COMPETENCY REQUIRED AT DIFFERENT LEVELS:-

Fortunately, many H.R. Professionals have started making the necessary changes required for success. However, HR departments still need to support these changes energetically by:

• Developing a compelling vision and value proposition for their whole organization;
• Aligning the focus of their efforts on more strategic outcomes;
• Re-negotiating their roles and relationships with operational leaders within organizations; and
• Committing to major, immediate competency development.

These functional transformations often entail significant realignment of attitude toward a much more strategic, action-oriented stance and significant structure, process, activity and behavior changes.

In practice, different organizations design various structures and roles to meet their diverse needs. However, as HR departments start their change process, professionals should focus initially on guiding principals rather than key roles or activities. These guidelines can then be applied as organizational design requirements:-
Functional Guiding Principles:

Maintain focus on adding value for business partners.

Develop a value proposition for the business worth of all key HR activities.

Eliminate or outsource any non-value added or highly specialized expertise.

Develop a product and service quality attitude that encompasses best practices for product/service development, communication, and support.

Automate products and services whenever possible to increase distribution, speed of delivery, and quality.

Develop organizational capabilities for identifying and implementing critical change initiatives.

Create new HR products and services that create more impact for the organization.

To fulfill these principles, what should the HR function focus on most Several most recent researches indicate that the most critical activities now include:

developing, clarifying, and communicating an organization culture, vision and values;

developing methods for producing alignment between employee goals and behaviors and organization strategy;

defining, communicating, and leveraging the organization’s key capabilities;

capturing and distributing the organization’s intellectual capital and expert knowledge;

developing teams and networks that can share and leverage expertise; • creating, distributing, and supporting HR products and services that support both employees and the business as a whole;

creating performance development systems that maximize productivity and growth opportunities for each employee; and

Generating and tracking of clear measures related to employees, core processes, and the enterprise as a whole.

The Human Resource Competencies That Matter Most:

Developing a functional vision and strategies and defining critical into the following building blocks:

• Personal Attributes; and
• Key Competencies;

Each of the two building blocks represents success factors that are responses to different sets of environmental requirements for HR professionals.
This framework is modular in design so that it can serve as a flexible “engine” to drive excellent performance. The competencies are arranged in building blocks or clusters that can be grouped into profiles necessary for a specific individual’s current position, as well as future positions in an individual’s potential career path.

Competency framework:-

SOME THINGS STAY THE SAME:-
PERSONAL ATTRIBUTES

Each “Building block” of competencies represents behavioral success factors corresponding to different kinds of environmental drivers of organizational life. Over many years we have observed, a consistent set of challenges individuals in all organizations face. Every contemporary organization, more than ever, needs honest, committed employees who can continuously learn and adapt to change. These basic, but critical, requirements translate in to a set of personal Attributes encompassing four competency areas.

These represent stable characteristics common to employees across all career levels, functional groups, industries, and global regions over time.
PERSONAL ATTRIBUTES
• Producing a valuable product and/or service. RESULT ORIENTATION:-Maintains focus on those activities that have the greatest impact on meeting work commitments.
• Energetically supporting the organization’s vision and strategy. COMMITMENT:-Demonstrates initiative and personal accountability to meet work demands according to the highest standards.
• Taking personal responsibility to grow and change. CONTINUOUS LEARNING:-Proactively seeks performance feedback and identifies approaches to improve own and other’s performance and learning.
• Exhibiting highest day-to-day work standards. HONESTY & INTEGRITY:-Demonstrates the highest level of business ethics and consistently adheres to and promotes key values and principles in all business and personal transactions.
KEY COMPETENCIES:-

A. INTERPERSONAL SKILLS:-

I.COMMUNICATION

“Think like a wise man but communicate in the language of the people.”

by:-William Butler Yeats (1865 - 1939)

“We are cups, constantly and quietly being filled. The trick is, knowing how to tip ourselves over and let the beautiful stuff out.”

by:- Ray Bradbury

“The way we communicate with others and with ourselves ultimately determines the quality of our lives”
by:-Anthony Robbins quotes (American advisor to leaders)

