The Importance of Bonding at workplace

as written by Fordyono Sukamto, Account Executive, Precision Language

Just how important is team bonding at work? A lot of people don’t realise this, but team “bonding” is in fact a very important process that helps to ensure a close-knit team. However, many tend to confuse team building with team bonding, of which the latter is basically the process of a group of people, forming a close, personal relationship through frequent or constant association.

Objectives
Bonding is a prerequisite for team building – you have to be comfortable with and trust the team members you are going to work with. Team bonding is, by comparison, informal and structured and the main aim is to interact and get to know one another better on a personal basis, especially when working in a multiracial environment in the central business district. Getting to know your colleagues better could mean better acquaintance among colleagues, improved communication among your colleagues and breaking the barriers between senior and new colleagues in the office. How would you feel working in a new office for a month and you still couldn’t get a lunch buddy?

How to do it
Bonding can be accomplished through such simple activities as going for lunch or dinner together or organizing sports activities after office hours; and other social events, such as a pool night out, or a pub night, or simply hanging out. Bonding might sound simple enough to do but something so simple can create valuable experience; experience you can’t just buy ‘off the rack’.
Nevertheless, the challenge from all this is in getting people to participate. A majority of people might be excited, yet some might resist getting involved. But whatever the reason, I believe we all must take the initiative. As the saying goes, “it takes two hands to clap.”

Is there an opportunity for the Outsourcing industry amid global financial crisis?

as written by Amrit Vijay Vaswani, Account Executive – Group Marketing & Creative Services

Some believe that, despite this financial debacle, there seems to be some light in the tunnel for outsourcing vendors. Dallas-based Everest Research Institutes predict that BPO will increase approximately 40 times the current market size, with the main driver of growth being cost pressure. At a time when companies face liquidity problems and consumer sentiment is low, it is only right for firms to think about restructuring to cut operating costs. In this case, lay-offs might not be such a good idea, because this will drive the economy further down and will gradually lead to recession. What they should be thinking about is: how do we cut cost in areas where we are not doing effectively and efficiently and focus on areas which we’re good at?

Financial institutions and Insurance companies will be the main drivers of offshore outsourcing, with the main areas being policy servicing, customer service, finance and accounting, new business acquisition and claims processing. As much as 39% of the financial institutions globally are now looking to increase their outsourcing in the light of the recent events, although some are still afraid to take the leap, especially those with complex transitional and transformational needs; hence, those service providers which can help streamline these costs over the course of a contract will be successful.

This presents a massive opportunity for outsourcing vendors to benefit from the current economic crisis. Outsourcing vendors might have to be aggressive in their approach and get their business development executive to present an array of solutions to these companies. At such times of crisis, there is always an opportunity to gain and make profit, but it only applies to those who are aggressive and proactive.

Making an appointment with a client you don’t know

as written by Leci, Senior Administrator, Corporate Services

Q: How can I get an appointment with a client I don’t know?

A: The best way to set a meeting with a client that you don’t know is to turn them into someone that you do know. The best way to do that is to research the client that you are targeting. Find out all you can about the company, the contact, and some of the challenges that they may face that your product or service will solve. After you have the required Intel, then it’s only a matter of initiating contact.

Remember that your initial contact isn’t for you to sell your product or services. That initial contact is there to sell a meeting. The only way a potential client will agree to meet with you is if they see a potential gain in meeting with you–there has to be something in it for them. So for that initial contact, you are selling value, your value.

To gain that credibility, use your client’s name and title (shows that you took time to investigate the company), identify one challenge that they may face in their industry and show how your company helped another company similar to theirs solve that particular challenge.

Throughout this exchange, you also need to be aware of what your potential client is doing and how they are responding. If you notice that their eyes light up when you mention that particular challenge, then you know that you’ve hit a nerve. ON the other hand, if they don’t even look up from what they are doing, then it’s time to change the approach.

All of this is predicated into turning someone that you don’t know into someone that you do know. Gather your intelligence before making the approach and you should have no trouble getting a meeting.

