In ISTT I wrote this about Strategy Innovation :
"Robert E. Johnston, Jr. and J. Douglas Bate in their book 'The Power
of Strategy Innovation: A New Way of Linking Creativity and Strategic
Planning to Discover Great Business Opportunities' look at presents a
five-step Discovery Process for staging, aligning, exploring,
creating, and mapping the paths between analytical, numbers-oriented,
day-to-day planning and market-centric, discovery-driven innovation
that focuses on the future.
Strategy innovation is shifting a corporation's business strategy in
order to create new value for both the customer and the corporation.
In a dynamic marketplace, every business runs the risk that its
current business model will become obsolete. As long as there is
customer value to be delivered, there will be companies interested in
delivering it. New companies will create innovative, more efficient
business models in order to compete in profitable industries.
Given the strategic importance of a company's business model in its
ability to compete in the marketplace, it is logical that efforts put
into improving the business model could provide real value to a
company. If that is true, then companies should place at least as
much 'innovation' focus on the other elements of the business model
(and how they interact) as they currently do on the product side.
Strategy innovation is a process of applying innovative thinking to
the entire business model of a company, not just to its products or
inventions.
In his book The Innovator's Dilemma, Clayton Christensen suggests
that this small company advantage is an important force in the
marketplace. He writes, 'Large companies often surrender emerging
growth markets because smaller, disruptive companies are actually
more capable of pursuing them. Though start-ups lack resources, it
doesn't matter. Their values can embrace small markets, and their
cost structures can accommodate lower margins. Their market research
and resource allocation processes allow managers to proceed
intuitively rather than having to be backed up by careful research
and analysis, presented in PowerPoint. All of these advantages add up
to enormous opportunity or looming disaster— depending on your
perspective."
Constantinos Markides, a professor at the London Business School and
author of All The Right Moves, calls strategy innovation "a
fundamental reconceptualization of what the business is about, which
in turn leads to a dramatically different way of playing the game in
the industry."
In his book Leading the Revolution, Gary Hamel cites a number of
companies that have dared to reinvent themselves by adopting
innovative strategies and creative new business models. He believes
that this capability will be required to compete in the markets of
the future. "Unless you and your company become adept at business
concept innovation, more imaginative minds will capture tomorrow's
wealth."
Michael L. Tushman and Charles A. O'Reilly III in their book "Winning
Through Innovation: A Practical Guide to Leading Organizational
Change and Renewal" talk about the pattern by which organizations
evolve: long periods of incremental change punctuated by
revolutionary, or discontinuous, change. These organizational
discontinuities are driven either by performance crises or by
technology, competitive, or regulatory shifts. (similar to Larry
Griener's model that we discussed earlier) They call any organization
that can ride both these changes as "Ambidexterous Organizations"
Dec 30, 2003
Dec 19, 2003
Cappuccino: Deloitte e-zine for Change & Learning had an interview with Tom Peters and this is what Peters said:
Have you read this book, cited in my book, by Howard Rheingold called Smart Mobs? It talks about this amazing phenomenon, about how these multi-organizations do their thing at the WTO meeting in Seattle or IMF meeting in Washington and so on . . . . That's a longwinded way of saying that I could buy the e-Learning model if it was democratic, blog-gy, community-ish, as opposed to top-down, dictatorial, "this is an efficient way to do training." If (online learning) is an incredibly interesting way to get a conversation started among 200 or 2000 people at Deloitte or at GE or whatever, then I love the idea. But if there's a hall monitor, or an overly irascible sys-op, as they used to say, then I worry
The whole damn point of the Web and of new technology is spontaneous learning and gathering and community events. The current issue of Wired talks about how corporations may be killed off, literally, by new methods of spontaneous innovation.
I really believe — and this is not an excuse for illegalities that occurred — that we're going through a very strange period where value is being redefined. Value is brands — Harley-Davidson doing this, IBM becoming IBM Global Services and so on. Value is getting more and more ephemeral. It used to be if you were a Deloitte audit partner all you had to do was count the damn smokestacks and multiply it by the current price of iron per pound . . . and now the value of the enterprise is, "do we really believe Bill Gates will live to be 100?" It's all ethereal. Part of this problem, which is not to excuse evil-doing, is that the nature of economic value is being fundamentally transformed in the direction of things that are ephemeral.
But I am basically, without wearing rose-colored glasses, a globalist. I think that the entire world will be safer and better if the Indians and Chinese are more wealthy than they are today, and if someone could figure out how to inject the entrepreneurial business gene into our Islamic brothers, if they could get the chip off their shoulder — and I don't mean that in a denigrating way relative to their religion... When people have more food in their bellies, they tend to be a little bit less rebellious, and that's the nature of the human being. I'm hardly anti-American, but I'm very pro Chinese and very pro Indian. Rich Indians and Chinese will provide your children's security. Instead of having two-thirds of the world being poor, having two-thirds of the world being rich is better than any nuclear weapons that could be invented.
Have you read this book, cited in my book, by Howard Rheingold called Smart Mobs? It talks about this amazing phenomenon, about how these multi-organizations do their thing at the WTO meeting in Seattle or IMF meeting in Washington and so on . . . . That's a longwinded way of saying that I could buy the e-Learning model if it was democratic, blog-gy, community-ish, as opposed to top-down, dictatorial, "this is an efficient way to do training." If (online learning) is an incredibly interesting way to get a conversation started among 200 or 2000 people at Deloitte or at GE or whatever, then I love the idea. But if there's a hall monitor, or an overly irascible sys-op, as they used to say, then I worry
The whole damn point of the Web and of new technology is spontaneous learning and gathering and community events. The current issue of Wired talks about how corporations may be killed off, literally, by new methods of spontaneous innovation.
I really believe — and this is not an excuse for illegalities that occurred — that we're going through a very strange period where value is being redefined. Value is brands — Harley-Davidson doing this, IBM becoming IBM Global Services and so on. Value is getting more and more ephemeral. It used to be if you were a Deloitte audit partner all you had to do was count the damn smokestacks and multiply it by the current price of iron per pound . . . and now the value of the enterprise is, "do we really believe Bill Gates will live to be 100?" It's all ethereal. Part of this problem, which is not to excuse evil-doing, is that the nature of economic value is being fundamentally transformed in the direction of things that are ephemeral.
But I am basically, without wearing rose-colored glasses, a globalist. I think that the entire world will be safer and better if the Indians and Chinese are more wealthy than they are today, and if someone could figure out how to inject the entrepreneurial business gene into our Islamic brothers, if they could get the chip off their shoulder — and I don't mean that in a denigrating way relative to their religion... When people have more food in their bellies, they tend to be a little bit less rebellious, and that's the nature of the human being. I'm hardly anti-American, but I'm very pro Chinese and very pro Indian. Rich Indians and Chinese will provide your children's security. Instead of having two-thirds of the world being poor, having two-thirds of the world being rich is better than any nuclear weapons that could be invented.
Nov 14, 2003
Verticalisation, Matrix and other organizational changes
On ISTT: I said
"I have been following the debate on the verticalisation of IT firms and thought I'd just point you all out to a model that has been around a
long time and whether we can look at this approach in a new light.
I am talking about Larry Greiner's model 'Evolution and Revolutions in Organizational Growth' that was published in the early 1970s in the HBR
Griener's model is suited for organizations that grow from small entreprenuerial firms and in time grow in size and markets.
Griener says that an organization experiences a crisis point in various stages of its life and takes certain decisions to negotiate that crisis, which in turn leads to another crisis in the future.
The firms typically try structural changes to crises, and verticalisation, centralisation and decentralisation are examples of these efforts which are suited for that point of time.
Here are the various stages of Griener's model
1. Creativity - which runs into a crisis of leadership when the founder is no more around.
2. Direction - which runs into a crisis of autonomy
3. Delegation - which runs into a crisis of Control
4. Co-ordination - which runs into a crisis of red tape
5. Collaboration - and we still don't know what crisis this will run
into :-)
Check out the model here
On ISTT: I said
"I have been following the debate on the verticalisation of IT firms and thought I'd just point you all out to a model that has been around a
long time and whether we can look at this approach in a new light.
I am talking about Larry Greiner's model 'Evolution and Revolutions in Organizational Growth' that was published in the early 1970s in the HBR
Griener's model is suited for organizations that grow from small entreprenuerial firms and in time grow in size and markets.
Griener says that an organization experiences a crisis point in various stages of its life and takes certain decisions to negotiate that crisis, which in turn leads to another crisis in the future.
The firms typically try structural changes to crises, and verticalisation, centralisation and decentralisation are examples of these efforts which are suited for that point of time.
Here are the various stages of Griener's model
1. Creativity - which runs into a crisis of leadership when the founder is no more around.
2. Direction - which runs into a crisis of autonomy
3. Delegation - which runs into a crisis of Control
4. Co-ordination - which runs into a crisis of red tape
5. Collaboration - and we still don't know what crisis this will run
into :-)
Check out the model here
Nov 10, 2003
On ISTT I wrote about ITES in India
The ITES industry leaders can make a difference if they are thinking about further growth, ready to tackle the emerging challenges in the field from players like Phillipines, China and a whole lot of others. For reasons of Business Continuity and Risk Management Indian ITES segment would also need to slowly become global and maintain data centres across the world
Coming to the HR issue in ITES the situation is quite similar to the pre-Y2K days of the IT services firms. The team sizes are large, the work is monotonous and the average project cycle is long (similarilites with maintenence work)
As soon as organizations can reorient business models to take into account niche outsourcing work and work becomes more project oriented
(shorter projects, more value added , like compiling reserach reports for global research firms, and giving recommendations) more people with high end skills (PhDs, MBAs etc) will move into the operations functions of the ITES sectors.
For example at a payroll outsourcing centre data miners and business analysts would slice and dice and analyse data to come up with recommendations for a new compensation systems based on trend analytics.
The quality of this work will invariably pass on skills to the fresh graduates who do the 'maintenence' version of the job and as companies seek to ramp up their skills with facilities like part time or satellite studies as a buffer for the scarce high end skills they will result in better and higher wages.
While now the work is coming for a cost arbitrage model as soon as these skills become more numerical maybe the very low end data entry and answering calls kind of jobs might migrate to cheaper countries (which has still not happened in the IT services industry, there does happen some amount of gravity :-) their ability to duplicate these kind of skills will be very low (qualitatively or quantitatively)
There will happen some kind of shakeout after this boom, when people who have entered this industry just to make hay while the sun shines, who do not concentrate on quality and customer understanding will go down the way of the hundreds of small time IT firms which vanished mid 2000 ...but they would have created a talent pool from which the bigger players will select and become still bigger.
My Monday morning hopes about the creation of a sustainable industry :-)
The ITES industry leaders can make a difference if they are thinking about further growth, ready to tackle the emerging challenges in the field from players like Phillipines, China and a whole lot of others. For reasons of Business Continuity and Risk Management Indian ITES segment would also need to slowly become global and maintain data centres across the world
Coming to the HR issue in ITES the situation is quite similar to the pre-Y2K days of the IT services firms. The team sizes are large, the work is monotonous and the average project cycle is long (similarilites with maintenence work)
As soon as organizations can reorient business models to take into account niche outsourcing work and work becomes more project oriented
(shorter projects, more value added , like compiling reserach reports for global research firms, and giving recommendations) more people with high end skills (PhDs, MBAs etc) will move into the operations functions of the ITES sectors.
For example at a payroll outsourcing centre data miners and business analysts would slice and dice and analyse data to come up with recommendations for a new compensation systems based on trend analytics.
The quality of this work will invariably pass on skills to the fresh graduates who do the 'maintenence' version of the job and as companies seek to ramp up their skills with facilities like part time or satellite studies as a buffer for the scarce high end skills they will result in better and higher wages.
While now the work is coming for a cost arbitrage model as soon as these skills become more numerical maybe the very low end data entry and answering calls kind of jobs might migrate to cheaper countries (which has still not happened in the IT services industry, there does happen some amount of gravity :-) their ability to duplicate these kind of skills will be very low (qualitatively or quantitatively)
There will happen some kind of shakeout after this boom, when people who have entered this industry just to make hay while the sun shines, who do not concentrate on quality and customer understanding will go down the way of the hundreds of small time IT firms which vanished mid 2000 ...but they would have created a talent pool from which the bigger players will select and become still bigger.
My Monday morning hopes about the creation of a sustainable industry :-)
Nov 5, 2003
Defending Consultants on Ryze
Actually Witch Doctors goes beyond just consultants and calls 'management science' itself an 'immature discipline' lacking both academic rigor or research !
That is true if viewed from the lens of traditional academic disciplines...the lines between practitioners, academics and consultants in the world of management is very blurred...what, for example, would one call Gary Hamel or Micheal Porter ? They have their own consulting shops and they also teach...
Having said that, I'd like to do the difficult...try to analyse the bad press that consultants get.
Most of it is due to what OB gurus call the "theory of attribution" that human beings justify the good they do by attributing it to themselves and the bad by attributing it to external factors (environment, other people etc)
The same I think is true for organizations...if they succeed its because of themselves and if they do badly then they blame suppliers, markets, the appreciating rupee and consultants :-)! A steel company in Eastern India and an Auto Company in Western India and a two wheeler company in North India have been consistently beating market averages in terms of growth and new products ...and all of them have had upwards of more than 3 consulting firms in their factories at any given time ! We don't hear these firms (or the media) heaping praise on their consultants for the superlative performance...
"Dangerous Company" that you quote also has case studies when firms have used consulting firms well, the case of Dave Ulrich being one in point. The book also points out some points to manage consultants (they are any other resource!)
- Most firms come in awe of big global consultants and give them a carte blanche to create magic...that is a recipe for disaster and designed to burn a hole in the balance sheet
- A firm must project plan a consulting assignment and put its best people to manage the consultants.
- These days consultants are no longer taken for just advice but to buttress a temporary skill that a business lacks and therefore are not just advice-givers but also implementors.
Consultants can be of two types:
An Expert Consultant will have specific expertise in a certain field of business. Their knowledge will be specific to the task in concern and they will usually do the job without your input. They will be employed until the task has been completed and are usually consulted to solve short term problems. For example, it may be the set up of a computerized stock control, or completing parts of your marketing plan that you have little knowledge about.
A Process Consultant will have a general business knowledge and so they can be used in most cases. They will offer and share their advice to all those in the business and will also get involved in solving the issue. Process Consultants can be employed as an ongoing long term solution to a task and so they are particularly useful for developing and changing your business.
Hope this helps and adds some perspective...
Actually Witch Doctors goes beyond just consultants and calls 'management science' itself an 'immature discipline' lacking both academic rigor or research !
That is true if viewed from the lens of traditional academic disciplines...the lines between practitioners, academics and consultants in the world of management is very blurred...what, for example, would one call Gary Hamel or Micheal Porter ? They have their own consulting shops and they also teach...
Having said that, I'd like to do the difficult...try to analyse the bad press that consultants get.
Most of it is due to what OB gurus call the "theory of attribution" that human beings justify the good they do by attributing it to themselves and the bad by attributing it to external factors (environment, other people etc)
The same I think is true for organizations...if they succeed its because of themselves and if they do badly then they blame suppliers, markets, the appreciating rupee and consultants :-)! A steel company in Eastern India and an Auto Company in Western India and a two wheeler company in North India have been consistently beating market averages in terms of growth and new products ...and all of them have had upwards of more than 3 consulting firms in their factories at any given time ! We don't hear these firms (or the media) heaping praise on their consultants for the superlative performance...
"Dangerous Company" that you quote also has case studies when firms have used consulting firms well, the case of Dave Ulrich being one in point. The book also points out some points to manage consultants (they are any other resource!)
- Most firms come in awe of big global consultants and give them a carte blanche to create magic...that is a recipe for disaster and designed to burn a hole in the balance sheet
- A firm must project plan a consulting assignment and put its best people to manage the consultants.
- These days consultants are no longer taken for just advice but to buttress a temporary skill that a business lacks and therefore are not just advice-givers but also implementors.
Consultants can be of two types:
An Expert Consultant will have specific expertise in a certain field of business. Their knowledge will be specific to the task in concern and they will usually do the job without your input. They will be employed until the task has been completed and are usually consulted to solve short term problems. For example, it may be the set up of a computerized stock control, or completing parts of your marketing plan that you have little knowledge about.
A Process Consultant will have a general business knowledge and so they can be used in most cases. They will offer and share their advice to all those in the business and will also get involved in solving the issue. Process Consultants can be employed as an ongoing long term solution to a task and so they are particularly useful for developing and changing your business.
Hope this helps and adds some perspective...
On Mavens and Connectors or How Ideas Spread
Tipping point a book written by Malcolm Gladwell talks of two kinds of people who when they connect together can help ideas to spread (interestingly Gladwell started off by trying to do research on how epidemics spread)...
These two kinds of people are:
mavens - People who know things more than other people
Connectors - People who know lots of other people (more than average)
But interestingly the internet and social software can erase the differences between these two types of people :-)
On the net mavens can become connectors, when face to face interaction is not necessary:
Check out this article !
