Two guys from our QA section broke their contract and joined L10NBridge last month. First, one guy disappeared (called up the morning and said I am not coming!) And then another went after him in a week. This was better, he came to office, said I am quitting, and that give me my papers ASAP so that I can leave!
I do not get surprised by such behaviours now. Am used to it now. What surprised me was the interaction with L10NBridge HR – Deepak Deshpande.
Our HR called him up, and asked how do they take people without clearance from the previous organization. And why do they encourage people to break their contracts, dishonor the word they have given, and join their company.
And he opined; we are a 1200 people company. If one person leaves it does not matter to us. You are a 100 people company, so you are affected. He went on and said that see how I hire the remaining people from your QA team as well. I will hire them, and you won’t be able to do anything. I am a big company, you are not!
On the topic of contracts, trust, commitment and honor of the word, he had more advice. He told our HR that you are new in the field, and you do not understand the practicalities of life! He did not agree to take any action againts the candidates, since it will not look good on him!
I know that we do not know the practicalities of life! We want to create an organization that’s built around values – not greed. But I am surprised how it does not matter at all, to the HR head of a large company (ok, not that large actually), that people break their earlier commitments and join them. And they actually encourage it! Looks like ethics is only in books for them, not in life!
I am just wondering what lesson Deepak and L10NBridge are giving to their employees!
SUCKS!
I am hoping desipundit.com picks up this story and let’s more people know about the poor ethics the company is practicing.
Hmmm? You mean, like the fact that you call them human _resources_? Computers are resources. I am sure people deserve a bit more respect.
Currently, all companies are desperate for good people, and they are willing to pay a premium for them. On the other hand, the people being recruited know that they will be ditched as soon as the market turns bad, and want to buffer up their cash. I don’t really blame either side.
You are basically paying a premium for your staff’s time for their skills. Why would they not go to the highest paying client when they get the chance? Money speaks in this market, and it speaks very loudly.
If you want people to stay on, pay more. A lot more than anyone else out there. If you think that the contracts you signed with those people have any value, why not sue them?
In God we trust, everyone else pay cash.
Money speaks louder, got it! But it’s difficult to accept it that it’s bigger than values for most people!
Looks like there is inflection point coming in the industry within a decade!
I believe, there will be an end to these predatory unethical companies, if the bubble bursts, it is people like Mr Deshpande who will feel the pinch.
These no good rent-a-new-office-a-day companies will just evaporate!
The point here is that the programmers know that the bubble will burst. That is why they want to make as much as possible *now*. There is no guarantee that you will not lay them off when you are hit by the bubble collapsing. Today, the employer needs to prove his (or her) loyalty to the employee first.
Oh, and money trumps everything most of the time. It doesn’t matter how much you speak about values, your staff wants as much money as you make. If they can get there faster by ditching you and going elsewhere, they will.
Loyalty does not count, as we have seen in the previous bust, when employees were laid off or made to work overtime without pay increases, or had to take pay cuts. Now, the employees want their pound of flesh too. They have their first loyalty to themselves, not to their employer.
Keep in mind that interest rates are going up. Anyone wanting to buy a house has to pay more. Why would they not be willing to take more money now, and pay off the loan, or at least make a down payment?
Remember that if you have enough money, laws will change for you. We have seen this plenty of times in India.
If I ever get dragged to court, I want Ram Jethmalani representing me, not the guy who represented Mohammad AfzaL Guru. That takes money. Remember, the world loves Bill Gates and hates (or ignores) RMS. The guys commiting fraud get rewarded on Wall Street, while the good guys get punished. Your ex-employees are merely following the examples they are being shown.
Loyalty does not count! WTH! It counts.. No doubt, career is important, but unethical practice is not what I want in my employer.
I feel your pain and “been there suffured that” I have accepted attrition as a fact and I disagree that money speaks louder than anything else.
However – consider this the company *your* people went to is not concerned with you and you should not be concerned with them. I would have never called the HR there. He is just concerned with saving his ass. Under the bravado of numbers he is scared shitless. But thats besides the point.
