An open culture, an environment of trust and passionate workers helped Induslogic become one of the hottest employers in India

Induslogic is the first offshore product development company to participate in the DQ-IDC Best Employers Survey 2005 and make it to the top 20 in its very first attempt. So what makes it one of the hottest employers in India? DQ attempts to look beyond plain numbers to find out.

It's All About Culture
Induslogic is an offshore product engineering company founded in 1998 by Tarun Upadhyay, 30, Manoj Agarwala, 36, Sanjay Singh, 38, and Rajul Garg, 27-all ex-IITians. Today the company is a 643-member team with 613 people at its Noida office in India, another nine in Mumbai, and the remaining 21 at its headquarter in Washington DC.

LOTS OF WORK, LOTS OF PLAY: Employees take some time out of work to enjoy a basketball session within the company premises

Meet Anuj Kumar, vice president, human resources at Induslogic. Kumar, a thorough pro with stints at companies such as CSC, HCL Infosystems, and Keane India explains that the management is very focused on creating the right environment and culture within the company. Incidentally, Induslogic scored highly on parameters like overall satisfaction and culture, which highlights the management's commitment to the culture building process. Says Kumar, “The idea is to create a sense of ownership among the employees.”

Organizational culture is all about creating trust. For example, company financials are available to employees on the internal website. “We are under no obligation to reveal company performance since we are not a listed company, but the step simply helps establish the right trust relationship between the management and the employees,” explains Kumar.

"Employee participation in policy formation creates a sense of ownership"
---Anuj Kumar, vice president, human resources at Induslogic

Continuous communication is also encouraged. An initiative, which is particularly popular among employees, is 'Time Out' where Rajul Garg,  who is VP-corporate development and the only co-founder based out of India currently, takes out four employees selected randomly to breakfast. While this helps create a more amicable environment in the organization, it also deepens the employee-management bond. In addition, there are fortnightly skip-level meeting, which essentially means that approximately 20 people on an average attend in the absence of managers and give their feedbacks, ratings, and suggestions on any support function in the organization. This is complemented by monthly updates from the CEO, Peter Harrison who is based in the US. Another interesting practice at Induslogic is employee involvement in the formulation of policies that directly impact them. Says Kumar, “This is a feel-good practice. Employees get the feeling that they have been a part of the decision-making process.” To encourage participation, the company gave rewards the first time it launched the practice.

Creating stars: Stars found atop key performers is another form of acknowledging and rewarding high performance

What Makes Induslogic a Star? Trust and transparency: Even though a privately held company, every employee gets access to company financials. This helps them assess the direction in which the company is moving and establishes a relationship of trust Ownership: ESOPs are given every year based on performance to the employees. Employee opinions are also taken while formulating policies that directly impact them Open culture: Employees are encouraged to communicate as much as possible. 'Time Out' is one of the initiatives where Garg, a co-founder of Induslogic, takes approximately four members of the team out to breakfast to discuss their problems and issues Quality of work and peers: High-level code writing that goes beyond just maintenance and superior quality of peers who help you grow better as a professional Two-track career program: Offers individuals who do not want to move in to management roles a parallel growth path

The Real Thing
Typically, product development companies require serious code jocks. Says Jaskaran Singh, director of technology-telecom, “I make sure that every new hire actually enjoys serious code writing so that there is no room for dissatisfaction.” It is commonly believed that the pace of change in technology is the biggest challenge today. Most people find it difficult to keep pace with the ever-changing world of technology. However, it is precisely this aspect of technology that is exciting for these geeks. Adds Singh, “If you can't keep pace you are just not fit for the job.”

A self-confessed techie, Singh himself has over eight years of experience with startups. There a couple of factors that makes working for an offshore product development (OPD) company a compelling proposition for geeks like Singh. One, you get the opportunity to work for startups which helps sustain the excitement minus the risks that are associated with startups. Two, one can strike a better work-life  balance as opposed to startups. In most organizations, one is expected to move into a managerial role as one grows in the organization. However, Induslogic offers a two-track growth program where one is allowed to continue at the operational level and get growth path similar to anyone who would be willing to move into a managerial role. Says Singh, “On a personal level, I would never like to work for some of the bigger names for the simple reason that at the senior level I would never get the opportunity to do what I do best-write codes.” Code jocks at Induslogic work on cutting edge technology as core teams for startups in the US and grow with these startups. The strategy also works well for the company's business model.

