The Hindu Business Line : ‘It is customer service that sets us apart’

The New Manager - Interview
Industry & Economy - Radio/TV
Marketing - Customer Relationship Management
‘It is customer service that sets us apart’

Deepa Watsa, Chief Human Resources Officer, Tata Sky, on the unique challenges of rolling out DTH services

Deepa Watsa, Chief Human Resources Officer, Tata Sky.

Tunia Cherian

Tata Sky, the DTH service, has set a hot pace for itself, garnering 1.8 million connections since launch in August 2006. But the service is far more than a numerical success. It has brought a sea change in the TV viewing experience of an audience spanning across generations from toddlers learning language skills to the elderly.The service has also brought with it several innovations such as interactive TV.

The product, which has a technology-intensive backbone, strives to be simple enough to be mastered by school-going children.

Every subscriber’s first interaction is likely to be with the company’s call centre associates or the installation staff. The product’s success obviously also depends on the customers’ interactions with these points of contact, that according to surveys, maintain the highest standards.

The New Manager caught up with Deepa Watsa, Chief Human Resources Officer, Tata Sky Ltd, to find out more about HR management at the company.

What are the challenges associated with training people in a new field such as DTH? What were the specific requirements you were looking for in your personnel?

DTH being a new industry, there were no ready skill sets available in the marketplace. We had to create the best breed of talent from scratch and each function required a niche set of skills, which was not easily available in India.

We were looking at hiring talent from consumer durables /FMCG /telecom /broadcast media and, in turn, training them on the product/processes/installation, etc.

We had six months to train 5,000 direct and indirect employees across 180 cities simultaneously as we were slated for an all-India launch.

What is the staff strength at Tata Sky? Since you are providing a high technology service, does it mean a major chunk of your personnel are highly qualified people.

Currently, our strength is 2,000 employees. We have technical workforce in our uplink facility in Gurgaon and our installation teams across India.

Tata Sky HR has drawn support from both stakeholders — Tata and Newscorp — in setting up systems. What are the specific inputs given by each player?

We adopted the best practices from both stakeholders. The Tata brand helped us attract the best talent. Newscorp, with their expertise in the DTH space, assisted us in specialised areas such as legal, content, training and call centre operations.

While you were hiring, what was the kind of experience you were looking for in your staff?

As stated above, DTH being a new category, the skills sets were not available. We did most of our hiring from the consumer durables/FMCG/telecom and media industry. What was important was to get people with a positive attitude, the potential to learn and the desire to take on the challenge of launching new category.

Additionally, thanks to our pedigree of Tata and Newscorp, we attracted the best talent in India.

In a business, where no one has any exclusive content to boast about, it is only customer service that differentiates us from competitors. In our first year of operation, we were the only DTH company in the world to touch the one-million-mark in the launch year.

A national consumer satisfaction survey conducted by AC Nielsen has revealed that Tata Sky has beaten all global benchmarks for customer satisfaction for the durables and DTH sectors.

Two years after launch, what are your views on the general motivation levels at the company? Do you also face the challenges that IT companies face, of high attrition, and astronomical demands from employees in terms of salary packages and perks?

I believe that the corporate culture we have created and the transparent open door policy we have is widely appreciated at all levels in the company.

We have had some attrition, which in my opinion is healthy.

Our compensation structure, which is the best in the industry, is based on a total cost to company (CTC) concept. Till date, we have not had to deal with unrealistic expectations in terms of CTC.

This sector is likely to see the entry of many more players in the days to come, which should play up the demand for trained personnel. How do you plan to face this looming challenge?

We believe that whilst compensation is important it is not the key driving factor to motivate employees. Several of our staff have received offers from competition but have chosen to stay with us as they like the company culture and work ambience. Some who have left us are keen to come back.

We believe it is important for our employees to grow professionally and personally and to this end we have launched several company-sponsored self- and career development initiatives for our staff.

They have been put through Development Centres and we have identified Individual Development Plans for each of them. We also have several employee engagement initiatives involving the employees and their families.

Tata Sky expects to ramp up operations. Are you continuing to hire staff?

Yes, we will be hiring staff in some departments.

Two years down the line, do you feel the novelty of working in this field of activity is waning among your personnel? How do you keep the excitement going at your company?

It is quite normal for enthusiasm levels to wane a bit now and again. Having said that, our staff still enjoy the challenges they encounter in the field and they leave no stone unturned to ensure that they are able to complete even the most difficult installations like the ones we have done on an oilrig and on a tree, ploughing through snow in Jammu & Kashmir.

Our technical staff at times have had to deal with outages from the broadcasters’ end which has resulted in our call centre associates being flooded with calls on the same.

Our motto is service with a smile and we have always lived up to that. It is our commitment to continually provide our customers with a superior product offering coupled with gold standard customer service.

More Stories on : Interview | Radio/TV | Customer Relationship Management

Article E-Mail :: Comment :: Syndication :: Printer Friendly Page

Stories in this Section
Setting high standards

Crossing the Rubicon!

Compensation 2008-09: Will this be the year of deep differentiation?

Putting ethics on the business agenda

‘It is customer service that sets us apart’

Four leadership activities