Do not shuffle an employee into wrong job because they are in suitable Payroll

Is it correct to shuffle employees into wrong job just because they are in suitable Payroll?

An Organization growth depends on their employees and their performance. It is a very huge responsibility to place a proven performers where they are needed.
Some organizations have the strategy of internal recruitment where the employees in the Organization are shuffled and promoted based on their skills.

However, Is it correct to shuffle the employees into wrong job just because they are available and are in suitable role...
I don't think it is the right key to run the organization without a strong and inefficient team, It is actually harmful when the individual is know to the team and operating in an entirely different role.

It is better we have to hire them instead of adjusting with somebody else internally from different department.

It happens sometimes in Organizations that they pick up existing employees on bench or some one out of recommendations in a vacancy that doesn't suit their skills just because they are available and it is convenient for them which doesn't work always.

Generally, layman need more time to learn, understand and analyze new technology even after effective training sessions which is also a huge expense for Organization. After all the practice and efforts if it still doesn't work out then it results in the poor performance of the employees which might lead to downfall of the Organization.

Solution to avoid shuffling wrong person into an available job just because he is in suitable payroll is to take time and hire a candidate who has proven skills to that job.

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Solution for Case Study:

Explanation given by Mr.Peter was that he explained Jill about the difference between Jack's designation and Jill's designation and that is the difference between Jack's nature of work and Jill's nature of work.

He explained Jill that Jack's nature of work is to interact with people always and move around increasing her contacts as her designation demands it because she is into Human Resource Management.
people into HR have to maintain contacts and always move around identifying the difficulties employees are facing and solve them to make them comfortable in the Organization.

In the same process she must have interacted with the security guard and that is why the security guard knows her well and so she is famous among employees and people around.

In board meetings her points are well valid because the points she raises in the meeting must be in consideration with employees issues and that is why they are notes and valued properly.

Whereas Jill's nature of work demands him to keep things private and confidential and also to avoid much interaction with people because he is into Finance department that is why less people identify him and in board meetings he must have approached only once or twice with his points and not tried further to make them important, that is why his points are not well observed or considered.

With this explanation Jill understands the whole concept and gets satisfied and decides not to resign the Organization.
After the meeting with his Chairman Mr.Peter he runs back to meet Jack apologizes and speaks to her normally as before and all the issues in his mind were solved and he was happy with the way he was treated and thereafter continued his work and also friendship with Jack as usual.

In this way Chairman Mr.Peter succeeded in retaining one of his best employees from leaving the Organization.

HR - Case Study and Solutions.

Case Studies plays a prominent role in Management education especially in subjects like Human Resource Management, People Management,Personnel Management.
Case studies helps management people after entering into their professional life to solve real time issues among employees.
Here is one such live case study mention below which allows us to think practically and sharp our brains.

Case Study:


Jack and Jill are two persons who are best friends from childhood, they were friends from college days and continued their friendship from as they go paced in the same Organization. Jack was placed into Human Resource department and Jill was placed into Finance Department as Key Finance Executive.
Both are with same grade,position and on same level.
 Jack has good nature and helps everybody who needed help around her, Jill also has good nature, he has a bit ego but he helps persons only who approached him for help personally.
Both were happy with their work life for some days,but Jack suddenly observes some difference in Jill's behavior. She feels he started taunting her that she is famous in the Organization among all employees but he is not.
He doesn't speak to Jack properly anymore as before. Jack also keeps quiet observing his behavior.
One day suddenly Jill resigns to the company. on seeing his resignation his chairman Mr. Peter gets shocked, he calls Jack and discusses about Jill's resignation as they both are close to each other, Jack gets shocked and explains her chairman about Jill's behavior with her, after listening to Jack her chairman asks her to relax as he would handle the situation as he doesn't want to loose both employees.
One fine day his chairman Mr.Peterson takes Jill to his office canteen and tries to discuss with him about his resignation,after a lot of effort Jill opens up about his resignation and he expresses that 
he is not being honored,identified or famous as his friend Jack being on same grade, level and position.
Jill explains Mr.peter some cases which he had experienced they are:

1. Once when he was entering the office campus along with Jack he was wished well and treated well but the other day when he was entering the office campus alone he was not even identified or wished.
2. In board meetings his points are not valid by the board members as much as Jack's points are valid.
3. He is not as famous or identified when he is alone but he is treated well when he was with Jack.
Due to all these points he got disappointed and does not want to continue in such partial environment anymore and that is the reason for his resignation.

