Thursday Nov 28, 2024
Thursday Nov 28, 2024
Thursday, 26 February 2015 00:00 - - {{hitsCtrl.values.hits}}
Chitral Amarasiri is the founder President and one of the founding members of the Association of HR Professionals (HRP) of Sri Lanka. He is the Chairman of the HRM Awards 2014/15 Technical Committee organised by the HRP Sri Lanka.
He was the former Chief HR Officer/DGM HR of Commercial Bank of Ceylon, Head of HR of Hemas Group of Companies and Bogawantalawa Plantations Ltd. Currently, he is working for an international development organisation in Washington DC, USA as a Senior HR Expert. Following is an interview with him on HRM Awards 2014/15:
Q: You were the founder President of the HRP, which was established in 1999. What was the thinking behind the formation of the HRP?
A: Let me set the context before I share with you the thinking behind the formation of HRP way back in the 1990s. The country was going through a very difficult time in many respects: political instability, a war-torn country, poor fiscal and balance of payments deficits with below $ 900 per capita. The economy was hit by a series of global and domestic economic problems.
The economy of Sri Lanka was very different to what it is now; they were absolutely difficult times. Companies where we worked at that time also went through difficult times to sustain their business performance and some companies were struggling to survive in their respective markets. We worked hard to maintain our competitive advantage in local and or international markets.
These companies represented various industries such as apparels, leisure, FMCG, transportation, banking and finance, plantations, IT, manufacturing, etc. HR heads of these companies were working with the top management on many HR-related projects connected to productivity improvements, process and cost efficiency enhancements, introducing new technologies, re-skilling staff, re-organisations, downsizing, etc.
Some of those companies encountered confrontational industrial disputes. Many of us were keen to work with trade unions that were keen to represent the rights of their members. These are not typical trade unions, but quite different. The motives and priorities of these trade unions were not aligned with the welfare and rights of their members.
In the meantime, employees were going through difficult times. Anxiety and security concerns as a result of a two-decade long war, job insecurity, high cost of living, and demands for emerging skills, continuous job pressure and discomforts created negative emotions among many employees.
CEOs and top management of companies had huge expectations from their HR heads. HR implications and HR challenges were enormous with a huge HR agenda. These HR projects varied from a modest HR task of motivating staff to make complex HR interventions. We were compelled to stretch our horizons towards meeting these challenges as a result of the rapid changes that were taking place, but we were struggling at the inception.
We were looking for professional support, assistance and specifically technical guidance beyond textbooks and classrooms. In the absence of such support and with the help of an academic guru, we created an informal platform for the purpose of knowledge sharing and brainstorming on current HR issues, which were common to many companies. We faced those challenges with tremendous success. We experienced the importance of networking together and sharing our experience/knowledge with each other. These handfuls of human resource professionals from leading organisations continued to meet informally to discuss issues of mutual interest. This proved to be both learning and a mutually-rewarding experience for all of us. In addition we had good fun and collegiality was very high.
The news of these informal meetings spread among the HR community and as a result our group began receiving numerous inquiries. Sensing the need, it was decided to formalise this organisation. It was felt that the time was ripe for us to put Human Resource Management on a proper footing for the mutual benefit of the professionals, our employers and the nation at large. It was the beginning of an endless relay for operationalising our vision to bring HR to the forefront. The formation of the Association of HR Professionals was the first step in this direction.
Q: Since its formation back then, in your view, what progress has been made in the field of HR in Sri Lanka, and how has HRP evolved over the years?
A: A very pertinent question. Let us examine those founding principles and ideologies on which we built this wonderful organisation for HR professionals. Our vision is to bring HR to the forefront. We outlined our mission in such a manner that all agreed to operationalise these ideologies. As a professional HR body, we were keen to bring together HRM professionals in a common forum to be the leading voice of the HRM profession. We were also keen to provide the membership with professional development opportunities, create professional and social networking arenas to facilitate knowledge and experience sharing to establish the HRM factor as a dominant force or an enabler in business performance.
In addition, we were very interested in focusing on legislative interventions on national HRM issues and enhancing HRM practices in the public sector. In order to support this cause, we were very fortunate from the inception to have with us many professionals and academics from numerous industries, sectors and organisations to create a web of knowledge and information to work towards a desirable matrix to achieve our expectations.