Tipping point a book written by Malcolm Gladwell talks of two kinds of people who when they connect together can help ideas to spread (interestingly Gladwell started off by trying to do research on how epidemics spread)...
These two kinds of people are:
mavens - People who know things more than other people
Connectors - People who know lots of other people (more than average)
But interestingly the internet and social software can erase the differences between these two types of people :-)
On the net mavens can become connectors, when face to face interaction is not necessary:
Check out this article !
On emerging Organizational Structures
My post on ISTT
The last century was dominated by the thinking of organization as
machines and view of organizational processes as mechanistic process
(where the job of the employees was to "manage" only, and terms
like "Value chains" originated - organizational metaphors )
This way of looking at organization still permeates our thinking
today, but there are emerging a new type of organizational system
that do not follow these models.
The question I want to ask is, do you think these reflect a
fundamental shift to how organizations are understood and managed ,
and point to a new age...or do you think these are only exceptions
and the organizational structures that the majority of us work and
make meaning for our lives will remain unchanged ?
<< The following links and text courtesy Dr. Madhukar Shukla
Gautam >>
Visa International:
(in fact, I will also recommend that you explore the chaordic.org
site - it is pretty interesting - and is founded by Dee Hock, the
founder and CEO emeritus of Visa International... another article on
Dee Hock can be found at Fast Company )
Mondragon Community:
A $5bn cooperative in Basque country (Spain), with 120 different
companies, 42,000 employees, which runs its own schools, colleges,
banks, credit unions, etc. since last 50 years.
http://www.ping.be/jvwit/Mondragon.html
http://www.sfworlds.com/linkworld/mondragon.html
(this last link has many links on articles/ resources on Mondragon)
To the best of my knowledge, one of the first companies to adapt this
perspective was Toyota, in their production systems (we call it JIT,
Kanban, etc. nowadays - focus on its efficiency, while forgetting its
foundations). Taichi Ohno, who designed the Toyota Production System
(in a book by the same name - wrote):
"A business organisation is like a human body. The human body
contains autonomic nerves that work without regards to human wishes
and motor nerves that react to human commaand to control muscles. The
human body has an amazing structure and operation; the fine balance
and precision with which body parts are accommodated in the overall
design are even more marvellous...
At Toyota, we began to think about how to install an autonomic
nervous system in our own rapidly growing business organisation. In
our production plant, an autonomic nerve means making judgements
autonomously at the lowest level; for example, when to stop
production, what sequence to follow in making parts, or when overtime
is necessary to produce the required amount.
These decision can be made by factory workers themselves, without
having to consult the production control or engineering departments
that correspond to the brain in the human body. The plant should be a
place where such judgements can be made by workers autonomously."
Needless to say (and I might as well admit:0))... that underlying
these, there is an ideological/value dimension (viz, business is a
part of society/communnity, and not the otherway round; that wealth
can be created in more comprehensive ways other than making just
profit/dividends, etc.)... In case, you are intereted in exploring
this perspective, check out:
http://www.pcdf.org/living_economies/
and then
http://members.tripod.com/~taodesigns/index.html
and then
http://www.context.org/ICLIB/IC41/Rowe.htm
etc. etc.
<>
My post on ISTT
The last century was dominated by the thinking of organization as
machines and view of organizational processes as mechanistic process
(where the job of the employees was to "manage" only, and terms
like "Value chains" originated - organizational metaphors )
This way of looking at organization still permeates our thinking
today, but there are emerging a new type of organizational system
that do not follow these models.
The question I want to ask is, do you think these reflect a
fundamental shift to how organizations are understood and managed ,
and point to a new age...or do you think these are only exceptions
and the organizational structures that the majority of us work and
make meaning for our lives will remain unchanged ?
<< The following links and text courtesy Dr. Madhukar Shukla
Gautam >>
Visa International:
(in fact, I will also recommend that you explore the chaordic.org
site - it is pretty interesting - and is founded by Dee Hock, the
founder and CEO emeritus of Visa International... another article on
Dee Hock can be found at Fast Company )
Mondragon Community:
A $5bn cooperative in Basque country (Spain), with 120 different
companies, 42,000 employees, which runs its own schools, colleges,
banks, credit unions, etc. since last 50 years.
http://www.ping.be/jvwit/Mondragon.html
http://www.sfworlds.com/linkworld/mondragon.html
(this last link has many links on articles/ resources on Mondragon)
To the best of my knowledge, one of the first companies to adapt this
perspective was Toyota, in their production systems (we call it JIT,
Kanban, etc. nowadays - focus on its efficiency, while forgetting its
foundations). Taichi Ohno, who designed the Toyota Production System
(in a book by the same name - wrote):
"A business organisation is like a human body. The human body
contains autonomic nerves that work without regards to human wishes
and motor nerves that react to human commaand to control muscles. The
human body has an amazing structure and operation; the fine balance
and precision with which body parts are accommodated in the overall
design are even more marvellous...
At Toyota, we began to think about how to install an autonomic
nervous system in our own rapidly growing business organisation. In
our production plant, an autonomic nerve means making judgements
autonomously at the lowest level; for example, when to stop
production, what sequence to follow in making parts, or when overtime
is necessary to produce the required amount.
These decision can be made by factory workers themselves, without
having to consult the production control or engineering departments
that correspond to the brain in the human body. The plant should be a
place where such judgements can be made by workers autonomously."
Needless to say (and I might as well admit:0))... that underlying
these, there is an ideological/value dimension (viz, business is a
part of society/communnity, and not the otherway round; that wealth
can be created in more comprehensive ways other than making just
profit/dividends, etc.)... In case, you are intereted in exploring
this perspective, check out:
http://www.pcdf.org/living_economies/
and then
http://members.tripod.com/~taodesigns/index.html
and then
http://www.context.org/ICLIB/IC41/Rowe.htm
etc. etc.
<
Oct 14, 2003
The usefulness of an MBA??- Part II
Mahesh Murthy carries off his previous article in Businessworld:
"My premise is that nothing approaching anything real or useful is taught in MBA programmes in India. It's a basic timepass employers want you to go through as a filter before they come to hire you.
Their theory is straightforward. Say 10 out of every 1,000 students get into an Indian Institute of Technology. And then five of those get into an Indian Institute of Management. The hideously misinformed HR community then figures this must, hence, be the top 0.5% in India - and proceeds to throw gobs of cash at them for jobs completely unrelated to their education.
So if you want a high-paying job, get into a 'high-ranked' B-school - and don't you worry about your specialisation in graduation or the MBA itself. Nobody else does. Do what you feel like - or can pass exams most easily in."
Well there is a grain of truth in that...and MM with 'absolutely no formal management qualifications whatsoever' does know what he is talking about ;-))
Mahesh Murthy carries off his previous article in Businessworld:
"My premise is that nothing approaching anything real or useful is taught in MBA programmes in India. It's a basic timepass employers want you to go through as a filter before they come to hire you.
Their theory is straightforward. Say 10 out of every 1,000 students get into an Indian Institute of Technology. And then five of those get into an Indian Institute of Management. The hideously misinformed HR community then figures this must, hence, be the top 0.5% in India - and proceeds to throw gobs of cash at them for jobs completely unrelated to their education.
So if you want a high-paying job, get into a 'high-ranked' B-school - and don't you worry about your specialisation in graduation or the MBA itself. Nobody else does. Do what you feel like - or can pass exams most easily in."
Well there is a grain of truth in that...and MM with 'absolutely no formal management qualifications whatsoever' does know what he is talking about ;-))
Oct 13, 2003
Naukri's HR headlines:
Modicare Appoints Expatriate As COO
Mr K.K Modi has appointed Mr Richard Johnson as the Chief Operating Officer of Modicare, his direct marketing company. Mr Samir Modi moves up from the managing director’s position to Executive Chairman as the post of MD has been abolished. Mr Samir Modi is now out of the day-to-day management of Modicare, while Mr Johnson has been hired to provide insights into the finer points of direct marketing.
Source: 09-10-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Times Compiled by www.naukri.com
Dr Paul To Head Virtusa Centre
Dr Santanu Paul has been appointed the General Manager Operations at Virtusa Corporation, a US-based provider of software engineering services. He would be heading their Advanced Technology Centre (ATC) in Hyderabad. He replaces Mr Harsha Kumar, who returns to the US to head a US-based business unit after guiding the company’s operations for three years. Before joining Virtusa’s Indian operations, Dr Santanu Paul was in the US for approximately 13 years and had only recently joined the global leadership team at the local headquarters of Virtusa.
Source: 09-10-03 Hindu Business Line: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Sify CFO Set To Join Global Corp
Mr T. R. Santhanakrishnan (TRS) Sify CFO is quitting. He has already put in his papers. He will be relieved after a 4-year stint with the company on October 18th 2003. TRS has confirmed the news and said that he had taken the decision around 10 months ago on this (quitting). “ I was just waiting for the right time. Now Sify with a cash-in-hand of $30 million is in a comfortable position financially. The operating costs per quarter has also been cut down to a low of around $2 million,” he said. He is expected to join an MNC as their global CFO.
Source: 09-10-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Times Compiled by www.naukri.com
Star TV’s Mr Katial Quits
After being transferred to Star TV’s Hong Kong headquarters Mr Tarun Katial has reportedly put in his papers. Mr Deepak Sehgal, Creative director, has been promoted as programming head with the designation of executive vice-president (content & communication). Mr Katial had been shifted to Hong Kong to assist the huge portfolio of Mr Steve Askew, who is heading Star’s overall programming and operations.
Source: 09-10-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Essar’s Gas Expansion Plans Hinge With Mr Virani
Mr F.B. Virani has joined Essar group as an advisor for gas-related business. He was formerly with Enron India’s subsidiary Metgas. Mr Virani would be assisting the Essar group with its proposed expansion plans in the field of coal bed methane (CBM) and purchasing natural gas. “Essar itself is a big consumer of gas, its 550-mw gas based captive power plant at Hazira, consumes around 2 million tonnes of natural gas,”
Source: 09-10-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
US CEO Compensations Open to Scrutiny
Information on how US business executives are compensated has become much easier; also rival companies can now know what kind of packages are being offered by their immediate competition. This could be a boon for investors seeking to trade on the information. As per the new disclosure requirements introduced after the MCI, Enron Corp and other accounting scandals which broke out in 2001-2002, Corporate entities must disclose stock transactions and awards of stock and options within two days of such transactions taking place. They have to do it through electronic filings accessible to all through company and other websites. Before August 2002, the insiders- who consist of executives, directors and big shareholders- could delay disclosing the information for up to 41 days and they could also avoid announcing some transactions until after the end of the financial year.
Source: 09-10-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
5-Year Extension For NDDB Chief
Ms Amrita Patel the chairperson of NDDB has been given an extension of 5 years at her position. The Appointments Committee of the Cabinet has given its approval to this effect. The 5-year term would commence from mid-November 2003.
Source: 09-10-03 The Financial Express: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Mr Siddiqui Appointed Head Human Resources at Maruti Udyog Ltd
Maruti Udyog Ltd has appointed Mr Saqulain Siddiqui as Head of Human Resources/ Chief General Manager HR. Mr Siddiqui was formerly Director Human Resources (India Operations) with New Holland Tractors for 7 years. Mr Siddiqui has a track record of 24 years in top Indian and multinational companies like Escorts, DCM Toyota, DCM Daewoo and DCM Benetton. He has also been associated with the CII, AIMA and other professional bodies in the HR area.
Source: 09-10-03 Industry Sources Compiled by www.naukri.com
Landmarks
Appointed: Mr Sandeep Basu, President and CEO, BPL Mobile.
Mr C. Ramullu, Director (finance), HPCL.
Mr Sameer Hiremath, executive director, Hikal Ltd.
Mr Anoop Kaul, GM (commercial), SBI, Bengal circle.
Mr K. R. Srikantan, Managing Director, State Bank of Bikaner & Jaipur.
Resigned: Mr Cyrus Bagwada, Managing Director, Essel Propack.
Mr C.V. Krishnan, Chief Executive Officer (metals), Sterlite industries.
Mr J. S. Chatterjee, joint Managing Director, Jenson & Nicholson.
Mr Alak Saha, joint Managing Director and CFO, Nicco Corporation.
Source: 09-10-03 Business India (Sep 29- Oct12) Compiled by www.naukri.com
Mr Mashelkar Wins Lal Bahadur Shastri National Award
Well known scientist-manager, Mr R. A. Mashelkar has won the Lal Bahadur Shastri National Award for excellence in Public Administration and Management Services for the year 2002.
Source: 09-10-03 Business India (Sep29 - Oct12) Compiled by www.naukri.com
Mr Nair Appointed As Head - Isro
Speculations over who would head Isro - India's reputed space programme, after the retirement of Mr K. Kasturirangan, have come to an end with Mr. G. Madhavan Nair taking the seat. Known as an efficient low key team leader, Mr Nair would be a rocket engineer to take over Isro after a long gap of 15 years.
Source: 09-10-03 Business India (Sep29 - Oct12) Compiled by www.naukri.com
Nabard And Other Banks Still Seeking Heads
The National Bank of Agriculture and Rural Development (Nabard) is making relentless effort to appoint a head which has remained without a head for the last few months. Ms Ranjana Kumar, Chairperson and Managing Director, Indian Bank, may take charges if the government clears the file. However, Nabard has promoted Amaresh Kumar, Secretary and Chief General Manager as Executive Director. Similarly, the Kolkata based Allahabad Bank too is looking for a chairman cum managing director (CMD), for the last six months after Mr B Samal retired on March 31.
Source: 08-10-03 Business Standard: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
iFlex CMD Bags Award
Mr Rajesh Hukku, Chairman and Managing Director of iFlex Solution has been awarded by Ministry of Communications and Information Technology, Government of India, with the “Dewang Mehta Award for Innovation in Information Technology” for this year. The award which has been instituted by the ministry in the memory of late Dewang Mehta, founder and former president of NASSCOM, has been conferred on Mr Hukku for launching Flexcube, which is helping to cater to the needs of modern financial institutions in the best manner possible.
Source: 08-10-03 Business Standard: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Overwhelming Response To DD Job Ad
37 applications have been so far received in response to the advertisement put out for the post of Doordarshan director general, which is lying vacant for the last three months. The advertisement which had been posted by Prasar Bharti has received response mostly from government servants, though there are some applications from the private sector as well. This overwhelming response mostly from people holding joint secretary level ranks has put Prasar Bharti in a fix as these officials need to get permission from their respective cadres before making a move.
Source: 08-10-03 Business Standard: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Indian Women In Fortune List
Ms Vidya Chhabria, Chairperson, Jumbo Group and Ms Naina Lal Kidwai, Vice-Chairperson and Managing Director, HSBC Securities and Capital Markets (India) Pvt Ltd, are the two Indians picked by the Fortune magazine in its list of the world’s top 50 corporate women. Ms Chhabria has been ranked 38th and is up by six notches as compared to the 44th position last year, while Ms Kidwai moved up to 47th rank from last year’s 50th position. The international power 50 considers women who have an operating role in businesses outside the US but it includes women based in the US who run overseas divisions.
Source: 07-10-03 Business Standard: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Chrysler Plans To Prune 4,500 Jobs
The world’s fifth largest carmaker, Daimler Chrysler AG’s Chrysler unit is likely to cut 4,500 jobs as part of their aim to boost US sales and lower costs after losing $1.1 billion in the second quarter. The company plans to reduce the number of jobs in order to compensate the loss, which it suffered by spending more than expected on rebates and low interest loans to sell Dodge, Chrysler and Jeep-brand cars and trucks. As part of a new four year treaty with the United Auto Workers that Chrysler workers agreed on, the company plans to either sell or close about nine plants, while workers retain healthcare coverage without paying premiums.
Source: 07-10-03 Hindu Business Line: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
LIC Rules The Group Insurance Business
More than 95% of the group insurance business has been retained by the Life Insurance Corporation of India (LIC), amid strong competition which LIC continues to get from private insurance players. The 12 private insurance companies have captured only 4.74% of the group premium business which comes to Rs 626.36 crore as per the Insurance Regulatory Authority. LIC, in actual terms, has retained 93.42% of the 3,100 odd policies sold.
Source: 07-10-03 Business Standard: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Jindal Vijayanagar Steel Gets New CEO
Jindal Vijayanagar Steel Ltd has appointed Dr B.N. Singh as Joint Managing Director and CEO. Dr Singh will succeed Mr J.K. Tandon who will be relocated to corporate office of Jindal South West at Mumbai. Dr Singh has worked with the LNM Group at their Algeria plant as Director General for more than a year, before joining Jindal. He was also employed with Rashtriya Ispat Nigam Ltd, Vizag and has also worked with SAIL for over a decade in varied assignments. To round-off his experience in the steel sector, he worked with with TISCO for 17 years prior to joining SAIL.
Source: 07-10-03 Hindu Business Line: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
IOC Staff Likely To Go On An Indefinite Strike
Employees of Indian Oil Corporation Ltd may go on an indefinite strike. The employees have threatened to go on a strike to protest the Cabinet Committee on Disinvestment’s proposal to sell a part of the company’s business. The workers will begin with a one-day token strike followed by an indefinite strike.