How the financial crisis will affect the outsourcing industry

Oct 9th 2008
From The Economist print edition

IN ONE respect it has been a record couple of weeks for “outsourcing”. Around the world, governments and taxpayers have agreed to help ailing financial firms offload their toxic loans and resolve their liquidity worries. Banks are not the only ones hoping that this will help keep them afloat. The multi-billion-dollar outsourcing industry that runs computer systems and other things on companies’ behalf is keeping its fingers crossed, too. After all, financial giants have helped drive the industry’s stellar growth in the past few years. Now they threaten to undermine it.

Huge outsourcing deals involving banks are still being done—on October 8th Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), a big Indian firm, announced a $2.5 billion, nine-year deal with America’s Citigroup—but they are getting rarer. TPI, a consultancy which tracks outsourcing deals worth over $25m, says that in the first nine months of 2007 financial-services firms signed 132 such deals, worth a total of $17.9 billion; in the first nine months of 2008 there were only 101, worth a total of $10.8 billion.

Some outsourcing folk claim that the financial crisis could ultimately help their business, even though it threatens to harm it in the short term. For one thing, they say, banking survivors that already use outside contractors will give them more to do as they cut costs. For another, banks that have hitherto shunned outsourcing will have to embrace it to protect their margins. And those with their own offshore activities will be more likely to turn them over to specialists. As part of this week’s deal, Citi is selling its Indian back-office operation to TCS for $505m. “This deal sets the stage for a lot of future revenue,” says Subramanian Ramadorai, TCS’s chief executive.

Other industry bosses are more cautious about forecasting the impact of the banking debacle. “It’s like driving blind at the moment,” says Girish Paranjpe, co-chief executive of Wipro, another leading Indian outsourcing firm. As they struggle for survival, many banks have put discussions about outsourcing contracts on hold or just cancelled them altogether. Once the dust settles there will be far fewer financial institutions around, so competition for the remaining contracts will be stiffer.

American outsourcing giants such as Accenture and IBM will suffer from all this too, but India’s behemoths are particularly exposed. Unlike their American rivals they do not have other activities, such as consulting, to fall back on. NASSCOM, a body that represents India’s outsourcing firms, reckons that financial-services work accounts for 30-40% of the industry’s activity. To make matters worse, other areas such as back-office operations for airlines and retailers are also slowing. Hence predictions that contract prices charged by Indian firms are likely to drop. CLSA, a brokerage firm, predicts they will fall by 3-5% in the next fiscal year, starting in April 2009.

Faced with tougher times, more outsourcing firms sitting on piles of cash will turn to acquisitions as a way to boost revenues. Infosys and HCL Technologies, two other big Indian companies, are already locked in a battle for control of Axon, a British firm that provides outsourced computer services. On September 26th HCL bid £441m ($813m) for Axon, trumping an earlier offer of £407m from Infosys.

As they chase new revenues, outsourcing companies will also need to clamp down on costs. These have been soaring, especially in India, where a ferocious war for talent has driven up wages and led to very high staff-turnover rates. But now companies are hiring new staff only once deals are in the bag, and turnover rates are falling, says Mr Paranjpe. That is good news, but it signals trouble ahead.

Source: http://www.economist.com/business/displaystory.cfm?story_id=12376813

Look what technology have done to us!

Created on http://yearbookyourself.com

Impact of Employee Dissastisfaction on Company’s Bottom Line

as written by Amrit Vijay Vaswani, Account Executive – Group Marketing & Creative Services

One of the goals of a company is to maximize profits and one of the ways to achieve this is to increase productivity. Productivity on the other hand is closely linked to the Employees performance. Higher productivity is likely to occur if employees perform at their at most potential. Employees performance depends upon job satisfaction, the more satisfied the person is with the job the more effort he will put in into his tasks.

Most employees view job satisfaction as having job security, Work/life balance and adequate remuneration and opportunities for development and growth (IOMA, 2006). If these needs are not met then it is almost certain that the employees will be unhappy at their job which eventually will affect into the company’s bottom line.

Lack of Opportunities For development and growth:
Employees will experience job satisfaction if they feel that their individual capacities, experience and values have been utilized in the working environment and that their workplace offers them opportunities for growth and development (Buitendach & De Witte, 2005).

Lack of balance between Work and life:
Employers have to help their employees to strike a balance between work and life. Constantly pounding employees with work when he/she has already have enough work on his/her hand will only lead to stress, longer hours at work, poor quality and increase absenteeism. Workers who have too much work tend to be absent as a result of too much stress at work. Work to employees should be allocated accordingly to allow employees to spend enough time at work and with their family.

