Bring Your Own Device

It's a concept that is quickly gaining grip within corporates as a way to give employees the freedom to choose the devices they use on a daily basis because employees are demanding not only to use their own devices at work, but also to have more flexibility as well...

The rapid growth in Smartphone and tablet usage in people's personal lives, along with core and noncore applications available, has caused a massive shift on employee’s behavior. Employees are much more particular about deices they use and carry on a daily basis. They no longer want a work device that focuses specifically on email, or a personal device that can't access the information they need. They want one device to handle everything – work/personal email, company apps, watching movies, listening to music, playing games, share pictures, using Facebook/Twitter.

One of the surveys report says more than 39 percent of college students and employees said they would accept a lower-paying job that had more flexibility with regard to device choice and mobility than a higher-paying job with less flexibility.

After seeing these kinds of demands we need comprehensive approach that unifies policy and supports a better user experience and simplifies management to deliver an uncompromised user experience in any workspace.

“BYOD” is not just about connecting user-owned devices and allowing guest access. Beyond that we have to think for monitoring, Access management, how many points and how many clients can have access, allow flexible, scalable wireless network that can support higher capacities while lowering operational costs.

Taking a 360’ view of the overall scenario, I feel that it would be somewhat unjust to put a check on employees bringing their own devices at workplace; rather organization should call on for better and strict monitoring and user access management policies for ensuring a more secured and better control over the” BYOD” concept…

Is cloud computing is economical?

What is cloud computing?

IT trends are changing rapidly, and forming layer after layer that touches every aspect of our lives. We are so depending on now these days on IT services, healthcare, BFSI and manufacturing etc, along with all kind of transactions. Cloud computing is the combination of software, data access, and storage services that do not require end-user knowledge of the physical location and configuration of the system that delivers the services. Cloud computing describes a new supplement, consumption, and delivery model for IT services based on Internet on virtualized environment. Cloud computing is a model for enabling convenient, on-demand network access to a shared pool of configurable computing resources for example networks, servers, storage, applications, and services that can be rapidly provisioned and released with minimal management effort or service provider interaction. Typical cloud computing providers deliver common business applications online that are accessed from another Web service or software like a Web browser, while the software and data are stored on servers.

Is cloud computing is economical?

IT delivery model cloud computing-can significantly reduce IT costs & complexities while improving workload optimization and service delivery. Cloud computing is massively scalable, provides a superior user experience, and is characterized by new, internet-driven economics.

“But if we flip the coin there are several other thoughts are behind that which is not clear yet” :

There are finding's about the ROI/cost of clouds are much higher than our costs for purchasing and supporting a more traditional client-server application. The primary differences are, of course, the on-going monthly fees to cloud vendors vs. the up-front implementation fees and hardware purchases for client server. Few findings say SaaS having higher costs than client-server setups. In that case emphasis shifts to functionality and IT solution, it depends on the nature and functionality of the application and the pricing structure. Vendors need to re-think their overhead structures. They must also set prices that deliver healthy, sustainable client ROI because long term profitability depends on customer retention and healthy subscription volume. In cloud computing, you are always on the latest version of software (no patches, no upgrades) and robust hardware that gets upgraded regularly. So every 3-5 years, a company would either continue to run on old hardware, or if it tried to upgrade software and hardware, incur more capital investment.

In terms of the cost comparisons, it's good to remember that when you host on internal gear, not only do you need to put up new hardware and replace it in 3+ years or so, but you also need hardware for test for example patches, integration or system testing, user acceptance and / or pre-production staging environments, not to mention database instances, clusters help. And resource time like DBA's, system admins or application specialists to refresh data from production so tests can be representative. Or you might not bother with that and experience the nice surprise of promoting an untested patch or unproven upgrade and quickly wish you had.

It takes a specific case to find the real answers, but a good portion of the ROI in SaaS is around ‘soft costs’. IT or management has no headaches about patches, upgrades, down servers, warranties, etc. It’s hard to gauge or justify these time savings in some cases unless you look at IT more strategically.