“The single biggest problem in communication is the illusion that it has taken place.”
by: - George Bernard Shaw
“To effectively communicate, we must realize that we are all different in the way we perceive the world and use this understanding as a guide to our communication with others.”
by:- Anthony Robbins quotes
“Kind words can be short and easy to speak, but their echoes are truly endless.”
by:- Mother Teresa of Calcutta quotes
“Start with good people, lay out the rules, communicate with your employees, motivate them and reward them. If you do all those things effectively, you can't miss.”
by:- Lee Iacocca quotes
“Deep listening is miraculous for both listener and speaker. When someone receives us with open-hearted, non-judging, intensely interested listening, our spirits expand.”
BY:- Sue Patton Thoele quotes

Communication refers to the process that facilitates sharing of information and ideas across the organization. No organization can survive without effective communication. You need communication for everything. You communicate to request, to inform, even to persuade others. Communication stimulates others to take action and helps to give direction to people for achievement of set goals.

The purpose of communication is to get your message across to others. This is a process that involves both the sender of the message and the receiver. This process leaves room for error, with messages often misinterpreted by one or more of the parties involved. This causes unnecessary confusion and counter productivity.
Infact, a message is successful when both the sender and the receiver perceive it in the same way.
By successfully getting your message across, you convey your thoughts and ideas effectively. When not successful, the thoughts and ideas that you convey do not necessarily reflect your own, causing a communications breakdown and creating roadblocks that stand in the way of your goals – both personally and professionally.
In a recent survey of recruiters from companies with more than 50,000 employees, communication skills were cited as the single more important decisive factor in choosing managers. The survey, conducted by the University of Pittsburgh’s Katz Business School, points out that communication skills, including written and oral presentations, as well as an ability to work with others, are the main factor contributing to job success.
In spite of the increasing importance placed on communication skills, many individuals continue to struggle with this, unable to communicate their thoughts and ideas effectively – whether in verbal or written format. This inability makes it nearly impossible for them to compete effectively in the workplace, and stands in the way of career progression.
Getting your message across is paramount to progressing. To do this, you must understand what your message is, what audience you are sending it to, and how it will be perceived. You must also weigh-in the circumstances surrounding your communications, such as situational and cultural context.
Communications Skills - The Importance of Removing Barriers:
Communication barriers can pop-up at every stage of the communication process (which consists of sender, message, channel, receiver, feedback and context - see the diagram below) and have the potential to create misunderstanding and confusion.

To be an effective communicator and to get your point across without misunderstanding and confusion, your goal should be to lessen the frequency of these barriers at each stage of this process with clear, concise, accurate, well-planned communications. We follow the process through below:
Sender...
To establish yourself as an effective communicator, you must first establish credibility. In the business arena, this involves displaying knowledge of the subject, the audience and the context in which the message is delivered.
You must also know your audience (individuals or groups to which you are delivering your message). Failure to understand who you are communicating to, will result in delivering messages that are misunderstood.
Message...
Next, consider the message itself. Written, oral and nonverbal communications are effected by the sender’s tone, method of organization, validity of the argument, what is communicated and what is left out, as well as your individual style of communicating. Messages also have intellectual and emotional components, with intellect allowing us the ability to reason and emotion allowing us to present motivational appeals, ultimately changing minds and actions.
Channel...
Messages are conveyed through channels, with verbal including face-to-face meetings, telephone and videoconferencing; and written including letters, emails, memos and reports.
Receiver...
These messages are delivered to an audience. No doubt, you have in mind the actions or reactions you hope your message prompts from this audience. Keep in mind, your audience also enters into the communication process with ideas and feelings that will undoubtedly influence their understanding of your message and their response.