After listening to all this reasoning his chairman Mr.Peter thought that this case can be handled easily and his resignation can be managed to call off.
Mr.Peter explained him why there is so much of difference in others behavior towards both of them.
after keenly listening to Mr.Peter, Jill got satisfied and all his allegations towards Jack disappeared.
He decided not to resign the Organization and went to Jack and spoke to her normally as before.

What do you think was the explanation given by Mr.Peter to Jill, that changed the thinking towards Jack and also to take back his resignation. 



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Statutory Compliance:

Indirect tax:
This tax is not collected directly from the persons it is collected indirectly through goods and services through a person who acts as intermediary by selling the goods and services.
Examples of Income tax are Value Added Tax(VAT),Service tax,Sales tax etc.
Recently valid tax that is prevailing all over is GST (Goods and Services tax).

GST the largest reform in India that is established since 25 years i.e. it is available since the market opened up.This tax is applicable only when the Consumption takes place.It is levied on the value added goods and services at each stage of consumption in the supply chain.
GST payable on the procurement of goods and services can be set off against the GST payable on the supply of goods and services, the merchant will pay the applicable GST rate but can claim it back through the tax credit mechanism.

Service Tax:
Service tax is not implied on the companies that provide goods and services but it is imposed on the companies that provide services to the products .It is collected every month or once in every quarter based on the services provided.For companies service tax is applicable as soon as the invoice is raised irrespective of the customer's bill payment however if it is an individual's establishment then the service tax is applicable only if the bill payments are done.
for those who are on hotels category service tax is combination of food,waiter's service and the usage of premises so it is difficult to pin point the service tax therefore government has issues 40% of service tax on the bill.

Sales Tax:
Sales tax is levied on the sale of products.Sales tax is the tax levied on the products that are produced in India or imported and tax is also laid on the services rendered.Sales tax is levied on the person who sells(seller) and seller imposes the same tax on the buyer i.e. customer. If the product is reselled again then tax cannot be levied on it further.
Every seller has his own sales tax on the products and there are some other taxes that similar to sales tax like turnover tax,purchase tax,transaction tax etc. that is why Sales tax acts as largest revenue generators for various state governments.

Value Added Tax: 
VAT is not levied on end products or commodities it is levied in different stages of the supply chain of the product starting from 1st to last stage i.e. from manufacture of the product, dealership, distribution to the end user.
The vat is decided by the particular state itself.VAT is divided into certain schedules or stages of the product for suppose if a product is divided into three stages then at the first stage it is 1% at the second stage it is 5% and so on.If  VAT is not divided into stages then the standard tax is 15%.
Statutory Compliance:

Firstly let's understand about the Statutory Compliance!!

These are the compliance that are designed by various statutory authorities which are meant to be religiously followed by an organization/s registered under the companies act in a systematic way by which they(govt.) gets taxes /revenue. 

Statutory means "Laws and Regulations" Compliance means "adhere to" or "Obey". There are many such statutory requirements which an organization must adhere to. 

Some of those rules and regulations that are primarily important are Income Tax,Value Added Tax,Partnership tax, PF and ESIC.




let us know about what does Salary mean:
The word ‘salary’ originates from the Latin word 'salarium'. It was the quota of salt given to Roman soldiers in addition to their pay.Salary is a remuneration given to a person periodically for rendering his services  to an Organization based on the contract he is bounded with.Person who takes the service and pays is called an Employer and person who renders services and takes salary is called Employee, both are bounded with many rules and regulations.
Salary can be termed into multiple words based on the period of time the person is getting paid.
For example if a person is getting paid on daily basis it is called daily wage.

