Grooming Tips For Men In The Work Environment

The work culture of the corporate world has been very dynamic in recent times. Hence the employment terms and conditions have changed drastically in recent times. Right from the time of interview, the first impression scores the points that are essential for the final selection of an individual. While there has been a lot talked out the resumes and profiles, communication, way of presentation in terms of appearance and grooming has also become an important criteria of selection. Be it a recruitment consultancy or a company, all have talked about necessity of grooming that creates an impression which is carried on to the evaluation phase. However, while women grooming has been quite in talks, not much have been spoken about the men grooming tips and techniques. Some men will say that it is not very usual affair but the times are changing pretty fast and this factor has been applicable for male candidates as well. So we list down certain essential tips for men’s grooming range.

• First and foremost, you need to take this thought process out of your mind that being a man means just wearing a shirt and trousers and going to work. Taking care of yourself has nothing to do with gender and now days that trend is pretty evident. So even before we go in to the grooming tips the basic pointers need to be addressed first hand. Keeping yourself clean is essential. Taking bath using preferred soaps and lotions is essential not only for presentation, but it keep you fresh all throughout the day.
• The second pointer that requires a serious attention is the hair and facial frizz. Choose a hairstyle that suits your facial structure and enhances your features. Same goes for the facial hair. If at all confused take professional help. It is better to keep away from over top hair styles that take the attention away from your performance. If at all you feel to have something wild, better to stick to temporary options rather than permanent dying or cuts.
• Next in line is the choice of clothes. Now days there are most companies who have reformed their policy towards business casuals’ rather strict formals. This opens up a huge option door for the choice of clothes in terms of semi casual shirts and trousers or jeans. But that does not essentially mean that you can go to your workplace wearing ripped jeans, over the top T-shirts and slippers. Keep your style toned down and choose colour options in pastel shades.
• Keep your shoes and socks in line with the trousers. You can either go for leather ones or if you feel like carrying a casual yet sophisticated look, the you can also opt for basic canvas shoes in single colour which goes well with business casuals.

Lastly, be careful with the accessories you carry. Be it a backpack, tie or pen. You need to keep in mind that just carrying an eccentric bag does not give out good impression. Be careful with the style and colour that is more formal.

Hand On Guide For An Interviewer

There has been a lot of discussions regarding interview preparations and grooming lessons for candidates. But there is another part of the story that comprises of the interviewer. Many recruitment agencies have now recognized the need to prepare the interviewers for the recruitment process as well. This is essential as it directly impacts the quality of recruitment and workforce creation and management in the longer run. While we talk about the preparation at the candidate end, a similar approach is also required at the employer end as well.

Below are certain measures to be taken for the process.

• First and foremost thumb rule for interviews is that, number of candidates should not be restricted. We all know that saying goes practice makes a man perfect. In this case, it is very true. When there is requirement for a single position, it is better to shortlist at least 10 to 12 candidates for the same and conduct the process. This increases the quality of the process and at the same time chances of finding the best of the lot. It helps in increasing the network channel and improves communication process for the interviewer as well.
• It is essential to treat the candidate like a client. The interviewer needs to sell the position at a desired package and along with other related pointers so as to make the offer lucrative. One needs to keep in mind that there is always a shortage of required skills and talent. So when a potential employee is located, the position needs to be sealed. In many cases, it has been observed that such candidates have multiple offers at hand and the interviewer needs to make his offer more attractive.
• Technical aspects and professional knowledge can be judged through evaluation tests and online tools. But in order to fit in to a company, the individual should be behaviourally compatible with the work culture. He or she should be able to contribute to the team culture and work towards learning initiative for productivity. Hence professional behavioural pattern, problem solving abilities and contribution to the team through ideas are essential. These can be evaluated by responses received from demo scenarios put forward in front of the candidate.
• The initial introduction with the candidate should include a brief description about the company, outline of the services, job role description, the service segment under which the specific job role will fall and interview process details . This helps the candidate to get a clear picture of the entire scenario and proceed accordingly which is a positive boost to the entire process.

Lastly there are certain minute details that need to be followed before, during and after the interview. Reviewing the resume before the process is essential. Sticking to the professionally related areas during discussion is crucial. Following up with the candidate using emails or phone call is important. It helps in keeping the prospect fresh in the candidate’s mind while he or she delegates on the employment opportunity.

Role Of HR Consultancy During Termination And Outplacement

Termination of services for an employee is a tricky situation in the corporate structure. It is the end of employment of an individual with a particular organization which can be of two types. One is known as voluntary termination which takes place when an employee resigns voluntarily or retires after specific employment terms. It might also occur when an individual goes for voluntary retirement. The second termination type is involuntary. This has two aspects to it. The termination may occur due to poor performance of the employee or breaking of work culture regulation as well as ethics. There is another scenario where a company terminates a certain section of employees as a part of business strategy. It might occur due to loss in revenue or change in market or industry conditions. This is where an HR consultancy steps in to the picture and is often asked for outplacement services. The work of the consultancy is mainly divided in to three major phases.

