Interview of the Quarter
He holds a Bachelor (Honors) degree in Engineering from Birla Institute of Technology, Pilani. In addition to that, he has done his post graduation from Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad. Mr. Saxena has over 25 years of experience in Sales and Marketing. He joined as Vice President, Operations in Wipro. His current assignment is Vice President - Strategic Sourcing, Wipro BPO Solutions. Interview Excerpts: Compensation is an important parameter but not the only one in recruiting qualified staff. Q 1. What according to you are the key challenges facing the BPO sector today? • Attrition – A lot of the incoming youngsters see this as a stop gap job and not as a career. We need to promote acceptance of BPO as a career option. • Availability of quality/quantity manpower – demand for numbers is accompanied by better skill sets too .This is putting pressure since the work pool is proving inadequate for the combination to be met at industry level. • Development of middle management - Rapid industry growth has led to a gap between demand and availability of mature , qualified supervisors. Q 2. What else do you look for in the desired candidate in addition to basic qualification? • Communication skills Q 3. What are your scoring points to attract the desired candidates? • Wipro Brand Q 4. Do you think compensation is an important parameter for recruiting qualified staff? It is an important parameter but not the only one. Specially as we move up the seniority level, it becomes a lesser draw – as employees look for stability and core organization values & job challenges. Q 5. Does compensation package in your organization align with the industry standards? We take into account industry specific situation as well as the overall national scenario. Q 6.How has talent shortage impacted your industry ? How will Wipro BPO address the issue? Yes – this is an industry concern. We have tied up with leading universities to offer graduation and PG courses to our employees. There are other employee bond schemes that we are launching, which will help us manage talent retention better. It takes longer and harder to find required numbers with desired quality. Q 7. What are the key drivers that attract talent from other industries? • Faster career progression/ growth opportunities Q 8.What kind of evaluation system do you follow to appraise and reward your key performers? Multi layer system. Programs are designed in such a way that in
addition to annual appraisal, there are growth opportunities on
an ongoing basis, as positions become available from growth of existing
accounts / new business. Q 9.Which HR challenges are critical to your organizations growth and success? • Retention Q 10. Which are the various methodologies adopted to identify and implement training needs in your organization? • Annual appraisal exercise gives data , based on which behavioral
training programs are designed. Q 11.Kindly share with us the best practices adopted by your organization to hire and retain the best and the brightest talents? • Focused channel management and attractive offers to potential
employees facilitate hiring the right talent. |
