The global economy is struggling, dealing and learning on a day-to-day basis, on how to combat the circumstances created by the novel Coronavirus. To be able to sail through, it would be wise to hit pause and reflect on the basics, rethink strategy, redesign employee experience, and implement what works best for your organization and your people as you navigate the ongoing change. Helping us reflect on these basics is Jacob Jacob, Group Chief Human Resources Officer at Columbia Asia Healthcare.

An HR professional with close to 25 years of HR experience across various international markets from India to Middle East and now SEA, Jacob is currently leading HR strategy, organizational change and performance management for Columbia Asia Healthcare, Malaysia. His core areas of expertise include performance management and development of reward systems (Including ESOP), career planning & development, competency mapping, change management, HR strategy, organizational design, and organizational restructuring & people transformation initiatives for enterprise growth.

In an exclusive conversation with People Matters, Jacob talks about designing customized employee experience for a multi-generational workforce, stabilizing performance management and overcoming roadblocks in change management.

Here are excerpts of the interview.

In your career spanning close to a quarter of a century, what has been the biggest learning experience? How did that impact your outlook as a leader?

I have been fortunate and lucky to have worked across various continents, geographies and industries spanning Middle East, Africa and across South East Asia. Understanding various cultures, how people work in various countries, their aspirations and what really makes them tick has been ongoing learning, and I have picked up various facets in managing a multicultural workforce. What stands out is that when you work across different regions, you cannot have one framework for people; it requires detailed customization, which requires you to go in depth into understanding people and their mindsets. You need to interact more with people across the organization and more importantly, ensure that they are connected to the organization by its culture and value systems. Organizational ethos is all about understanding people and getting them to connect with the organization and help build the enterprise. This is key in ensuring that people connect better with the organization.

Today, it's important to have diverse policies to cater to the contrasting expectations and differentiated segments of our workforce

How are you building the capabilities of the HR function in your organization? How do you see the role of HR changing in times to come?

The capabilities of HR are a direct determinant of the business and the growth of the organization. HR professionals in every organization must assess their strengths and opportunities from the standpoint of if I am doing enough to help build the organization and what areas I must improve my capacity to deliver better. Do I have a competitive advantage through what I am delivering on the people front? If not, where is the gap and how must I close it? This simple analysis is what is required to build capability.

The role of HR will see a change in the following dimensions:

• Rethinking HR value add and context with new HR delivery mechanisms 
• Ability to scale up with minimal effort and build the enterprise 
• Use of technology both for decision making and making lives simpler within the organization 
• Creating an inherent advantage for the organization with talent as the only differentiator 

What lens do you apply when you contemplate enforcing a large scale change in the organization? 

Large scale change has to be looked at in the context of:

• How will this change help grow the organization?
• Was there a lack of resources that delayed bringing in this change sooner?
• Will this change help derive a competitive advantage for the organization?

Once you have got answers to the above, the next step is making this change happen by communicating the need to key stakeholders, getting their buy-in and creating catalysts among them to make it happen. The key is keeping it simple and not complicating the change process. This can be done by not creating too many layers and processes to make the change happen. It is equally important to review what has been put in place and understand whether it is working or not working, and accordingly making any necessary changes to ensure effectiveness.

The workforce today is multi-generational with significantly contrasting expectations from their employers. What is your approach to employee experience with such divergent demands?

Today’s workforce is extremely demanding. The key is to have diverse policies to cater to the contrasting expectations and differentiated segments of our workforce. If we can create some degree of customization, it will have a huge impact. More importantly, we need to focus on the key products and services we provide as offerings to our associates. Are the products and services competitive enough to provide a meaningful experience to all those who work for us? Is HR working as an innovative center of excellence and are we ahead of the curve and not only doing what someone else is doing but thinking through in creating new products and services? Today’s employee demands are all about the experience that we provide to them. Is our value proposition competitive and better than the choices they have in the market is what we need to think about.

Performance management has undergone multiple changes from mere annual feedback and appraisal to biannual conversations to quarterly, monthly and now real-time feedback to monitor and improve performance. What can HR professionals do to bring in stability in the changing functionalities of performance management?

It is important to understand that performance management is certainly not a science, but an art. One must look at managing performance in the context of what is important for our organization and how it helps employees in performing their roles better. Processes designed around the initiative must be simple. The key element here is to ensure that employees receive feedback in real time and not wait for the year-end or bi-annual feedback. Basically the employee would like to know how he/she is faring in real-time and rewards must be a combination of past performance plus potential. Managers must be given the freedom to decide what is best for their teams and one cannot be prescriptive. The HR function cannot be the custodian and owner of the process, instead, they must facilitate this shift to the line departments and managers to take ownership of their teams and have the freedom to decide what is best. On an organizational level, managers must be accountable and should take ownership for their teams. By being collectively responsible for enterprise growth, they can deliver on their commitment together as a team. This approach is more holistic, simpler, and less bureaucratic.

One must look at managing performance in the context of what is important for his organization and how it helps employees in performing their roles better

With agile practices and design thinking being among the key pillars of the future of work, what challenges do you face in conceptualizing and implementing learning and development initiatives? What steps are you taking to overcome these roadblocks?

Most employees/associates look at their organizations as playing an important role for upskilling and improving their capability to deliver better. Integrated learning is the key focus area today. Gone are the days of sending employees for internal/external training. Employees like to look at learning in their own time, space, and convenience. E-learning and gaming initiatives on learning are preferred approaches to L&D today. Employees today are looking at ways and means to keep learning simple, at the same time look for avenues to learn on their device, supported by classroom sessions where required. Therefore, design thinking in L&D Initiatives must focus on simpler innovative methods by which employees can learn a new skill. The focus must be on improving one’s skill set rather than the certification/qualification that one gets through such initiatives.

As a healthcare organization that employs a varied workforce across various countries, our approach is based on the following:

• Customizing learning by geography/location
• Do it in your own time
• Do it on your device &
• Skill-based approach to internal career progression

With leaders across the globe focused on addressing digital transformation, talent scarcity, and upskilling, what do you think is the need of the hour?

The most important aspect is to ask yourself the question:

Is the talent that we have today capable of upscaling our organization by 2X in the next two years - if not, what must we do?

The starting point is a realistic assessment of where we are on talent and what must we do to get the right talent in. Therefore, the most important element is “talent acquisition”. This has to be well thought through. Only if you have the required skill sets, can you take the organization forward? Upskilling and digital transformation can only happen if your talent insights are credible.

Upskilling and digital transformation can only happen if your talent insights are credible

What are you most looking forward to in 2020?

The year 2020 will be a year of consolidation where we’ll see a lot of movers and shakers in the people space. This will mean organizations competing fiercely in the marketplace for talent and placing adequate importance in retaining key talent. I personally look forward to our growth story and the ability to nurture, sustain and attract the best of talent through improvisation of our entire employee experience process and story.