“Nothing is so simple that it cannot be misunderstood”
- Freeman Teague, Jr.
Anything that prevents understanding of the message is a barrier to communication. Many physical and psychological barriers exist:
• Culture, background, and bias - We allow our past experiences to change the meaning of the message. Our culture, background, and bias can be good as they allow us use our past experiences to understand something new, it is when they change the meaning of the message then they interfere with the communication process.
• Noise - Equipment or environmental noise impede clear communication. The sender and the receiver must both be able to concentrate on the messages being sent to each other.
• Ourselves - Focusing on ourselves, rather than the other person can lead to confusion and conflict. The "Me Generation" is out when it comes to effective communication. Some of the factors that cause this are defensiveness (we feel someone is attacking us), superiority (we feel we know more that the other), and ego (we feel we are the center of the activity).
• Perception - If we feel the person is talking too fast, not fluently, does not articulate clearly, etc., we may dismiss the person. Also our preconceived attitudes affect our ability to listen. We listen uncritically to persons of high status and dismiss those of low status.

• Message - Distractions happen when we focus on the facts rather than the idea. Our educational institutions reinforce this with tests and questions. Semantic distractions occur when a word is used differently than you prefer. For example, the word chairman instead of chairperson may cause you to focus on the word and not the message.
• Environmental - Bright lights, an attractive person, unusual sights, or any other stimulus provides a potential distraction.
• Smothering - We take it for granted that the impulse to send useful information is automatic. Not true! Too often we believe that certain information has no value to others or they are already aware of the facts.
• Stress - People do not see things the same way when under stress. What we see and believe at a given moment is influenced by our psychological frames of references - our beliefs, values, knowledge, experiences, and goals.

These barriers can be thought of as filters, that is, the message leaves the sender, goes through the above filters, and is then heard by the receiver. These filters muffle the message. And the way to overcome filters is through active listening and feedback.

Feedback...
Your audience will provide you with feedback, verbal and nonverbal reactions to your communicated message. Pay close attention to this feedback as it is crucial to ensuring the audience understood your message.
Managers need timely and appropriate information to make sound decisions. Therefore, communication is essential for the effective functioning of the organizations. To communicate effectively, a person need not say all he knows. He should sort out the relevant data and convey only that portion which is required at that time. He must turn data in to information that has clear meaning and relevance to what has been asked. Everybody needs to understand that communication is a two way process. Two monologues can never make a dialogue. The key to effective communication is ‘Exchange’ & so is listening.

It is not just about words. In fact, a person communicates more with gestures, expressions and body language. Think of life without communication. Nobody would be able to express his/her ideas across to the other person. It will lead to an end of all the relationships- even before the start of one. Here I would like to refer one famous saying-

“KABHI SHOLA KABHI SHUBNAM KABHI TUFAAN HAI ANKHEN,
TULTA HAI BASHAR JISME VO MIZAAN HAI ANKHEN”

Communication fosters sharing of information. It helps people overcome barriers to open discussion. Imagine having a dinner with eight bright guests all knowing something different. Now, think of how much better everyone would be if everybody communicated his or her best ideas with each other. That’s the essence of communication- learning by sharing.

Definition:- Shares and receives information, including views, facts and feelings. Communicates clearly and succinctly, checking for understanding and encouraging open, two-way discussion. Identifies appropriate people (internally & externally) to communicate with and tailors the message to their needs.

LEVELS OF PROFICIENCY:-

LEVEL C

Demonstrates originality and flexibility of communication.
Identifies communication needs across the organization and to customers.
Ensures Formal and Informal channels are established between different groups to keep everyone up to date.
Speaks and communicates to difficult audiences, moving among a variety of cultural contexts and languages.
Speaks clearly and succinctly.
Prepared to contribute to discussions.
Clear, concise and well-structured written and graphical communication.

LEVEL B

Identifies and keeps appropriate people at all levels informed (Internal/ External)
Tailors amount & style of communication to audience e.g. summarizes key points for directors, supplies data and facts for engineers.
Uses a variety of routes to get the message across.
Asks probing questions to identify and understand differences of view.
Explains technical information to non-specialists without using jargon.
Timely and consistent communication.
Documents decisions.
Takes clear and well structured notes.

LEVEL A

Presents information in a professional manner.
Present effectively at one to one and group levels.
Active listening e.g. summarizes checks for understanding and
agreed actions.
Uses the most appropriate communication channel e.g. e-mail,
telephone, face to face.
Utilizes technology to communicate effectively.
Takes time to ensure that information is communicated.
Polite and friendly telephone manner.
Communicates important information in writing.