Enterprise Service Bus

A very important component of the Service Oriented Architecture (SOA) is Enterprise Service Bus (ESB). ESB is used as a diamond bullet to clean up the enterprise integration spaghetti.

The following are some of the important reasons for using an ESB :

1. Why ESB :

Enterprise Service Bus based solutions are very reliable & robust specially in product development , application development, BFSI domain etc., only the thing is enterprises would have to set up teams to manage the ESB and deal with the governance around the ESB usage

2. ESB and Business Process:

This is one of the major features that attract people to ESB. As a result, the business process gets into the ESB. The ESB now contains the critical business logic of the enterprise, apart from being just an integration backbone. This makes the whole system extra complex with business logic spread all over.

3. Other ESB approaches :

The use of ESB results in a vendor lock-in. Business processes is almost always coupled, using vendor specific languages and products.

Performance is another area where more dollars are spent.

Application performance hit with ESB is significant and requires considerable amount of money to scale. Sometimes, simple transformations that can be done easily with a programming language get implemented as an XSLT transformation.

Some of the ESB products do provide good performance but more money is spent on scaling the infrastructure, without even a thought about the acceptable performance limit. In general, it’s acceptable for domain processes to start running in minutes or even hours. However, with the advent of ESB in the system, the tolerance for the process execution time by enterprise CIOs gets reduced to milliseconds and seconds.

ESB does come with pre-packaged adapters or transformers that may or may not be useful in the project. Hence, occasionally, there is a need for development of custom adapters or data-transformers to be used with ESB, which is an additional effort or learning curve for the development team that is already burdened with strict timelines.

Mostly out-of-box adapters are not useful to the project, the licensing cost for these adapters is an unwanted expense.

Is ESB Useless:

No, as I said in the beginning ESB is not a diamond bullet.

It assists the project in meeting the data transformation and communication requirements. It is a good candidate for dealing with disparate protocols (FTP, IIOP, and SOAP) between the interacting systems.

Most of the times it is preferred to have text based protocols (SOAP or HTTP) between services, which makes the system more manageable.

How do we handle Integration Mess:

Through business modeling we can prevent integration mess. SOA has capabilities to handle it.
As we all know, traditional software models and the business domain is the one that best meets the business requirements. Why can’t we extend this to SOA?

Just model the business interactions between services. If that is spaghetti, so be it. The business itself is running with so many interactions.

If a clean up is required, then the change should originate from the business domain. This business domain change will percolate down and would warrant a change in the SOA model.
I feel that this idea of modeling the business chaos among the services is very much in line with the philosophy of SOA, which promotes the alignment of software systems to the business needs.
ESB alone cannot cleanup the problems that originate in the business domain.

Manageability:

Manageability of the solution or system post-implementation is critical to any client. Although we model the business domain spaghetti in our system, it is critical that the spaghetti be manageable.
Monitoring and control interfaces to manage the complex interactions are essential.
Sometimes this needs a single point of control, and management necessitates the use of an ESB rather than the need to integrate various services.

Rise of the Indian BPO Industry

BPO or Business Process Outsourcing is distinct from Information Technology (IT) outsourcing. IT focuses on hiring a third-party company or service provider for activities, such as application management and application development, data center operations, or testing and quality assurance. In the early days, BPO usually consisted of outsourcing processes, such as payroll. It then grew to include employee benefits management and now encompasses a number of functions that are considered "non-core" to the primary business strategy.

Typically, BPO would include everything from call centers, problem solving in the insurance sector, to other sophisticated activities, such as research and other back office dealings. India has the distinct advantage of low cost, highly qualified, English speaking labor. Hence, most of the BPO ventures in India are call centers. Even though of late companies are venturing into high-end areas like research, we can assume that most companies in India would continue doing the call center type of business for some time to come.