Source: 07-10-03 Hindu Business Line: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Singapore Airlines Board appoints Pei-Yuan Chia
Mr Pei-Yuan Chia who is a former Vice-Chairman and Director of Citicorp and Citibank, has joined the Singapore Airlines (SAL) board with effect from October 1, 2003.
Source: 07-10-03 The Financial Express: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Mr Verma Fights For Right To Strike
Union Labour Minister, Mr Sahib Singh Verma is against the Supreme Court verdict banning strikes by the government employees. According to Mr Verma, the last resort of the government employees would be to strike, when their plea is not listened to by the authorities or if he has exhausted all channels of grievance redressal. The government workers should not be denied of their right to strike, which has been provided by the Industrial Dispute Act, 1947.
Source: 07-10-03 Business Standard: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Mr Premkumar Joins Food Corporation
Mr R M Premkumar has been elected as Chairman of the Food Corporation of India (FCI). A 1968 batch IAS, Mr Premkumar was secretary in the national commission on scheduled castes and scheduled tribes earlier.
Source: 07-10-03 Business Standard: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Indian Hotels Hiring More And More Expatriates
Indian Hotels Company is now looking at inducting foreigners to run the business.The last few months have seen quite a few foreign national taking charge of Indian hotels. Mr Raymond Bickson, a US national has recently replaced Mr R K Krishna Kumar as Managing Director at the Taj Group. Taj has also filled some other top corporate positions with expatriates along with hiring executive chefs with foreign nationality at two of its premium hotels.
Source: 07-10-03 Business Standard: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
McCann-Erickson WorldGroup Gets New CFO
Mr Ramesh Rajan has been appointed as the new Chief Financial Officer of McCann-Erickson WorldGroup, part of the Interpublic Group of Cos. He will replace Mr Arthur D’ Angelo and will report to Interpublic’s Chief Operating Officer, Mr Chris Coughlin, as well as WorldGroup Chairman-CEO Mr John Dooner.
Source: 06-10-03 exchange4media.com Compiled by www.naukri.com
Nurses Now Must Qualify Eligibility Criteria To Get US Visa
Nurses who aspire to work in US, would now have to prove their eligibility to apply for US visa. They will now need to produce a certificate, even if they are applying for a non-immigrant visa. According to a memo issued by Mr William Yates, the associate director of operations for citizenship and immigration, "professionals" seeking a non-immigrant visa can no longer enjoy the waiver. The aspirants now have to demonstrate that they have VisaScreen at the time that the adjustment application is filed , that is from non-resident to resident status, even if she is not seeking a green card. This will make obtaining visas for nurses much tougher and longer. At the same time the U S continues to face a shortage of nurses.
Source: 06-10-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
New Area Director For Singapore Tourism Board
The Singapore Tourism Board (STB) has recently made Mr Romen Bose the new Area Director for Northern and Western India operations. Mr Bose who has worked with Channel News Asia as a Broadcast Journalist, was working as a Communications Strategist with the United Nations before joining STB.
Source: 06-10-03 Hindu Business Line: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
IDBI Bank Loses Its Acting CEO Too
Amid continuing uncertainty in the IDBI Bank, the senior-most Executive and the acting CEO of the bank, Mr Ajay Bimbhet, puts in his papers. His resignation comes as a blow to the bank which has seen Ms Verma retiring from the chairmanship in March followed by the resignation of the Managing Director, Mr Gunit Chadha in August and also two directors Mr M.C. Shah and Mr Shekhar Bajaj stepping down from the board. Mr Bimbhet is said to have joined Abu Dhabi Commercial Bank, where he will be handling the retail business.
Source: 06-10-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Number Of Workers On US Payrolls Grows
After eight months of decline at a stretch in the job market, the US employers for the first time in September added jobs. The financial market which was braced for 30,000 job losses, by Wall Street economists’ forecast, saw the rise in the number of jobs. Last month, the number of workers on US payrolls outside the farm sector increased by 57,000. Although the growth was not big enough to bring down the unemployment rate, it was encouraging enough, as it happened after eight months of decline.
Source: 05-10-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Fast Moving Indian Services Industry Offers Age-old Compensation Packages
On one hand the services industry in India is moving at a fast pace and on the other its compensation packages still remain archaic. The hospitality industry, till date, sticks to the hierarchy of a traditional organisation in terms of financial returns. The hospitality industry pays the highest to its general manager, followed by the resident manager. This was revealed in the seventh annual report of HVS International, a hospitality consulting group, based on a study of hotels in India.
Source: 05-10-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
SIMA Appoints New Chairman And V-C
Mr Sandeep Jajodia, Vice-Chairman and Executive Chairman of Monnet Ispat Limited, has been elected as Chairman of SPONGE Iron Manufacturer’s Association (SIMA) while Mr P R Dhariwal, Executive Director, Essar, takes over as Vice-Chairman, SIMA. Mr Jajodia brings with him a 15 years experience in international trading and project execution, while Mr Dhariwal has 28 long years of experience in various industries behind him.
Source: 05-10-03 The Financial Express: Delhi Times Compiled by www.naukri.com
Mr Sankar Becomes Director At Tesco
In addition to his existing position as managing director of Tesco India Sourcing, Mr G Sankar will also take over as director for its new IT-focussed high-tech centre. Tesco which is a UK-based discount retail chain has recently promoted Mr Sankar, who started his career with Madura Coats Ltd in 1987.
Source: 05-10-03 The Financial Express: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Top Moves
Mr Richard Fleming appointed Business Manager, Kodak C&PI Group, South Asia.
Mr Vivek Sharma appointed Business Head for Morphy Richards.
Mr S. Srinivasan assumes charge as Chief Vigilance Officer, Kudremukh Iron Ore Ltd.
Source: 04-10-03 Hindu Business Line: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Former Volkswagon Chief Likely To Become Fiat Executive
The Fiat Group will very soon make an announcement regarding the appointment of Mr Herbert Demel as Chief Executive Officer of Fiat Auto. Mr Demel who is the former Head of Volkswagon Brazil, will replace Mr Giancarlo Boschetti who will retire in November 2004. Mr Martin Leach formerly with Ford Europe who was in the picture is no longer being considered since Fiat refused to release him from a two-year non-compete clause.
Source: 04-10-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Hyderabad Facility Of Surgical Info To Expand Soon
The Atlanta-based technology solutions provider for hospitals, Surgical Information Systems Inc (SIS) is all set to expand its India development-cum-support centre in Hyderabad. The company is slightly behind its schedule of expansion, as it requires highly specialised skills for their projects. However, the company with an investment of about $4 million by the end of this financial year plans to more than double its numbers.
Source: 04-10-03 Hindu Business Line: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Employee Retention – A Challenge For Captive BPOs
The captive business process outsourcing (BPO) industry in India is going through a struggle to retain its employees. Most of the captive BPOs are experiencing an annual attrition of 45 percent while third party BPO service providers have managed to maintain their attrition rates at around 20 pct. Poor salary structure and limited growth opportunities are said to be the major reason behind the high attrition rate in captive BPOs, particularly the ones which focus on niche business areas such as banking, finance and insurance.
Source: 04-10-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Singapore Company Dismisses PWC, KPMG
South east Asia’s largest logistics group, the Singapore-based conglomerate SembCorp Logistics, has sacked six senior officials, including its managing director and chief financial officer after the company uncovered a $12-million accounting irregularity at its Chennai-based subsidiary SembLog India. An investigation has also shown the involvement of the company’s accountants Pricewaterhouse & Co (India) and auditors KPMG Consulting in the scam. SembLog has, therefore, terminated the services of PWC and KPMG and is now planning to take legal action against them.
Source: 03-10-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
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Modicare Appoints Expatriate As COO
Mr K.K Modi has appointed Mr Richard Johnson as the Chief Operating Officer of Modicare, his direct marketing company. Mr Samir Modi moves up from the managing director’s position to Executive Chairman as the post of MD has been abolished. Mr Samir Modi is now out of the day-to-day management of Modicare, while Mr Johnson has been hired to provide insights into the finer points of direct marketing.
Source: 09-10-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Times Compiled by www.naukri.com
Dr Paul To Head Virtusa Centre
Dr Santanu Paul has been appointed the General Manager Operations at Virtusa Corporation, a US-based provider of software engineering services. He would be heading their Advanced Technology Centre (ATC) in Hyderabad. He replaces Mr Harsha Kumar, who returns to the US to head a US-based business unit after guiding the company’s operations for three years. Before joining Virtusa’s Indian operations, Dr Santanu Paul was in the US for approximately 13 years and had only recently joined the global leadership team at the local headquarters of Virtusa.
Source: 09-10-03 Hindu Business Line: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Sify CFO Set To Join Global Corp
Mr T. R. Santhanakrishnan (TRS) Sify CFO is quitting. He has already put in his papers. He will be relieved after a 4-year stint with the company on October 18th 2003. TRS has confirmed the news and said that he had taken the decision around 10 months ago on this (quitting). “ I was just waiting for the right time. Now Sify with a cash-in-hand of $30 million is in a comfortable position financially. The operating costs per quarter has also been cut down to a low of around $2 million,” he said. He is expected to join an MNC as their global CFO.
Source: 09-10-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Times Compiled by www.naukri.com
Star TV’s Mr Katial Quits
After being transferred to Star TV’s Hong Kong headquarters Mr Tarun Katial has reportedly put in his papers. Mr Deepak Sehgal, Creative director, has been promoted as programming head with the designation of executive vice-president (content & communication). Mr Katial had been shifted to Hong Kong to assist the huge portfolio of Mr Steve Askew, who is heading Star’s overall programming and operations.
Source: 09-10-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Essar’s Gas Expansion Plans Hinge With Mr Virani
Mr F.B. Virani has joined Essar group as an advisor for gas-related business. He was formerly with Enron India’s subsidiary Metgas. Mr Virani would be assisting the Essar group with its proposed expansion plans in the field of coal bed methane (CBM) and purchasing natural gas. “Essar itself is a big consumer of gas, its 550-mw gas based captive power plant at Hazira, consumes around 2 million tonnes of natural gas,”
Source: 09-10-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
US CEO Compensations Open to Scrutiny
Information on how US business executives are compensated has become much easier; also rival companies can now know what kind of packages are being offered by their immediate competition. This could be a boon for investors seeking to trade on the information. As per the new disclosure requirements introduced after the MCI, Enron Corp and other accounting scandals which broke out in 2001-2002, Corporate entities must disclose stock transactions and awards of stock and options within two days of such transactions taking place. They have to do it through electronic filings accessible to all through company and other websites. Before August 2002, the insiders- who consist of executives, directors and big shareholders- could delay disclosing the information for up to 41 days and they could also avoid announcing some transactions until after the end of the financial year.
Source: 09-10-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
5-Year Extension For NDDB Chief
Ms Amrita Patel the chairperson of NDDB has been given an extension of 5 years at her position. The Appointments Committee of the Cabinet has given its approval to this effect. The 5-year term would commence from mid-November 2003.
Source: 09-10-03 The Financial Express: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Mr Siddiqui Appointed Head Human Resources at Maruti Udyog Ltd
Maruti Udyog Ltd has appointed Mr Saqulain Siddiqui as Head of Human Resources/ Chief General Manager HR. Mr Siddiqui was formerly Director Human Resources (India Operations) with New Holland Tractors for 7 years. Mr Siddiqui has a track record of 24 years in top Indian and multinational companies like Escorts, DCM Toyota, DCM Daewoo and DCM Benetton. He has also been associated with the CII, AIMA and other professional bodies in the HR area.
Source: 09-10-03 Industry Sources Compiled by www.naukri.com
Landmarks
Appointed: Mr Sandeep Basu, President and CEO, BPL Mobile.
Mr C. Ramullu, Director (finance), HPCL.
Mr Sameer Hiremath, executive director, Hikal Ltd.
Mr Anoop Kaul, GM (commercial), SBI, Bengal circle.
Mr K. R. Srikantan, Managing Director, State Bank of Bikaner & Jaipur.
Resigned: Mr Cyrus Bagwada, Managing Director, Essel Propack.
Mr C.V. Krishnan, Chief Executive Officer (metals), Sterlite industries.
Mr J. S. Chatterjee, joint Managing Director, Jenson & Nicholson.
Mr Alak Saha, joint Managing Director and CFO, Nicco Corporation.
Source: 09-10-03 Business India (Sep 29- Oct12) Compiled by www.naukri.com
Mr Mashelkar Wins Lal Bahadur Shastri National Award
Well known scientist-manager, Mr R. A. Mashelkar has won the Lal Bahadur Shastri National Award for excellence in Public Administration and Management Services for the year 2002.
Source: 09-10-03 Business India (Sep29 - Oct12) Compiled by www.naukri.com
Mr Nair Appointed As Head - Isro
Speculations over who would head Isro - India's reputed space programme, after the retirement of Mr K. Kasturirangan, have come to an end with Mr. G. Madhavan Nair taking the seat. Known as an efficient low key team leader, Mr Nair would be a rocket engineer to take over Isro after a long gap of 15 years.
Source: 09-10-03 Business India (Sep29 - Oct12) Compiled by www.naukri.com
Nabard And Other Banks Still Seeking Heads
The National Bank of Agriculture and Rural Development (Nabard) is making relentless effort to appoint a head which has remained without a head for the last few months. Ms Ranjana Kumar, Chairperson and Managing Director, Indian Bank, may take charges if the government clears the file. However, Nabard has promoted Amaresh Kumar, Secretary and Chief General Manager as Executive Director. Similarly, the Kolkata based Allahabad Bank too is looking for a chairman cum managing director (CMD), for the last six months after Mr B Samal retired on March 31.
Source: 08-10-03 Business Standard: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
iFlex CMD Bags Award
Mr Rajesh Hukku, Chairman and Managing Director of iFlex Solution has been awarded by Ministry of Communications and Information Technology, Government of India, with the “Dewang Mehta Award for Innovation in Information Technology” for this year. The award which has been instituted by the ministry in the memory of late Dewang Mehta, founder and former president of NASSCOM, has been conferred on Mr Hukku for launching Flexcube, which is helping to cater to the needs of modern financial institutions in the best manner possible.
Source: 08-10-03 Business Standard: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Overwhelming Response To DD Job Ad
37 applications have been so far received in response to the advertisement put out for the post of Doordarshan director general, which is lying vacant for the last three months. The advertisement which had been posted by Prasar Bharti has received response mostly from government servants, though there are some applications from the private sector as well. This overwhelming response mostly from people holding joint secretary level ranks has put Prasar Bharti in a fix as these officials need to get permission from their respective cadres before making a move.
Source: 08-10-03 Business Standard: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Indian Women In Fortune List
Ms Vidya Chhabria, Chairperson, Jumbo Group and Ms Naina Lal Kidwai, Vice-Chairperson and Managing Director, HSBC Securities and Capital Markets (India) Pvt Ltd, are the two Indians picked by the Fortune magazine in its list of the world’s top 50 corporate women. Ms Chhabria has been ranked 38th and is up by six notches as compared to the 44th position last year, while Ms Kidwai moved up to 47th rank from last year’s 50th position. The international power 50 considers women who have an operating role in businesses outside the US but it includes women based in the US who run overseas divisions.
Source: 07-10-03 Business Standard: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Chrysler Plans To Prune 4,500 Jobs
The world’s fifth largest carmaker, Daimler Chrysler AG’s Chrysler unit is likely to cut 4,500 jobs as part of their aim to boost US sales and lower costs after losing $1.1 billion in the second quarter. The company plans to reduce the number of jobs in order to compensate the loss, which it suffered by spending more than expected on rebates and low interest loans to sell Dodge, Chrysler and Jeep-brand cars and trucks. As part of a new four year treaty with the United Auto Workers that Chrysler workers agreed on, the company plans to either sell or close about nine plants, while workers retain healthcare coverage without paying premiums.
Source: 07-10-03 Hindu Business Line: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
LIC Rules The Group Insurance Business
More than 95% of the group insurance business has been retained by the Life Insurance Corporation of India (LIC), amid strong competition which LIC continues to get from private insurance players. The 12 private insurance companies have captured only 4.74% of the group premium business which comes to Rs 626.36 crore as per the Insurance Regulatory Authority. LIC, in actual terms, has retained 93.42% of the 3,100 odd policies sold.
Source: 07-10-03 Business Standard: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Jindal Vijayanagar Steel Gets New CEO
Jindal Vijayanagar Steel Ltd has appointed Dr B.N. Singh as Joint Managing Director and CEO. Dr Singh will succeed Mr J.K. Tandon who will be relocated to corporate office of Jindal South West at Mumbai. Dr Singh has worked with the LNM Group at their Algeria plant as Director General for more than a year, before joining Jindal. He was also employed with Rashtriya Ispat Nigam Ltd, Vizag and has also worked with SAIL for over a decade in varied assignments. To round-off his experience in the steel sector, he worked with with TISCO for 17 years prior to joining SAIL.
Source: 07-10-03 Hindu Business Line: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
IOC Staff Likely To Go On An Indefinite Strike
Employees of Indian Oil Corporation Ltd may go on an indefinite strike. The employees have threatened to go on a strike to protest the Cabinet Committee on Disinvestment’s proposal to sell a part of the company’s business. The workers will begin with a one-day token strike followed by an indefinite strike.