SOME SUCCESS STORIES:-

Let’s take a look at some examples on how communication has helped organizations/teams to achieve success:-
Email an Effective Communication Tool for Insurers

Calibre Insurance Company was a new entrant in the insurance industry. Jack Austen (Austen) was the CEO and the managing director of this company. Tom Scott (Scott) headed the marketing department.

Though the company's sales volume was satisfactory, the management was worried about the prospects of the company in the long run. At that time, its market potential was sound and the number of customers was substantial. But Austen was not sure about whether there would be an increase in the market share when the market attains saturation. Therefore he wanted more innovative strategies to be adopted for promotion of the products.

Scott agreed with Austen and began to think of other innovative strategies to promote their products. While doing so, he hit upon the idea of using the e-mail for marketing products. He felt that good communication is an important aspect of product promotion and requires sufficient deliberation. He was aware that e-mail had become a popular and effective medium of communication. Previously, only youngsters and techies used the e-mail. But now, almost everyone seems to be comfortable using e-mail. Therefore, he felt that this channel of communication can be tapped to promote the company's products.

Scott conveyed his idea to Austen, but it did not sound impressive to the latter. "The time, effort and skill required to carry out promotion through e-mails is tremendous. It would not be easy to generate money through websites," said Austen.

"Some time ago, people were not able to make the best use of e-mail due to lack of adequate technical skills. But things have changed now. The advantages of using e-mail for marketing are numerous. For instance, it returns immediate results, requires less effort and can be the traffic generator for our website," replied Scott.

"I agree with you. But we must carefully plan on using e-mail for marketing effectively," said Austen.

Marketing and Communication Strategy of Titan
“There has been a perceptible shift in consumer attitudes, which has tilted towards established brands. More and more people are actually willing to buy branded timepieces at a premium to flaunt them. Today, watches are all about style and statement”
- Manoj Dhanwani, Managing Director, Megan Impex Pvt. Ltd. in 2005.

“The association with Aamir Khan was mainly due to the brand values that both Titan and the actor are associated with. We are both known for our commitment and obsession towards perfection, quality, innovativeness, setting new trends and our market leadership.”
- Bijou Kurien, Chief Operating Officer (Watches), Titan Industries Ltd. in 2004.
"With the re-invention of Fastrack, what we are going to be seeing in the future is certainly a lot more investment in the brand, a lot more in terms of product collections, which will come in, in both watches and sunglasses and hopefully a more unified campaign that will span both categories."
- Bijou Kurien, Chief Operating Officer (Watches), Titan Industries Ltd. in 2005.
INTRODUCTION
In October 2004, Titan Industries Ltd. (TIL), a leading manufacturer and marketer of watches, jewelry, eye wear, and other lifestyle products, appointed Aamir Khan (Aamir) as the brand ambassador for its Titan range of watches. Bijou Kurien (Kurien), Chief Operating Officer (Watches), TIL, said, “There is a perfect fit between Aamir and Titan -- their stature, timelessness, and the love and trust they both share with the people, both nationally and internationally, makes this an ideal partnership.

Moreover, Aamir has a universal appeal that extends to everyone, across age groups, just as our watches do.” With the celebrity endorsement, TIL hoped to promote the latest trends in the industry.
The idea was to make watches that would be seen as style and fashion accessories rather than just utilitarian devices. The company decided to use Aamir in brand and product communication on television and in the print and outdoor media.

Though the vast distribution and service network of TIL had served as an effective entry barrier in the 1990s, foreign brands were becoming increasingly popular in the early 2000s, thanks to the paradigm shifts in the retail scenario and the growing affluence of the Indian consumers.
And TIL found that it was not safe even at the bottom of the pyramid. The grey market with cheap Chinese imports and the unorganized sector had cornered a sizable chunk of the low-end market. The appointment of Aamir Khan as brand ambassador for the Titan brand was seen as an attempt to broad base the appeal of the Titan brand.
INTRODUCTION
In 2004, besides appointing a brand ambassador, TIL made several attempts to revitalize its sub-brands. It introduced several collections/ranges under each of its sub-brands. Moreover, it participated in the retail boom that the country was experiencing.