Modern India has risen on the wave of outsourcing. It has made India so prominent around the globe. MNCs are attracted to Indian BPOs and IT industry because of the low salaries of skilled workers. Apart from the salary, Indian BPO employees are paid incentives depending on factors, such as attendance regularity, target achievements, etc.

Compared to other Indian companies, Indian BPOs pay a fat salary because of the following reasons:

1. We do not have enough experienced people in the call-center business and the working hours are odd. This is why we do not have as many peopleas we want in the field.

2. There are no college courses or professional training centers on BPO in colleges.

3. There is a high turnover and the companies struggle to retain employees by giving them extra money in the form of incentives and other facilities.

BPOs generally perform back-end administrative functions that are essential to running a business, but are not part of the core business. Business Process Outsourcing is the transfer of direct managerial responsibility, but not accountability, to an unaffiliated third party service provider who performs services previously delivered by internal staff and management. Globalization, competitive markets, mergers and acquisitions are theprimary stimuli for BPOs. Companies are now increasingly outsourcing their Finance and Accounting functions, followed by Human Resource (HR)outsourcing.

Top reasons for outsourcing include:

* Expertise of specialists.

* Saving of time and money.

* Saving administrative costs.

* Freedom to focus on more strategic initiatives.

* Elimination functions that are not part of the core business.

* Redistribution of increased responsibilities.

India became a prominent destination for outsourcing in the services sector in the 1990's. Indian BPOs have responded to the changing market demands by increasing the scale of operations and are now capable of handling complexity. BPOs in India have grown very rapidly as compared to softwareservices, as the advantages offered by the country (low cost and abundant talent pool) were well known and tested in IT outsourcing.

Financial institutions generally seen as victims of archaic thought processes are witnessing cataclysmic changes. Everybody is on the lookout for ways to make their operations more efficient and providing customers with convenient, innovative, and cutting edge services. However, the sad part is that any effort in this direction directly increases pressure on bottom-line profitability. To compound the problem, there is an exponential increase in competition. Hitherto unknown players are entering the market and customers are becoming more mercenary and consequently less loyal. Information technology was already tearing down barriers to remote working before the arrival of the Internet. This has only served to accelerate the pace, especially as more and more applications become Web-enabled.

The number of people employed in the BPO sector is now above 2,50,000 in the country and is expected to reach 1.1 million by 2008. (According to a NASSCOM Report) The business has grown by 46 per cent, with the revenue touching $3.6 billion and has added 70,000 new jobs in the year 2004. NGO workers are apprehensive about the sustainability of these numbers. This is because it is very difficult to manage a large number of people in a short span of time in this industry. The working hours cause great stress in the people who work in BPOs and they are yet to be trained on differentissues. Poaching of employees, the gap of supply and demand, high labor turnover are other problems faced by the industry.

Human Resources (HR) as a function is changing fast as it works closely with senior management, business segments, line management, and functionalleaders in an IT organization. HR management is undoubtedly one of the major challenges ahead for Indian IT companies.

Recruitment and Training

Recruitment has changed from an important sub-system to a major function in HR, particularly in the IT industry. HR managers play a vital role in creating assets for the organization in the form of quality manpower. Another challenge for HR managers is to put systems in place to make peoplea perfect fit for their jobs. Skill obsolescence is rapid in the software industry. To overcome this problem, organizations give utmost priority totraining and skill enhancement programs on a continuous basis. Many IT companies are providing technical training to their employees on variousplatforms every quarter. Most employees find this regular training quite useful, apart from the feeling of security it provides.

Employee Benefits Provided By Majority Of the BPO CompaniesApart from the legal and mandatory benefits, such as provident-fund and gratuity, given below is a list of other benefits BPO professionals are entitled to:

1. Group Medi-claim Insurance Scheme: This insurance scheme provides adequate insurance coverage of employees for expenses related to hospitalization due to illness, disease, injury, or pregnancy. All employees and their dependent family members are eligible. Dependent family members include spouse, non-earning parents, and children above three months of age.