Source: 07-10-03 Hindu Business Line: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Singapore Airlines Board appoints Pei-Yuan Chia
Mr Pei-Yuan Chia who is a former Vice-Chairman and Director of Citicorp and Citibank, has joined the Singapore Airlines (SAL) board with effect from October 1, 2003.
Source: 07-10-03 The Financial Express: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Mr Verma Fights For Right To Strike
Union Labour Minister, Mr Sahib Singh Verma is against the Supreme Court verdict banning strikes by the government employees. According to Mr Verma, the last resort of the government employees would be to strike, when their plea is not listened to by the authorities or if he has exhausted all channels of grievance redressal. The government workers should not be denied of their right to strike, which has been provided by the Industrial Dispute Act, 1947.
Source: 07-10-03 Business Standard: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Mr Premkumar Joins Food Corporation
Mr R M Premkumar has been elected as Chairman of the Food Corporation of India (FCI). A 1968 batch IAS, Mr Premkumar was secretary in the national commission on scheduled castes and scheduled tribes earlier.
Source: 07-10-03 Business Standard: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Indian Hotels Hiring More And More Expatriates
Indian Hotels Company is now looking at inducting foreigners to run the business.The last few months have seen quite a few foreign national taking charge of Indian hotels. Mr Raymond Bickson, a US national has recently replaced Mr R K Krishna Kumar as Managing Director at the Taj Group. Taj has also filled some other top corporate positions with expatriates along with hiring executive chefs with foreign nationality at two of its premium hotels.
Source: 07-10-03 Business Standard: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
McCann-Erickson WorldGroup Gets New CFO
Mr Ramesh Rajan has been appointed as the new Chief Financial Officer of McCann-Erickson WorldGroup, part of the Interpublic Group of Cos. He will replace Mr Arthur D’ Angelo and will report to Interpublic’s Chief Operating Officer, Mr Chris Coughlin, as well as WorldGroup Chairman-CEO Mr John Dooner.
Source: 06-10-03 exchange4media.com Compiled by www.naukri.com
Nurses Now Must Qualify Eligibility Criteria To Get US Visa
Nurses who aspire to work in US, would now have to prove their eligibility to apply for US visa. They will now need to produce a certificate, even if they are applying for a non-immigrant visa. According to a memo issued by Mr William Yates, the associate director of operations for citizenship and immigration, "professionals" seeking a non-immigrant visa can no longer enjoy the waiver. The aspirants now have to demonstrate that they have VisaScreen at the time that the adjustment application is filed , that is from non-resident to resident status, even if she is not seeking a green card. This will make obtaining visas for nurses much tougher and longer. At the same time the U S continues to face a shortage of nurses.
Source: 06-10-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
New Area Director For Singapore Tourism Board
The Singapore Tourism Board (STB) has recently made Mr Romen Bose the new Area Director for Northern and Western India operations. Mr Bose who has worked with Channel News Asia as a Broadcast Journalist, was working as a Communications Strategist with the United Nations before joining STB.
Source: 06-10-03 Hindu Business Line: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
IDBI Bank Loses Its Acting CEO Too
Amid continuing uncertainty in the IDBI Bank, the senior-most Executive and the acting CEO of the bank, Mr Ajay Bimbhet, puts in his papers. His resignation comes as a blow to the bank which has seen Ms Verma retiring from the chairmanship in March followed by the resignation of the Managing Director, Mr Gunit Chadha in August and also two directors Mr M.C. Shah and Mr Shekhar Bajaj stepping down from the board. Mr Bimbhet is said to have joined Abu Dhabi Commercial Bank, where he will be handling the retail business.
Source: 06-10-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Number Of Workers On US Payrolls Grows
After eight months of decline at a stretch in the job market, the US employers for the first time in September added jobs. The financial market which was braced for 30,000 job losses, by Wall Street economists’ forecast, saw the rise in the number of jobs. Last month, the number of workers on US payrolls outside the farm sector increased by 57,000. Although the growth was not big enough to bring down the unemployment rate, it was encouraging enough, as it happened after eight months of decline.
Source: 05-10-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Fast Moving Indian Services Industry Offers Age-old Compensation Packages
On one hand the services industry in India is moving at a fast pace and on the other its compensation packages still remain archaic. The hospitality industry, till date, sticks to the hierarchy of a traditional organisation in terms of financial returns. The hospitality industry pays the highest to its general manager, followed by the resident manager. This was revealed in the seventh annual report of HVS International, a hospitality consulting group, based on a study of hotels in India.
Source: 05-10-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
SIMA Appoints New Chairman And V-C
Mr Sandeep Jajodia, Vice-Chairman and Executive Chairman of Monnet Ispat Limited, has been elected as Chairman of SPONGE Iron Manufacturer’s Association (SIMA) while Mr P R Dhariwal, Executive Director, Essar, takes over as Vice-Chairman, SIMA. Mr Jajodia brings with him a 15 years experience in international trading and project execution, while Mr Dhariwal has 28 long years of experience in various industries behind him.
Source: 05-10-03 The Financial Express: Delhi Times Compiled by www.naukri.com
Mr Sankar Becomes Director At Tesco
In addition to his existing position as managing director of Tesco India Sourcing, Mr G Sankar will also take over as director for its new IT-focussed high-tech centre. Tesco which is a UK-based discount retail chain has recently promoted Mr Sankar, who started his career with Madura Coats Ltd in 1987.
Source: 05-10-03 The Financial Express: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Top Moves
Mr Richard Fleming appointed Business Manager, Kodak C&PI Group, South Asia.
Mr Vivek Sharma appointed Business Head for Morphy Richards.
Mr S. Srinivasan assumes charge as Chief Vigilance Officer, Kudremukh Iron Ore Ltd.
Source: 04-10-03 Hindu Business Line: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Former Volkswagon Chief Likely To Become Fiat Executive
The Fiat Group will very soon make an announcement regarding the appointment of Mr Herbert Demel as Chief Executive Officer of Fiat Auto. Mr Demel who is the former Head of Volkswagon Brazil, will replace Mr Giancarlo Boschetti who will retire in November 2004. Mr Martin Leach formerly with Ford Europe who was in the picture is no longer being considered since Fiat refused to release him from a two-year non-compete clause.
Source: 04-10-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Hyderabad Facility Of Surgical Info To Expand Soon
The Atlanta-based technology solutions provider for hospitals, Surgical Information Systems Inc (SIS) is all set to expand its India development-cum-support centre in Hyderabad. The company is slightly behind its schedule of expansion, as it requires highly specialised skills for their projects. However, the company with an investment of about $4 million by the end of this financial year plans to more than double its numbers.
Source: 04-10-03 Hindu Business Line: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Employee Retention – A Challenge For Captive BPOs
The captive business process outsourcing (BPO) industry in India is going through a struggle to retain its employees. Most of the captive BPOs are experiencing an annual attrition of 45 percent while third party BPO service providers have managed to maintain their attrition rates at around 20 pct. Poor salary structure and limited growth opportunities are said to be the major reason behind the high attrition rate in captive BPOs, particularly the ones which focus on niche business areas such as banking, finance and insurance.
Source: 04-10-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Singapore Company Dismisses PWC, KPMG
South east Asia’s largest logistics group, the Singapore-based conglomerate SembCorp Logistics, has sacked six senior officials, including its managing director and chief financial officer after the company uncovered a $12-million accounting irregularity at its Chennai-based subsidiary SembLog India. An investigation has also shown the involvement of the company’s accountants Pricewaterhouse & Co (India) and auditors KPMG Consulting in the scam. SembLog has, therefore, terminated the services of PWC and KPMG and is now planning to take legal action against them.
Source: 03-10-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
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The information provided here is gathered from published sources and is true to the best of our knowledge. Info Edge India Pvt. Ltd. has taken reasonable steps to ensure the accuracy of the information. Info Edge India Pvt. Ltd. will not be liable on account of any inaccuracy of information in this newsletter. It is the responsibility of the information seeker to research the bona fide content in greater detail before placing reliance on information given herewith.
Oct 10, 2003
Consulting's salary squeeze coming to an end?...
Top Consultant's survey says: "UK-based consultancies are likely to face pent up pressure for pay rises over the next 12 months, according to the provisional findings from Top-Consultant’s 2003 salary survey.
Polling several thousand management consultants worldwide, the survey finds that over the last 12 months the majority of UK-based consultants have been hit by zero bonuses, pay freezes - or indeed both.
Taking the UK responses in isolation, 53% of the 1400 management consultants surveyed received no pay rise in the last 12 months. Of those that did secure a payrise, over half saw only a 1-5% rise in their base salary. By contrast, only 8% of all consultants achieved a pay rise in excess of 10%.
Coupled with the slow rate of growth in base salaries, UK consultants also fell on hard times in terms of bonuses. 56% of UK respondents received no bonus whatsoever in the last 12 months. The minority that did achieve a bonus mostly achieved 5% - 15% of salary, again lower than the 20%+ that would be expected in the boom years.
The result, according to Top-Consultant Director Tony Restell, is likely to be considerable pent-up demand amongst UK consultants for sizeable increases in remuneration:
'Speaking to consultants at several leading firms, there is dissatisfaction that career aspirations have not being met of late. Regular promotions, pay rises and bonuses are all seen as the quid pro quo for accepting the sometimes-harsh consulting lifestyle. In 2003 there has been no let up in pressure on consultants, hence many have been left feeling that pay expectations have not been met.'
'While the industry has clearly been through a period of turmoil in which s"
Top Consultant's survey says: "UK-based consultancies are likely to face pent up pressure for pay rises over the next 12 months, according to the provisional findings from Top-Consultant’s 2003 salary survey.
Polling several thousand management consultants worldwide, the survey finds that over the last 12 months the majority of UK-based consultants have been hit by zero bonuses, pay freezes - or indeed both.
Taking the UK responses in isolation, 53% of the 1400 management consultants surveyed received no pay rise in the last 12 months. Of those that did secure a payrise, over half saw only a 1-5% rise in their base salary. By contrast, only 8% of all consultants achieved a pay rise in excess of 10%.
Coupled with the slow rate of growth in base salaries, UK consultants also fell on hard times in terms of bonuses. 56% of UK respondents received no bonus whatsoever in the last 12 months. The minority that did achieve a bonus mostly achieved 5% - 15% of salary, again lower than the 20%+ that would be expected in the boom years.
The result, according to Top-Consultant Director Tony Restell, is likely to be considerable pent-up demand amongst UK consultants for sizeable increases in remuneration:
'Speaking to consultants at several leading firms, there is dissatisfaction that career aspirations have not being met of late. Regular promotions, pay rises and bonuses are all seen as the quid pro quo for accepting the sometimes-harsh consulting lifestyle. In 2003 there has been no let up in pressure on consultants, hence many have been left feeling that pay expectations have not been met.'
'While the industry has clearly been through a period of turmoil in which s"
Oct 9, 2003
Gartner analysts say: "Brands could play key role in winning market share in fragmented IT services industry -
The IT services marketplace is a highly competitive and fragmented market where a strong brand can play an important role in differentiating a company, as IT service providers compete with top-tier technology vendors for market share and mind share, according to Gartner's latest report.
The survey showed that IBM, Hewlett-Packard and Microsoft ranked in the top 10 in terms of first to mind and total unaided responses in the business and IT consulting category, even though none of the three have a strong footprint in business consulting.
A total of 159 different providers were top of mind in business and IT consulting. Even so, 'don't know' was among the top five in every category. Gartner analysts believe this is a good news/bad news situation for IT professional services providers.
'For providers entering the market, or established and/or boutique players who have historically foregone brand building, there is still plenty of mind share to be had. Outside of IBM, no one provider overwhelmingly dominated any categories tested,' said Christine Adams, principal analyst for Gartner. "
Strategic consulting looks set to make a comeback
Strategic consulting looks set to make a comeback on both sides of the Atlantic, according to the latest research. In the US, a new report* shows there is an increased appetite amongst corporate executives for strategic advice. Surveying consulting clients, Kennedy Information found that 87% envisage engaging strategic advisors during the next 2 years - suggesting the hey days may soon be back for the likes of McKinsey, BCG and BAH. This ties in with data suggesting a US economic recovery is underway and that a refocusing on growth strategies is likely to occur amongst big corporate clients.
The renewed interest in recruiting experienced strategy consultants is the most obvious indicator that Partners expect stronger strategy consulting growth to materialize in 2004. Several of the leading strategy firms are actively recruiting once again, though mostly through discreet channels.
Perhaps the most telling indicator for the sector will become clear during the next 6 weeks, when the strategy consultancies begin their drives to entice and recruit the top talent amongst university graduates. These last 2 years, the presence of many firms at campus recruiting events has been a purely token gesture to maintain brand awareness on campus. If October sees a renewed gusto in their attempts to woo the brightest of the bright then we will feel confident that better times are here to stay.
The IT services marketplace is a highly competitive and fragmented market where a strong brand can play an important role in differentiating a company, as IT service providers compete with top-tier technology vendors for market share and mind share, according to Gartner's latest report.
The survey showed that IBM, Hewlett-Packard and Microsoft ranked in the top 10 in terms of first to mind and total unaided responses in the business and IT consulting category, even though none of the three have a strong footprint in business consulting.
A total of 159 different providers were top of mind in business and IT consulting. Even so, 'don't know' was among the top five in every category. Gartner analysts believe this is a good news/bad news situation for IT professional services providers.
'For providers entering the market, or established and/or boutique players who have historically foregone brand building, there is still plenty of mind share to be had. Outside of IBM, no one provider overwhelmingly dominated any categories tested,' said Christine Adams, principal analyst for Gartner. "
Strategic consulting looks set to make a comeback
Strategic consulting looks set to make a comeback on both sides of the Atlantic, according to the latest research. In the US, a new report* shows there is an increased appetite amongst corporate executives for strategic advice. Surveying consulting clients, Kennedy Information found that 87% envisage engaging strategic advisors during the next 2 years - suggesting the hey days may soon be back for the likes of McKinsey, BCG and BAH. This ties in with data suggesting a US economic recovery is underway and that a refocusing on growth strategies is likely to occur amongst big corporate clients.
The renewed interest in recruiting experienced strategy consultants is the most obvious indicator that Partners expect stronger strategy consulting growth to materialize in 2004. Several of the leading strategy firms are actively recruiting once again, though mostly through discreet channels.
Perhaps the most telling indicator for the sector will become clear during the next 6 weeks, when the strategy consultancies begin their drives to entice and recruit the top talent amongst university graduates. These last 2 years, the presence of many firms at campus recruiting events has been a purely token gesture to maintain brand awareness on campus. If October sees a renewed gusto in their attempts to woo the brightest of the bright then we will feel confident that better times are here to stay.
Oct 6, 2003
India HR News
compiled by Naukri
Corio Inc's R&D Outfit In Bangalore
Corio Inc an enterprise application service provider with an investment of about $20 million has recently set up a R&D unit in Bangalore, which currently is the only unit outside the US. This particular outfit has been set up to provide customer support services for the parent?s clientele from Bangalore and also to carry out research and development operations for the main company. Corio India Infotech Pvt Ltd, which is currently focussing on developing upgrades for two of the five of Corio?s product line iServices, would also decide ramp-up plans too.
Source: 03-10-03 Hindu Business Line: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
IBM Axes 720 Employees
As part of an effort to match workers? skills with jobs, IBM has brought down its workforce of 180,000 services employees by 720. The cuts throughout the US, are a part of company?s regular skills rebalancing, which in general terms is an exercise to match worker skills to the types of services it is offering. IBM has shed jobs this year in its various spheres which include global services, software and microelectronics divisions.
Source: 03-10-03 Hindu Business Line: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Nokia Plans To Hire 150 More
For its large Salo mobile phone plant in Finland, Nokia plans to hire another 150 people to cater to the strong mobile phone market demand. According to the Nokia Mobile Phones spokesman, Mr Kari Tuutti, the mobile phone market is picking up volumes thus needing more people to meet the market needs.This move will take place concurrently with a management and structural revamp. This revamp will lead to the firm splitting its three divisions into four to further substantiate its top position in the cut-throat mobile phones market.
Source: 03-10-03 Hindu Business Line: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Corporates Finding New Bases
The current trend of corporates is of moving out of metros and exploring new cities to save on their costs. With respect to commercial real estate, last year the market has witnessed tremendous change. As part of their long-term space requirement and cost-saving strategy now more and more corporates are expanding into newer facilities from their existing locations. This trend is picking up not only in Bangalore, but also in most of the cities where corporates are moving out to save cost and to overcome the problem of space-shortage.
Source: 03-10-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
PeopleSoft Starts Shedding Jobs
Following the purchase of rival JD Edwards & Co, PeopleSoft Inc has started to bring down its workforce by almost seven percent by dismissing its employees. This was planned previously which the company is implementing now by notifying its workers last week. A few employees have already been dismissed, however the company declined to disclose the number. The company has plans to eliminate between 750 and 1,000 jobs as part of a plan to save up to $207 million in 2004.