Some of such terms are Commission,Pension,Annuity,Gratuity etc.
It is an indicator of your position, growth and success in the company and will, in many cases, determine the course of your career.
There are three types of salaries and they are Gross Salary and Net salary.

Net Salary:
India follows one of the highest ‘salary confiscation’ models in the world, i.e, labor laws in India require the highest salary deductions in the world for low wage employees. In the current cost-to-company model followed in India, informal employees can take home their entire salary as opposed to employees in the organised sector who “lose” a part of their earnings to various schemes such as Employees Pension Scheme, Employees State Insurance (ESI), Provident Fund, Professional Tax and gratuity.
Net salary is the take home salary by the employee after all the deductions of Statutory Compliance ex. tax, PF,ESIC.

Gross Salary:
It is total salary before deductions i.e. before Statutory Compliance is deducted.

CTC(Cost to Company):
Cost to Company is the amount that an employer will spend on an employee in a particular year.

The difference between all these three components is:
CTC is the total amount spent on the employee by the employer, i.e. It includes Employer's contribution along with employee's components.
Gross Salary is the amount of salary received before any deductions are made.
Net Salary: Salary received by the employee after the deductions of Statutory Compliance

CTC or cost to company = Gross Salary+PF+ESIC+Leave Pay+Gratuity. Gross salary includes both taxable and nontaxable income. It is, therefore, the sum of components prior to deductions.
 Gross salary may include the following:-
  • ·       Basic Salary
    ·       Dearness Allowance
    ·       House Rent Allowance
    ·       Conveyance Allowance
    ·       Medical Reimbursement Allowance
    ·       City Compensatory Allowance
    ·       Performance Incentives
    ·       Leave Travel Allowance
    ·       Food Allowance

    Any Other Allowance depending upon the company Certain deductions are made from your salary as listed below:

    ·       Employee PF Contribution of 12%
    ·       Employee ESIC Contribution
    ·       Professional Tax (state-specific)
    ·       Income Tax

When the aforementioned deductions are made from the Gross Salary, the remaining amount is known as Net Salary. It is the take home salary of the employee.

Net Salary = Basic + Additions (bonuses, allowances) – Deductions.
What is TDS?
TDS: Tax deducted at source which is applicable for businesses and employees, HR Department or Finance department in the Organization holds responsibility of collecting a percentage of TDS from employees and sent to central government periodically.taxes are generally levied  on the citizens to generate income for the projects undertaken that helps in boosting the economy of the country.
The types of payments includes salary,rent,fees,interest,commission etc.

There are two types of Taxes:

Direct tax 
Indirect tax
But, besides these two conventional taxes, there are also other taxes that have been brought into effect by the Central Government to serve a particular agenda. ‘Other taxes’ are levied on both direct and indirect taxes such as the recently introduced Swachh Bharat Cess tax, Krishi Kalyan Cess tax, and infrastructure Cess tax among others.

Direct tax:

Direct tax, as stated earlier, are taxes that are paid directly by you. These taxes are levied directly on an entity or an individual and cannot be transferred onto anyone else. One of the bodies that overlooks these direct taxes is the Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) which is a part of the Department of Revenue. It has, to help it with its duties, the support of various acts that govern various aspects of direct taxes.
some of the direct taxes are Income tax,Wealth tax,

New tax slabs for FY 2017-18 are
Slots 
Percentage

Income up toRs.2,50,000*                                                  
No Tax
Income from Rs. 2,50,000 – Rs. 5,00,000
           5%
Income from Rs. 5,00,000 – 10,00,000    
20%
Income more than Rs. 10,00,000
30%
Surcharge: 10% of income tax, where total income between Rs. 50 lakhs and Rs.1 crore. 15% of income tax, where total income exceeds Rs. 1 crore.
Cess: 3% on total of income tax + surcharge.
* Income up to Rs. 2,50,000 is exempt from tax if you are less than 60 years old.