It opened several outlets in the huge malls and hypermarkets that were mushrooming in the big cities. It also paid attention to its communication strategies. And its attempts seemed to have paid off -- the company posted good annual profits and its image was rejuvenated.
BACKGROUND NOTE
TIL, a joint venture between the Tata Group and the Tamil Nadu Industrial Development Corporation, commenced operations in 1987 under the name Titan Watches Limited (TWL). With the diversification of TWL into jewelry in 1994, the company changed its name to TIL. In June 2004, the company diversified into other lifestyle products like eyewear by extending its watch sub-brand Fastrack and perfumery with a new brand Evolve, launched in early 2005.

The main manufacturing plants of the company were situated at Hosur in Tamil Nadu. It also had an assembly unit at Dehradun in Uttaranchal and a unit that produced electronic circuitry for quartz watches in Goa. TIL reported a turnover of Rs.9.58 billion for the year ended 2003-04.

BOUNDARYLESS BEHAVIOR:-

Jack Welch knew the importance of communication in an organization and how it could remove the impediments in the normal day-to-day activities. Keeping this in mind, he came up with an idea of “Boundaryless Behavior”
That would make the difference between & rest of the world business. He had a vision of a boundaryless company that would remove all the barriers among the various functions: Engineering, Manufacturing, Marketing & the rest.

He stressed on the fact that open-ended communication always fosters growth and development. To the success of a company, the thing that matters is that how open its employees are to the information, how open they are to the ideas from other functions or even other companies.

Communication is all about bringing new information in to the organization for its betterment. Jack Welch brought in many new ideas and techniques from other companies. He popularized the line “Best Practices has legitimized plagiarism,” at GE, where the study of other high performing organizations was institutionalized. At GE, employees were encouraged to borrow and implant excellent ideas that were not trademarked, patented or proprietary.

Jack Welch met Sam Walton and visited a Wal-Mart store and observed the speed, the bias for action, the utter customer fixation that drove Wal Mart.

Soon, the ‘Boundaryless Behavior’ became the right behavior at GE. It lead to an obsession for finding a better solution, a better idea- be its source a colleague, another GE business or another company on the other side of the globe that would share its practices and ideas with GE.

Jack aligned this behavior with a rewards system that recognized the implementer of an idea. By creating this open, sharing climate, he rooted out bureaucracy from the company and developed a workplace where people were open, curious, cooperative and always breaking down barriers.

‘Boundaryless Behavior’ completely changed the way people worked, the way they behaved, and it stripped out a whole level of bureaucracy within GE. Boundaryless behavior increased the organization’s intellect and, thus, its effectiveness.

A good leader constantly communicates with his team. He would always try to make his presence felt in the team by interacting regularly with the team members. Let’s read the following case, which illustrates how communication can change the atmosphere in a team.

GENERAL BERNARD MONTGOMERY

On 13th august 1942, when Montgomery arrived at 8th Army Headquarters, two months before the battle of Alamein, the atmosphere was dismal and dreary. To recreate the morale of his broken team, he felt the need to communicate his thoughts to his team members. That very evening he gathered the entire staff of Army Headquarters and spoke the following words to increase motivation and instill confidence in them.

“I want first of all to introduce myself to you. You do not know me. I do not know you. But we have got to work together. Therefore, we must understand each other and must have confidence in each other. I have only been here a few hours. But from what I have seen and heard since I arrived I am prepared to say, here and now, that I have confidence in you. We will work together as a team; and together we will gain the confidence of this great army and go forward to final victory in Africa.”

These few words changed the whole atmosphere in the team. A spirit of hope was born that evening. Everybody went to bed that night with a new optimism in their hearts and a great confidence in the future of the Army.

MANOJ TIRODKAR-“Right combination of business and
Emotional talks”

Started less than 20 years ago. Global enterprise has blazed its way through Indian Business skies like a comet, backed by revenue of Rs 800 crore in 1999-2000. The dynamic and Young Manoj Tirodkar, its founder and CEO, was selected as the India’s Young Business Achiever as well as the World Young Business achiever for 2000. He is the executive vice-chairman of Global Tele-Systems Ltd, its wholly owned Mauritius-based subsidiary.

