Cab in, Cab out…

“Saab/Madam, aapka location kahan par hai…. Main Cab driver baat kar rahaa hoon…”

Cabs are an essential part of almost every IT/ITES/BPO employee’s work life. Their reporting time at work is most likely dependant on it! So, I decided to have a look at these vibrant life-lines of the high tech industry.

Cab operators, known as vendors in the industry parlance, run fleets of automobiles – a high population of them is the Tata Indica(b), followed by the Tata Sumo and the Chevrolet Tavera – servicing the logistics of transporting employees in and out of the company they serve. Maintaining the fleet, overseeing operations on a large scale, ensuring rosters are optimal in terms of time and location, tracking movement of vehicles as they pick/drop employees one after the other and so on, is no mundane task. And agreeably, most operators do a wonderful job of it.

Barring a few occasional hiccups, most cab drivers/operators carry the day with élan. Providing employment to well over a hundred thousand, this industry does its work without much ado. While an employee would not hesitate to register a complaint at the slightest inconvenience, rarely would the cab service be complimented ‘on record’ for a job well done! Most of the city streets in India that looked desolate at the stroke of the midnight hour not very long into the past, are now bustling with these cabs, zipping to and fro on their errands!

Employees, on their part, consider cabs a great way to commute. Apart from the obvious savings on travel, they are also saved the hassle of negotiating through traffic gridlocks. Therefore, they arrive fresh as a dewdrop at work, and can also afford to catch up with a wink or two on their way back home, tired from the day’s (night’s) work.

Using the cab service also fosters friendship and bonhomie amongst colleagues – and is in fact, a great way to catch up with ‘offline’ information and gossip. Rotational shifts or route reviews bring new cab-mates from different departments/processes, and over a short period of time, they turn into good friends.

While there will be concerns of rash driving indulged in by some cab drivers, the general opinion is that the cab driver is a friend of the ‘greenback’ industry and will be around for quite some time to come. So, three cheers to the ‘one for the road’!

Missed Call!

"Hi, Amit, this is Rina from Aychaar Solutions...Just wanted to remind you that you have your final round of interview at 3pm this afternoon. You need to be there at the venue by 2.40pm and report to Gaurav of HR. Wish you all the best! I'll give you a reminder call anyways at 2pm. Bye..." (All names changed, to protect the privacy of the intended parties) This at 10.30 a.m.… Come 2 p.m., Rina calls Amit’s mobile and is greeted by the 'either switched off, or out of calling area' message. She then calls his home phone, and the lady at the other end is ‘not exactly’ sure of Amit’s whereabouts. Maybe he is somewhere in India; maybe, he’s taken a flight to Los Angeles…. At 4pm, a tense Rina is alternating between calling Amit’s mobile (with a prayer in her heart), hearing the same message, and receiving Gaurav's frantic and exasperated calls.

Familiar scenario? All too familiar scenario!

What does Rina do? What could Rina do?

Pretty little! Considering that eight out of ten interview-schedule calls meet with the same fate today…. Recruiters, jobseekers, and the corporate HR staff, go through this much dreaded grind almost every single day. Blame game….anyone? Dicey, ain’t it?

I hope to go forward in this blog looking at all of the central players in this game of the 'missed call'. Amit, the elusive Amit, could well have been at the cinema, watching the latest release that afternoon, to celebrate the honey-dripping offer letter that he had picked up from another employer that morning, soon after Rina's call. To Amit's credit, he is not amongst those 'cats' that walk around with at least half-a-dozen offer letters across their attire, on any given day. He was content with the offer he had picked up, knew the afternoon guy couldn't fare better; so decided to call it off, and enjoy a movie instead!

Rina, in the meantime, has a tough evening ahead trying to explain this 'missed call' to her team leader. Gaurav's scene is no better as he is one guy short, and hopes Rina or her counterparts from the other consultancies make up for it the next day! And there are a couple of other 'gaayabs' too for the other positions that he has to close by the end of the week. So, Gaurav is not really a happy man either.

Rina could be forgiven for feeling let down by Amit. She had guided him most diligently through the company profile intro, the job description, the pay package counseling, the initial telephonic interview, the elimination round….taken pains to update him on all the possible landmines, the benefits, his strengths vis-à-vis his competition, and so on.

However, for Amit, she was but doing her job! He does not realize that his accomplishment is also very much a part of Rina’s job. That his success is her success too! So, he does not think it important to update Rina with his conquest of the morning. Nor does he want to be ‘pestered’ by Rina’s follow-up calls… so stays off the familiar number! And this behavior is surprisingly displayed across functional levels. Only, the ‘missed calls’ are a little stylized at the upper end of the spectrum. ‘Had an important JV contract meeting at the other end of the world, scheduled at short notice….’, ‘had intended to call and let you know, but was just too caught up…’, ‘you mean to say you did not get my SMS?!! That’s strange!’ Yes sirree….strange indeed!

Just as an employer has the right to choose from amongst the best of the turnout at the interviews, and just as the recruitment firm would not pick all and sundry CV’s to proffer to their clients, every jobseeker does have the intrinsic right to choose the best offer. But the point we need to reinforce here is about communication. How and why does the same recruiter suddenly fall out of favor when someone has landed a better offer? Why is it that when one could spend time to explain his/her expectations and aspirations, and the recruiter takes after those discussions, there is a feeling of ‘disconnect’ when the recruiter is needed no more? How different things would be if one were to spend just about five minutes to explain that they have a better offer, and thank the recruiter for all their efforts!

