30 OCT 2011

ORGANIZATIONAL DEVELOPMENT AND CHANGE MANAGEMENT

TATA CONSULTANCY SERVICES

Organizational Development
Organization Development has been defined as a process by which behavioral science knowledge and practices are used to help organizations to achieve greater effectiveness, including improved quality of life, increased productivity, and improved product and service quality. Its focus is on improving the organization's ability to assess and to solve its own problems & to move the organization to a higher level of functioning by improving the performance and satisfaction of organization members. At Tata Consultancy Services Limited, (TCSL), too OD interventions have been instrumental in facilitating change management and bringing about competitive advantage. OD has contributed to redefining the organizations relationship to its environment, its markets and key stakeholders. About TCS Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) is one of the major providers of information technology services. The company provides a wide range of services including business consulting, information technology, business process outsourcing, infrastructure, and engineering. The company operates in Americas, Europe, Middle East, South Africa and Asia Pacific. The company is headquartered in Mumbai, India and has around 160,500 employees. The company recorded revenues of INR300,289.2 million ($6,339.1 million) during the financial year ended March 2010 (FY2010), an increase of 8% over 2009. The operating profit of the company was INR83,057.3 million ($1,753.3 million) in FY2010, an increase of 34.4% over 2009. Its net profit was INR70,006.4 million ($1,477.8 million) in FY2010, an increase of 33.2% over 2009. Pre- OD scenario of TCS In the years 1998-99, TCS had grown into the largest Indian software company with revenues of over Rs.1600 corers and racing towards achieving its vision of being global top ten. As pioneers in the industry, TCSs strengths included on time delivery, premier position in the industry in terms of revenues, focus on training programs, quality initiatives, use of good technical tools and procedures and encouragement of individual excellence in performance. STRENGHT In the years 1998-99, TCS had grown into the largest Indian software company.
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Racing towards achieving its vision of being global top ten. On time delivery, Premier position in the industry in terms of revenues, Focus on training programs, Quality initiatives, Use of good technical tools and procedures and Encouragement of individual excellence in performance.

Diagnose Problems 1. Mounting revenue pressures: : The pressure to retain its strong premier position led the organization to tend towards short-term revenues, and relatively lesser efforts were being put into medium and long-term markets and activities (such as products and building up knowledge). Though TCS built relationships with individual customers, Relationship Managers largely tended to focus on obtaining short-term projects there was lesser investment on aligning to long-term objectives of customers. The approach, by and large, was of reactive project management and we were yet to espouse the approach of architecting proactive solutions for the customer. 2. Selectivity in projects: There was a tangible tension at TCS, between generating revenues and organizing strategically, on basis of technology and business areas, impacting selectivity in projects accepted. Pressures from customers on schedules was resulting in faster delivery and hence, snowballing into further pressure on future schedules.

3. Efforts on Experimentation and Innovation: The management at TCS felt that by and large, employees tended to go straight by the book. Though Dr. De Bonos techniques were introduced and employees trained on these techniques to encourage innovation, there was a need to scale up on perceived rewards for experimentation. 4. Focus on specialization: There was diffusion of expertise and we were yet to focus on building strategic expertise in individual centers. Employees were rotated across domains and skills in the interest of learn ability as well as for meeting requirements. In a sense, there was heightened focus on Voice of the Customer, in comparison to the Voice of Employee.

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5. Rewards and Recognitions: The reward structure at TCS was, at this point in time, primarily focused on individual performance and we were yet to explore the institutionalization of team based rewards at the organizational level. 6. Inter group co-ordination & knowledge sharing: Sharing of knowledge was very centre-oriented, and although, informally, best practices spread by interaction and word of mouth, we were yet to evolve a formal system which would capture these for ease of replication across projects. Multiple centers and multiple projects within the same centre ended up resolving the same sort of issues, resulting in avoidable rework. 7. Branding and PR: Image building endeavors were not yet an area of focus and, in a subtle way, this affected the sense of pride of employees. Among educational institutions, this meant greater difficulty in terms of attracting quality talent, which further aggravated stress among the few key performers in the organization.

Alignment and Attunement: As an answer to the areas of concern, alignment and attunement were sought to be achieved through integrating and balancing out the four voices:
Voice of Wealth
Voice of Employee
Voice of Customer
Voice of Technology The Organizational Development interventions at TCS focused on balancing tensions arising from these four voices along dimensions of strategizing, valuing, serving, energizing, investing and improving.

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Organizational Development interventions at TCS

strategizing

Improve ment

Serving

Focus
Investing

Valuing energizing

OD Intervention: An Overview Human Process Interventions: Coaching Training & Development Process Consultation Team Building.

Techno-structural Interventions Restructuring Organization.

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Employee Involvement. Work Design.

Human resource management interventions Goal setting. Performance appraisal. Reward systems.

Strategic Change Interventions: Mergers & Acquisitions. Alliances Networks.

