The People Management Committee of The Bengal Chamber of Commerce and Industry organized ‘The People Management Conclave – Metamorphosis of People Management in a Disruptive Era’ at Hotel Novotel, Rajarhat, Kolkata on April 21, 2018.

A Brief about the Conclave:

HR of an organization no more functions to just hire a candidate and release salaries on time. It has emerged as one of the powerful function that mediates between organizational goals, top management and employees. In an economy founded on innovation and change, one of the premium challenges of organizations is to design more flexible organizations. Companies are replacing vertical hierarchies with horizontal networks; linking together traditional functions through inter-functional teams and forming strategic alliances with suppliers, vendors and even competitors. HR Managers are insisting that every employee understand and adhere to the company’s strategic mission without the distinction of title, function or task.

Organizations have been prudent in dismissing rigid and unresponsive boundaries. The newer boundaries that exist today are more psychological than organizational. Instead of being reflected in a company’s organizational structure, they are enacted repeatedly in a manager’s relationship with superiors, peers and subordinates. As these boundaries are new and unconventional, they tend to be invisible to most managers. Hence knowing how to recognize these new boundaries and use them productively is the essence of management in any organization. The thrust today on the human resources function is to align their goals to the organization and ultimately enhance organizational effectiveness.

Hence what is the role of HR in building and engaging a virtual workplace? What is the role of HR analytics in enhancing the functional maneuverability of HR? What is the role of HR in restructuring organizations for new age business? What is the role of HR in future of work? The BCC&I People Management Conclave tried to explore answers to few of the questions posed above through speeches and discussions with eminent HR & IR professionals from different industrial sectors in India.

Themes for Panel Discussion were:
• Technology Disruptors
• Managing Business
• Future Workforce

1. Technology Disruptors
As computational power rises exponentially, not linearly, so does the rate of change and that means the next ten years should pack in far more technological change than the last decade, Disruptive technology is, by its very nature, unpredictable, but it is still possible to look at the work being done by R&D labs around the world and see clues as to what the future holds.

2. Managing Business
If a corporate needs to link HR with business it would have to make HR into a Strategic function. This would imply that all people related activities be it recruitment, selection, compensation benefits succession planning, training, development, work life balance et al must be strategic in nature, and not a on a year to year basis or need. The panel would need to first set the context on the floor that to stay relevant HR needs to be Strategic and therefore no action of HR can be a knee jerk but must be tied to a Strategic Apex view. This would mean every move, say recruitment has to justify that the money spent is actually for the workforce that would be required tomorrow. All activities need to be thought through with the lens if my employees were my customers what would I do differently.

3. Future Workforce
The recognition of human resource capability to global business growth has changed Indian HRM culture in recent years. Rapid globalization has made companies realize people are keys to growth. Now HRM is human resource planning, job design, motivation, recruitment, Skill development & employee relations. Now companies are using their innovative HR practices to keep up with time in the wake of rapidly developing labor landscape. To face the recent challenges, HRM has to implement effective strategies. Hence, the role of HRM will be more significant in future age / epoch due to emerging scenario.

Speakers at this event were:

1. Mr Somesh Dasgupta, Chairperson – The People Management Committee, The Bengal Chamber of Commerce and Industry and President (Corporate Affairs & Admin), India Power Corporation Limited
2. Mr Chandra Shekhar Ghosh, President, The Bengal Chamber of Commerce and Industry & Managing Director and CEO, Bandhan Bank Limited
3. Mr Rahul Bose, Co – Chairperson - The People Management Committee, The Bengal Chamber of Commerce and Industry and Global Manager Learning & Knowledge, IBM Global Business Services
4. Mr Rajiv Krishnan, Managing Director, Korn Ferry Hay Group
5. Mr Ranjan Kumar Mohapatra, Director – HR , Indian Oil Corporation Ltd
6. Shri Dushyant Nariala, IAS, Principal Secretary, Department of School Education, Government of West Bengal
7. Dr Tapan Kumar Chand, Chairman cum Managing Director, National Aluminium Company Limited
8. Mr. P.K. Sahu, Co - Chairperson – The People Management Committee, The Bengal Chamber of Commerce and Industry and Sr. General Manager (HRM & Safety), Tata Steel Processing And Distribution Limited
9. Mr Somnath Chatterjee, Vice President, Capgemini
10. Mr Tridib Mitra, Vice-President – Projects, Cognizant Technology Solutions Ltd
11. Mr Sugata Halder, Country Head - HR , Century Plyboards (I) Limited
12. Mr Debabrat Mishra, Partner, Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu India Private Limited
13. Mr Gautam Ray, Executive Director, HR & Admin, CESC Ltd
14. Mr Joydeep Bose, President & Global Head Human Resources, Olam International Ltd
15. Mr Sidharth Das, Vice President - HR, Kolkata & Rest of Bengal, Vodafone
16. Mr Chaitanya N Sreenivas, VP-HR and HR Head, IBM India/South Asia
17. Mr Chandrasekhar Mukherjee, Group Chief People Officer, Srei Infrastructure Finance Ltd
18. Mr PJ Anand, Vice President- Corporate Human Resources, ITC Ltd
19. Ms Mahua Bagchi, AVP, Global Leadership Development - HR, Cognizant Technology Solutions Ltd
20. Mr R P Yadav, Chairman & Managing Director, Genius Consultants Ltd

Eminent HR heads were of opinion that organizations will transform the HR function to deliver employee experiences that are human-centered, leveraging the latest technologies to deliver personalized, compelling, and engaging experiences. The scale of the change in the HR function had been staggering and had witnessed an exceptional surge over the last few years. Global companies who had established a presence in India over the last decade have brought with them different perspectives and some new HR practices as well. Technology had significantly influenced the HR function. It had led to new business models coming into existence, allowing technology platform companies to make a significant impact. Competition had come not from within the known set of businesses but also from different industries by leveraging technology.

In a nutshell they expressed their views that HR professionals need to build more effective listening skills and pay heed to their employees on a continuous basis and keep taking corrective action as and when necessary.

A magazine named “HR Graffiti” was also published on the programme day which contains many articles written by eminent HR heads from the industry.

The Conclave was attended by Directors, Faculty, Students and Administrative Officers of Engineering and Management Institutes and HR Leaders involved in recruitment process.