Job insecurity:
The Kind of culture in the company will effect the employees i.e. their social interaction, their willingness to engage in risky decisions, fear, level of anxiety and job security (Bainbridge, 2006). With the attitudes “perform or u get fired” and company plans to cut back will only lead to employees being highly insecure about their jobs. Employees with low perceptions of job security will also be less committed and more likely to engage in work withdrawal behavior.

In adequate Remuneration:
Companies need to make sure employees are fairly compensated. Workers that feel that they haven’t been properly compensated will feel they have been discriminated in a way.

High performance work systems if implemented well will contribute to a company’s performance. Practices such as training, alternative compensation and employee involvement and enhanced communication will help improve employee satisfaction which will lead to higher productivity and higher quality output (Kling, 1995)

1. Training and Development
Employees now days have greater expectation in terms of what they want from a job. They want to be given the opportunity to learn and develop new skills and a chance to accomplish something worth wile. The company needs to redesign jobs to give workers more variety and responsibility in their jobs to make it more appealing. Job enrichments, for example is a good way could to do this.

2. Employee involvement
Getting the employees more involved in the organization can help improve productivity. This can be done when problem solving process i.e. getting employees to participate in decision making process or when implementing new changes. Employees should also be consulted during job design to create a more satisfying and motivating jobs to help improve company’s performance. When employees are consulted they feel that they are part of the organization and that its success depends on them. Employees that are more involved are more committed to the organization and will enjoy coming to work.

3. Communication
Communication from top to bottom is very crucial. Managers need to constantly talk to their employees, listen to their problems and work together to solve them, provide guidance and leadership on the job, assure them of their job and eliminate any doubts in their minds.

4. Compensation policy
Employees should be compensated fairly and should be compensated based on the amount of effort they put in on the job. They should be continuously rewarded for their hard work and effort they put into their work. Incentives should be given out when the company performs well in market as it was their hard work and dedication that resulted in an increase in the company’s bottom line.

Employee is an important asset and is proven to be a competitive advantage for companies hence they need to be managed effectively so that they can perform to their utmost and contribute to the organization. Organization should focus on employee satisfaction and make sure they are satisfied working for the company as their satisfaction on the job will help improve the company’s bottom line.

Numerology: National Boss Day

Interesting piece taken from Fast Company magazine edition October 2008. Click the image to view the bigger image.

Technology Services Update – New HR Website for Precision Staff

The Development team of the Technology Services Division, in conjunction with the Human Resources Department, are pleased to announce the launch of the PrecisionGroup HRM website.

Login!

All Precision Group staff may log into the website using their domain (Windows) username and password.

*Mac users also have a domain username and password. If you don’t know what yours is, you may drop by the Technical Support area and ask to have your password reset.

The HR website allows you to do the following:

• View your personal HR records and keep them up-to-date
• View the records of your staff (if you are a manager)
• View your allotted leave time and request leave from your manager
• Approve or reject leave requests (if you are a manager)
• Log your attendance

In the future there will be more facilities, including performance assessment tools that will allow managers and staff to communicate both ways about job responsibilities, performance criteria and personal goals. Stay tuned in the next few months!

Update!
The HR Department expects all staff to keep their personal HR records up-to-date. Start by logging into the website, click the ESS (Employee Self-Service) tab and update the following areas:

• Personal
• Contact
• Emergency Contact(s)
• Dependants
• Education

Watch the Movie!
For a video tutorial, click the FAQ tab and select Video Tutorial. Download the file and/or open it in your PC video player. Enjoy the soothing voice of the narrator as she leads you through the main features of PrecisionGroup HRM!

Give Feedback!
Let us know about your experience with the new HR website. Are you having problems performing a task? Did something not work as expected? Send your comments or questions to precision.hrm@precision-group.biz

Regards,
The PrecisionGroup HRM Team

Adi ‘Mr. Natural’ Alam (Project Manager)
Donny ‘Bugs’ Firdhana (Chief Programmer)
Edward ‘Doraemon’ Rantung (Graphic Designer)
Melinda ‘The Voice’ Santoso (HR Adviser)
Matthew ‘Mohawk Man’ Arciniega (Quality Control)