Sai,
Thanks for that. Yes, I agree... If we restrict our question, your strategy advocated compensating for the legal department inefficiencies through your own reading. In other words, you ended up 'doing the work of others' in some sense. Does that qualify as a reasonable conclusion from what you have described? Please let me know if I understood it right.
Reg,
From United States, Daphne
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52Thanks for that. Yes, I agree... If we restrict our question, your strategy advocated compensating for the legal department inefficiencies through your own reading. In other words, you ended up 'doing the work of others' in some sense. Does that qualify as a reasonable conclusion from what you have described? Please let me know if I understood it right.
Reg,
From United States, Daphne
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Nikhil,
I look at it from a different perspective: raising my individual performance to the optimum level, strengthening my knowledge relevant to my area of functioning to serve the interests of the organization well, and achieving considerable freedom of action by reducing my dependence on other support functionaries like legal. The cumulative effect of my individual efforts was to make my job significantly effective, enabling me to deal with issues/unions from a position of strength and ultimately insulating my department from the adverse effects of poor knowledge levels elsewhere. In the ultimate analysis, I worked for myself and my department, rather than for some other department.
B. Saikumar HR & Labour Law Advisor Mumbai
From India, Mumbai
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I look at it from a different perspective: raising my individual performance to the optimum level, strengthening my knowledge relevant to my area of functioning to serve the interests of the organization well, and achieving considerable freedom of action by reducing my dependence on other support functionaries like legal. The cumulative effect of my individual efforts was to make my job significantly effective, enabling me to deal with issues/unions from a position of strength and ultimately insulating my department from the adverse effects of poor knowledge levels elsewhere. In the ultimate analysis, I worked for myself and my department, rather than for some other department.
B. Saikumar HR & Labour Law Advisor Mumbai
From India, Mumbai
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Sai,
Thanks for the clarification, and it is in line with my remarks (whether we like it or not!). So, that is one way of working around. Like you rightly stated, this may not work for other functions.
So, can we think of any other strategies to use in this situation?
Reg, Nikhil
From United States, Daphne
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Thanks for the clarification, and it is in line with my remarks (whether we like it or not!). So, that is one way of working around. Like you rightly stated, this may not work for other functions.
So, can we think of any other strategies to use in this situation?
Reg, Nikhil
From United States, Daphne
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Dear Mr Nikhil Gurjar,
I have gone through all the comments once again. Overall it emerges that poor performance or sub-optimal performance pervades across all the functions and HR is no exception. This is where solutions of "Knowledge Management" comes in picture.
Let me repeat the thought propounded by Socrates. He told that "Human wisdom begins with the recognition of one’s own ignorance." Today the No 1 trouble with humankind is that "we don't know what we don't know". Errors happen because we grope in the dark.
In Mahabharat, Yaksha asks questions to Yudhistira - "the entire world is filled with what?". Yudhistira replies, "the tntire world is filled with ignorance".
In the business context, theory of knowledge management should be propounded with still greater earnest however, after recession, it has taken back seat. Knowledge management practices help in repetition of the past mistakes or mistakes committed by other companies. If we avoid repetition of the mistakes, this in itself is a big achievement.
Thanks,
DVD
From India, Bangalore
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I have gone through all the comments once again. Overall it emerges that poor performance or sub-optimal performance pervades across all the functions and HR is no exception. This is where solutions of "Knowledge Management" comes in picture.
Let me repeat the thought propounded by Socrates. He told that "Human wisdom begins with the recognition of one’s own ignorance." Today the No 1 trouble with humankind is that "we don't know what we don't know". Errors happen because we grope in the dark.
In Mahabharat, Yaksha asks questions to Yudhistira - "the entire world is filled with what?". Yudhistira replies, "the tntire world is filled with ignorance".
In the business context, theory of knowledge management should be propounded with still greater earnest however, after recession, it has taken back seat. Knowledge management practices help in repetition of the past mistakes or mistakes committed by other companies. If we avoid repetition of the mistakes, this in itself is a big achievement.
Thanks,
DVD
From India, Bangalore
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Mr. Nikhil,
Taking Dinesh's comments further on ignorance, I, during my career, came across the following kinds of ignorance which contributed to poor knowledge levels in the organization.
1) There are people, as Dinesh rightly said, who do not know that they do not know and end up giving wrong direction and decisions.
2) There are also people who do not know that they know and end up giving wrong direction and decisions.
3) There are people who do not know but pretend to be knowing and end up giving wrong direction and decisions.