Performance Appraisal:                                
Performance appraisal is done to evaluate the performance of the employees and also helps in the understanding the abilities of a person for the further growth of the employees.
Performance appraisal is done in systematic ways using following steps:


  • Supervisor measures the pay of the employees with the targets and plans for betterment of the pay scale.
  • Supervisor measures the key terms that are responsible for the performance of the employees.
  • Employers also guide the employees regarding their performance that helps them in growth of their career.

Objectives of Performance Appraisal:
·      To maintain records of every employee in order to decide their compensation packages.
·      To identify the strengths and weakness of the employee to place the correct person in correct job.
·      To maintain, present and improve the potential of a person which leads to their career growth.
·      To evaluate the performance of the individual employees periodically.
·      It is a basis to influence the work habits of an employee.
·      It helps to review or retain the promotional and training programs to the employees.

Advantages of Performance Appraisal:
Performance appraisal is believed to be an investment for the company and the advantages are:
·      Promotions: Performance Appraisal helps to evaluate the performance of the employees and conduct promotional programs or training programs for the employees who are on average performance.
Employees who are not able to improve even after training can be demoted or dismissed from the services.
·      Compensation: Performance appraisal helps in deciding the compensation packages of the employees and rating depends on merit ranking of their performance. Compensation packages includes salaries, bonus, allowances, extra benefits, the compensation should depend on merits of performance rather than seniority.

Employees Development:
·      Performance appraisal helps to frame training programs. It helps to analyze the strengths and weakness of the employees so that new jobs and designations can be designed for the promotion of employees.

·      Selection method:
As per the performance appraisal results one can determine and improve the selection methods of the employees. Improvements that helps for the betterment of selection procedure are made with the help of performance appraisal.

·      Communication:
Communication is important between the employee and employer in an Organization.
It helps the employers to accept the skills and weakness of the employees.
It creates trust to the employees on the employers.
It boosts the spirit of work and morale of the employees to perform better than the present.

The above factors help in effective communication in the organization.

·      Motivation:
Whenever an employee is evaluated on his performance using performance appraisals and given the worth compensation benefits like bonus, incentives etc. that is the greatest motivation to the employees to perform better than the present.

Performance appraisal Tools and Techniques: 


1.    Ranking
2.    Paired Comparison
3.    Forced Distribution
4.    Confidential Report
5.    Essay Evaluation
6.    Critical Incident
7.    Checklists
8.    Graphic Rating Scale
9.    BARS
10. Forced Choice Method
11. MBO
12. Field Review Technique
13. Performance Test
Ranking:
·      Ranking is rating an employee against his competitor on overall performance. Comparison of one employee against another is done under same work group to know the better performance. The position of an employee is done in terms of numerical rank.
Ranking is done according to their performance levels.
It is easier to rank the best performance employee and worst performance employee.    

Limitations of Ranking Method:
·      The “whole man” is compared with another “whole man” in this method. In practice, it is very difficult to compare individuals possessing various individual traits.
·      This method speaks only of the position where an employee stands in his group. It does not test anything about how much better or how much worse an employee is when compared to another employee.
·      When a large number of employees are working, ranking of individuals become a difficult issue.
·      There is no systematic procedure for ranking individuals in the organization. The ranking system does not eliminate the possibility of snap judgements.
Forced Distribution method

·      This is a ranking technique where raters are required to allocate a certain percentage of rates to certain categories like average, below average, excellent or percentiles (e.g.: top 10 percent, bottom 20 percent etc.). Both the number of categories and percentage of employees to be allotted to each category are a function of performance appraisal design and format. The workers of outstanding merit may be placed at top 10 percent of the scale, the rest may be placed as 20 % good, 40 % outstanding, 20 % fair and 10 % fair.

Advantages:

·      This method avoids partiality of the raters and the judgement will be impartial
·      By these predetermined rating method different opinions from different uses can be avoided.

