The Hindu Business Line : Will employees be happy in 2008?

The pressure of making the right career choice is so high that parents are now assuming a central role in managing the careers of their young adult children.

Ganesh Chella

Happy 2008! With a labour force of over 500 million and a gainfully employed workforce of over 340 million isn’t it important to ask if the employees in India will indeed be happy in the year 2008?

To predict the level of employee happiness in 2008 we just need to look around, reflect and ask ourselves some honest questions. It is equally important to understand what we can all do to make happiness happen!

What was 2007 like?

A good way to predict happiness in 2008 is to look at our experiences in the year 2007.

Careers and happiness

The biggest positive change in 2007 was the effort by organisations to go beyond education and look at real talent. The move to hire graduates and even those with class XII qualifications is evidence of this shift.

While IT and ITeS appear to be the largest employers, I saw some significant shifts in 2007. I saw many talking about life beyond the IT industry. While those from the better educational institutions treated a job with any of the big IT firms the same way some of us would have treated a PSU job a decade ago, many others just did not consider them cool any longer. Many others were actually looking at opportunities with the so-called old economy companies in new light. All in all, I see this as a positive change.

The image of the BPO industry as an employment destination continued to suffer and many suggest that this is reflected in their inability to hire. Going overseas also became less cool than it used to be and that is surprising many.

For those who entered the labour market or made job shifts, there certainly has been happiness in 2007 and 2008 looks as good.

In the midst of all this abundance, the pressure of making the right career choice is so high that parents are now assuming a very central role in managing the careers of their young adult children. Managing one’s career was certainly not a source of great happiness.

Money and happiness

Did the ever growing list of Indian billionaires and the zooming Sensex translate into an equally exhilarating pay story for the average Indian employee? Not really for all.

On the contrary, most of us heard about the pressures on costs and margins, the rupee appreciation and its impact on long-term profitability. We also saw our Prime Minister talking about CEO pay, pointing perhaps to the growing disparities. Despite all of this, if money meant happiness, there was quite a bit of it in 2007 but there are worries that we may have less of it in 2008.

HR and happiness

The HR function is in many ways supposed to be the champion of happiness. Ask HR professionals and they will produce a huge list of all the things they do, copy book style. Ask the employees and they will respond quite cynically that HR and happiness just don’t go together and I must admit that there is truth in it.

In the year 2007, I saw HR continuing to sever its touch points with employees – out of sync with ground realities. Among the many HR professionals I met in 2007, I found very few who had any real interest in people. Finally, in trying to become “business partner” I saw them compromising on the people agenda.

Clearly, if HR led to happiness, I did not see as much as I would have liked and I do not believe 2008 will be any different.

Balance and happiness

Balance is the ability to pursue one’s career while also being able to meet and fulfil one’s personal needs and responsibilities.

Clearly, the year 2007 saw increasing imbalance. Invasive technology, working across the globe and commuting across Indian roads only made things worse.

If balance was important for happiness, we had little of it in 2007 and why would anyone believe it will be better in the coming year? In summary, there were plenty of jobs and quite a bit of money but not enough happiness and 2008 does not look any different.

What can we do to make 2008 happier for our employees? Despite all the challenges, I still believe it is possible for us to create a happier 2008 for our employees, if only we tried hard enough. Here are a few ideas for your consideration:

Lead from the front

The biggest casualty of our hectic pace of growth has been leadership. Our organisations desperately need leaders who can lead employees from the front. Leaders who can create and share a compelling vision, who can hold the promise of not just more money but of a great future, the opportunity to co-create a great organisation and the commitment to grow together. If we can create more leaders who are capable of doing this we will have more happiness.

Reconnect

In building large global organisations, we have lost our connect with employees. We are unable to manage the moments of truth that really matter to them because we have outsourced our employee relationships. If we can get the connection back, we have some hope of happiness.

For psychologically safe workplaces

While we have succeeded in building workplaces that are physically safe, we can do more to create workplaces that are psychologically safe for our employees — workplaces that are free of harassment and discrimination, that encourage openness, that provide fair supervision and treatment and can encourage creative expression.

If we can recognise this element of psychological safety and make it available, we may have more happiness.

Help redefine happiness

Having said all this, the most important thing to do is to redefine the jointly held meaning of happiness in the minds of employees and employers.

Let us accept it – organisations exist to deliver value to customers and returns to shareholders.

Happiness can only be a by-product and not the reason for existence. The first thing to do is to be honest about this and not mislead our employees to believe that we are here to create great workplaces and become the best employers.

At the least, we can define happiness as the experience of congruence between what was promised and what was delivered.

Let us, therefore, make only promises that we can fulfil (at all points in the relationship) and do everything to fulfil the promises we made.

Ultimately, organisations can only create the conditions for happiness. Getting there is the employee’s choice.

As Benjamin Franklin said, “The Constitution only guarantees the American people the right to pursue happiness. You have to catch it yourself”.

I wish you all a really happy 2008!

(The writer is the founder and CEO of totus consulting, a strategic HR consulting firm. He is also the co-founder of the Executive & Business Coaching Foundation India Ltd. He can be reached at ganesh@totusconsulting.com)

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Will employees be happy in 2008?