• The first or initial phase is the pre termination stage. In this the planning of the entire process is performed along with the outplacement strategy to be taken up.
• The next stage is the actual termination phase where the formal communication of the termination is given out to the employees which is followed by an initial support and guidance to the terminated employees.
•  The post termination stage is divided in to two parts. One deals with the existing employees in order to control any unwanted panic wave that might disrupt the productivity of the system. The other part consists of guiding the terminated employees through career orientation programs and stress management sessions. This is helpful in minimizing the tension and stressful environment within the organization.

The role of HR consultancy under the outplacement service is as follows.

• The initial support provided to the terminated employees is suggestions related to resume build up which helps in finding other employment opportunities with higher effectiveness and within a short span of time.
• It helps in planning the career development agenda in an organized manner.
• Elaborate career guidance is provided in terms of career objectives, opportunities available, market conditions, employment demand areas and much more.
• The HR consultancy helps the individuals with the preparation for interview process that involves grooming lessons, tips, objectives and presentations.
• Another important aspect of this service is network development. It helps in channelizing the profiles in the right direction for assured re-employment.
• Effective job search is facilitated by the consultancy so that profiles end up with the right positions and companies where it will conclude in proper recruitment.
• The consultancy helps with the assortment and management of documentation that are required for the selection process and final recruitment.
• Workshops are organized in order to assist the terminated employees to deal with the transition phase.

Lastly, legal compliance is thorough assessed and required measures are taken in order to minimize the risk.

Information Technology Becoming an Evitable Part of Business Processes

Innovation is the new face of corporate environment in current times. Technology is influencing every bit of business processes and adding to the quality and value of the same. Not only in terms of production and execution, technology has been used for finance management, workforce management, customer engagement and so on. It has proven to be effective across various business functionalities and segments across industry domains. Among all, Information technology has bagged major limelight in current years. Some of the business segments wherein IT is being used effectively are as follows.

• The first and most important segment of business that determines the path of growth and future expansion is the decision making. IT helps in making accurate decisions at a steady pace. Most organizations undergo a thorough market research process in order to take up a strategic decision. This process is characterized by online surveys, forums, blogs, group discussions and much more. Some of the popular tools which are used for this approach are Big data, Google Analytics and Microsoft CRM Dynamics. These tools are utilized for analyzing real time responses and well as increasing the accuracy of the decision by removing human errors.
• Marketing forms a significant channel of business growth. It involves many sub processes such as maintaining public relations, advertising, promotion and sales which contribute towards revenue generation and business growth. In this regard, digital marketing has gained tremendous popularity in the past couple of years inspired by IT. Concepts such as search engine optimization or SEO, Pay per click, social media marketing and much more have been introduced due to IT support. Web market is an important source of business management in recent times which has been effectively addressed through IT.
• Customer support and satisfaction plays a key role in the business development and revenue generation in the long run. An effective customer support process can be handled effectively though IT technologies in a steady and organized manner. Analyzing the consumer behaviour towards a certain product or service, satisfaction levels, needs and such like can be performed through effective IT tools. These tool both online and offline have helped businesses to get in touch with the customers directly and know their point of view. It also creates a brand image that lasts for a longer duration which is helpful in retaining a loyal consumer base.
• Resource management is one of important aspects of any business. Manual maintenance of resources for large organization becomes a tedious task and it also creates chances for human error. Cloud based Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) solutions have been popularly adopted by all large scale organizations in this front. It facilitates virtual monitoring of resources in an effective manner promoting a flexible work culture which is fast and effective at the same time.

Therefore, it is quite evident that IT is the frontier of business development in recent years. This has also increased the importance of IT staffing solutions provided by many recruitment firms.

Role of Human Resource in Business and Strategic Planning

Traditionally human resource segment was associated with the recruitment process and on boarding of candidates in to a company. The segment functionalities initiated with searching appropriate talents and conducting the selection process in an organized manner. But the corporate environment has undergone many changes in recent years and this has influenced the functioning model of HR segment in a major way. Now the role of HR has expanded even to business and strategic planning in order to secure growth in coming years along with effective crisis management. Previously companies were sceptical about investment in this segment as it was not a direct profit yielding business wing. But that thinking has faded away with recent corporate trends. The following pointers show the parallel connection of HR with business processes and planning.

• Executive support is the most basic requirement of a company when it plans to implement a certain strategy within the work environment or plans an organizational change. In order to understand the requirement type of executive support, HR needs to be addressed in the business planning phase. The segment can contribute by addressing the current scenario of talent availability in relation to business development which can be used for strategic and business planning.
• Building up a leadership line is crucial and difficult at the same time. This is especially true in current corporate situation where the baby boomers or generation x are nearing their retirement age. Building up the future leadership team requires insight and understanding of the current business statistics and market conditions along with future objectives. HR plays a significant role in building up the business strategies by hiring future leaders in accordance with the business objectives.
• Sometimes, the businesses go through a transition phase due to industry trends or market conditions. This transition is majorly undertaken and conducted by the resources within the organization. But the planning, development and execution of this transition is designed and formulated by the HR in order to overcome any unwanted conflicts and issues with the system or during the development processes.
• Companies that function at multiple locations have to undergo global placements in order to support the hiring requirements. Global placement process requires an in-depth research regarding the talent availability in relation to market conditions, various legislative frameworks across markets, labour laws and much more. This function and its related activities are handled by the HR segment that is influential in strategic planning.
• Training and development is one of crucial factors that contribute towards organizational development. It helps in increasing the knowledge base of the employees which results in higher productivity giving the brand a competitive edge. The identification of knowledge gap, present knowledge base and training programs is necessary for business planning that is performed by HR.

