Honesty is the best downturn cure

"could be laid off ", admits Surendranath working at ANZ Grindlays, when questioned about his primary fears as a software professional. The gut-wenching anxiety finds an echo among techies across the industry and reflects the hard reality of global work cultures - organisations, the world over, are in a state of transition from secure hierarchy-based to more temporary cultures. As organisations embrace short-term work contracts and adopt euphemisms such as natural attrition and right sizing, to mask job cuts in the face of an unstoppable Nasdaq downslide, diving profits, revised estimates, salary cuts, freeze on hiring and rightsizing, techies are trapped in a chronic state of stable "insecurity." The dawning realisation that the organisation's first commitment is towards the market rather than the techie, regardless of his/her skill sets or experience, have cast a palpable fear of redundancy in the community. Reports of job cuts churned by the media on a daily basis have sent confidence plummeting. For the techie, wooed with pink champagne, just a year earlier, the transformation to pink slips has been rather hard to stomach. Organisations that boasted of state of the art facilities for employees and mouthed platitudes on flexi-time, work life balance and made claims on human capital lost no time in writing off the same human assets in a bearish market. Worse, certain Indian companies such as HCL Perot adopted a stealthy and sly approach towards retrenchment, leaving employees out in the cold, casting doubts on employee rather than company performance.

As the first generation global employees feeling the sharp saber of job cuts, Indian techies' lack coping strategies to adjust to the fluid job culture of recent times. For most Indan techies, unlike software engineers in the West, which has had a history job cuts during recessionary periods, there are no precedents or earlier examples to fall back on to deal with professional devaluation. And the confusion, bewilderment, turmoil and the unpreparedness to deal with it all have created an unnatural climate where individuals vie with each other to demonstrate organisational commitment and work longer hours even as they live in fear and weariness of that very organisation.

Long hours and a climate of presenteeism do not, however, translate into greater productivity or a conducive work environment. The management of most IT companies is trapped in an unenviable situation where it needs to trim work force to achieve growth targets and yet keep morale of existing employees high. And even companies, who are bang on target and are not resorting to job cuts face an increasingly edgy, vulnerable and insecure work force. In the face of obvious panic, companies need to be increasingly inventive to ease the perceived horrors of the new work culture and assuage techies' fears of their immediate futures visa-vis the organisation. Although, most Indian companies are yet to launch programs that specifically address this widespread and all pervasive fear and help individuals make the necessary psychological transition from permanent security to semi-entrepreneurs with adequate self marketing skills, some organisations like Trivium, Sasken, Unimobile and Trigyn are shoring employee morale and trying to keep confidence high by simply being communicative, open and honest.

"As a young and growing company, we have been very open at Trivium," admits Aparna Ballakur HR Manager Trivium. " In today's environment keeping employee morale high is the primary HR challenge and we have tried simple ways to keep every employee connected to the company. These include a fortnightly company update by the CEO in India and monthly updates by the President located in the US. We have been very open in sharing the crests and troughs that are common to any business. This has helped our team build confidence in our leaders. We have also worked hard on creating a shared purpose and values for the organisation by every one who works with us. This has further enhanced alignment of the employees to the company. "

Similar decision to let its employees know the good bad and the ugly from the company management have been adopted by Unimobile, a company that decided to make a virtue out of transparency. Srikanth Srinivasan, Corporate Communications Manager at Unimobile, says: "Daily media reports have led techies to believe that the downturn is all pervasive. In the last few months, we have hired six people and got three new customers. There is a basic fear but on account of these developments it's not very marked in this organisation. A strong internal communication policy informing them that we are not doing badly has helped to keep panic at bay. Employees who are three levels away from where information comes from are kept informed of developments within the company." Unimobile also believes that external PR is central to doing business and keeping morale high. Employees fell proud when they hear positive reports about the company in the media."

Recently, Sasken decided to cut the double speak and made a clean breast of 20 per cent cut in salaries. The openness far from hurting Sasken's reputation helped boost the company image as an ethical market player. Sasken has also undertaken a massive communication exercise through focussed groups and one on one meetings. Nidhi Das, HR manager at Sasken also says that "at this stage its most important to keep talking to employees down the line"

Apart from sharing information and communicating with employees, training is another key concept for these companies. Trigyn, one of the first company which did not mask layoffs and mar employees prospects is also focussing on training. A senior manager in the company admits that the company is training employees through online channels.

In India, where most companies pay lip service to employee welfare, the decision top keep channels of vital communication open in these hard times is reflective of a sensitised management. Most companies report a visible easing of panic and tension among employees. For instance, Kumaran Devanesh of Sasken says that the one on one meetings have been helpful. This is, however, but the first step towards shoring employee morale. The malaise of insecurity extends deeper and, in the long term, employers can help employees survive the millennium organisation by reconciling them to the short-term work culture and equipping them with skills to accurately diagnose their abilities, get appropriate training in deficient skills and marketing themselves professionally to organisations. With due respect to all IT companies, who are just coming to terms with the realities of the global market, we still have still a long way to go in this direction!

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