managing people across borders; (2) to instill in new global managers an awareness of and an appreciation for the vast differences among the cultures in which they do business; and (3) to give global managers the tools and support they need to succeed.

The yawning cultural chasm

With the emergence of China and India as the newest and most daunting playing fields, experienced executives and thought leaders agree that softer cultural issues have become the source of notable management problems. 

"Managing in a global environment means you manage people who are separated not only by time and distance but also by cultural, social, and language differences," says S. Devarajan, managing director of Cisco Systems Global Development Center in Bangalore, India. Cisco India has more than 1,500 employees and close to 3,500 partner employees.

"The main challenge here is to integrate and coordinate these individuals in ways that will ensure success. You need to build a relationship and have frequent interaction and communication among your team members," he says. "And you also need to be sensitive to and respect the cultural differences. People from different cultures tend to misunderstand each other's behaviors or stereotype people from other countries. It is essential to recognize the discrepancies between cultures in order to work together effectively."

This, of course, is no simple task.

Letting go of the headquarters mindset

Embracing differences among cultures and taking advantage of them to build value begins by addressing what Mary Teagarden, a professor of global strategy at Thunderbird, the Garvin School of International Management, in Phoenix, calls "a headquarters mindset," which she says pervades many global organizations.

Simply put: Too many companies assume that they can do things abroad in the same manner as they do them domestically, says Teagarden. "When I see companies that are underperforming in the global environment, I hear them saying, 'We have people who are just like me at home, and we expect everybody else to be just like me.' And people don't work that way."

Among the rarest of traits is the ability to balancethe need for consistent corporate practices with the need for regional uniqueness.

Teagarden, who has spent much of her twenty-six-year career analyzing the challenges for managers in a global economy, says she believes that these constraints can be overcome if leaders focus more closely on the empathic qualities of prospective global managers.

"What is essential in a global environment is the ability to work with individuals, groups, organizations, and systems that are unlike our own," she says. "We must also understand what differentiates people and what unites them. Understanding that tension—how are we alike and how are we different—is a critically important starting point."

At the very least, organizations need to ensure that managers have had the opportunity to build a basic understanding of the new cultures in which they will be immersed—with a particular focus on appreciating how behaviors differentiate.

Beyond this, Teagarden has identified a number of key characteristics that successful global managers possess. Among them are three that resonate loudly: (1) a belief that differences matter; (2) openness to new and different ideas; and (3) cognitive complexity, or the ability to focus on both the "hard" and "soft" metrics in an organization—the hard quantitative side along with the softer, people side.

These three success factors provide a useful framework for prospective global managers to use as they assess their skills and their preparedness for their new assignment.

Differences matter

When footwear industry veteran Pat Devaney, a senior vice president of production, sourcing, and development for Deckers Outdoor, Inc., arrived at Deckers' China offices in Guongdong Province for a recent meeting, he stopped in the lunchroom to converse with a group of female workers.

"These women come from all over China, and each one orders a specific type of food depending on what region they are from," Devaney says. "As part of the dialogue, they were talking about the different flavors of mountain rat. 'Is grain fed better than fruit fed? Does it taste like cat? Are duck feet as chewy as chicken feet if cooked correctly?'"

Though the conversation was not work related, it illuminated a simple but profound truth about managing in a global environment for Devaney, who has worked closely with operations in Asia for Deckers Outdoor and other companies for nearly thirty years. There are great cultural differences between the people who make up global companies. Understanding how people think, work, eat, and interact in a foreign workplace is crucial to building a successful operation. Most managers, new to these exotic environments, are ill prepared for these nuances.

As the Chinese market economy has developed, Devaney has taken countless American managers on their first visit to China, and he has seen the importance of teaching them the subtle but crucial cultural characteristics of a new geography.

"You have to realize the complexity that is involved in managing people in different countries," he says. "What is important to them? How do they take information you give them and interpret it back to those who work for them?"