Limitations of Forced Distribution

·      The limitation of using this method in salary administration, however, is that it may lead low morale, low productivity and high absenteeism. 
·      Employees who feel that they are productive, but find themselves in lower grade (than expected) feel frustrated and exhibit over a period of time reluctance to work.
Critical Incident techniques
Under this method, the manager prepares lists of statements of very effective and ineffective behavior of an employee. These critical incidents or events represent the outstanding or poor behavior of employees or the job. The manager maintains logs of each employee, whereby he periodically records critical incidents of the worker’s behavior. At the end of the rating period, these recorded critical incidents are used in the evaluation of the worker’s performance.
Example of a good critical incident of a Customer Relations Officer is: March 12 - The Officer patiently attended to a customer’s complaint. He was very polite and prompt in attending the customer’s problem.
Advantages of Critical Incident techniques
·      This method provides an objective basis for conducting a thorough discussion of an employee’s performance.
·      This method avoids bias (most recent incidents are too much emphasized)
Limitations of Critical Incident techniques
·      Negative incidents may be more noticeable than positive incidents.
·      The supervisors have a tendency to unload a series of complaints about the incidents during an annual performance review sessions.
·      It results in very close supervision which may not be liked by an employee.
·      The recording of incidents may be a chore for the manager concerned, who may be too busy or may forget to do it.

Checklists and Weighted Checklists
 In this system, a large  number of statements that describe a specific job are given. Each statement has a weight or scale value attached to it. While rating an employee the supervisor checks all those statements that most closely describe the behavior of the individual under assessment.

·       The rating sheet is then scored by averaging the weights of all the statements checked by the rater. A checklist is constructed for each job by having persons who are quite familiar with the jobs. These statements are then categorized by the judges and weights are assigned to the statements in accordance with the value attached by the judges.

Advantages of Checklists and Weighted Checklists
·      Most frequently used method in evaluation of the employee’s performance.

Limitations of Checklists and Weighted Checklists
·      This method is very expensive and time consuming
·      Rater may be biased in distinguishing the positive and negative questions.
·      It becomes difficult for the manager to assemble, analyze and weigh a number of statements about the employee’s characteristics, contributions and behaviors.

Performance Appraisal Bias:

Managers commit mistakes in evaluating the employees and their performances, which mite spoil the performance appraisal and demotivate the employees.

1.    First Impression (primacy effect):
 Raters form an overall impression about the ratee on the basis of some particular characteristics of the ratee identified by them. The identified qualities and features may not provide adequate base for appraisal.

2.    Halo Effect: 
The individual’s performance is completely appraised on the basis of a perceived positive quality, feature or trait. In other words, this is the tendency to rate a man uniformly high or low in other traits if he is extra-ordinarily high or low in one particular trait. If a worker has few absences, his supervisor might give him a high rating in all other areas of work.

3.    Horn Effect: 
The individual’s performance is completely appraised on the basis of a negative quality or feature perceived. This results in an overall lower rating than may be warranted. “He is not formally dressed up in the office. He may be casual at work too!”.

4.    Excessive Stiffness or Lenience: 
Depending upon the raters own standards, values and physical and mental makeup at the time of appraisal, ratees may be rated very strictly or leniently. Some of the managers are likely to take the line of least resistance and rate people high, whereas others, by nature, believe in the tyranny of exact assessment, considering more particularly the drawbacks of the individual and thus making the assessment excessively severe. The leniency error can render a system ineffective. If everyone is to be rated high, the system has not done anything to differentiate among the employees.

5.    Central Tendency: 
Appraisers rate all employees as average performers. That is, it is an attitude to rate people as neither high nor low and follow the middle path. For example, a professor, with a view to play it safe, might give a class grade near the equal to B, regardless of the differences in individual performances.

6.    Personal Biases: 
The way a supervisor feels about each of the individuals working under him - whether he likes or dislikes them - as a tremendous effect on the rating of their performances. Personal Bias can stem from various sources as a result of information obtained from colleagues, considerations of faith and thinking, social and family background and so on.

7.    Spillover Effect: 
The present performance is evaluated much on the basis of past performance. “The person who was a good performer in distant past is assured to be okay at present also”.