Source: 03-10-03 The Financial Express: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Leo Burnett President Steps Down
Mr Bob Brennan the President of Leo Burnett, the Publicis Groupe ad network, is finally stepping down from his post. Temporarily, Linda Wolf, Burnett Chairman & CEO, will assume Brennan?s duties for its operations in North America including its flagship office in Chicago. Mr Brennan who joined Burnett 21 years ago as a media buyer and planner and rose to the post of president at the agency, declined to discuss the situation and reasons for his resignation.
Source: 03-10-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Rise In The Number Of Women Managers
Women are increasingly likely to hold managerial and professional jobs than men, reflecting a trend that is 25 years in the making. This is reflected in education and job status. However, on other measures, women seem to be losing out. Significantly, both sexes seem to be losing out in the fight to carve out free time. Mothers in dual-earning couples for instance report a paltry 54 minutes of personal time in a day. 39 pct of women are now in managerial or professional jobs as compared with 36 pct in 1997 and 24 pct in 1977. These findings are part of a report released during the week in the U S.
Source: 02-10-03 The Financial Express: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Ford To Prune 2,800 Jobs
Ford Motor Co has decided to bring down the strength of the contract workers by about 1,500 and will be cutting down 1,300 open salaried jobs to cut down costs by the end of this year. In order to maintain profitability, the company is axing surplus employees. Ford which has about 79,000 salaried employees worldwide, also plans to eliminate another 50 salaried employees.
Source: 02-10-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
LG Nominates Head For Its Flagship Unit
LG Electronics, in a step to reform the group?s family-controlled structure, has nominated a professional manager as head of its flagship unit. Mr John Koo, Chairman, LG Electronics, the son of founder Mr Koo Tae-Hoi, has been replaced by Mr Kim Ssang-Su, a professional manager who was promoted from vice-chairman. Mr Koo would control 4 units namely, LG Cable, LG-Nikko Copper, LG-Caltex Gas and Kukdong City Gas as part of the restrucuring program
Source: 01-10-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Ballarpur To Announce VRS
Ballarpur Industries is planning to announce a major voluntary retirement scheme (VRS) programme in its factories, including its mother plants. The material handling division will primarily be covered by the VRS programme. The Thapars-promoted domestic paper giant, is planning to prune almost 10% of its total workforce. The scheme is being rolled to boost labour productivity in tandem with machine upgradation in its plants. The VRS is likely to involve a one-time bullet payment.
Source: 01-10-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Corporates Turning To Meditation To Beat Stress
Transcendental Meditation (TM) is the buzz word in the corporate world, currently. More and more corporates are taking to TM, a meditation technique developed by Maharishi Mahesh Yogi. Executives who want to strike a balance are increasingly taking a refuge in TM. People who have undergone this programme vouch for the benefits. Marico, which started the TM programme at its Pondicherry factory, is now planning to expand it to its other plants too, after experiencing the benefits of the programme.
Source: 01-10-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
BT Asia Appoints New VP
British Telecom for its India and south-east Asia operations, has recently announced the appointment of Mr Richard Bagley as Vice-President. Mr Bagley would be based in New Delhi and will be responsible for managing the sales and marketing operations teams in the Asia-Pacific regional markets of India, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore and Thailand.
Source: 01-10-03 Hindu Business Line: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
IICT To Get New Chief
Dr J.S. Yadav who is a director grade scientist and coordinator-organic chemical sciences and a Fellow of the National Academy, on October 1 will take charge as Director of the Indian Institute of Chemical Technology (IICT). Dr Yadav will replace Dr K.V. Raghavan who is retiring.
Source: 01-10-03 The Finanacial Express: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Hind Lever's Garden Reach Unit Restarts
After facing a six months closure, the Garden Reach factory of Hindustan Lever Ltd (HLL) has recently restarted its operations. The workers were informed beforehand to resume duty, however they will not be paid any salaries or wages during the closure period in lieu they will receive a recoverable advance of Rs 20,000 each to be deducted in monthly instalments. As per the tripartite agreement, the 150 workers on contract basis have been separated, while all the permanent employees have been put on the rolls.
Source: 01-10-03 Business Standard: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Birla SunLife Gets New CEO
Birla SunLife Asset Management Company has finally elected Mr S.V. Prasad the Chief Executive Officer, after a lot of speculation over the appointment. Mr Prasad who is likely to join by October this year, is the former Chief of Zurich India Mutual Fund. Since the time Mr Jeremy Beswick left two years ago, the post has been lying vacant.
Source: 01-10-03 Business Standard: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
HCL's BPO Chief Quits, Joins vCustomer
Mr Sujit Bakshi, HCL BPO head is all set to join the Warberg-Pincus funded US-based BPO, vCustomer and has already submitted his resignation. During Bakshi's tenure at HCL, the BPO's operations grew from a two-member project team to a 2,300 strong base in 20 months. Mr Bakshi will now be heading vCustomer?s operations as President India and Head of Global Operations. As head of India operations, Mr Bakshi will be responsible for strengthening and consolidating vCustomer's position in the country by enabling the company to win and execute multi-crore, multi-year contracts.
Source: 30-09-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Birla Sun Life AMC Fund Manager Resigns
After a seven year term with the company, Mr Anil Sarin, Fund Manager, Birla Sun Life has submitted his resignation. With this, two top fund managers have quit the company within a year. Mr Sarin confirmed his leaving the company; he however declined to disclose his future plans. The company is yet to find a replacement for Mr Sarin, according to sources.
Source: 30-09-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Sugar Factories Will Now Require MBAs
Co-operative sugar factories in India which are said to be politically sensitive will soon start recruiting MBAs to fill its top management positions. The government is all set to create a professional cadre of Managing Directors which will manage and run the units, instead of promoting people to that position. A process has been formulated to select MDs to fill the current vacancies where in 50% of whom will be freshers holding MBA degree and the rest will be filled by following the existing method. However, this new procedure has also been opposed by the Maharashtra Rajya Sahakari Sakhar Sangh (MRSSS), who believe that freshers may know nothing of running a sugar factory.
Source: 30-09-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
The Benches Go Empty As Utilisation Rate Goes High
The Indian IT companies are once again experiencing an increase in the utilisation rate which is expected to cross the peak of 78-80 percent seen during 2000, the peak of the IT boom. The utilisation rate is directly proportional to the percentage of employees in a company who are actively working on projects for customers and are generating revenue. The number of such employees are increasing gradually in the IT industry as the companies are experiencing a rapid ramp-up, consequently lowering the number of people on the bench, or in general terms unutilised manpower, to almost negligible. The utilisation rates are now shooting up as the business volumes are swelling and the only people on the bench are those who are either on leave or on corporate training programmes for skill upgradation.
Source: 30-09-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Mr Damodaran To Join As IDBI Chief
Mr M. Damodaran has been appointed as the chairman of Industrial Development Bank of India, replacing Mr P.P. Vora. Mr Damodaran will take twin charges of a fund manager as UTI AMC chief and that of a term lender in IDBI. He will hold concurrent charge of the post of both, chairman of UTI as well as CMD of IDBI with effect from October 1.
Source: 30-09-03 Hindu Business Line: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
ITES Industry May Soon Progress In Kolkata
Bangalore which currently is considered to be the absolute epitome of an IT city, may soon get competitors. According to a recent survey by the UK-based real-estate consultancy, India Property Research Ltd (IPR), the smaller cities and even cities like Kolkata may soon witness a major influx and expansion of ITes business. Kolkata, which has hardly seen much flow of funds in the BPO sector, has huge potential and there is a possibility that it gets added to the list in the coming two years. The only thing, the study suggests, that cities like Kolkata need to change is the perception existing in the industry that it too has space and infrastructure for ITes and can be the next possible destination for the ITes revolution.
Source: 30-09-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
TCS Targets Global Image Makeover
Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) is training all its employees to speak and understand at least one foreign language in a bid to become a global player in the knowledge sector. The move is not limited to employees just learning a language but also making them conversant with other soft skills like culture and etiquette of at least one foreign country. A dedicated department for taking up the challenge of language training programmes across all its offices, development centres, departments and groups has been set up. Ms Indubala Ashok was hired as the TCS foreign language initiative head last year to spearhead this project across TCS offices.
Source: 29-09-03 The Financial Express: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Quintiles To Ramp Up India Operations
Quintiles, a $2-billion contract research organisation (CRO), has brought out a new India specific strategy. It intends to hire nearly 200 more people in its ITenabled services activities in India. There is also a plan to grow its Bangalore location into a major data management/IT hub for Quintiles globally. Overall, the company has 450 employees in the country, with 250 numbers in sales and marketing while 100 in clinical research and the rest (100) in ITES ( ECG analysis and data management).Quintiles currently employs 100 professionals in ITES, handling data management and analysis of ECG (electro-cardiogram) for clinical trials worldwide. The company plans to increase by threefold the number of employees in research and ITES in India by 2005.
Source: 29-09-03 The Financial Express: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Indian BPO, ITES Growth At $24 Billion By 2008
By 2008 the size of BPO and ITES (IT Enabled Services) business in the country is expected to top $21-$24 billion. Mr S Mahalingam CFO, TCS predicts the global outsourcing of BPO and ITES operations to India will continue in the year ahead. He said the ITES segment would beat the IT services industry in terms of the rate of growth. In 2002-03, the ITES industry in India generated a revenue of Rs 11,700 crore, a rise of over 65 per cent from 2001-02. India?s unbeatable advantage includes the availability of an English-speaking population, availability of technically qualified people at competitive costs apart from a virtual 12-hour time lag with the US. Mr Mahalingam was speaking at a conference on ITES organised by the CII in Kolkata.
Source: 28-09-03 Hindu Business Line: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Daimler Head Quits NYSE
The CEO, of Daimler-Chrysler Mr Juergen Schrempp, has stepped down from the board of directors of the NYSE because of the recent salary scandal involving Mr Richard Grasso which is plaguing the NYSE.
Source: 28-09-03 Hindu Business Line: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Board Member Resigns From NYSE
Mr. H Carl McCall resigned from the New York Stock Exchange board in what may foreshadow a series of departures sparked by the ousting of CEO Mr Richard Grasso over a $ 140 million payout.Mr McCall had previously defended Mr Grasso?s compensation, considered excessive by critics, but as the furore increased he supported Mr Grasso?s departure.
Source: 27-09-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Hitachi Reshuffles Top Positions
Hitachi Home & Life Solutions (HHLS) has reshuffled its top managerial positions in India. Mr Amit Doshi, hitherto the sales head moves to marketing. Mr Amit Gupta who headed marketing will move to corporate affairs and human resources. The current managerial shuffle is part of a three-phased restructuring programme, which Hitachi has charted out. This includes coming out of the red in 2003-2004 to be followed by enhanced brand positioning and expansion into new categories of durables.
Source: 27-09-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
ISB Governing Board Gets A New Member
STAR group Chairman & CEO Mr. James Murdoch joined the governing board of the Indian School of Business (ISB). He also serves the boards of New Corporation subsidiaries, British Sky Broadcasting group (BskyB), News Digital Systems (NDS), boards of the YankeeNets and the board of trustees of the Harvard Lampoon. Mr Murdoch graduated from Harvard University.
Source: 27-09-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
GRO Expands Its Operations
Chennai based Global Realty Outsourcing, a BPO firm, plans to expand its operations by employing more people by June 2004. CEO Mr. Nicholas B Laird said outsourcing was yet to catch up in a big way in the real estate vertical and the segment offered huge potential. It plans to increase headcount from 350 to 1000 persons. More than 50% are CA's and MBA's who analyse figures for US clients as an enabling tool in real estate investment decisions.
Source: 27-09-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Levis To Shut US Units
Struggling jeans manufacturer Levi Strauss & Co has closed down its remaining North American plants, rendering nearly 2000 employees out of work and completing its withdrawal from the US manufacturing segment. The retrenchment and plant closure is part of a restructuring exercise at the 150-year old company, which is facing increasing competition from cheaper discount brands and pricey designer labels eroding its profitability and existence. Like other apparel companies, Levi Strauss finds it more efficient to manufacture overseas, many of which are located in Latin America.
Source: 27-09-03 Business Standard: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
AtStake CTO Fired After MS Report
A report signed by seven researchers, which concluded that the dominance of Microsoft software on PCs has made computer networks susceptible to ``massive, cascading failures" has led to the CTO of Atstake resigning.The chief technology officer of computer security firm AtStake, which consults for Microsoft Corp, has been asked to leave after taking part in writing a report criticising Windows as posing a national cybersecurity risk. AtStake has confirmed Mr Dan Geer is no longer with the company, but did not say if he resigned or was fired.
Source: 27-09-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Nokia - Reshuffle At The Top
Nokia is undergoing a series of top management changes aimed at an organisational overhaul, naming a new chief financial officer, in a bid to maintain its position as the world?s top cellphone maker. The move is intended at grooming a successor to Chief Executive Mr Jorma Ollila. Under his stewardship Nokia climbed to the top of the mobile handset industry. He is under contract till the summer of 2006. The company named Mr Rick Simonson as its new chief financial officer in place of Mr Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo, who will head the Mobile Phones division.
Source: 27-09-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Motown Rides The BPO Wave
India's BPO reputation has started making itself felt even in Motown . As per a study by consultancy firm AT Kearney, which sampled opinions from American auto executives, India emerged as the outsourcing destination of choice with 24% of the respondents giving it the thumbs up. Auto hub China comes in second, with 15% of the votes, while older hubs like Mexico and Brazil manage 13% and 10% respectively. Even big Asian markets like Thailand and Australia cornered a mere 2% and 1% votes in the survey, while large supply centres like Canada and Hungary fared a little better at 7% and 6%.
Source: 27-09-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Editio
compiled by Naukri
Corio Inc's R&D Outfit In Bangalore
Corio Inc an enterprise application service provider with an investment of about $20 million has recently set up a R&D unit in Bangalore, which currently is the only unit outside the US. This particular outfit has been set up to provide customer support services for the parent?s clientele from Bangalore and also to carry out research and development operations for the main company. Corio India Infotech Pvt Ltd, which is currently focussing on developing upgrades for two of the five of Corio?s product line iServices, would also decide ramp-up plans too.
Source: 03-10-03 Hindu Business Line: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
IBM Axes 720 Employees
As part of an effort to match workers? skills with jobs, IBM has brought down its workforce of 180,000 services employees by 720. The cuts throughout the US, are a part of company?s regular skills rebalancing, which in general terms is an exercise to match worker skills to the types of services it is offering. IBM has shed jobs this year in its various spheres which include global services, software and microelectronics divisions.
Source: 03-10-03 Hindu Business Line: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Nokia Plans To Hire 150 More
For its large Salo mobile phone plant in Finland, Nokia plans to hire another 150 people to cater to the strong mobile phone market demand. According to the Nokia Mobile Phones spokesman, Mr Kari Tuutti, the mobile phone market is picking up volumes thus needing more people to meet the market needs.This move will take place concurrently with a management and structural revamp. This revamp will lead to the firm splitting its three divisions into four to further substantiate its top position in the cut-throat mobile phones market.
Source: 03-10-03 Hindu Business Line: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Corporates Finding New Bases
The current trend of corporates is of moving out of metros and exploring new cities to save on their costs. With respect to commercial real estate, last year the market has witnessed tremendous change. As part of their long-term space requirement and cost-saving strategy now more and more corporates are expanding into newer facilities from their existing locations. This trend is picking up not only in Bangalore, but also in most of the cities where corporates are moving out to save cost and to overcome the problem of space-shortage.
Source: 03-10-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
PeopleSoft Starts Shedding Jobs
Following the purchase of rival JD Edwards & Co, PeopleSoft Inc has started to bring down its workforce by almost seven percent by dismissing its employees. This was planned previously which the company is implementing now by notifying its workers last week. A few employees have already been dismissed, however the company declined to disclose the number. The company has plans to eliminate between 750 and 1,000 jobs as part of a plan to save up to $207 million in 2004.
Source: 03-10-03 The Financial Express: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Leo Burnett President Steps Down
Mr Bob Brennan the President of Leo Burnett, the Publicis Groupe ad network, is finally stepping down from his post. Temporarily, Linda Wolf, Burnett Chairman & CEO, will assume Brennan?s duties for its operations in North America including its flagship office in Chicago. Mr Brennan who joined Burnett 21 years ago as a media buyer and planner and rose to the post of president at the agency, declined to discuss the situation and reasons for his resignation.
Source: 03-10-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Rise In The Number Of Women Managers
Women are increasingly likely to hold managerial and professional jobs than men, reflecting a trend that is 25 years in the making. This is reflected in education and job status. However, on other measures, women seem to be losing out. Significantly, both sexes seem to be losing out in the fight to carve out free time. Mothers in dual-earning couples for instance report a paltry 54 minutes of personal time in a day. 39 pct of women are now in managerial or professional jobs as compared with 36 pct in 1997 and 24 pct in 1977. These findings are part of a report released during the week in the U S.
Source: 02-10-03 The Financial Express: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Ford To Prune 2,800 Jobs
Ford Motor Co has decided to bring down the strength of the contract workers by about 1,500 and will be cutting down 1,300 open salaried jobs to cut down costs by the end of this year. In order to maintain profitability, the company is axing surplus employees. Ford which has about 79,000 salaried employees worldwide, also plans to eliminate another 50 salaried employees.
