When we started the engagements at Microsoft IDC at Hyderabad we came across several problems related to HR and motivation and this post is about how we went about making small innovations to tweak a services company behavior to service requirements of a products company like Microsoft.
MBT till then was a Mumbai and Pune company, period. This meant that for any other location, we had to provide for travel allowances as per policy. There was no Hyderabad location we could technically transfer associates into. So initially we bore the costs of the allowances for the associates who moved to Hyderabad. We also went about finding apartments / guest houses for people to stay in, because the policy said that after 60 days the daily allowance would stop and it would get into a consolidated one time allowance. And this amount was not really sufficient to rent a house and so on. So to motivate people to go to Hyderabad we went into all this.
Over time, we had close to 30 apartments in Hyderabad. With software engineers there is no end to cribbing. “Oh that flat has a leak.” Or “The fridge in my flat is not working.” to a whole range of admin complaints. With no formal admin oversight of Hyderabad, the salesperson became the fulcrum for every such issue. In due course (read that as 3 years), we decided that it was important to create a help desk for Hyderabad and working with HR and Admin we created one and this helped mitigate the issues.
In a company where BT used to give requirements in the hundreds, there was not much management attention on 50 people sitting at the Microsoft offices in Hyderabad. So in effect, the pressure to perform for the sales team as well as the delivery team was enormous. It was also a difficult job to keep motivation levels up for everyone. After all, the refrain used to be, “why should we be slogging like this, when the BT folks are having a ball of a time and getting promoted too?” It became increasingly difficult to attract people to work for the Microsoft account, motivate them to work at Hyderabad and keep them motivated enough to stay on and not fall for the lure of the easier life across the wall.
In order for the Hyderabad team to feel connected to the mother ships at Pune and Mumbai, I instituted several HR measures locally. We created a Microsoft corner on the MBT intranet site via a micro site and ensured that the larger organisation came to know of their achievements and accolades. Periodic senior level visits were arranged to Hyderabad to address the team and share the developments. Pizza parties and outdoor events were done with regularity. Spot awards and pats on the back were instituted. All these helped to an extent I suppose but it was always an uphill task and required some tremendous motivation and drive from me and other leaders to infuse positivism in the system.
On and off a requirement would come from Microsoft, that they wished to hire such and such person (despite a Non Hire clause) and a raging debate would start internally on “HOW CAN they even suggest this?” The ostensible reason would be that s/he wants to leave anyway, so why not keep him/her in the ecosystem and s/he could become your “insider”. There were no simple and straight line answers to these and I played each ball on its merit.
With folks like CP Gurnani in the senior leadership, there was always tacit but valuable support and appreciation for this work and that did help a great deal.
Over time word got around in the organisation that people that had worked in the Microsoft project were extremely competent and would be a valuable addition to any team. They got snapped up easily and placed in good positions in various teams.
I believe that, Tech Mahindra learnt product engineering related staffing and projects work at some scale through the Microsoft engagement and subsequently did several such engagements including Motorola at Bangalore and Hyderabad which went on to become larger successes in terms of people deployed.
MEAxpert 