Our strategy was to bring the best world-class HR practices to Sri Lanka. This approach had two benefits. We were assisting our member organisations to acquire these proven HR practices, tools, processes and creating opportunities and offering new exposures to the membership. We obtained affiliation to the Institute of Public Management for Human Resources USA, a 100-year-old organisation.
We have strategically aligned with Hewitt Associates, which is a global human resources consulting and outsourcing firm delivering a complete range of human capital management services to organisations across diverse industries in the areas of organisational change, talent and reward strategies, HR and benefits outsourcing, HR strategy and technology, healthcare and retirement and financial management.
Now HRP is strategically aligned to the Society of Human Resources Management, USA, which is the world’s largest and leading provider of resources to serve the needs of HR professionals and to advance the professional practice of Human Resource Management. In addition, during the last 15 years HRP has been instrumental in getting down to Sri Lanka world-renowned HR gurus and global HR practitioners. Our focus areas in HRM have been HR strategy, rewards and benefits, variable pay plans, pension restructuring, competency management and performance management. HRP organised learning conferences, workshops, and training programs during this period focusing on these technical areas.
By and large, I am happy with the progress of HRP over the years especially in localising globalised best practices, exposure and opportunities offered to members and the forums that we have created for knowledge sharing, professional and social networking arenas at local and international level. However, our progress has been very poor in bringing legislative interventions in national HRM issues and also our deliberations on HRM practices in the public sector.
As you know, Human Resource Management interventions can facilitate public institutions to enhance their service delivery models with the bureaucracy to make life easier for people and in the interest of the public at large. Primarily, motivation, skills and integrity of this public sector Human Capital, and also the quality of leadership can make the change. Hence, I believe strengthening the national capacity for public administration is one of the best measures that the new government should take as a medium-term Human Resource Management intervention.
Q: During your presidency you initiated the HRM Awards, which started off in the year 2000. Why did you think it necessary to reward HR professionals and organisations for their HR practices?
A: The scope and potential of the HRM awards are much more than rewarding and celebrating HR professionals and organisations for their HR practices. Primarily we were focusing on the current state of HR practices of participating companies in the context of the environment that I detailed earlier and how best we would be able to influence and if required set higher standards. There are multiple benefits accruing from improved HR practices, creating awareness among the business community of the true potential of HR and very importantly sharpening the saw.
Continuous cutting will dull blades, which should be periodically sharpened to sustain the effectiveness and efficiency of the saw. Similarly, HR competencies and skills should be periodically updated; we knew the delta is the people factor, the human resources in organisations. Empirically, we were keen to find the delta factor, how HR drives business excellence in organisations. And last but not least, we want to give the HR function its rightful place in businesses.
We offered an opportunity for organisations and HR professionals to benchmark their HR strategies, initiatives, practices and achievements with local and international best practices. This was done through a unique, rigorous and completely confidential process. Organisations whose HR practices and performance were judged, and truly excellent practices received recognition for their achievement at the HR profession’s premier event – a glittering ceremony. There were instances, where certain awards were not awarded, since participating companies had not met the set standards. At the inception, the HRM awards focused on many HR dimensions.
We were looking at the contribution of the HR function to business success through strong links to organisational and business goals; the integration of policies to provide a comprehensive system for the delivery of high performance; how HR strategies and policies were used as a driving force to implement and manage change; creativity and innovation in devising effective people management initiatives; implementation of an effective communication strategy to manage some of these change management initiatives and positioning HR internally and externally; how HR competencies were being utilised as a source of competitive advantage; and the effective measures of the impact of HR on business strategies and HR initiatives.
In the process, we recognised and rewarded HR professionals and organisations for their HR practices. Those HR professionals, leaders of their organisations, are responsible for setting high standards. They deserve such honour for the outstanding work they have done. However, as a professional association we have national interests. For me, the competition is more than selecting the winners. As a professional association, we influenced the HR practices of Sri Lanka. You will notice the significant impact of this competition by simply assessing the HR practices from the dawn of the millennium to now, especially those companies whose HR practices evolved during the last 10 years.
Q: Often such initiatives come under a lot of criticism as being biased towards a particular company or individual. How does the HRM awards initiative differ from the many other awards programs in the country in terms of transparency in the final decision process?