Some Shades of Grey
What makes Induslogic a hot employer is clearly the niche space it operates in and of course the size, which is insignificant as compared to some of the giants. Remember, it is always easier to keep a smaller team happy. It's clearly the technology edge and compensation that is driving satisfaction levels in the organization. Says Kumar, “We do benchmarking on a regular basis to meet industry standards. Compensation here falls in the 85% percentile.”

Open culture, exciting technology and good compensation-Induslogic has it all. But that's clearly not sufficient and Induslogic still has a long way to go. But that's understandable given that it is just a seven-year-old company. For one, Induslogic needs to streamline its appraisal system where it scored fairly low. Admits Kumar, “Our people processes and practices are not very well-defined. We are trying to streamline HR processes” Kumar, an HR professional with over 18 years of experience was inducted into the company's board in March this year exactly for this purpose and hopes to set things right by the end of the current fiscal. 

"We are also trying to bulid a sense of pride and passion among the employees towards the quality of work done at Induslogic as opposed to some of the bigger brands in the industry"
---Mukul Jain, COO and country manager in India

Two, while the company tries to meet industry benchmarks on compensation, it struggles to meet the high expectations of the employees who are the crème-de-la-crème of the industry. Over 50% of Induslogic employees are from the IITs and the RECs. This makes retention a big challenge for Induslogic. Says Kumar, “There is a shortage of people with experience in product engineering, proven credentials in education and work experience. This makes our people extremely valuable in the industry.”

There are issues job design and job content as well. Typically, in an offshore product development setup startups select their own team for projects and want such relationships to be long standing ones. Often team members want to move out and work with a different customer. Says Munish Gupta, assistant VP, “If we lose a team member to another team or another project, internally we call this attrition.” Induslogic has so far handled this problem well. Customers are encouraged to interact directly with the team members and rotate them if required. Adds Kumar, “We also try and convince our customers to go for larger teams. This makes teams more stable and helps take care of meeting individual aspirations.”

	"If we lose a team member to another team or anothe project, internally we call this attrition"			"I would never like to work for big names because at the senior level I would never get to do what I do best--write codes"
	--Munish Gupta assistant VP			--Jaskaran Singh director of technology-telecom

The company also tries to create an emotional bond with the customers and a sense of ownership among respective teams towards the customers. The message is-“we are an extension of the customer's team and what we do either makes or breaks the customer”. This is complemented by initiatives like project longevity bonus and team retention bonus. Adds Garg, “Motivation comes in the form of opportunities to show leadership skills as well as customer stock options.”

"Motivation comes in the form of opportunities to show leadership skills and customer stock options "
---Rajul Garg, VP, Corporate Development

Brand Building
Brand equity is a very important parameter of satisfaction and Induslogic lags significantly on this parameter­-both internally and externally. This has also been established in the best employers survey. The first step is of course, to bring professionals on board. Induslogic today has a professional CEO, Peter Harrison, who sits in the US and of course, Mukul Jain, COO and country manager in India. It took Rajul Garg one whole year to convince Jain, an industry veteran with a 20-year-old stint at HCL Technologies, to come aboard. Kumar also joined nine months back. Founders have consciously taken a backseat to create to institutionalize the company. Explains Garg, “None of us had the relevant experience to head the company.” Quite so. The average age of the founding team today seven years since inception is only 33 years.

The second step is to create the right working environment that includes an open and transparent culture and empowerment of the people.  Induslogic already has it. The company just needs to promote it better. Says Jain, the two-month-old head of Induslogic India, “Branding has to begin internally.” Today Jain and team try to represent Induslogic at professional forums. Employees are encouraged to publish papers and are rewarded for the same. Adds Jain, “We are also trying to build a sense of pride and passion among the employees towards the quality of work done at Induslogic as opposed to some of the bigger brands in the industry.”

The last one-year has seen the management stepping up efforts to create the right image for the still infant company in the industry. A start has already been made in the right direction. It will take some time to reap the benefits of these efforts.

-Bhaswati Chakravorty
bhaswatic@cybermedia.co.in