2. Personal Accident Insurance Scheme: This scheme is to provide adequate insurance coverage for Hospitalization expenses arising out of injuriessustained in an accident. This covers total or partial disablement and death due to accidents.

3. Subsidized Food and Transportation: BPOs provide transportation facilities to all employees from home to office at subsidized rates. The meals provided are also subsidized.

4. Company Leased Accommodation: Some companies provide shared accommodation for all outstation employees. In fact some of BPO companies also undertake payment of electricity and water bills, as well as the Society charges for the shared accommodation. The purpose is to enable employees to have a more comfortable work-life balance.

5. Recreation, Cafeteria, ATM and Concierge facilities: Recreation facilities include pool tables, chess tables, and coffee bars. Companies alsohave well equipped gyms, personal trainers, and showers.

6. Corporate Credit Card: The main purpose of the corporate credit card is to enable timely and efficient payment of official expenses that anemployee undertakes for purposes, such as travel related expenses like Hotel bills, Air tickets, etc.

7. Cellular Phone and Laptop: Cellular phones and/or Laptops are provided to employees based on business need. The employee is responsible for the maintenance and safeguarding of the asset.

8. Personal Health Care (Regular medical check-ups): Some of the BPO'S provides facilities for extensive health check-ups. For employees above 40 years of age, the medical check-up can be done once a year.

9. Loans: Many BPO companies provide loan facility on three different occasions: Employees are provided with financial assistance in case of amedical emergency. Employees are also provided with financial assistance at the time of their wedding. And, The new recruits are provided with interest free loans to assist them in their initial settlement at the work location.

10. Educational Benefits: Many BPO companies have this policy to develop the personality and knowledge level of their employees and hence reimburses the expenses incurred towards tuition fees, examination fees, and purchase of books subject, for pursuing MBA, and/or other management qualification at India's top most Business Schools.

11. Performance based incentives: In many BPO companies they have plans for, performance based incentive scheme. The parameters for calculation areprocess performance i.e. speed, accuracy and productivity of each process. The Pay for Performance can be as much as 22% of the salary.

12. Flexi-time: The main objective of the flextime policy is to provide opportunity to employees to work with flexible work schedules and set outconditions for availing this provision. Flexible work schedules are initiated by employees and approved by management to meet businesscommitments while supporting employee personal life needs .The factors on which Flexi time is allowed to an employee include: Child or Parent care,Health situation, Maternity, Formal education program.

13. Flexible Salary Benefits: Its main objective is to provide flexibility to the employees to plan a tax-effective compensation structure by balancing the monthly net income, yearly benefits and income tax payable. It is applicable of all the employees of the organization. The Salary consists of Basic, DA and Conveyance Allowance. The Flexible Benefit Plan consists of House Rent Allowance, Leave Travel Assistance, Medical Reimbursement, and Special Allowance.

14. Regular Get together and other cultural programs: The companies organizes cultural program as and when possible but most of the times, oncein a quarter, in which all the employees are given an opportunity to display their talents in dramatics, singing, acting, dancing etc. Apart from that the organizations also conduct various sports programs such as Cricket, football, etc and regularly play matches with the teams of otherorganizations and colleges.

15. Wedding Day Gift: Employee is given a gift voucher of Rs. 1100/- to Rs.3500/- based on their level in the organization.

16. Employee Referral Scheme: In several companies employee referral scheme is implemented to encourage employees to refer friends and relatives foremployment in the organization.

17. Employee Stock Option Plan

Now, the real question is, why are people leaving? What types of retention strategies are required? What is expected from HR professionals and how can they address this issue?

Slow Down or Recession

Insurance sector is one of the fast growing sector in India, lot of players are around now these days like Birla Sunlife, HDFC Insurance, HSBC Canara, Star Union Dai-ichi Life Insurance, Reliance Life, DLF etc beside that lot of service provider companies are providing solutions to them like Mastek, TCS, EDS, CSC, CTS, Solecorp etc. All companies are trying to follow the benchmark & Industries standards of MNC's.