Source: 02-10-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
LG Nominates Head For Its Flagship Unit
LG Electronics, in a step to reform the group?s family-controlled structure, has nominated a professional manager as head of its flagship unit. Mr John Koo, Chairman, LG Electronics, the son of founder Mr Koo Tae-Hoi, has been replaced by Mr Kim Ssang-Su, a professional manager who was promoted from vice-chairman. Mr Koo would control 4 units namely, LG Cable, LG-Nikko Copper, LG-Caltex Gas and Kukdong City Gas as part of the restrucuring program
Source: 01-10-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Ballarpur To Announce VRS
Ballarpur Industries is planning to announce a major voluntary retirement scheme (VRS) programme in its factories, including its mother plants. The material handling division will primarily be covered by the VRS programme. The Thapars-promoted domestic paper giant, is planning to prune almost 10% of its total workforce. The scheme is being rolled to boost labour productivity in tandem with machine upgradation in its plants. The VRS is likely to involve a one-time bullet payment.
Source: 01-10-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Corporates Turning To Meditation To Beat Stress
Transcendental Meditation (TM) is the buzz word in the corporate world, currently. More and more corporates are taking to TM, a meditation technique developed by Maharishi Mahesh Yogi. Executives who want to strike a balance are increasingly taking a refuge in TM. People who have undergone this programme vouch for the benefits. Marico, which started the TM programme at its Pondicherry factory, is now planning to expand it to its other plants too, after experiencing the benefits of the programme.
Source: 01-10-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
BT Asia Appoints New VP
British Telecom for its India and south-east Asia operations, has recently announced the appointment of Mr Richard Bagley as Vice-President. Mr Bagley would be based in New Delhi and will be responsible for managing the sales and marketing operations teams in the Asia-Pacific regional markets of India, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore and Thailand.
Source: 01-10-03 Hindu Business Line: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
IICT To Get New Chief
Dr J.S. Yadav who is a director grade scientist and coordinator-organic chemical sciences and a Fellow of the National Academy, on October 1 will take charge as Director of the Indian Institute of Chemical Technology (IICT). Dr Yadav will replace Dr K.V. Raghavan who is retiring.
Source: 01-10-03 The Finanacial Express: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Hind Lever's Garden Reach Unit Restarts
After facing a six months closure, the Garden Reach factory of Hindustan Lever Ltd (HLL) has recently restarted its operations. The workers were informed beforehand to resume duty, however they will not be paid any salaries or wages during the closure period in lieu they will receive a recoverable advance of Rs 20,000 each to be deducted in monthly instalments. As per the tripartite agreement, the 150 workers on contract basis have been separated, while all the permanent employees have been put on the rolls.
Source: 01-10-03 Business Standard: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Birla SunLife Gets New CEO
Birla SunLife Asset Management Company has finally elected Mr S.V. Prasad the Chief Executive Officer, after a lot of speculation over the appointment. Mr Prasad who is likely to join by October this year, is the former Chief of Zurich India Mutual Fund. Since the time Mr Jeremy Beswick left two years ago, the post has been lying vacant.
Source: 01-10-03 Business Standard: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
HCL's BPO Chief Quits, Joins vCustomer
Mr Sujit Bakshi, HCL BPO head is all set to join the Warberg-Pincus funded US-based BPO, vCustomer and has already submitted his resignation. During Bakshi's tenure at HCL, the BPO's operations grew from a two-member project team to a 2,300 strong base in 20 months. Mr Bakshi will now be heading vCustomer?s operations as President India and Head of Global Operations. As head of India operations, Mr Bakshi will be responsible for strengthening and consolidating vCustomer's position in the country by enabling the company to win and execute multi-crore, multi-year contracts.
Source: 30-09-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Birla Sun Life AMC Fund Manager Resigns
After a seven year term with the company, Mr Anil Sarin, Fund Manager, Birla Sun Life has submitted his resignation. With this, two top fund managers have quit the company within a year. Mr Sarin confirmed his leaving the company; he however declined to disclose his future plans. The company is yet to find a replacement for Mr Sarin, according to sources.
Source: 30-09-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Sugar Factories Will Now Require MBAs
Co-operative sugar factories in India which are said to be politically sensitive will soon start recruiting MBAs to fill its top management positions. The government is all set to create a professional cadre of Managing Directors which will manage and run the units, instead of promoting people to that position. A process has been formulated to select MDs to fill the current vacancies where in 50% of whom will be freshers holding MBA degree and the rest will be filled by following the existing method. However, this new procedure has also been opposed by the Maharashtra Rajya Sahakari Sakhar Sangh (MRSSS), who believe that freshers may know nothing of running a sugar factory.
Source: 30-09-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
The Benches Go Empty As Utilisation Rate Goes High
The Indian IT companies are once again experiencing an increase in the utilisation rate which is expected to cross the peak of 78-80 percent seen during 2000, the peak of the IT boom. The utilisation rate is directly proportional to the percentage of employees in a company who are actively working on projects for customers and are generating revenue. The number of such employees are increasing gradually in the IT industry as the companies are experiencing a rapid ramp-up, consequently lowering the number of people on the bench, or in general terms unutilised manpower, to almost negligible. The utilisation rates are now shooting up as the business volumes are swelling and the only people on the bench are those who are either on leave or on corporate training programmes for skill upgradation.
Source: 30-09-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Mr Damodaran To Join As IDBI Chief
Mr M. Damodaran has been appointed as the chairman of Industrial Development Bank of India, replacing Mr P.P. Vora. Mr Damodaran will take twin charges of a fund manager as UTI AMC chief and that of a term lender in IDBI. He will hold concurrent charge of the post of both, chairman of UTI as well as CMD of IDBI with effect from October 1.
Source: 30-09-03 Hindu Business Line: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
ITES Industry May Soon Progress In Kolkata
Bangalore which currently is considered to be the absolute epitome of an IT city, may soon get competitors. According to a recent survey by the UK-based real-estate consultancy, India Property Research Ltd (IPR), the smaller cities and even cities like Kolkata may soon witness a major influx and expansion of ITes business. Kolkata, which has hardly seen much flow of funds in the BPO sector, has huge potential and there is a possibility that it gets added to the list in the coming two years. The only thing, the study suggests, that cities like Kolkata need to change is the perception existing in the industry that it too has space and infrastructure for ITes and can be the next possible destination for the ITes revolution.
Source: 30-09-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
TCS Targets Global Image Makeover
Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) is training all its employees to speak and understand at least one foreign language in a bid to become a global player in the knowledge sector. The move is not limited to employees just learning a language but also making them conversant with other soft skills like culture and etiquette of at least one foreign country. A dedicated department for taking up the challenge of language training programmes across all its offices, development centres, departments and groups has been set up. Ms Indubala Ashok was hired as the TCS foreign language initiative head last year to spearhead this project across TCS offices.
Source: 29-09-03 The Financial Express: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Quintiles To Ramp Up India Operations
Quintiles, a $2-billion contract research organisation (CRO), has brought out a new India specific strategy. It intends to hire nearly 200 more people in its ITenabled services activities in India. There is also a plan to grow its Bangalore location into a major data management/IT hub for Quintiles globally. Overall, the company has 450 employees in the country, with 250 numbers in sales and marketing while 100 in clinical research and the rest (100) in ITES ( ECG analysis and data management).Quintiles currently employs 100 professionals in ITES, handling data management and analysis of ECG (electro-cardiogram) for clinical trials worldwide. The company plans to increase by threefold the number of employees in research and ITES in India by 2005.
Source: 29-09-03 The Financial Express: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Indian BPO, ITES Growth At $24 Billion By 2008
By 2008 the size of BPO and ITES (IT Enabled Services) business in the country is expected to top $21-$24 billion. Mr S Mahalingam CFO, TCS predicts the global outsourcing of BPO and ITES operations to India will continue in the year ahead. He said the ITES segment would beat the IT services industry in terms of the rate of growth. In 2002-03, the ITES industry in India generated a revenue of Rs 11,700 crore, a rise of over 65 per cent from 2001-02. India?s unbeatable advantage includes the availability of an English-speaking population, availability of technically qualified people at competitive costs apart from a virtual 12-hour time lag with the US. Mr Mahalingam was speaking at a conference on ITES organised by the CII in Kolkata.
Source: 28-09-03 Hindu Business Line: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Daimler Head Quits NYSE
The CEO, of Daimler-Chrysler Mr Juergen Schrempp, has stepped down from the board of directors of the NYSE because of the recent salary scandal involving Mr Richard Grasso which is plaguing the NYSE.
Source: 28-09-03 Hindu Business Line: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Board Member Resigns From NYSE
Mr. H Carl McCall resigned from the New York Stock Exchange board in what may foreshadow a series of departures sparked by the ousting of CEO Mr Richard Grasso over a $ 140 million payout.Mr McCall had previously defended Mr Grasso?s compensation, considered excessive by critics, but as the furore increased he supported Mr Grasso?s departure.
Source: 27-09-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Hitachi Reshuffles Top Positions
Hitachi Home & Life Solutions (HHLS) has reshuffled its top managerial positions in India. Mr Amit Doshi, hitherto the sales head moves to marketing. Mr Amit Gupta who headed marketing will move to corporate affairs and human resources. The current managerial shuffle is part of a three-phased restructuring programme, which Hitachi has charted out. This includes coming out of the red in 2003-2004 to be followed by enhanced brand positioning and expansion into new categories of durables.
Source: 27-09-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
ISB Governing Board Gets A New Member
STAR group Chairman & CEO Mr. James Murdoch joined the governing board of the Indian School of Business (ISB). He also serves the boards of New Corporation subsidiaries, British Sky Broadcasting group (BskyB), News Digital Systems (NDS), boards of the YankeeNets and the board of trustees of the Harvard Lampoon. Mr Murdoch graduated from Harvard University.
Source: 27-09-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
GRO Expands Its Operations
Chennai based Global Realty Outsourcing, a BPO firm, plans to expand its operations by employing more people by June 2004. CEO Mr. Nicholas B Laird said outsourcing was yet to catch up in a big way in the real estate vertical and the segment offered huge potential. It plans to increase headcount from 350 to 1000 persons. More than 50% are CA's and MBA's who analyse figures for US clients as an enabling tool in real estate investment decisions.
Source: 27-09-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Levis To Shut US Units
Struggling jeans manufacturer Levi Strauss & Co has closed down its remaining North American plants, rendering nearly 2000 employees out of work and completing its withdrawal from the US manufacturing segment. The retrenchment and plant closure is part of a restructuring exercise at the 150-year old company, which is facing increasing competition from cheaper discount brands and pricey designer labels eroding its profitability and existence. Like other apparel companies, Levi Strauss finds it more efficient to manufacture overseas, many of which are located in Latin America.
Source: 27-09-03 Business Standard: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
AtStake CTO Fired After MS Report
A report signed by seven researchers, which concluded that the dominance of Microsoft software on PCs has made computer networks susceptible to ``massive, cascading failures" has led to the CTO of Atstake resigning.The chief technology officer of computer security firm AtStake, which consults for Microsoft Corp, has been asked to leave after taking part in writing a report criticising Windows as posing a national cybersecurity risk. AtStake has confirmed Mr Dan Geer is no longer with the company, but did not say if he resigned or was fired.
Source: 27-09-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Nokia - Reshuffle At The Top
Nokia is undergoing a series of top management changes aimed at an organisational overhaul, naming a new chief financial officer, in a bid to maintain its position as the world?s top cellphone maker. The move is intended at grooming a successor to Chief Executive Mr Jorma Ollila. Under his stewardship Nokia climbed to the top of the mobile handset industry. He is under contract till the summer of 2006. The company named Mr Rick Simonson as its new chief financial officer in place of Mr Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo, who will head the Mobile Phones division.
Source: 27-09-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Edition Compiled by www.naukri.com
Motown Rides The BPO Wave
India's BPO reputation has started making itself felt even in Motown . As per a study by consultancy firm AT Kearney, which sampled opinions from American auto executives, India emerged as the outsourcing destination of choice with 24% of the respondents giving it the thumbs up. Auto hub China comes in second, with 15% of the votes, while older hubs like Mexico and Brazil manage 13% and 10% respectively. Even big Asian markets like Thailand and Australia cornered a mere 2% and 1% votes in the survey, while large supply centres like Canada and Hungary fared a little better at 7% and 6%.
Source: 27-09-03 The Economic Times: Delhi Editio
Oct 3, 2003
IBM, EDS, Fujitsu, HP and Accenture emerge as the top 5 IT services providers whilst the overall market declined in 2002
Consultant - News.com reports:: "2002 saw the first ever outright decline in revenues for the IT services market, according to research and advisory specialists Gartner. Their latest research suggests end-user spending on IT services was $536bn for the year, a 0.6% year-on-year fall. IBM, EDS, Fujitsu, HP and Accenture were the top 5 IT services providers in terms of revenue and market share, and the impact of the slowdown on these companies has been well-documented. "
Consultant - News.com reports:: "2002 saw the first ever outright decline in revenues for the IT services market, according to research and advisory specialists Gartner. Their latest research suggests end-user spending on IT services was $536bn for the year, a 0.6% year-on-year fall. IBM, EDS, Fujitsu, HP and Accenture were the top 5 IT services providers in terms of revenue and market share, and the impact of the slowdown on these companies has been well-documented. "
Outsourcing seen in a key role in restructuring of German banks
Consultant - News.com reports: "A joint study by Accenture and the International Bankers' Forum has conclude that outsourcing will play a key role in the restructuring of German banks, as they look to save costs and concentrate on core activities.
In the course of the study, 124 managers and sector experts were questioned on their views of outsourcing. 21 per cent expected to be outsourcing work in the near future, while 51 per cent already had. The authors of the study expect outsourcing to retain its importance for the sector in the longer term, in addition to providing short-term solutions. "
Sometimes cost cutting, sometime strategic...Outsourcing is many things to similar people ;-)
Consultant - News.com reports: "A joint study by Accenture and the International Bankers' Forum has conclude that outsourcing will play a key role in the restructuring of German banks, as they look to save costs and concentrate on core activities.
In the course of the study, 124 managers and sector experts were questioned on their views of outsourcing. 21 per cent expected to be outsourcing work in the near future, while 51 per cent already had. The authors of the study expect outsourcing to retain its importance for the sector in the longer term, in addition to providing short-term solutions. "
Sometimes cost cutting, sometime strategic...Outsourcing is many things to similar people ;-)
The news of the Yahoo Groups Ban - How news travels and grows in scope
Dr. Madhukar Shukla sent out this to some folks and I am putting this up for you all to read:
"how ideas travel across the globe, I had put a search on Google News for 'yahoo group block india', and the following are the figures:
Sept 9:
Ministry of Comm & IT issues the directive to ISP
Sept 19:
first report on this issue in Hindu Business Line
Sept 23:
7 newspapers report the ban
Sept 24:
3 newspaper reports
Sept 25:
5 newspaper reports
Sept 26, 27, 28
2 newspaper reports
[though in the regional editions of Indian and Asian publications thre were reports which the key words, I had put in for 'news alert', could not find out]
Sept 29
16 newspaper reports
Sept 30
25 newspaper reports
What is important to note - if you scan through the links below - how the news travelled from:
1. how the information moved geographically - from India to East Asia/Australia, and then to UK and USA
2. how the information moved from local/ technical publications to global popular publications
Companies which succeed in the emerging environment, seem to track and manouver the trajectory of the 'idea virus'..
(1) they create the 'hype' among the consumers to quickly increase the market size and bring down their per-unit cost... or
(2)use 'viral marketing' to disseminate their offerings (did you ever see any ad of hotmail or yahoo?? - if not, how did you come to know about it???...
that is 'idea virus'/ 'meme'!!! :0))"
Dr. Madhukar Shukla sent out this to some folks and I am putting this up for you all to read:
"how ideas travel across the globe, I had put a search on Google News for 'yahoo group block india', and the following are the figures:
Sept 9:
Ministry of Comm & IT issues the directive to ISP
Sept 19:
first report on this issue in Hindu Business Line
Sept 23:
7 newspapers report the ban
Sept 24:
3 newspaper reports
Sept 25:
5 newspaper reports
Sept 26, 27, 28
2 newspaper reports
[though in the regional editions of Indian and Asian publications thre were reports which the key words, I had put in for 'news alert', could not find out]
Sept 29
16 newspaper reports
Sept 30
25 newspaper reports
What is important to note - if you scan through the links below - how the news travelled from:
1. how the information moved geographically - from India to East Asia/Australia, and then to UK and USA
2. how the information moved from local/ technical publications to global popular publications
Companies which succeed in the emerging environment, seem to track and manouver the trajectory of the 'idea virus'..
