Aravind Suitings is a global textile company based in India. The company has presence in more than 35 countries. It has succeeded in getting a decent share in an increasingly competitive global market. It has employed more than 5,800 employees. This company always views its employees as its strength and as the secret of its success. It has got several HR practices oriented towards employee satisfaction and motivation. The uniqueness of the HR practices of this company are: (i) its accent on extensive training programme for its employees during their probationary period of two years; and (ii) its compensation packages, which are excellent for the industry. The HR department of the company is managed by Mr Ravi Varma, a postgraduate in human resource management.
However, the company has been plagued by quite a few HR-related problems in the recent past. One of them is the high rate of attrition witnessed by the company, especially among the employees promoted to the higher positions in the organization. Some other recently promoted employees were asking for reversals to their original positions. Apparently, the company was perplexed by the developments as the employees leaving the organization were indeed performing activities critical to the organization. The company took the matter seriously and was determined to identify its reason. It appointed a team of HR experts to look into the issue and suggest necessary remedial measures.
The team approached all the employees who were leaving the organization and conducted an exit interview to ascertain the reason for their quitting the firm. It also interviewed the employees who applied for reversals to their previous positions. Similarly, it interviewed all the existing employees in that cadre as on that date. Finally, it went a step ahead and contacted the employees who had already left the company in the recent past and elicited their views on the different aspects of employment and the reason for leaving.
Shockingly, almost all the employees spoke negatively about their job. They also informed the team about the presence of an anomaly in authority, responsibility and accountability. A number of them perceived a lack of fit between the level of authority and responsibility. They opined that the job carried too huge a responsibility but provided little authority for the job holder. They also revealed that the lack of demarcation of job authority of different employees often led to misunderstanding and quarrels with their subordinates. Several employees felt that the compensation package was not commensurate with the difficulty and accountability of the job. Based on its interviews with the present and former employees, the team of HR experts prepared a report and presented it to the top management. The report squarely blamed the job analysis report (that had been made earlier) and the resultant HR practices as responsible for the present situation. It held the job analysis report as poorly investigated and drafted. The HR manager was asked to respond to the report and present his own report about the situation. In his report, the HR manager cited the lack of cooperation of the employees for job analysis exercises as the reason for inaccuracies in the job analysis report. However, he strongly defended the methods and techniques adopted in the job analysis process.
Finally, the company decided to undertake a fresh job analysis for all the job titles and integrate the information with the HR practices by revising these practices thoroughly. An external HR consultancy agency with relevant expertise in job analysis was hired this time to prepare the job analysis report even though it charged a high fee.
Questions for Discussion
- How do you view the developments in Aravind Suitings from your perspective?
- Do you agree with the findings of the team of HR professionals regarding the recent spate in employee resignations and requests for reversal?
- What is your response to the report of the HR manager Mr Ravi Varma blaming employees for the defective job analysis report?
- Do you have any alternative suggestions for controlling attrition in Aravind Suitings?