Scenario Building Workshops: An internal organization workshop was conducted with top management for scenario building. This program focused at a larger level, on the The TCS that can be . The idea was to challenge the conventional ways of thinking and to give shape to the key drivers of change through realistic listening and dialoguing. These workshops were followed by dissemination and communication of the scenarios with teams in order to develop a new language in the organization, consistent with the envisaged future scenario. As a fallout of this workshop, several representatives of senior management worked on building scenarios as for e.g. on TCS tools and approach to high end consulting. These looked at what we were and what we wished to be, our competition, changes and challenges with regard to our business models, technologies, products and support functions. Further, the factors that would facilitate the desired change and focuses that needed to be redefined were clearly laid down. The scenarios addressed the nature of the struggle the organization would go through and etched out realistic possibilities based on present factors. The roles and context that would impinge on the following were detailed: Wealth creation
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 Factors which will enhance productivity and enhance the feeling of being valued Resource allocation and team-work Membership criteria and norms of the group Learning opportunities for individuals and teams Scenario Building Workshops Internal organization workshop was conducted with top management for scenario building. Focused at a larger level, on the The TCS that can be. Aim: To challenge the conventional ways of thinking and to give shape to the key drivers of change. Realistic listening and dialoguing. Dissemination and communication of the scenarios with teams. To develop a new language for the organization, consistent with the envisaged future scenario. PROPEL PROPEL was introduced as a revolutionary intervention with the dual objectives of facilitating the exchange of ideas and helping in immediate problem solving, while also encouraging bonding and self-development among and within teams. As the organization and its relationships grew, it brought its own challenges, whereas change remained a constant. PROPEL was introduced as a platform and a tool to help bring about this change, in consonance with the TCS belief of Let us make it a joy for all our stakeholders. Promoting continuous improvement at a cross-functional level was one of the envisaged objectives. Change management was enabled through alignment with growth strategy; by creating platforms for dialogue on the current and emerging experience of the organization. PROPEL has helped the organization build a culture of collaboration, creativity and also networks of relationships through its two modes: 1. Confluences: Listening to the voice of the employee in a team scenario, by
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creating a platform for open sharing of thoughts on a relevant theme. This is achieved through a balance of fun, introspection and interaction, while evoking commitment to self- development. 2. Camps: Platform for problem solving, focus on the Quality, Cost and Delivery measures of throughput resulting in transfer and adoption of best practices within and amongst relationships in the organization.

Techno structural interventionsValue Cards at the Large Relationship Devised after the analysis of tensions existing in the four dimensions as represented by Voice of Customer, Shareholders, Employee and Technology. Used to analyze the problems faced by the relationship in relation to these tensions. To arrive at workable solutions to the identified problems, within designated timeframes. Helped to effectively capture and track this through the following steps: 1. The situation summary was charted out. 2. Improvement goals, action plans and owners of each plan were identified. 3. Success measures were identified against the dimensions of Valuing, Strategizing, Improving, for each actionable, along with timeframe for closure. 4. Impact was analyzed in terms of short term and long-term actions. Balanced Scoured Card Lead to the formulation of career paths in TCS global services, consulting and products, supported by HR processes, tools and support staff. This structure was designed to enable a fair degree of flexibility in rotating at appropriate levels, provides avenues for individual growth. Besides, there was an exercise to bring out new role definitions in Human Resources (HR), focusing on alignment, energizing and task facilitation through HR. Business leaders dialogued to evolve the mission and expectations and further, to design enablers for continuous change, team work, and individual growth.

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Darpan - Reflect and Improve With aggressive expansion and dispersion of ever-growing associate strength in the relationship, communication or the lack of it, had emerged as one of the biggest bottlenecks in employee motivation and managerial decision-making. In this context, an associate satisfaction survey at relationship level christened Darpan, was initiated, with the objective to Reflect and Improve at the relationship level through a better understanding of the explicit and implicit expectations of associates. A Questionnaire was used to collect the preliminary data, as a structured mechanism to capture associate feedback across 5 categories: Career & Job, Communication, Culture & Pride, Leadership and Supervisor. The Survey comprised 20 questions related to leadership, communication, culture and pride, career, supervisor, work environment, competency building, work-life balance etc. Interestingly, the maximum number of questions revolved around the single most important entity - the Supervisor. This was in consonance with several studies which reveal this as the pivotal factor to associate satisfaction and aspiration. Analysis of Darpan Results: Details such as experience within the relationship, designation, gender and Business Unit (BU) were taken as the basis for analysis of survey results, to arrive at focused findings. Analysis was done for the overall relationship, as well as individual Business Units within the relationship. The results were then shared with the entire team and actionable evolved through a series of camps and confluences. The Cultural Perspective: Outcomes from Darpan There was a distinct increase in the Associate Satisfaction Index (ASI) in Darpan 06, which, interestingly, corresponded to an increase in Customer Satisfaction Index (CSI) as well. In the recent Darpan results, the following findings have emerged: 91 % of the team felt proud of being part of the relationship. 90% of the team felt that they are now able to see the big picture and know how their contributions add value to the customers. 90% of the team felt that their supervisors are approachable for any kind of guidance and enable them to do their job better.

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Post OD scenario from cultural prospective Organizational Development interventions have been instrumental in terms of enhancing value to the customer & employee at Tata Consultancy Services. PROPEL - encouraged sharing of ownership and empowerment to change, as also the sharing of success stories and best practices across the organization. Valuing of employees was institutionalized through establishing processes that enable and enhance individual performance, and lead to empowered project teams. Issue based mentoring was facilitated, with camps and confluences as enabling frameworks. Confluences invested in personal transformation for the employee, camps invested in improving the workspace. Through Scenario building, a collective transformation of dreams and concerns into response capabilities was envisaged. Continuous scanning of environment for opportunities and threats was proactively looked at. Goal alignment through cascading of Balanced Score Card concept could be achieved organization wide. There was continuous investment in learning, and an active sharing of knowledge with the aim to convert learning into action. The focus shifted to adding knowledge through delighting every customer. The earlier tendency of self-sacrificing hard work was replaced by a shift of focus to teamwork and valuing of the employee. Helped push self imposed boundaries and limitations through challenging organizational boundaries and limitations constantly.

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Organizational Structure

Organizational Infrastructure

Conclusion OD interventions at TCS have helped build a culture of fostering systems thinking. Creating forums for dialogue. Encouraging leadership at all levels. For the organization at large, OD helped to reiterate the merits of valuing enquiry, expressing differences, and constantly generating new knowledge.

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