(1) they create the 'hype' among the consumers to quickly increase the market size and bring down their per-unit cost... or
(2)use 'viral marketing' to disseminate their offerings (did you ever see any ad of hotmail or yahoo?? - if not, how did you come to know about it???...
that is 'idea virus'/ 'meme'!!! :0))"
More companies outsource for strategic value than to cut costs
Top Consultant also reports a study by Accenture that says:
Executives are outsourcing for the control it gives them over business outcomes, not simply as a cost-cutting measure, according to results of a survey from Accenture. The findings indicate that outsourcing, which initially gained appeal as a means of reducing costs, is being embraced for the ability it gives executives to predict business results and support strategic planning.
The survey, which entailed interviews with more than 800 health, manufacturing, retail and travel executives in the United States and Europe, found that an overwhelming majority (86 percent) said that outsourcing gave them more control over business results in a variety of critical areas, the most important being the ability to plan. And while cost-cutting is among these critical areas, the executives also reported equal levels of control in reliability, cost variability improvements, and effective implementation of ideas. More than half (55 percent) of respondents said that outsourcing allows their companies to implement strategies and change at a faster and more controlled rate.
Top Consultant also reports a study by Accenture that says:
Executives are outsourcing for the control it gives them over business outcomes, not simply as a cost-cutting measure, according to results of a survey from Accenture. The findings indicate that outsourcing, which initially gained appeal as a means of reducing costs, is being embraced for the ability it gives executives to predict business results and support strategic planning.
The survey, which entailed interviews with more than 800 health, manufacturing, retail and travel executives in the United States and Europe, found that an overwhelming majority (86 percent) said that outsourcing gave them more control over business results in a variety of critical areas, the most important being the ability to plan. And while cost-cutting is among these critical areas, the executives also reported equal levels of control in reliability, cost variability improvements, and effective implementation of ideas. More than half (55 percent) of respondents said that outsourcing allows their companies to implement strategies and change at a faster and more controlled rate.
Consulting making a comeback?
Top Consultant says the following:
Strategic consulting looks set to make a comeback on both sides of the Atlantic, according to the latest research. In the US, a new report* shows there is an increased appetite amongst corporate executives for strategic advice. Surveying consulting clients, Kennedy Information found that 87% envisage engaging strategic advisors during the next 2 years - suggesting the hay days may soon be back for the likes of McKinsey, BCG and BAH. This ties in with data suggesting a US economic recovery is underway and that a refocusing on growth strategies is likely to occur amongst big corporate clients.
In the UK a similar story is emerging, with the latest economic data suggesting the UK economy is growing more resiliently than previously thought - and a continued upturn expected over the next 12 months.
The renewed interest in recruiting experienced strategy consultants is the most obvious indicator that Partners expect stronger strategy consulting growth to materialise in 2004. Several of the leading strategy firms are actively recruiting once again, though mostly through discreet channels.
Perhaps the most telling indicator for the sector will become clear during the next 6 weeks, when the strategy consultancies begin their drives to entice and recruit the top talent amongst university finalists. These last 2 years, the presence of many firms at Milkround recruiting events has been a purely token gesture to maintain brand awareness on campus. If October sees a renewed gusto in their attempts to woo the brightest of the bright then we will feel confident that better times are here to stay.
Top Consultant says the following:
Strategic consulting looks set to make a comeback on both sides of the Atlantic, according to the latest research. In the US, a new report* shows there is an increased appetite amongst corporate executives for strategic advice. Surveying consulting clients, Kennedy Information found that 87% envisage engaging strategic advisors during the next 2 years - suggesting the hay days may soon be back for the likes of McKinsey, BCG and BAH. This ties in with data suggesting a US economic recovery is underway and that a refocusing on growth strategies is likely to occur amongst big corporate clients.
In the UK a similar story is emerging, with the latest economic data suggesting the UK economy is growing more resiliently than previously thought - and a continued upturn expected over the next 12 months.
The renewed interest in recruiting experienced strategy consultants is the most obvious indicator that Partners expect stronger strategy consulting growth to materialise in 2004. Several of the leading strategy firms are actively recruiting once again, though mostly through discreet channels.
Perhaps the most telling indicator for the sector will become clear during the next 6 weeks, when the strategy consultancies begin their drives to entice and recruit the top talent amongst university finalists. These last 2 years, the presence of many firms at Milkround recruiting events has been a purely token gesture to maintain brand awareness on campus. If October sees a renewed gusto in their attempts to woo the brightest of the bright then we will feel confident that better times are here to stay.
Sep 29, 2003
Yahoo! Groups ban…who is responsible?
"Some smaller ISPs had a totally different story to say. Instead of blaming the government or Yahoo!, they said they could do little because bandwidth providers have blocked access to that IP address. "
"Some smaller ISPs had a totally different story to say. Instead of blaming the government or Yahoo!, they said they could do little because bandwidth providers have blocked access to that IP address. "
Government of India's attempts to Block Yahoogroups ??
GOI had asked the ISPs to block access to a particular yahoogroup site, however, many ISPs have blocked access to entire yahoogroups site.
(It may not effect many yahoogroups members, but it does hinder moderators to do their job - and therefore, the effectiveness of the groups)
A copy of the government GO, which was available at:
http://corporate.ddsl.net/images/sc1.gif
It is from the Ministry of Communications and IT - LR Cell, signed by Jayant Kumar, Director, LR II (tel # 011 23372601)
It tells ISPs to block http://groups.yahoo.com/groups/kynhun/ - and definitely not to block the whole of yahoogroups.
On Google news
http://news.google.com/news?hl=en&ie=ISO-8859-1&edition=us&q=cert-in
http://news.google.com/news?hl=en&edition=us&q=yahoo+group+blocked+india&btnG=Search+News
And Yahoo Groups says
"India's Department of Telecommunications (DoT) recently issued an order
directing India's ISPs to block access from India to the Yahoo! Groups
service operated by Yahoo! Inc. in Sunnyvale, California. Although the order
apparently was intended to block access to only one particular U.S.-based
group, the practical effect has been to block access from India to all of
Yahoo!'s U.S-based Groups. The Group targeted by the DoT did not at any time
appear on Yahoo! India. Yahoo! Inc. has requested that the DoT narrow the
scope and impact of its order and hopes the DoT will restore your access to
this service shortly."
News items about the Ban made it across the world
In Australia
in UK
And of course in our Indian publications
Mid Day
Economic Times
GOI had asked the ISPs to block access to a particular yahoogroup site, however, many ISPs have blocked access to entire yahoogroups site.
(It may not effect many yahoogroups members, but it does hinder moderators to do their job - and therefore, the effectiveness of the groups)
A copy of the government GO, which was available at:
http://corporate.ddsl.net/images/sc1.gif
It is from the Ministry of Communications and IT - LR Cell, signed by Jayant Kumar, Director, LR II (tel # 011 23372601)
It tells ISPs to block http://groups.yahoo.com/groups/kynhun/ - and definitely not to block the whole of yahoogroups.
On Google news
http://news.google.com/news?hl=en&ie=ISO-8859-1&edition=us&q=cert-in
http://news.google.com/news?hl=en&edition=us&q=yahoo+group+blocked+india&btnG=Search+News
And Yahoo Groups says
"India's Department of Telecommunications (DoT) recently issued an order
directing India's ISPs to block access from India to the Yahoo! Groups
service operated by Yahoo! Inc. in Sunnyvale, California. Although the order
apparently was intended to block access to only one particular U.S.-based
group, the practical effect has been to block access from India to all of
Yahoo!'s U.S-based Groups. The Group targeted by the DoT did not at any time
appear on Yahoo! India. Yahoo! Inc. has requested that the DoT narrow the
scope and impact of its order and hopes the DoT will restore your access to
this service shortly."
News items about the Ban made it across the world
In Australia
in UK
And of course in our Indian publications
Mid Day
Economic Times
Mahesh Murthy on why NOT to do an MBA
To B School or Not to Be
"First: Understand that an MBA, in India at least, has nothing to do with education. Please 'get' this. It's not that institutes teach you stuff that is irrelevant and obsolete. That's probably true, too. It's that nobody cares what you are taught here.
Second: An MBA is about filtration. You're an employer - more likely, an HR person, and you have to hire the batch of 2004. You can either search far and wide for the right people, and expend a lot of energy - or take the easy way out. You assume that the top of the gene pool would have filtered up to the top of the MBA pool. So you set your sights on the right 'level' schools, and go hire at will. You secretly know your assumption is invalid, but everybody's doing it so it's okay. "
Well there are six more points in that article ! Go ahead and read MM's contrary view points :-D
To B School or Not to Be
"First: Understand that an MBA, in India at least, has nothing to do with education. Please 'get' this. It's not that institutes teach you stuff that is irrelevant and obsolete. That's probably true, too. It's that nobody cares what you are taught here.
Second: An MBA is about filtration. You're an employer - more likely, an HR person, and you have to hire the batch of 2004. You can either search far and wide for the right people, and expend a lot of energy - or take the easy way out. You assume that the top of the gene pool would have filtered up to the top of the MBA pool. So you set your sights on the right 'level' schools, and go hire at will. You secretly know your assumption is invalid, but everybody's doing it so it's okay. "
Well there are six more points in that article ! Go ahead and read MM's contrary view points :-D
Sep 24, 2003
Whats your Google Number ??
Valdis Krebs article on how Google’s greatest application as an ‘HR tool’ is not in the corporation – it is out among the free agents, consultants and entrepreneurs who live and work by reputation and experience. It is here where ‘Google numbers’ become very important.
Last week, several Knowledge Management consultants and I were sitting around after a conference. We were discussing the current economic climate, when one of the consultants started bragging about a just published book. Soon others were talking about their books. Eventually we were verbally jousting – who amongst us was the most ‘well-known’ consultant? Being the only consultant present without a book to my name, I had to quickly turn the measuring stick from ‘books published’ to something else. I remembered my friend’s amazement at my Google number. As one consultant finished listing some of his Fortune 100 clients, I said, “That’s nice, but what’s your Google number?” Puzzled looks soon overcame everyone in the room. Google number? What’s that? I quickly explained that it was a rough-order measure of your reputation and influence as a thought-leader – it is how much buzz, or word-of-mouth, you have as an expert.
Valdis Krebs article on how Google’s greatest application as an ‘HR tool’ is not in the corporation – it is out among the free agents, consultants and entrepreneurs who live and work by reputation and experience. It is here where ‘Google numbers’ become very important.
Last week, several Knowledge Management consultants and I were sitting around after a conference. We were discussing the current economic climate, when one of the consultants started bragging about a just published book. Soon others were talking about their books. Eventually we were verbally jousting – who amongst us was the most ‘well-known’ consultant? Being the only consultant present without a book to my name, I had to quickly turn the measuring stick from ‘books published’ to something else. I remembered my friend’s amazement at my Google number. As one consultant finished listing some of his Fortune 100 clients, I said, “That’s nice, but what’s your Google number?” Puzzled looks soon overcame everyone in the room. Google number? What’s that? I quickly explained that it was a rough-order measure of your reputation and influence as a thought-leader – it is how much buzz, or word-of-mouth, you have as an expert.
Sep 17, 2003
Edgar Schein on Organizational Innovation
My post on Innovating Challengers egroup:
From the Businessworld article:
MIT's Edgar Schein has very strong views on organisational culture.
He believes business theory has got it all wrong - it is impossible
to transform an innovative company into a business-driven one.
"A culture of innovation doesn't scale up. As a company grows, it
must either find a way to break away small units which continue to
innovate, or abandon innovation as a strategic priority. Also,
different organisations with different cultures are needed at
different stages in the evolution of a market. Current business
theories are too locked in making a mature corporation in a mature
market not only economically effective, but innovative as well. That
may be just as difficult as making an innovative company economically
effective. In a developing market based on new technologies, you may
need more organisations like Digital, many of which will not survive,
but will create an industry. Thus, playing their role as innovators.
I am not sure that companies can avoid getting into such a culture
trap. Business books always have a solution for everything. I am
trying to be a bit more pragmatic. Some problems don't have an easy
resolution. Companies do die. Wang could not make this transition.
Neither could Polaroid. It is not something which you can necessarily
fix unless the entrepreneur is able to see it and chooses to abandon
some of his original values. But you cannot say he should see it -
some do, some don't. It is very easy for us to say what the
entrepreneur should or shouldn't do. But it is very difficult to
predict if they, in fact, will do it.
Business books are written on the premise that the business gene is
there is every company. And that it is just a question of figuring
out how to become economically successful. But, I think, if you want
innovation, you have to consider the possibility that you will create
organisations that will die. They will innovate. They will influence
technology but they will not make that transition. Why do we say DEC
should have survived? Maybe it's the kind of company which should
have died."
"There are two kinds of anxiety associated with learning - learning
anxiety and survival anxiety. Learning anxiety comes from being
afraid to try something new for fear that it will be too difficult,
or that we will look stupid in the attempt. Survival anxiety, on the
other hand, is the realisation that in order to make it, we will have
to change.
Now, change will only happen if the survival anxiety is more than the
learning anxiety. And most managers make the mistake of increasing
the survival anxiety rather than decreasing the learning anxiety. It
is a mistake because that just creates more tension and defensiveness
if I am convinced I cannot learn the new things I have to learn. If
the leadership has convinced me that the vision of the future is non-
negotiable, I already know I have to change. If my leadership also
tells me that they will help me change, that I will be involved in
choosing the mechanisms by which I will learn, that they will give me
the time and resources to facilitate learning, and that they will
provide coaching, all of that will reduce the learning anxiety, and
that work "
What do you think? Do you agree with Prof. Schein? Why or why not?
My post on Innovating Challengers egroup:
From the Businessworld article:
MIT's Edgar Schein has very strong views on organisational culture.
He believes business theory has got it all wrong - it is impossible
to transform an innovative company into a business-driven one.
"A culture of innovation doesn't scale up. As a company grows, it
must either find a way to break away small units which continue to
innovate, or abandon innovation as a strategic priority. Also,
different organisations with different cultures are needed at
different stages in the evolution of a market. Current business
theories are too locked in making a mature corporation in a mature
market not only economically effective, but innovative as well. That
may be just as difficult as making an innovative company economically
effective. In a developing market based on new technologies, you may
need more organisations like Digital, many of which will not survive,
but will create an industry. Thus, playing their role as innovators.
I am not sure that companies can avoid getting into such a culture
trap. Business books always have a solution for everything. I am
trying to be a bit more pragmatic. Some problems don't have an easy
resolution. Companies do die. Wang could not make this transition.
Neither could Polaroid. It is not something which you can necessarily
fix unless the entrepreneur is able to see it and chooses to abandon
some of his original values. But you cannot say he should see it -
some do, some don't. It is very easy for us to say what the
entrepreneur should or shouldn't do. But it is very difficult to
predict if they, in fact, will do it.
Business books are written on the premise that the business gene is
there is every company. And that it is just a question of figuring
out how to become economically successful. But, I think, if you want
innovation, you have to consider the possibility that you will create
organisations that will die. They will innovate. They will influence
technology but they will not make that transition. Why do we say DEC
should have survived? Maybe it's the kind of company which should
have died."
"There are two kinds of anxiety associated with learning - learning
anxiety and survival anxiety. Learning anxiety comes from being
afraid to try something new for fear that it will be too difficult,
or that we will look stupid in the attempt. Survival anxiety, on the
other hand, is the realisation that in order to make it, we will have
to change.
Now, change will only happen if the survival anxiety is more than the
learning anxiety. And most managers make the mistake of increasing
the survival anxiety rather than decreasing the learning anxiety. It
is a mistake because that just creates more tension and defensiveness
if I am convinced I cannot learn the new things I have to learn. If
the leadership has convinced me that the vision of the future is non-
negotiable, I already know I have to change. If my leadership also
tells me that they will help me change, that I will be involved in
choosing the mechanisms by which I will learn, that they will give me
the time and resources to facilitate learning, and that they will
provide coaching, all of that will reduce the learning anxiety, and
that work "
What do you think? Do you agree with Prof. Schein? Why or why not?
Aug 27, 2003
Consultancy firm rankings
Vault has brought out its 2004 guide to the top consulting firms ranked by the employees of the consulting industry.
To no one's surprise the Firm , McKinsey & Co. ranks number one. However in a surprising development Accenture is out of the top 10 at number 12 ! Is that a result of IT services and BPO focus?
The other two in the top 3 are also the true-blue 'strategy' firms, BCG and Bain.
In fact there is no change in the top 6 firms.
What is interesting is that a HR consulting firm Mercer comes in at number 13. IBM is in at number 16, having dropped 4 places.
