Jun 17, 2011

Indian firms are superior in Talent Management than their global peers

Here's an interesting article I came across How Indian Firms Beat the World for Talent

The reasons the article states are due to these advantages Indian firms have

1. A legacy of HR influence: India’s socialist past created both large public-sector undertakings such as the Indian Oil Corporation and family-owned enterprises such as Tata Group, Reliance and Birla Group that invested heavily to develop human resources. According to Ernst & Young’s Rajan, “Indian firms have shown a higher propensity to invest at the high end of the HR value chain as compared to multinationals. For many years public sector undertakings have invested in leadership capability development and their head of HR has historically been a member of the board. Family-owned enterprises have made similar investments and recently transformed HR so it can more effectively support talent building.”

2. A well-trained and closely-knit talent fraternity: India’s graduate education system produces top HR leaders from its institutes of management. The XLRI School of Business and Human Resources, established in the 1950s, is a top 5 Indian business school whose graduates include HR leaders for Procter & Gamble India, Hindustan Lever, Hindustan Coca-Cola, Bharti Airtel and Wipro. These top Indian talent leaders often form strong interpersonal networks with talent peers outside their companies. Compared to talent leaders in the U.S., Indian senior talent leaders seem to have deeper relationships with, and are in more regular contact with, their external talent peers. This increased interaction enables them to more easily share best practices and India-specific market information.

3. Strong individual commitment to talent development: It’s not unusual for Indian corporations to hold internal leadership development courses on Saturdays. These meetings aren’t held on the weekend to accommodate the schedule of the CEO or a visiting professor. The companies simply have a five and a half or six-day work week. Ask the typical American or European executive to give up a Saturday for a leadership development course and eyes likely will roll. Indian leaders, on the other hand, are less likely to complain about being away from home or not having work/life balance.

4. A unique understanding of India: Indian firms have the obvious advantage of understanding how to manage talent in an Indian context. Coca-Cola’s Murthy offered a simple but telling example. “Indian firms are very adept at managing the slightly more emotional nature of Indian leaders. While Indian firms have flexibility to support employees’ feelings and emotions, multinationals are often bound by rules and regulations that prevent the type of empathy and coaching that can support success.”

5. The ability to develop and pay: Two key factors to engage and retain great talent — professional development and compensation — are easier to come by at many Indian firms. “Because of their success, Indian companies can offer large wealth creation opportunities through stock options or shares. Western firms aren’t listed on the Sensex (the Indian stock exchange) so can’t offer similar benefits,” Murthy said.