Our People Are Our Assets

[alfred jones]

"Our People Are Our Assets"

....many companies writes this sentence in their websites.
but who actually implements ?

From my sources,

It is known ,only GOOGLE respects this very sentence...and they give equal importance and careness to each and every employees and the result is nobody leaves Google.

I would invite you guys to add some more such companies in this thread....they need not have to be paymaster , neither a big MNC but they respect this sentence.

Few days back, some people complained here about the carelessness attitude of IBM and Fidelity.

i would like to ask you to share your experience/findings/knowledge from some soures etc here...

1)Do you ever feel a pain to leave your old company ?
2)Do the company listens carefully about your problems ?
3)Do they ask you , whether you have any problems and facilitates you ?

probabily these would be the issues we could think about for this discussion.

As you all know when a seneior person leaves because of disatisfaction its HUGE LOSS to an organization....so, the companies should takes care of people and should treat them well...they should preserve the meaning of "Our People Are Our Assets".

please put some comments/discussion and lets come out with a list of companies who actually implements "Our People Are Our Assets"

Regards

Alfred.
[ August 09, 2006: Message edited by: alfred jones ]

[Shrinivas Mujumdar]

Very few companies really mean it..I totally agree with you alfred....Its a marketing catchy line.....
Actuallly if you proove yourself in any organization & stay there for relatively longer time (compared to avg. stay of an employee)then one can get lot of benefits (In terms of Salary, Flexi timings etc... )

However, To do all this stuff , company has to care about their employees not only in terms of salary but other facilities like Health Related issues, Food Quality in Canteen, Transportation facility, Professional Work culture, Uninterrupted access to Internet with Messenger & private mail checking facilities(One of my friend having around 2 Yrs. of Exp. working in one of the MNC on Java/J2EE can't access Javaranch....its a Joke of a Millenium) etc..

So its like a Vicious Circle.

Shriniwas

[alfred jones]

(One of my friend having around 2 Yrs. of Exp. working in one of the MNC on Java/J2EE can't access Javaranch....its a Joke of a Millenium)

are they crazy ?

i strongly dislike filtering internet in workplace....this is very bad.
they dont trust their own employees !

[Devesh H Rao]

Originally posted by Shrinivas Mujumdar:
.......with Messenger & private mail checking facilities
Shriniwas

and why do you suppose a company should provide you the above, is it not something which falls under the category of "To be done from home"

[Shrinivas Mujumdar]

What kind of problem anybody would face if this is allowed?. Although it can be done from home ...sometimes you don't have any work at all....If you remain in touch with your friends & relatives i don't think there will be any harm, rather it will act as a refresher.
The people who do have lot of work will not use messenger unless & otherwise required ....Because they must be having deadline pressure etc..


Shriniwas

[Devesh H Rao]

Originally posted by Shrinivas Mujumdar:
What kind of problem anybody would face if this is allowed?. Although it can be done from home ...sometimes you don't have any work at all....If you remain in touch with your friends & relatives i don't think there will be any harm, rather it will act as a refresher.
The people who do have lot of work will not use messenger unless & otherwise required ....Because they must be having deadline pressure etc..
Shriniwas

If there is no work, study, take up online course for new technologies, get into discussions regarding stuff that you have done or planning to do in the future, give telephonic interviews

If you want to remain in touch with friends and relatives call them using phones which are made available, better still use personal phones for personal calls, mail them using the office mail id's which I guess each employee has.

when someone is talking about companies treating its employees as assets, I guess its the employees responsibility to be one instead.
There is no free lunch, company pays for people to be productive and contribute to the "Profits", it is a simple principle.
[ August 09, 2006: Message edited by: Devesh H Rao ]

[alfred jones]

use gmail chat !!!

stay connected all time....thats what i do.


[ August 09, 2006: Message edited by: alfred jones ]

[Prudhvi Kumar]

I strongly feel that not every employee of a particular company is going to be asset for the company. I have so much practical experience about this thing. Atleast 30%of the employees fails to achieve targets and maintaining quality of the work.
Despite this fact, Every company should treat its employees as their assets. After all no one is perfect in this world.

[Shrinivas Mujumdar]

Hey,
In companies having BS 7799 Certification ..all personal mail sites (rediff,yahoo,gmail) are blocked.You can't see even meebo,orkut etc..