A: This is a very sensitive area of concern. Employers of the general membership, council members, project members and the organising committee are participating in the competition. Your question is very pragmatic and we as a professional body are more concerned about the conflict of interest. More specifically, how do we mitigate the perceived conflict of interest? We extensively researched the process, methodologies and tools that we will use to assess and evaluate companies. We disassociated ourselves from the traditional methods of assessing HR practices of organisations and moved on to a research study.
We crafted an approach and methodology for the study, and used validated diagnostic tools, which would mitigate such conflict of interest issues and ensure the quality of the assessments. At the inception, the Postgraduate Institute of Management and our patrons directed us to develop the methodology. We asked our content partner to bring its expertise in Human Resource Management with view to leverage their rich experience in similar projects in the world.
Hewitt Associates, our content partner, brought much-needed subject matter expertise to the process. In addition, we requested our content partner to do a critical analysis and comprehensive report based on their interaction with participating companies and their thought leadership in HR. This time, SHRM will do the needful. Let me explain the process.
We have a three-pronged approach to mitigate this perceived conflict of interest issue. HRP HRM awards always try to understand the HR processes, tools and practices of participating organisations, and their alignment with overall business objectives and how they impact and support the achievement of business success. We simply followed checks and balances – the principles of separation of power. This is very similar to the Montesquieu tripartite system ensuring that no one could usurp complete power.
There are three connected parties to the HRM awards, i.e. HRP the organisers, the content partner and the panel of judges. These three parties have no direct link or accountability to each other. However, the content partner performs a critical role in terms of linking both the organisation and the panel of judges. The role of HRP as the organisers is absolutely limited to the logistics of the competition. They have no authority over the content partner or the panel of judges.
In the past, our content partners were PIM, thereafter Hewitt Associate and now SHRM. A technical committee, whose members could be local, governs the role of the content partner and international HR thought leaders. The role of the technical committee is to ensure evaluation methodology/tools meet global standards and yet be appropriate to the local conditions and also to ensure that consistency of the evaluation process so that all participating organisations are treated in a fair manner and insist on consistency of quality in the evaluation process.
Secondly, the profiles of panel of judges. The panels of judges are extremely independent and HRP in consultation with the content partner selects eminent business personalities and local and international HR thought leaders who have no links with competing organisations. They bring supplementary expertise and thought leadership to the panel of judges to create an idea mix and also to ensure a right balance.
Lastly, the content partner collects primary data through an initial questionnaire. They shortlist companies and make site visits. Thereafter the content partner prepares blind reports for all shortlisted companies on a common template where the panel of judges will not know the names of participating companies. Neither the content partner nor HRP was involved in the final selection of winners. By design, the panels of judges were not aware of the identity of any participating organisation and were far from bias towards a particular company or an individual as result of these blind reports.
Q: The evaluation process has been subject to some changes under the current leadership, with a change in content partner also taking place. What are the reasons behind this change and why?
A: Change is inevitable. This is all about sharpening the saw and it is time for HRP to sharpen the blade with the help of the Content Partner. We are keen to reform the evaluation process, the current process was developed some years ago.
In the meantime, HRP establish a strategic partnership with SHRM as their content partner. I do not need to repeat the credentials, but specifically, SHRM does large number surveys from benchmarking data to custom oriented researches. SHRM confirmed that their extensive experience over a long period of time in this area of expertise, knowledge and research will deploy for the benefit of the HRM awards in Sri Lanka. In addition, SHRM will strengthen the governance of the selection process as a not-for-profit HR organisation.
The focus of the HRM Awards has been to assess the link between HR and business performance and more specifically HR contribution to the high business performance. There are numerous theories on connection between impact of HR on business performance and our previous content partner develop their tools and processes on a conceptual framework that was built with their worldwide experience in similar competitions.
SHRM has done numerous researches and their report on Human Resource Strategy: Adapting to the Age of Globalisation outlining variety of ways. They believe that ‘HR strategies need to simultaneously focus on building skills, motivation and behaviour for a successful business strategy’. Personally I like the perspectives of MacDuffiire: “Innovative human resources practices are likely to contribute to improved economic and psychological performances only when three conditions are met: When employees possess knowledge and skills that managers lack; when employees are motivated to apply this skill and knowledge through discretionary effort; and when the firm’s business or production strategy can only be achieved when employees contribute such discretionary effort. All three conditions must be met for HR practices to contribute to performance.”