What I would have probably done is one of the two
# Forgotten about it after a rant – one or two people never can make or break an entire organisation
# Sued the employees for all their worth for breach of trust.
But the second option is a double edged sword – I have a damn good lawyer so I can use it 😉
Yes, attrition is a fact of life and there is no problem with it. Have got used to it now. The only surprising thing was the response from Deepak. But as you said, he is trying to save his ass, at the cost of his company’s.
And well, we are going with both the options you suggested 😉
Nirav,
Was it a two-way contract or a one-way contract?
Cheers,
HP
Sire,
This is Laissez faire. Survival of the fittest.
As far as contracts are concerned, they are not worth the paper they are written on. What is your ‘official’ office timing as per the contract or the number of holidays allowed? Do your employees get extra for working overtime. The point is contracts are are just legal trash for both employees and employers.
Let me also add that the behaviour of your employees was quite unprofessional. Deepak Deshpande is just doing his job – to attract talent and keep it. If you can’t match (and there are other ways to match besides money) – Perish!!
There are two parties involved, and of course there are going to be hundred view points, and thousands of opinions.
I don’t have problems with people leaving the organization. I don’t even have problems with other people hiring them.
Anyone who has any doubts on how much we do to keep our team happy and progressing in their life, should come and stay with us for a year.
People who say it’s “ok” to jump around jobs breaking commitments, should ask themselves: “What damn value are you giving to your organization? The company that paid your bills and trained you so that you could do better?” And would they like this to be done to them? Imagine your friend ditched you because someone else had a better bike. Would you be happy with that?
We don’t treat our people as “resources” to get things done. Replaceable resources. Resources that do not have any other value. We treat our people as our friends, as people who are working with us to serve our customers, and create interesting tech solutions.
This may sound bookish to some people. Impractical to others. And if it does, consider that your self is not necessarily the best context to live your life from!
Ah…
All said n done, I feel and believe contracts/bonds are just means to retain/instill fear of breach of contracts. In fact, after this event Nirav, you may see more people having the guts to take that bold step. So considering the suggested options is defn. a solution but also you may think on not really having these kind of contracts. Will you work with an employer having such kind of contracts?
“Imagine your friend ditched you because someone else had a better bike”
Nirav,
you are assuming that the two employees or rather employees in general leave for money. Money comes in at a later stage than most people assume – the first stage is when the employee makes up his mind to leave due to career growth/problem with superiors/lack of ‘worthy’ work. In the next stage he starts looking out and in my opinion, not many people place money at the helm of their job search. Later in the stage of evaluating various offers, does money become a major factor in decision making.
Employees are like Indian women who marry the richest suitor – beacuse they have no other information to differentiate but they never leave for money.
Loyalty cannot be bought – not even if you were kind enough to train employees and pay their bills in return for their work. It has to be generated – by making them a part of your mission. The manner in which people leave shows a lot of what they felt towards that mission.
The least an organization can do is to understand what their employees feel and not to bask in its assumed greatness.
And if you see the entire industry, and consider what people feel about all the IT organizations and their missions, in this context, you would feel really sorry for yourself!
What are we creating? An IT superpower?
🙂
“what people feel about all the IT organizations and their missions”
Does that not explain the high attrition rates. Ofcourse the nature of work should lend itself to create a sense of purpose.
Oh! and I do feel sorry for myself 🙂
“Ofcourse the nature of work should lend itself to create a sense of purpose.”
Doesn’t Patni do that? If Yes, still people are always eager as to when their bond will finish. And in Patni, they would stay despite of being on maintenance work because they want the name of Patni on their experience certificate and that’s it.
Everyone knows what happens in big companies. You don’t get anything but the name of that company on your experience certificate. You are like the tiniest drop in the ocean in that big company. You are a “system/process” driven person. I hope there won’t be any process for going to the Loo. 🙂
Btw, Harman, I am closely associated with Magnet. And people from L10NBridge have also joined Magnet in the past. So you can think of the work opportunities Magnet provides.
Nirav,
Given your trust in values, what is your need for a contract with the employee? Why put clauses that can be restrictive for employees?
If you have high regard for human values then just get rid of those clauses that restrict employees. Let employees know that they are free to go whenever they feel like.
