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FEBRUARY 2009


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HR at BHEL: Impressive Capable Mature
Anil Sachdev (Director-Personnel, BHEL)talks to Aditi Sharma about managing people in one of the countrys top PSUs

As Director-Personnel at Bharat Heavy Electricals Ltd. (BHEL), Mr. Anil Sachdev has the challenging task of
maintaining one of the Navratna workforces in the country. He tells us about the challenges involved and
how HR has changed over the years, in this exclusive interview with The Human Factor.

Q. Please tell us about your early career and education.
I did my engineering from Jabalpur Engineering College and I joined BHEL through campus placement in
1975, as an Engineer Trainee. After joining, I pursued my MBA simultaneously, with specialisation in
Production and Operations Management. Working with the Bhopal unit, I gained experience in various
divisions like manufacturing, production, material management and technology. I then rose to the position of
Head of Department, and was shifted to Traction Motor Manufacturing, which was the most profitable
department at the time. I have also been actively involved with the companys switch from conventional
technologies to CNC (Computer Numerical Control) technology.

Q. So when did you switch over to the field of HR?
I joined HR after becoming a Director on the board. After working in the Bhopal unit till 2002, I was transferred to Haridwar, where I was heading
both plants in the capacity of GM. When the post of Director-Personnel fell vacant in 2007, I was selected and that is how I got here.

Q. How has your experience in HR been so far?
I am quite comfortable in this function as I have been dealing with people throughout my corporate life. In Haridwar, I was i n-charge of about
7,500 people, while in Bhopal, the strength was between 700 to 800. Also, since I had worked in such diverse functions earlier, I was able to
understand the people as well as operational issues. I have always believed that as long as you care for your employees, they will care for the
organisation.

Q. What is the vision of the HR department at BHEL?
We want to be business partners in helping BHEL fulfil its vision. At the same time, we want to become leaders in HR practices in the country. To
actualise this vision, we need to ensure availability of competent workforce as required by the business, while providing development opportunities
to the current workforce to achieve its full potential. Also, we want to continuously improve the motivation of employees through participation and
involvement initiatives.

Q. What has been the biggest HR challenge for you?
The biggest HR challenge for me has been to constantly attract good talent from the market, in competition with private companies and other
PSUs. It is also vital to keep the workforce motivated, to gain sincere commitment and contribution towards organisational objectives.

Q. What initiatives have you taken in this regard?
We recently introduced competency mapping, for which we identified key positions (from the middle to
senior levels of management) and defined the skills required for these roles.

We also work with assessment centres to understand current and potential competencies of employees,
which further helps identify training needs. Through our technical and behavioral training, we aim to seal the
gaps between actual and required skills.

At present, we are quite particular about soft-skills training. This is because we are at a junction wherein
growth rate is high, and so we need to groom leaders for future roles.

Q. What is the work culture at BHEL like?
We have a very open and free culture, which allows for freedom and independence for our people. Learning is continuous. New recruits are
encouraged to contribute with their ideas, and allowed to make mistakes as well.

We recently introduced a mentoring scheme, so that every new recruit can be guided and informed about the organisation, its operations and its
policies. This initiative comes from experience, as a lot of people used to leave without even getting to know the company in its entirety. The
mentors are now able to guide the youngsters and highlight the role of the company in developing the economy. This hand-holding exercise
improves involvement as well as commitment of those being mentored.

In terms of employee development, we have instituted our own Human Resource Development Institute, catering to employees at all levels of the
organisation. Various development programmes are held here, and even external faculty is invited on a regular basis to enhance exposure. We take
training and development very seriously and have received a tremendous response from the employees in this regard. Programmes taught at the
institute include comprehensive courses on: General Management, Young Managers, Advanced Management, and Strategic Management.

Q. How do you keep worker-level employees motivated?
Over the years, I have noticed that employees really love taking on challenging assignments, which reward them suitably. This is what keeps them
motivated. I consider it my duty to continuously enhance their career paths through stimulating assignments. Also, it is important to listen to their
queries and grievances, and then respond in a genuine manner. These employees are so precious as they have the most difficult jobs, and are the
pillars for growth.

Q. How do you measure employee performance for appraisal?
We have Key Result Areas (KRAs) for employees across the organisation, and our performance appraisal system is known as MAP (Moving Ahead
with Performance). When we sign the annual MoU (Memorandum of Understanding) with the government, we break it down into various
parameters. These are then further translated into department-wise goals and targets.

Q. So are there have any incentives attached to performance?
We have two schemes in this regard: Plant Performance Payment and Special Incentive Payment. These incentives are completely linked with
performance. Also, we have an interesting policy called IMPRESS (Improvement Projects Rewards Scheme), which rewards innovative ideas
implemented by employees. This helps to encourage individual efforts in taking up improvement projects. This scheme has yielded substantial
benefits: around 5000 new projects were registered in the previous year, while the savings since inception amount to about Rs. 800 crores. More
than 25,000 projects have been registered so far, and our employees have even won Vishwakarma National Awards for the same.



Q. What are the major sources of recruitment for BHEL?
We recruit mostly through open advertisements and campus selection. We look for people mainly in the technical aspects: engineers, diploma
holders and workmen. In the workmen category, we look for those specialising in industrial training. As per the strategic plan for BHEL, we want to
be a Rs. 45,000 crore company by 2011-12. We need to recruit 20,000 people to achieve this.

Q. How has the HR function at BHEL changed over the years?
With the companys requirements changing and the workload increasing over the years, we have recently introduced ERP (Enterprise Resource
Planning) software by SAP across the system. This is a superb module to work on. Using this, we have been able to improve our HR processes by
collating data about all employees in a master file. This is helping us in succession planning and career planning for the workforce. BHEL has more
than 100 project sites across the country, and as soon as a demand for internal promotion or posting comes up, we are able to find the right
employee/s in much lesser time and cost than ever before. Such systems were not part of HR earlier, but they have improved efficiency of the
function manifold.

We have also brought in the People Capability Maturity Model (PCMM) approach that helps to review people processes on a continuous basis, in an
endeavour to make them best-in-class. While all such initiatives are being done in-house at present, we are planning to seek expertise from
external consultants in the future.

Q. What is your overall outlook for the Indian HR arena?
I think HR professionals need to work on increasing productivity of the workforce as a whole. As a result of the meltdown, not many people want to
leave their jobs. Nonetheless, the attrition rate at the executive cadre in BHEL is very low as compared to the industry (around 3 to 4 percent). I
feel we have been able to implement the right kind of policies to retain employees.

Also, there is expected to be major growth in the infrastructure sector, and especially the power industry. Since that is our core business, we will
continue to do well, despite the slowdown. Most of our orders are from the government and this keeps operations quite stable.