8.    Recency Effect: 
Rating is influenced by the most recent behavior ignoring the commonly demonstrated behaviors during the entire appraisal period.

Therefore, while appraising performances, all the above biases should be avoided.

Handling Employees After Performance Appraisals

Job evaluation is a process of determining the relative worth of a job. It is a process which is helpful even for framing compensation plans by the personnel manager. Job evaluation as a process is advantageous to a company in many ways:

Reduction in inequalities in salary structure

It is found that people and their motivation is dependent upon how well they are being paid. Therefore, the main objective of job evaluation is to have external and internal consistency in salary structure so that inequalities in salaries are reduced.

1.    Specialization – 
Because of division of labor and thereby specialization, a large number of enterprises have got hundred jobs and many employees to perform them. Therefore, an attempt should be made to define a job and thereby fix salaries for it. This is possible only through job evaluation.

2.    Helps in selection of employees – 
The job evaluation information can be helpful at the time of selection of candidates. The factors that are determined for job evaluation can be taken into account while selecting the employees.

3.    Harmonious relationship between employees and manager
Through job evaluation, harmonious and congenial relations can be maintained between employees and management, so that all kinds of salaries controversies can be minimized.

4.    Standardization
 The process of determining the salary differentials for different jobs become standardized through job evaluation. This helps in bringing uniformity into salary structure.

5.    Relevance of new jobs – 
Through job evaluation, one can understand the relative value of new jobs in a concern.

Job evaluation represents an effort to determine the relative value of every job in a plant and to determine what the fair basic wage for such a job should be.
Thus, job evaluation is different from performance appraisal. In job evaluation, worth of a job is calculated while in performance appraisal, the worth of employee is rated.
Employee Stress - Strategies for managing stress at workplace

Employees stress 

It is a growing concern for organizations today. Stress can be defined as a lively circumstance in which people face constraints, opportunities, or loss of something they desire and for which the consequence is both unpredictable as well as crucial. Stress is the response of people to the unreasonable/excessive pressure or demands placed on them.
Stress is not always negative. It may also bring out the best in individuals at times. It may induce an individual to discover innovative and smarter way of doing things. 

This positive dimension of stress is called as en stress. But usually, the term stress has a negative implication and this negative aspect of stress is termed as distress. 


For instance - When a subordinate is harassed or warned by his superior, unhappiness of unsuitable job, etc. We can say that “Stress causes some people to break, and other to break records.”

Symptoms of Stress

Some of the symptoms of stress at workplace are as follows-
  • Absenteeism, escaping from work responsibilities, arriving late, leaving early, etc.
  • Deterioration in work performance, more of error prone work, memory loss, etc.
  • Cribbing, over-reacting, arguing, getting irritated, anxiety, etc.
  • Deteriorating health, more of accidents, etc.
  • Improper eating habits (over-eating or under-eating), excessive smoking and drinking, sleeplessness, etc.
It is thus very essential to have effective stress management strategies in an organization so that the detrimental repercussions of stress on the employees as well as their performance can be reduced and controlled.

Sources/Causes of Stress

The factors leading to stress among individual are called as stressors. Some of the factors/stressors acting on employees are-
1.    Organizational factors- With the growth in organizational stress and complexity, there is increase in organizational factors also which cause stress among employees. Some of such factors are-

·      Discrimination in pay/salary structure
·      Strict rules and regulations
·      Ineffective communication
·      Peer pressure
·      Goals conflicts/goals ambiguity
·      More of centralized and formal organization structure
·      Less promotional opportunities
·      Lack of employee’s participation in decision-making
·      Excessive control over the employees by the managers

Individual factors- 
There are various expectations which the family members, peer, superior and subordinates have from the employee. Failure to understand such expectations or to convey such expectations lead to role ambiguity/role conflict which in turn causes employee stress. Other individual factors causing stress among employees are inherent personality traits such as being impatient, aggressive, rigid, feeling time pressure always, etc. Similarly, the family issues, personal financial problems, sudden career changes all lead to stress.