Encourage a free atmosphere. Set up a precedent where no one is afraid to talk to you about their plans and the actions they take to pursue them.
Create that environment and that might work better for you.
And if you are considering legal option you are doing no good to your reputation. You are sending the wrong signals to your future employees. It is like if you betray us we will not leave you. Why?
Vulturo is disturbed by this post and has a nice post about hiring and people and jobs and companies.
I can understand he is an HR guy, and not an entrepreneur. He has a lot of points I like. Lot of things that we practice day in and day out.
As I said earlier, my concern is not really people leaving or other companies hiring. That’s the way life is going to work. What disturbs me is not “why people leave” or “why some people left”, but it’s more like “how do they leave like this” or “how can somebody encourage such practice”.
Over the last year, I have seen a startling growth in the number of people who are complaining about job hopping, and how people quit. We have been in business for almost 8 years now, we have seen all kinds of people and how they quit. But it’s just recently that we have started seeing/hearing about people quitting by sending an SMS or disappearing or threatening.
Surely, it’s a demand-supply phenomenon. There is just crazy demand for good people. Small companies end up being training institutes. People like me would feel bad about it, since they created companies to do something better.
I am concerned because I am seeing this as a trend. And feel it will hurt both employees and employers in the long run.
People have full right to do what they like. But they would leave many more friends if they do it well.
There are lot of questions in comments here, that I would like to answer. But I don’t think that would forward this discussion.
I think one action that can make a difference, is giving a proper notice to your current employer if you are an employee, and encouraging your new employees to serve a notice to their previous employers if you are an employer.
It’s interesting that you place all of the blame completely on the feet of the people leaving or the company hiring? Are you so sure your company is doing things right? Maybe there’s a reason people are leaving by SMS-ing you…While I agree that the way these people are leaving is very unprofessional, and even stupid, in the long-term, maybe there’s a reason they don’t mind burning their bridges with your company. Are you sure your management is good?
Hi Nirav,
I donot think there is anything unethical, when you have to hire your company woudl also do the same thing.
The real lack of ethics in HR & Recruiting is completely different. Have your cousins start a placement agency route all the resumes through them.
Take kick backs from consultants for placing candidates.
These are lack of ethics and they are rampant pretty much in IT industry.
Hi Nirav!
Came over from Rashmi’s blog.
I think this has a lot to do with an individual’s values rather than the organization’s. A hiring org will always push for a candidate to join ‘ASAP’ or ‘yesterday’. If the candidate really is true to their values, they will stay back, close their existing assignments, do a handover and quit elegantly – without burning their bridges. What they probably don’t realize is it’s a small world and like Rashmi puts it, what goes around comes around – the organization also doesn’t realize it could happen to them one day! – So they’re big. Ahem… there are bigger companies than them also 🙂
Cheers n adding u to my blogroll – hey by the way I quit Microsoft a few months back (with a cool 45 days notice) and moving back to Mumbai this weekend. Starting off my own lil’ something…
– Kaushal
Vishal
My intention was not to judge or compare different IT companies. I am quite incompetent to do so as I have never worked in an IT company. However, i just thought that the management ought to understand the employee perspective. Also, I strongly disagreed with some of the opinions in the post – so had to express mine. (Its a democracy afterall)
Hello Nirav,
I read your post and skimmed through the comments. I see that few people have disagreed with you.
Notwithstanding a contract, when someone switches from one employer to other then there is definitely a protocol involved. One needs to inform in writing and complete the paperwork. Every employer worth its reputation knows this will never encourage their newly hired employers to skip the protocol and join them. Infact there are couple of statutory formalities to be done like Form 16 and PF account. As long as these formalities are done an employee is always free to switch companies and it should always be so !
So definitely the other HR has erred and may be that person is not accepting it due to the comfortable position he is in, but he is definitely ruining the ethics of the industry.
Few placement consultants would disagree with you cause their job is only to place people, how they are poached and what protocols they follow does not decide their commission, so they won’t bother with it.
Big and reputed companies, around the world, even get the background information check done. But few fly by night employers, neither has money, will or ethics to get it done. They won’t survive in long term or make a brand of their own.