Here are the top 25 firms:
Rank and Name Score Last Year's Rank HQ
===============================================
1 McKinsey & Company 8.249 1 New York, NY
2 Boston Consulting Group 7.848 2 Boston, MA
3 Bain & Company 7.371 3 Boston, MA
4 Booz Allen Hamilton 6.432 4 McLean, VA
5 Monitor Group 6.060 5 Cambridge, MA
6 Mercer Management Consulting 5.801 6 New York, NY
7 Gartner 5.552 10 Stamford, CT
8 A.T. Kearney 5.528 11 Plano, TX
9 Mercer Oliver Wyman 5.524 25 New York, NY
10 Roland Berger - Strategy Consultants 5.314 21 New York, NY
11 Deloitte Consulting 5.292 8 New York, NY
12 Accenture 5.180 9 New York, NY
13 Mercer Human Resource Consulting 5.099 17 New York, NY
14 Marakon Associates 5.067 15 New York, NY
15 Parthenon Group, The 5.065 20 Boston, MA
16 IBM BCS 5.009 12 Somers, NY
17 L.E.K. Consulting 4.987 22 Boston, MA
18 Cap Gemini Ernst & Young 4.910 14 New York, NY
19 Towers Perrin 4.580 18 New York, NY
20 BearingPoint 4.550 13 McLean, VA
21 DiamondCluster International 4.266 23 Chicago, IL
22 Charles River Associates 4.211 34 Boston, MA
23 Hewitt Associates 4.205 16 Lincolnshire, IL
24 Stern Stewart 4.203 30 New York, NY
25 NERA Economic Consulting 4.175 NA White Plains, NY
Vault has brought out its 2004 guide to the top consulting firms ranked by the employees of the consulting industry.
To no one's surprise the Firm , McKinsey & Co. ranks number one. However in a surprising development Accenture is out of the top 10 at number 12 ! Is that a result of IT services and BPO focus?
The other two in the top 3 are also the true-blue 'strategy' firms, BCG and Bain.
In fact there is no change in the top 6 firms.
What is interesting is that a HR consulting firm Mercer comes in at number 13. IBM is in at number 16, having dropped 4 places.
Here are the top 25 firms:
Rank and Name Score Last Year's Rank HQ
===============================================
1 McKinsey & Company 8.249 1 New York, NY
2 Boston Consulting Group 7.848 2 Boston, MA
3 Bain & Company 7.371 3 Boston, MA
4 Booz Allen Hamilton 6.432 4 McLean, VA
5 Monitor Group 6.060 5 Cambridge, MA
6 Mercer Management Consulting 5.801 6 New York, NY
7 Gartner 5.552 10 Stamford, CT
8 A.T. Kearney 5.528 11 Plano, TX
9 Mercer Oliver Wyman 5.524 25 New York, NY
10 Roland Berger - Strategy Consultants 5.314 21 New York, NY
11 Deloitte Consulting 5.292 8 New York, NY
12 Accenture 5.180 9 New York, NY
13 Mercer Human Resource Consulting 5.099 17 New York, NY
14 Marakon Associates 5.067 15 New York, NY
15 Parthenon Group, The 5.065 20 Boston, MA
16 IBM BCS 5.009 12 Somers, NY
17 L.E.K. Consulting 4.987 22 Boston, MA
18 Cap Gemini Ernst & Young 4.910 14 New York, NY
19 Towers Perrin 4.580 18 New York, NY
20 BearingPoint 4.550 13 McLean, VA
21 DiamondCluster International 4.266 23 Chicago, IL
22 Charles River Associates 4.211 34 Boston, MA
23 Hewitt Associates 4.205 16 Lincolnshire, IL
24 Stern Stewart 4.203 30 New York, NY
25 NERA Economic Consulting 4.175 NA White Plains, NY
Aug 5, 2003
Consulting News from http://www.zambeasy.com/top-consultant/UK/news/newsletter.htm
Consulting firm Mercer appears to be weathering the storm in the global management consultancy sector quite nicely, according to the latest quarterly announcement by parent company Marsh & McLennan this week.
Mercer’s Q2 revenues rose 16% compared with the year ago period, to $690m. In no small part this growth was due to the recent acquisition of Oliver, Wyman & Company. However, even excluding the effect of acquisitions, Mercer’s revenues grew 2% on a constant currency basis. At a time when the major consulting brands have reported Q2 consulting revenues down as a result of the war in Iraq, Mercer’s continued growth is welcome news indeed.
EDS yesterday reported its latest quarterly results, most notable for a plunge in profits, stagnant revenues and a weak order book. Shares were actually up on the news, reflecting analysts’ concerns that the results might have been worse still.
Revenue picture shows mixed fortunes
EDS’s quarterly revenues rose 2% to $5.52bn on the previous year’s quarter (though down 3% on a constant currency basis). Overall, modest improvements in IT and business process outsourcing revenues were offset by a continuing decline in GM revenues and the impact of a number of under-performing contracts.
Most worrying going forwards - at a time when consulting and outsourcing competitors have been reporting improving order books - EDS reported it has signed only $3.4bn in contracts in Q2, vs $6.2bn a year ago. EDS blamed the poor order book on a "tepid IT spending environment" but the reality is it has been losing ground to IBM and HP, who are aggressively targeting the market at a time that EDS has been focused on a strategic review and restructuring exercise.
The picture is no prettier when consulting is taken in isolation. Solutions Consulting revenues at EDS decreased 13%, at constant currency, from the year-ago quarter to $1.31bn. In top-end consulting, EDS’s consulting business A.T. Kearney saw revenues decrease 27% (constant currency) compared with a year ago to $212m.
check this out http://www.eds.com/news/news_release_template.shtml?rowid=3432
New competitor on UK Consulting Market
A major new competitor is set to enter the UK consulting market this year, bringing together seasoned professionals from the likes of McKinsey, Accenture and WPP.
The new consultancy - called The Ingram Partnership - will advise on branding & communications strategy and looks set to compete both with traditional management consultancies and advertising agencies. The Ingram Partnership is the brainchild of Chris Ingram, former owner of the Tempus advertising agency - sold to Martin Sorrell's WPP Group back in 2001.
Mr Ingram is understood to be injecting £10m of initial financing, part of which is being used to acquire two companies as building blocks for the new consultancy: Unity, a communications strategy agency, and The Gathering, a brand-building agency. Through these acquisitions The Ingram Partnership will inherit an impressive client list including Bosch, B&Q, Cadbury Schweppes, the Carphone Warehouse, Guardian Media Group and Lucas Film. Further acquisitions to broaden the partnership's service line are not being ruled out.
Founding partners of the new business include Ditlev Schwanenslugel (ex-McKinsey), and Alastair Rhymer (ex-WPP). Richard Eyre, former chief executive of ITV and Terry Neill, former chairman of the worldwide board of Accenture will also join the advisory board. Consultancies and ad agencies alike will be closely watching the inroads that The Ingram Partnership is able to make into their markets.
Consulting firm Mercer appears to be weathering the storm in the global management consultancy sector quite nicely, according to the latest quarterly announcement by parent company Marsh & McLennan this week.
Mercer’s Q2 revenues rose 16% compared with the year ago period, to $690m. In no small part this growth was due to the recent acquisition of Oliver, Wyman & Company. However, even excluding the effect of acquisitions, Mercer’s revenues grew 2% on a constant currency basis. At a time when the major consulting brands have reported Q2 consulting revenues down as a result of the war in Iraq, Mercer’s continued growth is welcome news indeed.
EDS yesterday reported its latest quarterly results, most notable for a plunge in profits, stagnant revenues and a weak order book. Shares were actually up on the news, reflecting analysts’ concerns that the results might have been worse still.
Revenue picture shows mixed fortunes
EDS’s quarterly revenues rose 2% to $5.52bn on the previous year’s quarter (though down 3% on a constant currency basis). Overall, modest improvements in IT and business process outsourcing revenues were offset by a continuing decline in GM revenues and the impact of a number of under-performing contracts.
Most worrying going forwards - at a time when consulting and outsourcing competitors have been reporting improving order books - EDS reported it has signed only $3.4bn in contracts in Q2, vs $6.2bn a year ago. EDS blamed the poor order book on a "tepid IT spending environment" but the reality is it has been losing ground to IBM and HP, who are aggressively targeting the market at a time that EDS has been focused on a strategic review and restructuring exercise.
The picture is no prettier when consulting is taken in isolation. Solutions Consulting revenues at EDS decreased 13%, at constant currency, from the year-ago quarter to $1.31bn. In top-end consulting, EDS’s consulting business A.T. Kearney saw revenues decrease 27% (constant currency) compared with a year ago to $212m.
check this out http://www.eds.com/news/news_release_template.shtml?rowid=3432
New competitor on UK Consulting Market
A major new competitor is set to enter the UK consulting market this year, bringing together seasoned professionals from the likes of McKinsey, Accenture and WPP.
The new consultancy - called The Ingram Partnership - will advise on branding & communications strategy and looks set to compete both with traditional management consultancies and advertising agencies. The Ingram Partnership is the brainchild of Chris Ingram, former owner of the Tempus advertising agency - sold to Martin Sorrell's WPP Group back in 2001.
Mr Ingram is understood to be injecting £10m of initial financing, part of which is being used to acquire two companies as building blocks for the new consultancy: Unity, a communications strategy agency, and The Gathering, a brand-building agency. Through these acquisitions The Ingram Partnership will inherit an impressive client list including Bosch, B&Q, Cadbury Schweppes, the Carphone Warehouse, Guardian Media Group and Lucas Film. Further acquisitions to broaden the partnership's service line are not being ruled out.
Founding partners of the new business include Ditlev Schwanenslugel (ex-McKinsey), and Alastair Rhymer (ex-WPP). Richard Eyre, former chief executive of ITV and Terry Neill, former chairman of the worldwide board of Accenture will also join the advisory board. Consultancies and ad agencies alike will be closely watching the inroads that The Ingram Partnership is able to make into their markets.
Jul 28, 2003
Jun 18, 2003
Jun 16, 2003
I got my first publication on HR.com called "Building your creativity"
It'll ask for a password. Is only accessible to registered users of HR.com :-( But its free :-)
It'll ask for a password. Is only accessible to registered users of HR.com :-( But its free :-)
May 29, 2003
On ISTT I wrote this:
Cognitive and rational decision making as marketing guys know better
than anyone (HR guys included!) comes a piddly second to the power of
emotional/aspirational appeal !
So how can cold rational logical data like "not being good for
health" compete with a message like "wanna be cool...have x/y/z" ??
Free choice did someone say?
How can choice be free when media is controlled by advertisers and
therefore information that goes out either ignores the 'bad' parts or
is heavily edited ??
Cognitive and rational decision making as marketing guys know better
than anyone (HR guys included!) comes a piddly second to the power of
emotional/aspirational appeal !
So how can cold rational logical data like "not being good for
health" compete with a message like "wanna be cool...have x/y/z" ??
Free choice did someone say?
How can choice be free when media is controlled by advertisers and
therefore information that goes out either ignores the 'bad' parts or
is heavily edited ??
In HRavenues I wrote the following on the discussion if HR was a necessary evil !
Let's admit it, HR's credibility has been in question over a long
time not just in India but across the world. People like Dave Ulrich
have even studied what HR needs to do to become more "value-adding"
to the business rather than being an operational department.
While there are many reasons for this, the prime reason has been the
rise of an economy where people's imaginations and ideas are critical
to an organizations growth. Capital and finance does not count for
much.
HR stands at a threshold today.
Of all organizational functions it apparently understands the people
more than other functions. If it cannot translate that understanding
and insight into value for the organization then it will lose even
the apparently low levels of credibility it has today.
But to do that it needs to marry its insight with the needs of the
business. An HR person no longer can be 'just' an HR person. He/she
should be a generalist, with ease of understanding the financial and
customer perspectives. The future belongs to those business leaders
who know the cross-functional perspective and are not 'wedded' to any
function.
Let's admit it, HR's credibility has been in question over a long
time not just in India but across the world. People like Dave Ulrich
have even studied what HR needs to do to become more "value-adding"
to the business rather than being an operational department.
While there are many reasons for this, the prime reason has been the
rise of an economy where people's imaginations and ideas are critical
to an organizations growth. Capital and finance does not count for
much.
HR stands at a threshold today.
Of all organizational functions it apparently understands the people
more than other functions. If it cannot translate that understanding
and insight into value for the organization then it will lose even
the apparently low levels of credibility it has today.
But to do that it needs to marry its insight with the needs of the
business. An HR person no longer can be 'just' an HR person. He/she
should be a generalist, with ease of understanding the financial and
customer perspectives. The future belongs to those business leaders
who know the cross-functional perspective and are not 'wedded' to any
function.
May 22, 2003
In the KMSI group
Well, KM is understood differently by different organizations, and
leads on to different deliverables.
For example, Buckman laboratories had a objective of increasing their
IP by doing KM ...Hughes had a different objective, and BP-Amoco had
different aims.
The key to KM success, in my humble opinion, is to set a objective
that is central to the organization and then build KM processes
around achieving that objective.
So if reducing time of proposals is the KM objective in the next 3-4
months then that objective if shared with all the employees would be
a measurable low-hanging fruit. Very often, if such an objective is
not shared then KM initiatives like creating yellow pages, and
sharing of documents etc are nice to do, but not percieved as
necessary.
Another point to keep in mind is that the objective if clashing with
the existing organizational culture would be a recipe for disaster.
So, if current performance reward systems are based on business units
achieving the target, and the KM objective is to share knowledge
across business units, then you can see which one will fail, unless
the reward system for latter are greater than that of the former.
Well, KM is understood differently by different organizations, and
leads on to different deliverables.
For example, Buckman laboratories had a objective of increasing their
IP by doing KM ...Hughes had a different objective, and BP-Amoco had
different aims.
The key to KM success, in my humble opinion, is to set a objective
that is central to the organization and then build KM processes
around achieving that objective.
So if reducing time of proposals is the KM objective in the next 3-4
months then that objective if shared with all the employees would be
a measurable low-hanging fruit. Very often, if such an objective is
not shared then KM initiatives like creating yellow pages, and
sharing of documents etc are nice to do, but not percieved as
necessary.
Another point to keep in mind is that the objective if clashing with
the existing organizational culture would be a recipe for disaster.
So, if current performance reward systems are based on business units
achieving the target, and the KM objective is to share knowledge
across business units, then you can see which one will fail, unless
the reward system for latter are greater than that of the former.
May 9, 2003
On ISTT My post :
What gives us Indians an edge in this world is a paradoxical ability
to balance the super-structured with the totally ambiguous !
In my view, no other civilisation (Jung would call it the 'collective
unconscious of a people'), save the Japanese, drills in both the
factors to such an amazing degree. So you have the example of a
Ramanujam who excelled in the so called structured world of maths
relying on mysticism and intuition.
So what, I hear you ask? What does this psycho-babble have to do with strategy? with business? with India Inc.?
Look around you ! The structured world of business as Taylor, Ford
and Sloan knew it is falling (or has fallen) like a house of
cards...and the domino effect is happening around the world. In these
chaotic times the skills that are needed most are the duality to
balance the chaos of the environment with order and structure of the
organization...and yet not be rigid !
The rise of the Knowledge Age...Drucker called it...when individual
expertise is the most coveted...in the Financial Analyst industry
(the "new Jews" is what Indian whiz kids are called on Wall Street),
in the Software industry (too numerous to chronicle), in the still
developing discipline of Management (CKP, Rajat Gupta, Sumantro
Ghosal, Ram Charan are uber-gurus!)
I believe the skills that help us succeed in these diverse fields are embedded in us, in our psyches.
What gives us Indians an edge in this world is a paradoxical ability
to balance the super-structured with the totally ambiguous !
In my view, no other civilisation (Jung would call it the 'collective
unconscious of a people'), save the Japanese, drills in both the
factors to such an amazing degree. So you have the example of a
Ramanujam who excelled in the so called structured world of maths
relying on mysticism and intuition.
So what, I hear you ask? What does this psycho-babble have to do with strategy? with business? with India Inc.?
Look around you ! The structured world of business as Taylor, Ford
and Sloan knew it is falling (or has fallen) like a house of
cards...and the domino effect is happening around the world. In these
chaotic times the skills that are needed most are the duality to
balance the chaos of the environment with order and structure of the
organization...and yet not be rigid !
The rise of the Knowledge Age...Drucker called it...when individual
expertise is the most coveted...in the Financial Analyst industry
(the "new Jews" is what Indian whiz kids are called on Wall Street),
in the Software industry (too numerous to chronicle), in the still
developing discipline of Management (CKP, Rajat Gupta, Sumantro
Ghosal, Ram Charan are uber-gurus!)
I believe the skills that help us succeed in these diverse fields are embedded in us, in our psyches.
May 3, 2003
The Continuing McKinsey Mystique
Top-Consultant.com says:
'Positioning' is indeed a key differentiator. The firm goes to incredible lengths to gain the confidence of decision makers in what it believes will be large or strongly growing markets in five years' time or more. That is why McKinsey has been making a strong push in countries such as China and India, which cannot possibly be justified in terms of the immediate return, but which may be looking good when we all grow a little older. The partnership structure helps. 'Gratification or profit deferred' is not a phrase that actually rolls off the lips of McKinsey's top staff when describing their willingness to look to the long term; but it would be just about unthinkable for publicly-quoted firms to take the same long-term view.
Top-Consultant.com says:
'Positioning' is indeed a key differentiator. The firm goes to incredible lengths to gain the confidence of decision makers in what it believes will be large or strongly growing markets in five years' time or more. That is why McKinsey has been making a strong push in countries such as China and India, which cannot possibly be justified in terms of the immediate return, but which may be looking good when we all grow a little older. The partnership structure helps. 'Gratification or profit deferred' is not a phrase that actually rolls off the lips of McKinsey's top staff when describing their willingness to look to the long term; but it would be just about unthinkable for publicly-quoted firms to take the same long-term view.
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