Teagarden suggests that executives with Devaney's mentoring skills are in short supply, particularly in small and midsized organizations.

Openness to new ideas

As emerging markets such as China continue to expand, executives must also tap into the management expertise in these geographies and be willing to move international managers experienced in one country to other countries. Too many companies view globalization as a one-way street, which is a shortsighted view, according to Teagarden. The integration of international managers plays a big factor in developing global expertise.

"Moving U.S.-based personnel overseas is one thing, but what about bringing some of the Chinese or Indian managers back here or to Europe or South America and plugging them into the mix?" Teagarden asks. While some large companies have had success with this cross-fertilization, she says, very few small and midsized companies do it at all.

But consider what this can achieve. Mary Kay Cosmetics, for example, set up operations in China and discovered that it was not allowed to sell door to door as it did in the rest of the world. The Chinese government decided it had had enough Amway salespeople invading the country and called a halt to such selling. So Mary Kay's Chinese managers came up with a new distribution system in China, and a savvy marketing manager there led the development and introduction of a new midrange product that sold well in Chinese department stores.

Mary Kay brought this Chinese marketing manager to its Dallas headquarters to replicate what she did in China and help managers see how it could be replicated elsewhere in the firm's global operations. "That is how you use the human supply chain very effectively," Teagarden says.

This kind of cross-fertilization helps domestic managers think about how to be more flexible in their thinking and to appreciate how incorporating different perspectives is good management and good business.

Cognitive complexity: Getting the hard and soft in concert

Among the rarest of traits is the ability to balance the need for consistent corporate practices with the need for regional uniqueness—both in terms of respecting cultural differences across geographies and seizing the unique advantages of each market.

Charles Giancarlo, Cisco Systems' senior vice president of development, feels his firm has learned some important lessons in this regard. In the early stages of Cisco's global expansion, he says, Cisco's senior management allowed managers from different departments to establish their own connections in other countries, including India. The idea was to save money up front by avoiding Cisco's corporate bureaucracy and taking best advantage of the local opportunities.

But it also served to create a distinct shortage of consistency, or a lack of a single corporate culture for employees in other countries to embrace, Giancarlo says. "It's important for local employees to get the benefits of clear reporting structures and of uniformity in processes and procedures that a company like Cisco offers. You also want them to feel a sense of pride and a commitment to the larger organization. Otherwise, the cost savings you thought you had could be short lived. It's also very hard to consolidate later."

But teaching new global managers how to balance corporate philosophy with the unique circumstances of the local market is not easy; it requires an awareness of cultures in the midst of dynamic change. It also demands a healthy dose of independent thinking among some very unfamiliar surroundings. Inexperienced managers may end up clinging to the practices they know and, thus, fall prey to the "headquarters mentality" Teagarden warns of. Or they may succumb to a form of cultural intimidation in which they allow for whatever the local team is used to. In doing so, they open their organization to the problems Cisco once faced.

One way companies can help is to allow new global managers to immerse themselves in their assignments slowly. Teagarden suggests that companies commence a new manager's global assignment by having him work on a virtual team—that is, managing an overseas process or project while still being stationed in one's home country. By allowing people to learn to work together digitally, companies provide an opportunity for managers to hone the skills they will need to draw on when they are on the ground in a foreign country—but to do so while still in familiar territory. Diving in headfirst has not shown itself to be a particularly effective approach.

In a similar vein, Cisco India's Devarajan says that his company is addressing the marriage of cultural diversity with consistent management practices by employing "cultural ambassadors" who help coach the engineers and software developers about both company and country cultural issues before they are sent on assignment.

"It is a cultural mind shift," Devaney says. "Even the very small things when you arrive, like where the leader sits at a lunch meeting or where to sit in the car. We would assume riding shotgun next to the driver in front is where the big boss sits, but, in fact, the seat of power is in the back behind the passenger seat. As the economy grows, the relations will worsen because so many people arrive here completely unprepared for what they are up against. Teaching people to understand what is going on around them makes an impact as you build relationships."