Devesh, Why there are restrictions that is the point....Whether company restricts somebody saying "Now its 11'O Clock in night..no go to home..We will see this tommorrow" when there is a really a work pressure...So at that time there is no restriction on working hours...People stay in the office for 40-50 Hrs strech....

There are very few companies where there is norestriction on such sites ..people trust others very much..Nobody will use YM or any other chatting tool while there is a lot of pressure..or ...delivery time.

Hey, Take this in right spirit ..I am not critisizing you...or...not saying "keep quiet"





Shriniwas

[Devesh H Rao]

Originally posted by Shrinivas Mujumdar:
Hey,
In companies having BS 7799 Certification ..all personal mail sites (rediff,yahoo,gmail) are blocked.You can't see even meebo,orkut etc..

Devesh, Why there are restrictions that is the point....Whether company restricts somebody saying "Now its 11'O Clock in night..no go to home..We will see this tommorrow" when there is a really a work pressure...So at that time there is no restriction on working hours...People stay in the office for 40-50 Hrs strech....

There are very few companies where there is norestriction on such sites ..people trust others very much..Nobody will use YM or any other chatting tool while there is a lot of pressure..or ...delivery time.

Hey, Take this in right spirit ..I am not critisizing you...or...not saying "keep quiet"





Shriniwas

exactly certifications like BS 7799 mandate that there are no data breaches, some financial companies have policies where even printouts have to be destroyed.

And no company policy mandates working for 40-50 hours at a streach. I remember having the same conversation a year or 2 back on this same discussion forum and anyways things have not changed much.

If someone asks you to work for more than the office hours then it is your right to turn him down if you proper reasons, but if you have promised some work in a period of time then its your responsibility to get that completed any which way before the deadline which has been decided by yourself in the first place.


It is not a question of trust, 99.99% of the people may be genuine but the 0.01% is what can make or break the reputation of an organisation and the organisations cannot just take a risk on the probability of it occuring and on top of it we do have instances of things happening even with all the security in place.

It is on same line for a Fatal defect in an application, it may run prefectly for 99.99 test conditions but we still code for 0.01% test conditons which are not going through right...?

We also have such issues in our Organisation, we used to have flexi timings, net access, messenger, orkut, mail access, all workstations having cd r/w, usb ports .....the works. we still have them but the security team has to keep watch on going on's, they post data about most sites visited, IM packets sent etc on notice boards and block stuff if things get out of control.

Orkut was banned after it was found that there is very heavy traffic to that site from the organisation and after a cool off period it is unblocked again. The organisation provides facilities does not mean they can be taken advantage of right...? They have much more in payouts than an individual who is hell bent on creating trouble.

IM are the most fav way to hack systems or networks, at home what you lose is personal data if your system is hacked. Think what could be lost if a company network is hacked just coz they were lax in implementing security policies.

[Sumit Chopra]

Originally posted by Devesh H Rao:


exactly certifications like BS 7799 mandate that there are no data breaches, some financial companies have policies where even printouts have to be destroyed.

And no company policy mandates working for 40-50 hours at a streach. I remember having the same conversation a year or 2 back on this same discussion forum and anyways things have not changed much.

If someone asks you to work for more than the office hours then it is your right to turn him down if you proper reasons, but if you have promised some work in a period of time then its your responsibility to get that completed any which way before the deadline which has been decided by yourself in the first place.


It is not a question of trust, 99.99% of the people may be genuine but the 0.01% is what can make or break the reputation of an organisation and the organisations cannot just take a risk on the probability of it occuring and on top of it we do have instances of things happening even with all the security in place.

It is on same line for a Fatal defect in an application, it may run prefectly for 99.99 test conditions but we still code for 0.01% test conditons which are not going through right...?

We also have such issues in our Organisation, we used to have flexi timings, net access, messenger, orkut, mail access, all workstations having cd r/w, usb ports .....the works. we still have them but the security team has to keep watch on going on's, they post data about most sites visited, IM packets sent etc on notice boards and block stuff if things get out of control.

Orkut was banned after it was found that there is very heavy traffic to that site from the organisation and after a cool off period it is unblocked again. The organisation provides facilities does not mean they can be taken advantage of right...? They have much more in payouts than an individual who is hell bent on creating trouble.

IM are the most fav way to hack systems or networks, at home what you lose is personal data if your system is hacked. Think what could be lost if a company network is hacked just coz they were lax in implementing security policies.

I have to agree with most of the things you said. It is the responsibility of the employees not to take advantage of the facilities provided or else the organization has to take tough steps.