I am sure you will aslo follow the same ethics and practices when you get big ( i mean when your company grows big)
well its disgusting… i do agree with your views on the same.. i m a fanatic for capitalism at its hilt.,.. but what those employees did was definately not ethical .. even capitalism preaches rational selfishness not selfishness… YOU CONTINUE THE GOOD WORK of revolving around on values… It is sustainable… and smart.. even if its hard… there are a lot of people who are dispensible.. i guess it d make sense to add a precautionary underwriting in your contracts into taking stringent action if something of this sort happens again!
Hi folks,
I don’t get the topic of discussion.. this is a very casual thing happening in corporate.. that too on bigger scale.. you cannot blame the Hr of any company for taking away your best resource but will have to blame your company HR as it is his failure to retain the best resource of his company…
If we cannot challenge the loyalty of our employees how can we comment on the HR of the other company.. if you look carefully .. he is more loyal to his company then your employees…
If you really appreciate loyalty then appreciate the Lionbridge’s HR’s skills and loyalty..
And if you really want to fight the system then your HR has to be strong and efficient..
Vishal,
I dont agree with u. LioNBridge is supposed to be a CMM Level 5 company. Whereas, Magnet is not even a Level 1 company. I dont think so ppl from Level 5 company will ever work for peanuts which Magnet offurs to the employees. And this is the main reason why people must be leaving magnet.
Nirav,
I have heard lot many good and bad things abt magnet. Good in terms of experience, which is very important for any software engineer. But I also heard 1-1.5 yrs back that the QA department is not at all standardised. Any QA engineer will look out for a good experience in QA which magnet cannot provides. Just working with 4-6 QA guys does not make QA team. There are many responsibilites too. But still! I dont blame Magnet in not being a CMM Level company.
Nirav, if u beleive in ethics which u just blabbered on top of this page, then why do you bind the employees with the bond. You must be smart enough to know that Bonded labour is banned in our India. Just because all your clients are from US and UK you should not forget the Indian Laws. Please explain me how do you guys follow ethics and humanity over here? Please dont take me wrong, but I’m just trying to refresh your mind and warning you with further consequences due to this.
“If you have high regard for human values then just get rid of those clauses that restrict employees. Let employees know that they are free to go whenever they feel like.
Encourage a free atmosphere. Set up a precedent where no one is afraid to talk to you about their plans and the actions they take to pursue them.
Create that environment and that might work better for you.”
________________________
Yes, it’s a fact that money speaks more, especially in today’s materialistic world, but after having worked in HR for quite some time, I realised that not every body leaves for money. There are various factors which make them leave. Especially the atmosphere, the freedom therein and organisation culture.
I agree with the above points quoted above. It makes sense in creating such atmosphere that the employees feel free to approach their supervisor/manager and discuss about how they feel about their job content, how they are treated or for that matter what they feel about their salaries (at any given point of time, instead of yearly appraisals) than give a surprise by disappearing or a weeks notice.
All said and done, there are all kinds of employees. Inspite of any good atmosphere some people do leave for money, but we need not generalise this behaviour. I have seen employees who decided to leave very tempting offers. But again, this is a fire fighting excercise. I advise employers to take all possible care to avoid creating fire in the first place. There are ways & means for it.
It is a general tendency of anybody to first seek to be understood, than understanding others. As Stephen covy has mentioned in his book “7 habits”, let’s first seek to understand others then to be understood. It helps in solving most of the problems if not all, especially related to attrition.
Looking at the scenario in the industry & social life, everyone of us should understand that there is lot of pressure on younsters. Moreover, hardly have they been stressed on moral education. All that they have been tought are to be competent and be financially ahead of their peers. So, what more could we expect from them than run after money. And added to this there are many people like Deepak who create pressures in a way.
No doubt that there are some living examples, but these examples do not influence each and everybody. We cannot expect everybody to be an entrepreneur, or like one. Everybody’s priorities are different.
Another point raised by somebody was related to brand. Yes, it does make a big difference to most of the employees to work for big brands. They take pride in it. We cannot expect everybody to be enterpreneurs. Small companies do need to pay a price for not being a big brand. We cannot help it.
