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Rukmani Vishwanath

Mumbai , Oct. 25

TO sharpen its competitive edge, Union Bank of India will be recruiting as many as 325 `specialists' in various fields shortly.

The bank, which currently has a staff strength of 27,000, has been on a recruitment drive for specialised officers in the area of information technology, forex, law, chartered accountants and other technical officers.

As per existing regulations, post-VRS, the bank cannot hire personnel in the `general category' until March 2006. However, the bank does not have a requirement for general staff at the present time, according to Mr K.L. Gopalakrishna, General Manager, Union Bank.

"We need specialised people for specific functions, especially in the area of information technology. Technical officers will be useful for credit appraisals, etc; we also need support in the area of law due to the Securitisation Act and issues pertaining to the DRT. They will help us in strengthening our regional offices and major branches across the country," he said.

By January next, Union Bank will go live in implementing its plan for automation of human capital management, as part of tie up with TCS and PeopleSoft Solutions. The implementation is likely to be completed by March 2004.

It is hoped that the software solution will help the bank achieve a number of objectives, including controlling and managing job requisition data, post openings online and conduct online searches. It will also help the bank track applicants by personal data, skills, education, training, test results and work experience.

The solution will also serve as a multidimensional data warehouse for the entire human resources of the bank, keeping track of the benefits and payroll systems.

"The software programme will help the bank identify and associate competencies with individuals, jobs, positions and project teams. It identifies employee development needs, finds leadership and talent gaps in the organisation and identifies and follows up on high potential employees," according to Mr Gopalakrishna.

In the year 1984, in its endeavour to efficiently manage its human assets, the bank had developed an in-house software solution `Human Resource Personal Information System' (HRPINS) and started collecting data on all employees. However, the software had some inherent defects and the system could not stabilise properly. Consequently, the HR department at the regional and central level had to resort to manual intervention as part of their HR management, depending heavily on the collection of data physically from all the field units.

At present, the bank's intranet is already in place, connecting all the field executive offices. With the plan to interconnect 500 branches covering more than 75 per cent of the bank's business through the core banking solution supported by Infosys and Wipro, the automation of `Human Capital Management' is expected to help the bank increase staff productivity.

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