In my experience the product development companies are much more employee friendly than service based companies.

[Shrinivas Mujumdar]

I do agree with what you say but then why companies like IBM,AMDOCS etc.. can afford to offer all these faciliies to Developers.

[sachin yadav]

Originally posted by alfred jones:


are they crazy ?

i strongly dislike filtering internet in workplace....this is very bad.
they dont trust their own employees !

it happens in most of the companies in india. Name a few are hewitt associates banned gmail chat and messengers, HCL has banned messengers, flextronics do the same.

[alfred jones]

Name a few are hewitt associates banned gmail chat

they banned gmail chat or gmail ?

[Devesh H Rao]

Originally posted by Shrinivas Mujumdar:
I do agree with what you say but then why companies like IBM,AMDOCS etc.. can afford to offer all these faciliies to Developers.

It again depends on which division or what work is happening in those divisions for them to offer the facilities.

A division at IBM which works on proprietary solutions will have more stringent policies in place than divisions which may be working in R&D or in house products where there is a genuine need for access.

Even in my organisation we have policies depending on the division, a certain section does not have access to even the company network, they work in their own secure domain, we call them the castaway's.

A company will not on its own try to trouble the employees, will it....? they have to be innovative to keep people working for them happy so do you think restriction are put in place to trouble people or they are in place coz somewhere there is a need for the same.

[M Movilogo]

Large MNCs can't afford to take care of every employee! There will always be some rubbish jobs which someone has to do. So, those employees will become disgruntled and will leave eventually. All companies do plan about a certain percentage of attrition. I don't think it is practically feasible to take care of all employees and ensuring that no one is dissatisfied. In large companies, if an employee leaves, they don't really bother - they can hire someone more qualified on the next day.

[Devesh H Rao]

Originally posted by sachin yadav:



it happens in most of the companies in india. Name a few are hewitt associates banned gmail chat and messengers, HCL has banned messengers, flextronics do the same.

I guess this is the unstated policy in most of the companies[services] worldwide, I have been to 3 client sites till now and no where were messengers allowed or maybe it's just my luck
[ August 09, 2006: Message edited by: Devesh H Rao ]

[vjy chin]

Regarding the messengers and chats, I have seen people in my previous company, was connected to the messenger all the time, also the mail all the time, even if there is pressure to finish. At those times, what would you think?

I also suggest the employees should be given all facilities, but provided he uses them usefully.

[pankaj shukla]

Originally posted by alfred jones:
"Our People Are Our Assets"

....many companies writes this sentence in their websites.
but who actually implements ?

From my sources,

It is known ,only GOOGLE respects this very sentence...and they give equal importance and careness to each and every employees and the result is nobody leaves Google.

The reason is that each and every employee at Google deserves that. The quality of people that google has demands such respect. People are not only one of the most intelligent, good problem solvers but also self-driven and self-motivated.
These people are hardcore techies and geeks and Google does not need to force them to work. They do it on their own.
However, unfortunately, this is not the case with rest of the people in IT industry.
In our JaveRanch I have seen posts where people want to work for google not because these people are innovators and technology enthusiasts but due to the reason that Google pays well. I am not saying that money does/can/should not attract people but seems that Indian IT industry is plagued with people just wanting to make money irrespective of what they can offer.
If people are like that then they have only themselves to blame not the company they work for. Moreover, I hate people who say that their company is bad and still work for it. Such people are one of the best examples of hypocrisy as they know that they are not worthy of employment in good companies but they can't help it much as human desire is incessant!!!

[alfred jones]

Thanks pankaj,
i appreciate for the google analysis.
you are right .

i am also adding some points in favor of google ...

google reads each and every resume with carefully and will give feedback...this is really great.

how many people gets resume feedback from TCS,IBM,CTS,WIPRO etc etc ?
neither they provide any feedback when you send CV nor they provide any outcome of interview result.

but Google will tell you ...YES/NO ......they respond ,they listen...thats why they are different than others.

one more thing is,Google never believe in refferal program unlike TCS,IBM,WIPRO,CTS,..etc etc where bulk people comes via referral...and you know, this way ..they dont get the bright talents.

i give 10/10 to GOOGLE.

BEST COMPANY TO WORK WITH.

[Navabhi Jain]

I would like to add some points about Google.

Though I admire Google, I had some bad experience with thier selection process though.

It was last year June when I applied with them.
They took around 5 telephonic interviews where they asked all that applies to interviews by companies like Microsoft, Yahoo, Oracle etc.