Most of us are sailing in the same boat. Let us focus more on seeking a solution rather than be worried about the problem.
SABI
Are you sure they broke the contract? I think all employment contracts contain some kind of provision for monetary compensation if an employee does not serve the notice period fully. If not paid in cash, the amount is deducted from the employee’s final settlement.
If the contract was not broken, referring to this as “unethical” is debatable. It is definitely “unprofessional” but this is the risk the resigning employee is willing to take.
BTW, the perfect situation would be when an employee can negotiate the terms for his/her employment contract before joining the job. Instead, standard employment contracts are handed out with ominous terms when the employee is on the wrong side of the bargaining power scale. 🙂
The keyword is People and not lifestock. !
You are talking as if you own the 100 people in your company and Liongate stole lifestock from you ! GROW UP !!
Iam an entrepreneur myself and never had a contract ! People come and people go some stick around for long time, this is how it works !
Its a fact of business that ANY BUSINESS, SMALL, BIG, MNC, LOCAL…. MAKES PROFIT ONLY BY PAYING LESS THAT WHAT EMPLOYEES EARN FOR THAT BUSINESS ! so its not a charity that you are doing !
Looser whine like you are !! Like a little buy who dropped his candy !
i have always tried to create an atmosphere where employees confide in me before leaving. *That* is a good organisation. The pay i can give is limited, the growth channels are also limited – i accept that. *You* may think that your company is heaven on earth – do your employees think so? And the surest way to make your employees fear you even more is to sue those that left. In fact, after your reaction to the leaving of two of them, the next to leave will probably go underground, change his name and whatnot … I was reading godfather returns recently, and the attitude of many Indian companies reflect the ‘family ideal’ extolled there. Once in – never out. Defectors are terminated with extreme prejudice (read sued).
Nirav,
Its a dog eat dog world… you win some and loose some..there is no use whining over it.
I came here from Rashmi’s blog, then checked out vultouro..
They kind of speak both sides of the story… In the long run burning bridges doesnt really work for you..
but then what if everybody is doing so…? how long is the long run really?evrrybody is poacing from each other ..
what was once not ethical is pretty allright now…the point of references have changed, just as everything else has…
I have to agree with people like vultuoro and others..I do see both the sides of the story..but then when you are talking of ethics and stuff.. then why have a clause???? can you answer that???
everyone is looking for the best deal…you, L10NBridge, MNCs, employees, and everybody else…
Life is such buddy, when you have got into the business then you go to learn the tricks of the trade..learn to work around it…dont try to get even.. get better..move on…
Forget about them , forget they left if you are so good then they lost!!! not you…it aint worth it.. you have 98 more people and dont loose them.. thats all I got to say…
To tell you the truth, I don’t think Lionbridge needs to poach on your employees!!It simply attracts talent. You should take what Deepak Deshpande said positively. He is right…it is a career move for your staff. If I were you, I would get into a tie up with the company and share a talent pool. It is stupid to question ethics of an organization on an issue of this sort. If anything, he advised you that to retain talent, you have to pay it appropriately. This is simply not the manner in which you attack a peson in public. This is shameful to see you washing your dirty laundry like this by questioning the ethics of someone you hardly know. Please get your facts correct before you start a personal vendetta campaign. If you have not done enough to retain your employees then the problem is really yours and has nothing to do with Deshpande or Lionbridge whatsoever! Your reaction is like the child who refused to share his toys in school. And when the teacher took the toy to someone else, you started hitting out and bawling.
Karuna:
There is a fine line between attracting talent and poaching. Or unethical HR practices.
I guess you are trying to say that big companies are teachers and small companies are kids. So kids should take whatever the teacher does as positive. I don’t think that’s correct.
In the short term thinking of whose problem it is to “retain” and “attract” talent, let us not forget what we teach the young kids switching jobs!
Sonia, vijay and sabi are all the same person from L10Nbridge. Harman is none other than Deepak. I know these people..it is not surprising that they post comments defending themselves:)))
P.S I work with L10NBridge and am using an alias just like these people did. L10 like to gather mercenary robots..and that speaks much of the quality of work they do. I am leaving L10 it is boring work