STRATEGIC HUMAN RESOURCE MANAGEMENT

Introduction
Strategic human resource deals with aligning HR practices and policies with business strategy to achieve the overall goal of the business.

TATA CONSULTANCY SERVICES LIMITED

Group conglomerate. It is the second-largest India-based provider of business process outsourcing services. TCS has 142 offices across over 47 countries and generates around 20 per cent of India's IT exports.

Business strategy :
The core strategy of TCS is customer centric. The business strategy for the year 2009- 10 was sustaining growth. To sustain growth, the Company has a five pronged strategy. One: A strong focus on the customer enabled by a customer-centric organisation with domain capabilities, backed by excellence in execution. Two: Enhance value proposition to the customer through the power of integrated full services play. Three: To use global engagement model like Global Network Delivery Model to cater to the needs of developing markets. Four: Focus on Experience certainty as an important proposition. Five: Growth through non-linear growth models is a strategic priority. HR practices of TCS : TCS is the largest private sector employer in India with a total employee strength of 160,429 including those in its subsidiaries. This diverse and global base of employees from 80 nationalities is central to sustaining TCS competitive edge. Recruitment : Since the business was growing, recruitment strategy to recruit additional employees was carried out. TCS has recruited 16668 employees in the fiscal year 2009 -10 to match the man power requirement of the company. Continuous interaction with universities and other educational institutions remains a central plank of TCS strategy to attract the best scientific and engineering talent. TCS has also set-

up an Industry Academia collaboration network with some of the foremost Universities in India and rest of the world. Compensation in TCS TCS worked out an EVA framework to align corporate value with the performance of the constituent business units and the individuals who comprised these. It translated to a compensation model, where the employee had a share in the corporate pie with add-ons from the profits of the Business Unit and the Individual Performance Factor. At the individual level, an employee needs to know the drivers to tweak to enhance the EVA of the company, of the business unit, and his own contribution towards all these. Learning and development : TCS invests about 4 per cent of its annual revenues in Learning and Development, to build competency capital within the company in cutting edge technologies, domain and functional areas. Special emphasis is placed on providing necessary learning interventions to associates with potential of being leaders in the company. Initial Learning Program (ILP): TCS Initial Learning Program is designed to provide a smooth transition from Campus to Corporate environment. The program is designed to transform graduate engineers into IT Consultants with global mindset. The participants are put through a rigorous 47-day program that has good mix of technical skills and soft skills. Continuous Learning Program (CLP): Continuous Learning Program (CLP) is a manifestation of the company's commitment to the continuous growth of associates, in line with the core value of Learning & Sharing. Programs under the CLP umbrella arise out of business strategies, project needs, technology and business directions and individual aspirations, and span across Technologies, Domains, Processes and Soft-skills. This lay emphasis on long-term, short-term and medium-term needs of the organization alike. Leadership Development Program (LDP) : The program is to churn out the future leaders for the company. Associates are carefully assessed for leadership potential and then put through rigorous branded programs. TCS also encourages associates to attend various programs at premier B-schools across the globe. Foreign Language Initiative (FLI): Foreign Language Initiative is to help the associates to communicate effectively with the customers. Under this initiative, associates are encouraged to learn one or more foreign languages. This initiative also helps associates to use English effectively for business communication. This is highly beneficial in a company with a diverse workforce. The cross-cultural issues are curtailed with the proper use of communication.

Workplace Learning : Apart from all these initiatives TCS encourages "workplace learning". Associates are encouraged to learn while at work. To facilitate this, TCS has subscribed a huge library of e-Learning courses and online books. The classroom session and e-Learning materials complement each other. Employee engagement initiatives : A number of employee engagement initiatives were undertaken during the year to understand the career issues and aspirations of high performers and their career development. The Diversity and Womens Network (DAWN) initiative that was launched to encourage diversity and inclusion in our workforce has gained momentum within the organisation. TALENT MANAGEMENT : The attrition rate of 11.8% in fiscal 2010 (previous year 11.4%) is the lowest in the industry. TCS has low attrition rate in the industry. It has been achieved by continuously investing in learning and development programs for employees, competitive compensation, creating a compelling work environment, empowering employees at all levels, as well as a wellstructured reward. Talent acquisition: The Company continues to invest in improving the overall quality of engineering talent in India through a stringent academic accreditation program that helps benchmark and improve the quality of learning at colleges. The Company also provides training, internships and projects to students. As a result of these initiatives, TCS continues to be an employer of choice on engineering campuses across the country.

IMPACT OF HR PRACTICES ON BUSINESS STRATEGY:

Recruitment strategy ensured that employee addition was clearly aligned to the growing business demand.

Learning and development programs ensured that the company has the right competencies in its workforce and also ensure experience certainty to the customers.

Compensation plan that has 3 components such as company performance, business unit performance and individual performance ensured that employees are efficient and get pay according to their performance.

Talent management in TCS helped to retain its employees and its interaction and accreditation program in the engineering colleges enabled it to attract talent from the colleges.

Employee engagement initiatives helped the company to get the commitment of the employees and deliver value for the customers.

The HR practices in TCS centers around making the employees efficient and deliver excellence in their services and achieve overall customer satisfaction and sustain growth in the organisation.