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Infosys: Wealth & Values
(Contn.)
[ IV ] At
lunch, I witness a strange sight. One corner of the two-level food-court
that defines the epicentre of the campus has a solitary table where a
young woman is teaching a group of 10 how to conduct themselves at a
sit-down lunch: from the use of cutlery, to the art of small talk. It
wouldn't do to have a software professional ignorant of basic social
graces spoil the company's relationship with a client. Learning is a
common theme at Infosys; one I come across almost as frequently during my
visit as I do umbrella stands housing brightly coloured umbrellas (Bangalore
is given to sudden short sharp showers and someone caught in one can just
borrow an umbrella from a stand in the foyer of one building and replace
it in one in that of another).
It's also one of the things picked out as
unique to Infosys by S.D. Shibulal-a company co-founder who spent some
time with Sun Microsystems in the US to get a larger perspective of how
tech companies work before coming back to the fold-when he's asked to
compare the two companies. In 2000 alone, Infosys hired 2,505 entry-level
software pros (till September 30, 2000). At the end of a three-month
classroom- and lab-based training programme these employees are evaluated.
Only those who get through this process are put on to projects. And pros
between projects (we call it being on the bench, says one of them) are
attached to staff functions like MIS (Management Information Systems) or
left to their own devices and encouraged to learn new things-handling a
five-iron included.
Learning cuts both ways: yesterday e-biz
was code-jock heaven; today, m-commerce is. And no organisation,
especially not one like Infosys that prides itself on what Narayanamurthy
calls the predictability of its revenues, can provide opportunities for
all its employees to work on m-com projects. For the record, in the first
quarter of 2000-01, only 34.1 per cent of the company's revenues came from
e-biz projects; the rest came from other software services. Shibulal, who
looks after the company's 'production' admits that this is a bit of a
bother, not a real cause for concern: ''It's more an issue of
communication and awareness. We do not encourage discussions where someone
goes to his manager and says I have to work on m-commerce or I'll leave.''
Infosys' strategy to deal with this issue has three strands: articulating
the company's business model and showing employees how each business fits
into the whole; explaining the disadvantages of being obsessed with
technologies instead of customer-requirements; and pointing out the
opportunities every business provides to the individual to grow. Shibulal
hastens to add that not everyone is happy about not working on a m-com
assignment or having to spend time on the bench-all practices carry some
slack in terms of manpower so as to accommodate demand-spikes-but that
they 'understand'. It also helps that the company doesn't brand anyone a
specialist in any particular area.
It was Shibulal, I find out, who influenced
the company to create an incubator for ideas from employees in areas
outside the company's domain. Two companies, Yantra and Onscan-both based
in the US-have already emerged from the incubator. ''The idea should be
able to add value to customers and should eventually be something that can
be monetised,'' he says explaining how Infosys identifies candidates for
incubation.
Shibulal stops short of saying it, but at
Infosys, the customer is really the reigning deity. This is manifest in a
statement I hear repeatedly-from lots of senior managers-that the company
will offer any software service that the customer needs. It is also
manifest in the sizable number of obviously-foreign faces on campus,
clients who've hopped across to see how their off-shore software services
vendor works. Aligning its internal processes to customer requirements has
actually been a good thing for Infosys: it has been able to offer
employees opportunities to learn; and as the demand for high-end software
services increases, it has seen its revenues soar. For work done outside
India, primarily in the US, the company bills $135,000 a person-year. This
is somewhere in the mid-range (when compared to global software services
biggies). In India, it bills $60,000 a person year, possibly the highest
(among Indian software firms).
[ V ] I
pass a group of employees practicing their putts-they've taken off their
shoes so as to not damage the grass-on my way to Narayanamurthy's office.
I am at least 30 minutes early for the meeting and the man is taking a
walk around the campus. The attendant who serves me coffee tells me how
Infosys changed his life: he has just bought a house (for a sum that would
seem steep to most middle managers in other companies) and still has
around 1,000 shares left over for a rainy day. But is it just
opportunities to create wealth-in November 1999, Infosys decided to give
stock options to all its employees-that make Infosys a great place to
work? Or is it the values (another word that I come across frequently) of
the company? ''The values of the company,'' explains Pai, ''are the values
of its founders, essentially middle-class, essentially professional, and
essentially transparent.'' Or is it the people policies which K. Dinesh,
another of the company's co-founders believes revolve around the
'principle of fairness'.
All these are probably important
ingredients in the Infosys recipe to create a great workplace. Hygiene
factors (hr-speak for things that could demotivate people by their absence
but which do not necessarily motivate them by their presence) matter;
stock options help; and being part of a business that, to put it simply,
is booming makes everyone feel good. And, nebulous as it may sound, values
do have a role to play. All day, I've done nothing but watch the people
around me for some sort of flashiness, for the kind of tech-grunge look
you'd normally encounter (if you didn't live in the Valley) in the pages
of Wired and Red Herring. I've seen no signs, but that is only to be
expected in a company where the people hired, across levels, share two
characteristics: they're typically high-performers, and they're from
professional working class backgrounds. Ask Srinath Batni, who joined
Infosys as a project manager, eight years ago and is now a member of the
board, whether he had any problems fitting into the company and he smiles:
''The value systems adopted by the company is steeped in middle-class
mentality. Anyone coming from my kind of background won't have a
problem.''