In practical terms, the efforts should improve effective utilisation of talent, higher productivity, reduced costs, better service delivery, organisational integration, aligned culture and organisational values, greater employee engagement, stronger employee proposition. This year the HR technical areas to be assessed are (1) HR strategy, (2) HR management practices, (3) Employee wellbeing and engagement, (4) organisation learning and development, (5) measurement of HR performance. The focus of assessment is based on effectiveness of HR practices on the basis of innovation in HR initiatives, impact on stakeholder expectations, sustainability and scalability.
SHRM in coordination with the HRM Awards Technical Committee re-examined the existing tools and processes to bring much needed changes. The challenge was how to generalise tools and processes as participating companies are from diverse industries. Sometimes, what work for one organisation might not work for another, therefore the content partner is keen to understand the impact of HR practices rather than to conformity to a checklist at the time of site visits and report preparation time.
The site visits is an important piece of the assessment process, the Content Partner will assess the level at which organisations are operating in their HR management practice, and will look for evidence of the impact of these practices in the context of innovation, stakeholder impact, sustainability and scalability.
Contd on page 20
Q: In your view, how do you see the evolution of the HRM function and future role of HRP?
A: Many researchers have identified changes in demographics (global sourcing, dynamic shifts and diversity), rapid growth in technologies (social media, high tech processes, emerging skills), economic shifts, changes in population – each generation with new expectations and behaviours (retirement of baby boomers, generation X and Y), and increase demand for work/life balance as progressive forces that continue to change the world HR landscape.
The question would be extent of impact of these global challenges on Sri Lanka. Are our challenges different to global challenges? However, these challenges will certainly impact talent management, talent acquisition and sourcing strategies, talent development, employee engagement and retention, performance management and rewards, measurement of HR services and operations in Sri Lankan organisations. Solutions are beyond textbooks, I firmly believe a pragmatic approach suitable to our terrain.
I am of the view that HRP should create forums and symposiums to encourage dialogue, share knowledge and to find workable solutions. In the absence of empirical evidence in Sri Lankan context, I am unable to provide a detailed and workable solution to your very broad question. However, let me take a nationalistic approach and try to view the role of HRP in the public sector. There are couples of observations.
Criticality of HRM in the public sector particularly in developing economies like ours is significantly important as management and development of public sector staff, their level of motivation, competency and more importantly behaviour will have a positive impact on quality of public services. HRM has the capability to bring required changes through effective practices to promote public service with impartiality, professionalism and responsiveness to make life easier for people. HRP of Sri Lanka together with SHRM (India) and also IPMA-HR (USA) can initiate a dialogue with the government to bring reforms to HRM practices in the public sector.
The above-mentioned demographic transitions, information revelation, globalisation and changes in the labour markets have impacted the economy of Sri Lanka. In addition, Sri Lankan economy was built on agriculture-based industries from the inception. Now we are moved or moving towards higher-value added services based industries. This shift has created demand for value added technical skills – a skilled work force, but the supply has been continuing to be on semi-skilled/unskilled or mismatching skills.
The quality and relevance of skills is continuing to be mismatch. Shortage and mismatch of skills is a result in the absence of integrated national HR plan. Supply of relevant job specific skills to the labour market is essential to sustain economic growth. In this context, emerging workforce in Sri Lanka should have skills needed to support the growing economy, to reduce the gap between have and have not. The HRP with their strategic partners and with the participation of the private sector would be able to assist the government to find medium and long term solutions for skills shortage issues.
As many of you know, online learning/e-learning is a growing mode of education with the high penetration into Internet facilities in developed and developing countries. The higher education markets are increasingly competitive with rapidly changing new technology. Many universities, colleges, and commercial institutions are offering online courses and many large organisation have online courses and learning opportunities to their staff.
As you also know, demographics are fast-changing in Sri Lanka and online facilities are not only for the younger generation, but also for much older and also to rural population in Sri Lanka. Today, demand for convenient and affordable educational offerings is increasing. Although demonstrated effectiveness of online education is yet to be known and cultural norms and beliefs are predominantly classroom focused in countries like Sri Lanka, yet huge opportunities exist for quality affordable e-learning in Sri Lanka. Therefore, the potential benefits, costs, and risks of online education are worth assessing.
HRP is innovative, creative and a trend setter. I believe HRP with the support of their strategic partners would be able to lead a country wide, cost effective convenient e-learning project on Human Resource Management.