Therefore, the correlation of business and strategic planning with the human resource management is quite evident in recent times. It needs to be addressed with similar importance for long term growth and expansion.

Searching Talent At The Time of Crisis

Staffing solutions have become critical in recent times. The economic rundowns, new criteria for employment, changing technologies, finding right talent and such like have affected the recruitment process and talent pool of companies to a great extent. While finding the right set of candidates has become challenging, there are certain measures which can be useful towards hiring at the time of crisis.

• Often it has been observed that organizations hire or rather look for talent only when they have an opening. This means the company is already in crisis when it starts looking for recruits. This approach affects the company objectives in the long run. So, it is better to start off early. Regular analysis needs to be performed regarding the future talent needs of the company. The talent pool should be evaluated at regular intervals and forecasting regarding future talent needs is crucial.
• It is essential to specify the demands of the job role along with the skill set requirement. The hiring manager should identify the team in which the recruit will work and consider the company culture impact on the job role in order to find the best match.
• Talent pool development is one of the fundamental measures to handle recruitment crisis. The sourcing of the talent pool should be channelized among employees, social media platforms, network channels and such like for a compressive database of candidates. Even the candidate peers can be asked for nominations.
• For a successful recruitment process, an organization requires a set of well trained and high caliber interviewers who can successfully analyze candidate’s knowledge base along with professional behavioral pattern, problem solving abilities and soft skills. Reference checks can be effective towards past experience verification and it is better to involve the top stakeholders in the assessment process.
• Recruitment process goes both ways towards impression creation from the employers as well as candidate end. So it is better to keep the door open for questions in order to perk up the candidate interest. It is also essential to involve technicians and hiring managers along with HR professional to close the deal. In case of higher positions, C level employees should be involved in the process.
• Integration of the fresh recruit within the system should be performed with systematic on boarding of the candidate and proper support towards working systems to be provided by the team members and managers.

While these measures can assist towards effective recruitment even before the crisis rises, there are certain things which should be off limits.

• Going for the recruitment at the nick of time. When a company is desperate to hire, that’s when the worst decisions are taken. No one wants to end up with a bad recruit. So, refraining from hurried recruitment is a best approach,
• Generic competency models should be avoided at the time of recruitment.
• Ad hoc approach towards talent search results in a disorganized process.

Lastly, delaying selection for too much perfect match or settling for a candidate at first instance, both may result in crisis in after years.

Millennial - The Driving Force Towards Altering Workforce Demographics

The millennial generation is the new face of workforce demographics in current corporate structure. The people belonging to this generation have a different outlook towards employment than generation x or the baby boomers. While baby boomers were more in to organizational structure and used to put in long hours of work, millennial generation are skilled and technologically inclined. They are confident in performance and have the ability to multi task with efficiency. They prefer working in teams and seek challenging tasks in their employment. They have a tendency to achieve something much higher in career path yet give importance to work life balance. They are set to take over the reins from baby boomers who will be retiring in the coming years. The four most important characteristics that this generation looks forward in organizational structure are as follows.

• Digitization is one of the primary factors which drive the interest towards an employment opportunity for millennial. The technological innovations for carrying out several organizational processes are very common now days. This helps in effective and error free management of such processes which attracts this generation. Also it influences the working style by removing the restriction to work at office desk always.
• Transparent flow of communication and information from time to time along with open forums for discussion and feedback is greatly sought after by millennial. They think that organizations with clear and constant flow of information tend to make smarter strategic decisions and achieve growth in coming years.
• Flexibility is a key element of employment for this generation. As stated earlier, work life balance is important for them. Flexibility includes variable work timings and ability to work at different locations are to name a few. It also depicts the working environment demographics of the company. The fluid organizations better server customers and are advanced in strategic planning and execution.
• Time efficiency matters the most for millennial. Since they have access to huge information and resources within a quick span of time, they need similar processes within the organization. The streamlined processes for back end jobs with technology touch are sought after by them.

So, it is essential for the companies and recruitment agencies to follow certain processes to manage millennial.

• It is essential to have a structure in place for team and leadership management. Daily tasks require end of day updates. Similarly weekly and monthly sessions regarding assignment development and knowledge transfer sessions are important to encourage millennial.
• Providing required leadership and guidance at regular intervals during the course of employment is crucial to keep this generation stay motivated towards work.
• Since, this generation believes in team work, so it is better to encourage interaction of this generation within teams to channelize the team work spirit for better productivity.

There should be a well structured system for sharing thoughts and feedback regarding the work and its related affairs. Since millennial generation seek recognition for their work, appreciations and reward systems are essential in this regard.