Recruiters - well, some of them think that it is they that the jobseeker and the client owe their very existence to! This creed of recruiters would do all to pick up any CV, sell the jobseeker the job profile that they have an interview deadline for, meet the numbers, and goddamn the jobseeker! Left in a tizzy, the jobseeker walks out of the interview, humiliated by the alien questions not relevant to their realm, wondering what hit them! I once had someone share their experience of a walk-in for a BPO, announced prominently in a huge ad that appeared in the newspapers. The walk-in venue, apparently, was the office of one of their consultant recruiters. And when this person showed up for the walk-in, he was surprised to find a long queue actually circumventing the centre parapet across the whole floor. No seating arrangements, nor any attendant staff to walk around and inform the progress. Just one security guy at the entrance, and everyone had to patiently wait their turn to ‘walk-in’. Maybe an isolated case….maybe not! But downright pathetic! If that is the way jobseekers are treated, how could you expect niceties in return? And then we have the run-in phone calls from telecalling recruiters parroting about a better opportunity and would-you-be-interested stuff; no specifics, no nothing…. I’d be damned if there is no one out there that has not received a call about how lousy their resume looks, and how about them zapping yours! Maybe, giving it a try might elicit a direct call from Bill Gates!

Corporate HR staff - the hallowed torchbearers for the jobseeker and the recruiter alike - how could they be wrong? Ever! Well, some of all the foregoing confusion could be avoided with a little effort from their side as well. For starters, some of them could do with having a definite job description and an absolute clarity on the role when requisitioning the services of a consultant recruiter on a job mandate. Interacting with too many consultants for single digit requirements might actually end up as a case of too many cooks. The idea of generating numbers in terms of CV even to fill just one position is sure to drive the recruiter crazy. When you have a consultant recruiter empanelled, might as well give their intelligence their due! The job of filling up a position that began with a consultant recruiter should end with the consultant recruiter as well. Most of the recruiters feel that they are in the dark especially when there is an offer firmed up with the jobseeker, and they hear it first from the jobseeker rather than their client company’s HR personnel. Apart from the monetary issues that crop up with some clients, another issue that is causing concern to many recruiters is the issue of database ‘hijack’. Stacking up unused resumes forwarded by the recruiter, holding out for a while, and contacting the jobseeker directly is apparently becoming more a rule than an exception.

So, the merry-go-round continues....but let's hope we all see wisdom and let each of us enjoy the ride!

Oops…I see a couple of missed calls on my mobile…..Ciao!

"Home" Page!

"Aa ab laut chalen...."

Mukesh's mellifluous voice hypnotizes you while listening to this number from thespian Raj Kapoor's 'Jis Desh Mein Ganga Behthi Hai'.

The magic of being 'at home' is a pleasure indeed! And I do not intend to say this as an antipathy to the idea of staying in a land that is over a thousand miles away from one's own.

Nothing can take away the days that you fought the pain of moving away from your loved ones and all the warmth, to pursue your dreams of making your mark where it mattered most! Nothing can take away the initial struggle that you successfully overcame in coming to terms with working against your disposition to adjust to a new timezone, and to live amongst a new ethos. Nothing can take away the triumph you felt overcoming the initial tribulations, both emotional and physical. And finally, nothing can take away your stupendous success against all these odds! If you honestly feel that you have a lot more to achieve, and perhaps give back to the host country, nothing should stop you from rolling on. Period!

On the other hand, if there is a budding thought that is dormant in your mind about returning home ...well, nothing should stop you from brooding further! Again, it is understandable if one would like to take a holistic view of the whole idea. Chucking something that has been fantabulous all along, and moving back to a scenario that might need a bit of 'catching up' would take a lot of deliberation. It is not just about you; your family has to be comfortable with the idea too. Losing out on a well-knit network of colleagues and friends is another prospect that could tug at your heart. In other words, the whole process is quite a roller-coaster ride. If, however, the determination to return to India gets the better of all these, then what next?

I would like to steer clear of all the hype that surrounds the neo-persona of India Inc. Enough material would rain on you at the click of a mouse! It would make sense to judge your career options back home that would give you a close similarity to your current lifestyle in the US, if not all. The usual destination picks for returning Indians would be the hot metros. Bangalore and Hyderabad are no less favored. Of these, Hyderabad is where I would like to point to at the moment....

A decade ago, Hyderabad was just another non-descript capital, going about its business with a late start and an early finish every day. The earliest risers would be the industrious milk vendors with about a dozen of their overflowing milk cans tagged on to all available space on their two-wheelers rushing in to the city from its outskirts to ensure retail distribution. Of course, there would be the vegetable vendors on their way to pick up their stock for the day, and the morning walkers / joggers. Late nights were for the odd businessmen returning after an extended day's sale or a stock check, folks returning after the midnight movie show or a marriage, and a few others. Traffic at any time of the day would be far and between. That's not the scene today!

Far from the laidback milieu, Hyderabad is now a vibrant (greater) city, with all the trappings of a metropolis. There are the concrete high-rises jostling for space with residential apartments - with every vacant space or dilapidated building being eagerly lapped up to accommodate yet another construction venture - cineplexes, pubs, frequent traffic gridlocks, convenience stores, convenience products, et al. Every day sees yet another multinational corporate entity opening its office here. From retail to biotechnology to embedded infotech, jobs abound, and every major player boasts of a facility in Hyderabad. There are placement facilitators too, eager to co-ordinate every level of job requirement.

Lifestyle, though not comparable to a cosmopolitan city, can still be rated good. Cost of living is on the higher side of moderate. Yet there is some magnetic charm to this city. So, welcome to Hyderabad!

**For expert guidance on your plans to return to India, please check with Achyut Menon who is an authority on career Options for returning Indians!