Testing times

Government employees generally have to clear an exam before they can get a promotion. Now private companies are following suit. For instance, Intelenet Global Services, a BPO, uses a combination of written exams and assessment centres to evaluate its employees.

Among its training programmes, Intelenet has introduced certain functions which ensure a fair transition of a junior-level executive to a team leader and then a team manager.

The programmes are called the Skill Enhancement and Employee Development Program (SEED), Strive Towards Excellence Program (STEP) and Leadership Excellence and Accredition Developlemt Program (LEAD).

Once the executives complete probation period in the organisation, they are taken through SEED where they go through a 12-module training session in technical and behavioural aspect.

When the executives complete a year with the organisation, they are allowed to apply for STEP which enrolls 10 per cent of the employees and trains them in leadership aspects to fill in the company's vacant leadership positions.

Under STEP, the employees are selected on six parameters where points are allotted to them based on their performance and productivity quality, by assessment supervisor, from a psychometric test, attendance record, disciplinary action if any and competency-based interviews by HR.

The employees then undergo a six months training which takes them through a 24-module training programme in presentation, business case studies and competency-based interviews. The programme is divided in two phases of three months each.

Employees there after, if meet the selection criteria, are qualified to be team leaders. These team leaders after another six-month training programme qualify to be team managers. LEAD comes in play to train these qualified team managers.

"What excites the employees about these programmes is the fairness involved in promoting people. The selection process is purely based on their performance and capabilities. Thus the question of bias does not arise. We conduct exams not only to assess the knowledge level but also the soft skills of the employees," says Manuel D'Souza, Head HR at Intelenet.

Intelenet prides itself to be a promoter of fair HR practices. Sixty per cent of Intelenet's team leaders are grown from within the organisation. For instance, Carin Bamji (32) who joined Intelenet as an associate five years ago, today heads the operations team of 400 employees at Intelenet.

Sheldon D'Souza who joined the company six years ago as an associate is head operations, Asia Pacific region.

Siddharth Behl (30) who also joined Intelenet as an associate five years ago has grown up to be an operations manager.