A webinar conducted on the evening of 30th October 2020. The HR club of ISBR – Convergence Namma HR Club – which was coordinated by Prof. Veena Shenoy, the head of the HR Club; with, program coordinators Doel Bhattacharya, Gargi Desai, Anirban Dasgupta, Prachet Kulkarni, Ritom Das, and Riya Ganguly. The director of ISBR Business School – Dr. Y Lakshmana Kumar, Head of the HR Department – Prof.Savitri Jayant; Program Manager of ISBR – Prof. Lanna Lalithan graced as guests for the evening. Students of the PGDM batch 2020-22: Anjali Atipamula, Anshita Sharma, Kalam Harini, Khazi Mohammed Owais, Pooja Tummala & Sucheta Manvikar were the key speakers of the evening. They addressed the vast ongoing transformation in the world of HR The session started with an introduction and an insightful speech of Dr. Lakshman Director, ISBR Business School. The first speaker for the evening was Meghana Kalpala, whose interests lie in art and photography, the creative soul went onto speak about introverts and defined how one tackles the hurdles faced by an introvert and also defined how one overcomes these issues and juggles during this process and how it is vital in an organization & individual development. The next speaker was someone who loves to explore, is adventurous, interested in learning new languages, an outgoing and an independent personality, Anjali Atipamula. She explained how the position of different sets of people at a workplace has changed substantially, how such loopholes still exist in the 21st century, and what kind of measures one can take into consideration by transparent hiring of the HR managers & it should be done on basis of skills and talent, not on the background. It is tough but quite possible by ensuring that everyone knows the concept of the glass ceiling, vocal about requirements, conduct often training programs, also ensure that there is diversity in hiring.
A speaker who loves traveling, reading, interested in psychology and has a strong desire to pursue HR – Khazi Mohammed Owais, he gave some insights about the challenges faced by HR professional and how one can tackle these with the help of technology CHRO. It is responsible for corporate talent system; it is the keeper of culture and should maintain its health and provide feedback frequently like once in a month to Transform and upskill the HR team as they would know the flaws and could rectify them on time as Vision and planning play a key role. The following speaker runs a Ngo at such a young age, serves people, loves to connect with people Anshita Sharma. She threw some light on how the greatest wealth is health and providing these benefits results in better performance and increased productivity in the workplace, quote “productive work leads us to the way of benefits not only that but it also leads to a positive attitude and leads to critical thinking, reduces pressure it in order change the total atmosphere of the organization.”
The next speaker likes mountaineering and hiking and is semi-qualified chartered accountant, Pooja Tummala; she presented so well about the wonders made by AI and Automation in the field of HR like for hiring, for the quality work and how it helps in eliminating the biasedness, reducing manpower, helps in automation, etc. The next speaker was an individual who is passionate about visiting new cities and exploring cultures across the globe, also loves singing and reading – Sucheta Manvikar. She gave an excellent insight on how one could identify workplace bullying & tackle it. Bullying is the use of force, threat, and behavior that is unacceptable under any circumstance, especially in a place with working professionals. As per Harvard Business Review, 7/10 employees have faced Workplace bullying at some point in their career. Bullying is based on various reasons of behavior, which could be due to caste, creed, gender, and personality differences.
Cases of cyberbullying have also raised to 37% since lockdown due to COVID-19. Conquering the situation by various measures like observing, making note of such actions and being responsible enough to report to the immediate authority, taking a stand, etc. are some of those measures. The last speaker for the day – Kalam Harini, someone who loves dancing, yoga, traveling, and exploring new places; She gave us a profound perspective about the biasness that takes place in the workplace. Further, she added on by connecting as to how in her life she went through a similar experience and how such situations can be tackled in various ways by establishing objective criteria, defining “culture fit,” and accountability of the same. Limiting referral hiring could also be a step towards it, restructuring the interviews with more skills-based questions. She ended her part with a powerful statement, “It starts from separating performance from potential and personality to skill sets.” At the end of the session, Q & A session took place where doubts were cleared by the key speakers.
The main purpose of this webinar was to expand the horizon on the perspective that people carry so that they can understand the situation with reference to the changing dynamics of the society and know how they can overcome it in different possible ways instead of just facing these problems and letting it go. It’s important to take that one step ahead to make a change.