Manoj’s biggest asset is his tongue. Straightforward, simple talk; how to make it simple, not complex is the crux. For him, driving passion in employees means not talking about electronics, e-commerce or telecom, but talking about the end-result he is looking for, international benchmarks, and how his enterprise could marry the two.

Manoj says, “I am able to get down to their family concerns, personal issues, business, politics, or financial problems, in other words to relate to what is important to them. I can be rough or rude, but not hurtful. By and large, if I have spoken to somebody, I will get things done. I am a need-based man. I attribute it to what I call the ‘I ask what I want’ capability. People have the passion within them to give, it’s up to me to appeal to their right chord, to that passion. Its amazing, the number of times I am able to get things done this way,” says Manoj with satisfaction.

According to him, it’s all about the right combination of business and emotional talk. Ask in a simple way. Convince the other person that if you do it this way, you will help me. You appeal to the conscience of the person. “I need everybody, nobody needs me. I can go to any level of persuasion. What I am asking is genuine, I have a right to have it, it belongs to me and I am only imploring you to grant me what is mine.”

DAVID KELLY- Fostering Open Communication

David Kelly, president of IDEO, the firm that has designed cutting-edge products for such clients as Apple Computer, PepsiCo and Eli Lilly, is devoted to “unfettered conversation.” He and other leaders have searched for ways to blast open the hierarchical and departmental boundaries that block the flow of communication.

Kelley has designed IDEO’s physical workplace to provide maximum opportunity for open communication. There are few special executive areas or status symbols. Meeting spaces are arranged to make everyone feel comfortable enough to speak up, contribute ideas, and ask questions. In addition, walls are transparent, so anyone can see what’s going on and drop in to participate or pull out a colleague for a quick chat. Studio work areas are also open, so colleagues can visually eavesdrop on other projects, as well as plug in to neighboring conversations.

Kelley was so committed to the concept of an open environment that they hired a behavioral scientist, Peter Coughlan, who first carefully analyzed what employees were already doing-how they interacted with one another and what design elements could support the information that already existed. Employees were asked for their opinions about what areas of the office best supported interaction and creative collaboration. Video Cameras were positioned to allow office designers to analyze traffic flow and usage patterns. This careful approach helped IDEO design a casual, informal atmosphere that truly encourages continuous conversations that cross traditional boundaries. Too often, Kelley says,” leaders and companies are just faking an informal conversation. It’s staged. It’s not spontaneous, so you never really know what’s on anyone’s mind.”

David Kelley continually looked for ways to promote open communication. He believes that open communication improves the operations of a company, builds trust, spreads knowledge, and provides a foundation for communicating vision, values and other vital big-picture information.

HEWLETT & PACKARD- THE OPEN DOOR POLICY

Stanford engineers Bill Hewlett and David Packard founded HP in California in 1938 as an electronic instruments company. During 1940’s, HP’s products rapidly gained acceptance among engineers and scientists. The company’s growth was further aided by heavy purchases by the U.S. government during the Second World War. As their business succeeded, the confidence of Hewlett and Packard increased. The founders explicitly communicated their beliefs and values to the employees.

Since its inception, HP was known for its relaxed and open culture. The company followed an “Open-door policy”, which encouraged employees to discuss their personal and job-related matters with their managers. Most of the employees worked in open cubicles while the manager kept their doors open to encourage communication and idea sharing. A typical HP office building had a vast open area, in some cases the size of a football field, with dozens of cubicles. Most of the employees were technically oriented engineers who enjoyed learning and sharing their knowledge. According to Hewlett,” The open door policy is very important at HP because it characterizes the management style to which we are dedicated. It means managers are available, open and receptive. Everyone at HP, including the CEO, works in open-plan, door less offices. This ready availability has its drawbacks, in that interruptions are always possible. But at HP, we have found that the benefits of accessibility far outweigh the disadvantages. The open-door policy is an integral part of the management by objective philosophy. Also, it is a procedure that encourages and, in fact, ensures that communication flow be upward as well as downward.”

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