The whole telephonic interview process took around 3 months to complete.

After that I came to know in the month of September that this was just tech screening and I would have to appear for in-person interviews now.
Fair enough!

I attended around 3 interviews at thier office. The level of interviews and questions asked were again the same.

To my delight they told me that I am THROUGH. They gave me a nice T-shirt and said "Welcome to Google". They asked me to send me the copies of all the certificates I have, like Xth, XIIth, BE, GATE, IIT Rank Cert, everything...

Now after around 20 days, they again called me up and asked to come down to thier office for one more round of technical interview. By this time, I started getting nervous. They told me that this is just a formality round and I can come anytime by my convenience.

I attended another round on i/v again.

Now I kept waiting...waiting and waiting.

After much push and probe, finally in the month of November they called me up and told that they are not going ahead with my profile as they don't have requirements.

This was sick. My whole 6 months got wasted!!!

I understand that company requirements might have changed and all that. However, I do not concur with the statement that Google listens and responds in a timely fashion!

[Ali Hussain]

Originally posted by pankaj shukla:


In our JaveRanch I have seen posts where people want to work for google not because these people are innovators and technology enthusiasts but due to the reason that Google pays well.

Yes I agree. We have seen these kind of posts all too often, where people ask about the paymasters and then they start asking about interview questions, cheat sheets, and the selection process. I always think that no matter what the selection process is, people who want to work for these companies just because of money would/should not get the job (atleast I hope so).

IMO it is easier for smaller companies to treat their employees as assets. Obviously first you have to prove that you deserve this.

[pankaj shukla]

Originally posted by Ali Hussain:

We have seen these kind of posts all too often, where people ask about the paymasters and then they start asking about interview questions, cheat sheets, and the selection process.

Knowing a company's selection process and some sample questions is not a bad thing at all in my opinion. Its gives us a fair idea of what is going to follow and we can prepare ourselves accordingly.
If sample questions are just a representation of what company looks for in a candidate then what is the problem?. After all, not all people get into IITs/IIMs just by looking at its previous years' question papers.
And if there are companies where getting into is all it takes to have sample question paper then probably for these companies it does not matter who gets into and who doesn't. Everybody and anybody will do for such companies. Good companies take utmost care of their selection process and make sure that only deserving ones get into. Google is surely one of those.

[Suresh Thota]

Originally posted by alfred jones:

one more thing is,Google never believe in refferal program unlike TCS,IBM,WIPRO,CTS,..etc etc where bulk people comes via referral...and you know, this way ..they dont get the bright talents.

Though I agree with the rest of your post, I beg to disagree with this generalized statement. It's unfair to say that bright talent cannot be found via referral's. There are many hight profile positions which are filled only via referrals.

Referral is only a way to pass the candidate's resume to HR. rest all should be a fair game. Though there might be some companies who doesn't do that.

Cheers

[alfred jones]

i agree...but i did not mean that with referral bright people dont get place.

what i meant is, there are people (good, bright ) ..they dont have referral and so they are not able to apply ...they are loosing opportunities.
people who have referral , they are getting opportunities.



In this forum even , many people asks for referral....and if they dont get the referral....they are not able to apply.

Fortunately, we all are helpful here and we help each other.

i dislike this referral policy...........everybody should get the equal opportunity...nobody should be barred from applying jobs because of no referral.

apply-->appear for interview-->join.

in some companies , they dont even publish the recruitment information ....they tell their employess silently to catch some people.

can you expect good resources for your company this way ?

Absolutely not.

[Ali Hussain]

Originally posted by pankaj shukla:
Knowing a company's selection process and some sample questions is not a bad thing at all in my opinion. Its gives us a fair idea of what is going to follow and we can prepare ourselves accordingly.
If sample questions are just a representation of what company looks for in a candidate then what is the problem?. After all, not all people get into IITs/IIMs just by looking at its previous years' question papers.

There is one basic difference between IIT and Google (for example). IIT is not hiding their old papers so they know that the guys attempting their exams have seen old exam papers. I have heard that the Google, on the other hand requires a kind of "confidentiality agreement" that the interviewee would not tell (or publish) the interview questions to others, so they kind of assume that the interviewee has no knowledge of their "standard questions" (if such questions exist).

Otherwise I see no problem in asking for others interview experience (general themes e.g. focus on Java, C++, data structures or hardware etc but not specific questions). Personally I have done it several times and found it quite useful.