Probably one of the reasons for such poor knowledge levels in the organization lies in hiring wrong candidates by HR. This, again, is attributable to the ignorance of operational managers about the scope of the jobs in their department and the knowledge, traits, and skills required to perform the job. I used to hear from the HR fraternity with whom I used to interact at workshops and seminars, that operational managers, because of their poor knowledge about job requirements, used to hand down improper job descriptions/profiles. As a result, when they want a workhorse, they end up getting a "cute hare," which is more for ornamental and entertainment value. Due to these inadequacies of knowledge in operational staff, HR might hire the "BEST" candidate but not the "RIGHT" candidate. This, again, contributes to poor knowledge levels in the organization.
The strategy of an individual HR officer/HR Department to prevent such recruitment mishaps will be to keep asking questions to get at the core requirements of the job so that he/it can hire the "RIGHT" candidate. In a knowledge-based industry/business, which the modern industry unmistakably is, "asking questions" is considered one of the strategies to enhance one's knowledge or to supplement the shortage of it in others.
B. Saikumar
HR & labor law Advisor
Mumbai
From India, Mumbai
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Taking Dinesh's comments further on ignorance, I, during my career, came across the following kinds of ignorance which contributed to poor knowledge levels in the organization.
1) There are people, as Dinesh rightly said, who do not know that they do not know and end up giving wrong direction and decisions.
2) There are also people who do not know that they know and end up giving wrong direction and decisions.
3) There are people who do not know but pretend to be knowing and end up giving wrong direction and decisions.
Probably one of the reasons for such poor knowledge levels in the organization lies in hiring wrong candidates by HR. This, again, is attributable to the ignorance of operational managers about the scope of the jobs in their department and the knowledge, traits, and skills required to perform the job. I used to hear from the HR fraternity with whom I used to interact at workshops and seminars, that operational managers, because of their poor knowledge about job requirements, used to hand down improper job descriptions/profiles. As a result, when they want a workhorse, they end up getting a "cute hare," which is more for ornamental and entertainment value. Due to these inadequacies of knowledge in operational staff, HR might hire the "BEST" candidate but not the "RIGHT" candidate. This, again, contributes to poor knowledge levels in the organization.
The strategy of an individual HR officer/HR Department to prevent such recruitment mishaps will be to keep asking questions to get at the core requirements of the job so that he/it can hire the "RIGHT" candidate. In a knowledge-based industry/business, which the modern industry unmistakably is, "asking questions" is considered one of the strategies to enhance one's knowledge or to supplement the shortage of it in others.
B. Saikumar
HR & labor law Advisor
Mumbai
From India, Mumbai
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Thank you, DVD and Sai.
DVD, our discussion is restricted to individual strategies and not organizational ones.
Sai, the points are excellent. Kudos. Asking questions is a great strategy, provided the other person is willing to play the game! On one hand, the other person might feel exposed, and it could turn out to be a nasty political minefield. However, it might be possible to play the cards well.
So, now we have two strategies. Are there any more strategies to consider? Let us try to understand this further.
From United States, Daphne
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DVD, our discussion is restricted to individual strategies and not organizational ones.
Sai, the points are excellent. Kudos. Asking questions is a great strategy, provided the other person is willing to play the game! On one hand, the other person might feel exposed, and it could turn out to be a nasty political minefield. However, it might be possible to play the cards well.
So, now we have two strategies. Are there any more strategies to consider? Let us try to understand this further.
From United States, Daphne
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I think two articles might be relevant here:
http://consultingconnoisseurs.com/CC_123HR.pdf http://consultingconnoisseurs.com/CC_Truth.pdf
I am sure these effects can be evaluated with a little bit of system simulation as described in the first white paper. Of course, other options always exist.
From United States, Daphne
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http://consultingconnoisseurs.com/CC_123HR.pdf http://consultingconnoisseurs.com/CC_Truth.pdf
I am sure these effects can be evaluated with a little bit of system simulation as described in the first white paper. Of course, other options always exist.
From United States, Daphne
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Nikhil,
I agree with your statement that asking questions has limitations and will work only when the other person is willing to play the game. You can teach a person but may not make him think always. But you cannot ever make a goat sing.
B. Saikumar
HR & Labor Law Advisor
Mumbai
From India, Mumbai
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I agree with your statement that asking questions has limitations and will work only when the other person is willing to play the game. You can teach a person but may not make him think always. But you cannot ever make a goat sing.
B. Saikumar
HR & Labor Law Advisor
Mumbai
From India, Mumbai
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