The Hindu Business Line : Bharti on the Gallup

Being the third largest wireless operator in the world and the largest private integrated telecom company in the country, Bharti Airtel has the dual responsibility of keeping the phones of its 88 million customers ringing and motivating its 24,538 employees while doing so.

“The company rigorously links its business metrics such as employee productivity (revenue and subscribers), market share and attrition to engagement scores across circles and functions,” says Krish Shankar, Director, HR, Bharti Airtel Ltd.

Being on the Gallup Great Workplace Awards list this year came as no surprise to the telecom major that has been working on all the criteria that the consulting company had stipulated in its employee engagement framework.

“We have worked on an HR model that encourages managers to do four things continuously: build a highly engaged team, have a productive organisation, build future capabilities and remain individual focussed. This has created an enabling culture with employees who have a can-do attitude,” says Shankar.

Bharti Airtel has won the award for the second year in succession. This year, more than 40 organisations amongst 400 Gallup clients across the globe qualified for the award; 23 organisations (including two from India) were finally awarded.

The Gallup Great Workplace Award is based on multiple criteria, including response rates, overall engagement levels, and evidence of engagement impact on performance. The applicants’ results are compared across Gallup’s workplace research database comprising several thousands of work teams in more than 150 countries. A panel of workplace experts reviews each organisation’s portfolio in both quantitative and qualitative terms. Then a panel of workplace experts evaluates the award-winning organisation.

The award necessitates that participating companies explain how they have linked employee engagement to business outcomes and explain in detail a strategic plan that highlights building engagement in the organisation. “Our employee engagement programmes are based on three broad areas: communication, empowerment and building great managers.”

The review panel also insists that companies describe at least a couple of HR Best Practices followed in the organisation and provide one example of a tool, programme or process that has been created or used to increase or promote employee engagement in the organisation.

‘Saksham’ is an initiative that helps build capability in areas currently acting as limiting factors (either in revenue enhancement, increase in efficiency/effectiveness, cost saving or customer satisfaction). The programme, initiated in the Jammu and Kashmir area, involves collaborating with circles that possess strong skill-sets in this area and are established ‘Centres of Excellence’ within the company and learning from their experiences. This avoids reinventing the wheel in handling common concerns.

STEP or Small Team Engagement Programme develops the functional and people management skills of vertical heads by giving them challenging targets and leadership roles in cross-functional teams in order to groom them as future business leaders. ‘Life’ helps families of employees come closer to one another and thus helps in building a ‘conducive’ work atmosphere, he says.

Another initiative that has been working successfully in the J&K area for a year now is Joy@Workplace. It has given significant results in driving people engagement. As a part of this initiative, all activities touching employees under the umbrella of engagement are structured and proactively circulated amongst the employees every month. This makes the workplace vibrant and engaged.

All the organisation-wide initiatives are backed by a rewards and recognition framework where both planned and instant recognition is provided to employees. The company’s reward and recognition budget in 2008 was more than Rs 1.5 crore.

Bharti Airtel has been leveraging the Gallup employee engagement framework to drive business for the last five years. Gallup Great Work Place awards were created to recognise the efforts of Gallup clients in using the engagement framework to drive their businesses. Participating organisations are qualified based on size with at least 1,000 respondents required to give their feedback.

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

Stories in this Section
The glue that binds

Bharti on the Gallup

Essential leadership qualities