Job concerning factors- 
Certain factors related to job which cause stress among employees are as follows-
a.     Monotonous nature of job
b.    Unsafe and unhealthy working conditions
c.     Lack of confidentiality
d.    Crowding

Extra-organizational factors- 
There are certain issues outside the organization which lead to stress among employees. In today’s modern and technology savvy world, stress has increased. Inflation, technological change, social responsibilities and rapid social changes are other extra-organizational factors causing stress.

Strategies for Managing Stress

Stress experienced by the employees in their job has negative impact on their health, performance and their behavior in the organization. Thus, stress needs to be managed effectively to set off these harmful consequences. Strategies for managing stress are as follows-


Organizational strategies for managing stress

1.    Encouraging more of organizational communication with the employees so that there is no role ambiguity/conflict. Effective communication can also change employee views. Managers can use better signs and symbols which are not misinterpreted by the employees.
2.    Encourage employees’ participation in decision-making. This will reduce role stress.
3.    Grant the employees greater independence, meaningful and timely feedback, and greater responsibility.
4.    The organizational goals should be realistic, stimulating and particular. The employees must be given feedback on how well they are heading towards these goals.
5.    Encourage decentralization.
6.    Have a fair and just distribution of incentives and salary structure.
7.    Promote job rotation and job enrichment.
8.    Create a just and safe working environment.
9.    Have effective hiring and orientation procedure.
10. Appreciate the employees on accomplishing and over-exceeding their targets.

Individual strategies for managing stress
1.    The employees should make a “to-do” list daily, prioritize the acts in the list and plan the acts accordingly. Take regular breaks during work to relax you. By effective time management, the employees can achieve their targets timely and can meet work pressures and, thus, avoid stress.
2.    Do hard work. Strive to achieve your goals but do not do it to the harm of family, health, or peer.
3.    Indulge in physical exercises. It helps in effective blood circulation, keeps you fit, diverts mind from work pressures.
4.    Encourage a healthy lifestyle. Take a regular sleep, have plenty of water, have healthy eating habits. Promote relaxation techniques such as yoga, listening music and meditation.
5.    The employees should have optimistic approach about their work. They should avoid connections with negative approach employees.
6.    The employees should have emotional intelligence at workplace. They should have self-awareness, self-confidence and self-control at workplace.
7.    The employees should build social support. They should have close connections with trustworthy peer who can listen to their problems and boost their confidence level. This social network will help the employees to overcome stress.
8.    Employee counselling is a very good strategy to overcome employee stress. Through counselling, employees can become aware of their strengths and how to develop those strengths; their weaknesses and how to eliminate them; and they can develop strategies for changing their behavior. Employees are also given career counselling which helps in reducing their ambiguities with regard to career.
9.    Find a fun way to release stress, such as, cracking jokes, playing tennis, golf, etc.
10. Do not remain preoccupied with yourself. Turn your focus outwards. Help others. This will release some stress.

Employee Stress and Performance

Employee Stress is negatively correlated to their work performance. In short, more the level of stress, lower is the performance. It was conventionally perceived that reasonable levels of stress would boost the employees and improve their work performance. But this perception no longer holds true. Today it is believed that even a little bit of stress will inhibit employees’ work performance.
This is due to:
Even relatively slight stress distracts an employee. People facing stress concentrate more on the repulsive feelings and emotions rather than on the work/job at hand and consequently their work performance suffers. Stress affects people’s intellectual, emotional, and interpersonal functioning.
Extended or repeated exposure even to minor levels of stress may have detrimental effects on health and this might lower employee’s work performance.
But there are certain exceptions to the rule that stress interferes with work performance. For instance, some people are at their best in times of calamity / crises. They meet the expectations and show remarkable performance at times of great stress. This may stem out from the fact that they have great expertise in the tasks being performed, making their variation/inflection as very high. People who have exceptional skills and competencies at a task may cognitively evaluate a possibly stressful scenario as a challenge and not as a threat.
Thus, while concluding we can say that whether stress can spoil or increase performance is dependent on factors such as work complication, the skills and expertise of the employee in performing a task, personal traits of individuals/employees involved, etc. Organizations which encourage an open and honest communication develop an environment in which employees are less likely to be stressed out.