A few minutes before 5.00 p.m. (that's the
time scheduled for our meeting) Narayanamurthy is back from his campus
peregrination. I'm soon ushered into his office-his new office actually,
he's just moved in the previous day from a room in the Heritage
Building-which is spartan except for a Bose Lifestyle audio system that's
softly playing some western classical music (it continues to do so
throughout our chat). NRN, as he is called by some of his employees, says
its all a function of trust (see CEO-Bytes): ''The task of leadership is
to make people believe in themselves, the organisation, its value system,
and the aggressive targets that are set. Belief comes from trust: the
trust that this company is not about making one set of stakeholders better
off.''
Values, though, can take an organisation
only that far on the road to being a great company to work for. Nandan
Nilekani, Infosys' Managing Director rattles of a list of other things
that matter: strategy, work practices, culture, organisational structure,
infrastructure, ambience, facilities, pay, options... He also admits that
there are several characteristics of the software business that makes the
industry a great one to be in: its high growth, its global nature, and the
fact that it's all about transforming the way others do business. ''But
given that you still have to create a company that's a great place to
work,'' he concludes; that the organisation does by focusing on what
Ravichandar terms ''learning value-add, financial value-add, and emotional
value-add''.
Fine, says the cynic in me, but what if the
great place to work becomes so much of an obsession with employees that it
makes everything else-fun, life, family-pale into insignificance? ''Your
friends must all be Infoscions,'' I tell Muthamma Acharya. She bristles at
the suggestion: ''I have a life. And friends outside Infosys. Besides
there are some really nice people here. The kind you'd like to have as
your friends irrespective of where they work.'' It's not as if no one
cribs (as a corporate savant is once supposed to have said, cribbing at
work is therapeutic). Flashpoints range from the income tax everyone pays
on their salaries-high, since Infosys believes everyone should pay tax-and
the fact that not everyone can access the net on their PCs ("not
enough connectivity, boss,'' shrugs the manager I ask about this,
"but we have a cyber-cafe like thing in the Heritage building")
to the commute involved in getting to the Bangalore campus (up to an
hour-and-a-half for some). Still, most employees state they can't think of
working for any other company. ''What'll get me to leave this place?''
says Sushil, echoing my question. ''Another Infosys.''
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Why
Infosys Is Number 1 |
| The
buzz, energy, and excitement at the Infosys Campus cannot go
unnoticed. Employees-they call themselves Infoscions-are proud to be
part of this fast-growing company. Like one employee said in the
employee survey, ''This is truly an exceptional place to work!"
Infosys treats its employees as its key assets.
Our experience at Hewitt has
shown that the success of any system or programme in a company is
directly related to the level of senior-management commitment. The
high level of senior management involvement and commitment here is a
key differentiating factor. They communicate and share information
with employees on a regular basis, stand in the lunch queue with
everyone else, play an active role in all employee events, take
inputs from employees while taking decisions, have an open-door
policy, and build a personal rapport with employees. There is no
hierarchy and everyone is treated and behaves like equals.
Infosys boasts a vigorous
recruitment program, which includes components like interviews with
the HR manager, potential supervisor, supervisor's manager,
potential peers, and skill assessment. The key areas of
consideration while making hiring decisions, in order of priority,
include the degree of learnability; fit with organisational culture
and values; and educational qualifications. Employee referrals are
encouraged. And an analysis of exit interviews has shown that most
employees leave the company for personal reasons such as marriage or
higher education. However, many return to the company after
completing their education.
The work life at Infosys is
tailored around the personal lives of the employees, not the other
way round. All possible facilities are available on-site to all
employees. The company, an extension of the family, takes care of
every individual's need, from seeing an employee through a close
relative's illness to celebrating special occasions together. A
number of social events are organised regularly where both the
employees and their families participate. Besides other programmes,
an annual special day 'Petit Infoscion' is held where the children
of employees participate and have an opportunity to explore their
parents' workplace.
Infosys places a great emphasis
on the continuous upgradation of skills: 2.65 per cent of the
Infosys turnover is spent on education and research. Every Infoscion
receives an average 47 hours of training. In the technology sector,
where employees are the key to wealth-creation, the sharing of that
wealth helps increase their motivation. Not only are Infoscions
treated like owners, they are all technically owners. Every
employee, both managerial as well as non-managerial, owns stock in
the company. Other forms of reward include competitive pay, pegged
at the fourth quartile, incentives, and attractive loan schemes.
Regular 'value workshops' are
held to reinforce the articulated values. Infosys contributes to the
society at large through the Infosys Foundation. One per cent of the
company's profits are donated to this foundation every year, and
employees are also encouraged to contribute to different funds.
Despite being a global organisation, Infosys manages to retain the
spirit and warmth of a small, software hotshop. As an employee said,
"Working at Infosys is an experience, something which is
difficult to put into words."
Madhavi
Misra and Purva Misra, Hewitt Associates LLC |
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