Global Economy Slowdown, Global Recession, Cash Flow Crises, Pink slip well-known jargons are now these days. Is this true, Insurance Carriers & IT companies in India are also struggling to balance their funds. Big companies, Dream Companies, Blue Chip Companies, Top 100 companies have applied cost cutting majors, giving a reason of economy slowdown & Recession. Giving pink slips to employees, however Indian Companies have never paid global salaries to their employees, so why Cost cutting, Salaries cut downs, reduce cost, reduction in the infrastructure etc.

If you see last Q1,Q2 & Q3 results no company claimed the losses. Why in Q4 cost cutting majors? Let me list out the mistakes committed by companies in the past during good times and the cost of such mistakes are being paid now by Import & Export, Banking, Insurance, Software companies etc including their helpless employees.

1. Many Companies, in both manufacturing and services sectors, have acquired foreign companies at very prices, at double or triple times of their company values. For that they have borrowed large funds to acquire white elephant. At those times, the Indian companies were in a high and had illusions of making their companies into global empires with in no time.

2. Many Indian companies have diversified and have invested money in different domains like, Asset Management, Financial services, Telecom etc. where they were not experienced.

3. Many companies in software services sector, in their greed for growth & in their ambition to be counted upon in the rat race, have created large bench of unproductive employees.

4. Many company did not preserve the profit generated during the good times for rainy days. Hence when the business cycle turned down, these companies have no preparation and no contingency plans in hand to boldly face the situation.

The Best thing is that India is fewer sufferers compared to several other countries. Thanks to Indian public sector banks and special thanks to RBI to not permitting exotic derivative & foreign financial products to enter in India. Hence we can say there is only slow down in India and not a recession. A recession is defined two consecutive quarters of negative growth. India is still expected to grow about 6.5 to 7% in FY'09 and by about 5.5 to 6% in FY'10 (compared to the 8 to 9% growth in the last four years).

Certainly companies are earning less profit but still they are in profit because profit is coming from the blended income, not from the individual projects and products. Rest is management decision to continue or not to continue with the same.

IT Sales Team Vs Client

Business Head and Account Manager and other individuals stake holders work very hard to secure/generate a contract with the prospective clients. It is unfortunate that Project Manager is not a part of this process. Lack of PM involvement leads problem in future.

When client give opportunity to IT firms, they always oversite and over estimates the effort and cost to maintain the profit instead of the relationship.

Agenda for the client not defined – resulting trouble and outcome will go in wrong direction.

Not having enough knowledge of client - Business Head and Account Manager usually think they have enough information about the client which gives set back after the meetings and that resulting client unable to make decisions at critical times during the engagement.

List goes on and on. The small issues affect the project adversely. All of these problems extend the timeline for the project and decrease customer satisfaction.

Kapil Mehrotra

Accomplished Program Manager with around 13 years of demonstrated career success in developing and executing operational strategies to promote organizational growth with optimal utilization of emerging technologies in India. Extensive experience in leading operations for technology, business development and application development within diverse range of industries. Results oriented professional recognized for taking major initiatives, adapting to rapidly changing environment and resolving mission critical issues to ensure bottom line success.

Expertise in developing & streamlining systems with proven ability to enhance IT services effectiveness and meet / exceed operational goals within the cost, time & quality parameters. Spearheaded projects for creation and implementation of applications across multiple domains and platforms. Designed, setup and managed departments with high levels of retention, customer satisfaction and loyalty.

Proficient in end-to-end program planning and implementation in Global Delivery Model from scope management, to activity sequencing, effort & cost estimation to system development & testing and quality management in adherence to guidelines and norms. An effective communicator with exceptional analytical, technical, negotiation and client relationship management skills with the ability to relate to people at any level of business and management and significant experience working with steering committees and other project managers.