Employee Discipline and Features of a Sound Disciplinary System

Discipline means systematically conducting the business by the organizational members who strictly adhere to the essential rules and regulations.
These employees/organizational members work together as a team so as to achieve organizational mission as well as vision and they truly understand that the individual and group aims and desires must be matched so as to ensure organizational success.
A disciplined employee will be organized and an organized employee will be disciplined always. Employee behavior is the base of discipline in an organization. Discipline implies confirming with the code of conduct established by the organization.
Discipline in an organization ensures productivity and efficiency. It encourages harmony and co-operation among employees as well as acts as a morale booster for the employees. In absence of discipline, there will be chaos, confusion, corruption and disobedience in an organization.
In short, discipline implies obedience, orderliness and maintenance of proper subordination among employees.
Work recognition, fair and equitable treatment of employees, appropriate salary structure, effective grievance handling and job-security all contribute to organizational discipline.
Discipline is viewed from two angles/dimensions:
1.    Positive Discipline: 
Positive Discipline implies discipline without punishment. The main aim is to ensure and encourage self-discipline among the employees. The employees in this case identify the group objectives as their own objectives and strive hard to achieve them. The employees follow and adhere to the rules and regulations not due to the fear of punishment but due to the inherent desire to harmonize in achieving organizational goals. Employees exercise self-control to meet these goals.

2.    Negative Discipline: 
Employees adhere to rules and regulations in fear of punishment which may be in form of fines, penalties, demotions or transfers. In this case, the employees do not perceive organizational goals as their own goals. The action taken by the management to ensure desired standard of behavior/code of conduct from the employees in an organization is called negative discipline. The fear of punishment prevents the employees from going off-track.

 

 Characteristics of a Sound Disciplinary System (Red Hot Stove Rule)

Discipline should be imposed without generating resentment. The “red hot stove rule” which says that a sound and effective disciplinary system in an organization should have the following characteristics-
1.    Immediate-
 Just as when you touch a red-hot stove, the burn is immediate, similarly the penalty for violation should be immediate/ immediate disciplinary action must be taken for violation of rules.

2.    Consistent- 
Just as red-hot stove burns everyone in same manner; likewise, there should be high consistency in a sound disciplinary system.

3.    Impersonal- 
Just as a person is burned because he touches the red-hot stove and not because of any personal feelings, likewise, impersonality should be maintained by refraining from personal or subjective feelings.

4.    Prior warning and notice- 
Just as an individual has a warning when he moves closer to the stove that he would be burned on touching it, likewise, a sound disciplinary system should give advance warning to the employees as to the implications of not conforming to the standards of behavior/code of conduct in an organization.

In short, a sound disciplinary system presupposes-
1.    Acquaintance/Knowledge of rules- 
The employees should be aware of the desired code of conduct/ standards of behavior in the organization. This code of discipline should be published in employee handbook.

2.    Timely action- 
Timely inquiry should be conducted for breaking the code of conduct in an organization. The more later the inquiry is made, the more forgetful one becomes and the more he feels that punishment is not deserved.

3.    Fair and just action- 
There should be same punishment for same offence/ misconduct. There should be no favoritism. Discipline should be uniformly enforced always.

4.    Positive approach- The disciplinary system should be preventive and not punitive. Concentrate on preventing misconduct and not on imposing penalties. The employees should not only be explained the reason for actions taken against them but also how such fines and penalties can be avoided in future.

Types of Penalties for Misconduct/Indiscipline

For not following the standards of behavior/code of conduct in an organization, there are two kinds of penalties categorized as-
a.     Major penalties- 
This includes demotion, dismissal, transfer, discharge, withholding increments, etc.

b.    Minor penalties- 
This includes oral warning, written warning, fines, loss of privileges, etc.

















  









  



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