Tuesday, November 28, 2006
Wipro plans to train GenNext managers
28th November, 2006 - Economic Times
While globalisation presents the biggest market opportunity for companies today, grooming and training their managers to handle employees, customers and stakeholders across borders and in different cultures have become a challenge.
Senior management at Wipro has found an interesting way to overcome this challenge. The company has teamed up with four large multinational corporations — Nissan, Loreal, Schneider Electric and Alcan — to form a common senior management training and development programme.
Each of these companies represents diverse industries ranging from automobiles to personal care and operates in both emerging as well as mature markets. “The idea is to expose business heads to strategic issues related to globalisation from different industries and geographies,” says Ranjan Acharya, VP, Corporate HRD, Wipro.
Each of the participating companies sends six of its senior managers (vice-president and above) for this programme. For the first programme Wipro sent six VPs drawn from its various business divisions including global IT business, consumer care and infrastructure engineering.
Anchored by professor John Stopford of London Business School, the global leadership programme is split into two modules, each lasting a week. Nissan in Tokyo hosted the first module, while Wipro hosted the second module this year.
The first module exposed all the participants to common issues and challenges related to globalisation. The second module, discussed challenges faced by each companies while taking the business global.
So, while Wipro managers raised the issue of forming and managing client relationships across industries, Nissan’s challenge was how to form cross-functional teams to solve business problems and the L’oreal team worked on a herbal formulation for the Indian market.
“Most organisations tend to be very inward-focused, this programme exposes our managers to real issues faced by other global companies. They also understand how to resolve these challenges,” says Mr Acharya. Wipro then channelises this learning into its strategic planning cell.
“For me the really exciting thing was that I could sit down and chill with all these participants, not as clients but as friends, and soak up all the cultural nuances” says Sangita Singh, senior VP, EAS, Wipro Technologies, a participant in the first programme.
For someone like Ms Singh, who has spent almost her entire working life at Wipro, this provides an opportunity to “experience the insides of another organisation”. “We swapped stories about our work-life and organisational issues and I came back with some fascinating insights” she says.
One such insight came directly from the Nissan CEO Carlos Ghosn. Ms Singh had just taken over a business unit at Wipro and was struggling to come up with a vision statement for her team. During the leadership programme Nissan shared a presentation that Mr Ghosn had made to his colleagues 60 days after joining Nissan.
“Normally vision statements are made from 60,000 ft, but this was so simple, capturing all that Ghosn had learnt in his first two months at Nissan. He then followed it up with simple operational metrics with timelines in which they were to be achieved”. Ms Singh now follows the same format for her business.
What started as an experiment for Wipro has turned into a huge success internally. So positive has been the first group’s response to the global leadership programme that it has created a huge demand for more such initiatives.
The company has responded by putting together another such programme hosted by Professor Henry Mintzberg, an internationally renowned author of management, which has two other companies (one of them is Motorola) apart from Wipro.
The company sent 14 managers for this programme, which has three modules, spread over three continents. The first module was held in McGill University in Montreal, the second module will be held in IIM Bangalore.
Apart from the rich experiences that these initiatives bring to Wipro employees, the company also benefits from the fact that these programmes cost about a third of the money charged by IVY League schools such as Wharton and Stanford.
But it is the intangible benefits of the programmes that will really benefit Wipro. Its managers get to build deep and relationships with a set of people who might become a potential customer some day.
While globalisation presents the biggest market opportunity for companies today, grooming and training their managers to handle employees, customers and stakeholders across borders and in different cultures have become a challenge.
Senior management at Wipro has found an interesting way to overcome this challenge. The company has teamed up with four large multinational corporations — Nissan, Loreal, Schneider Electric and Alcan — to form a common senior management training and development programme.
Each of these companies represents diverse industries ranging from automobiles to personal care and operates in both emerging as well as mature markets. “The idea is to expose business heads to strategic issues related to globalisation from different industries and geographies,” says Ranjan Acharya, VP, Corporate HRD, Wipro.
Each of the participating companies sends six of its senior managers (vice-president and above) for this programme. For the first programme Wipro sent six VPs drawn from its various business divisions including global IT business, consumer care and infrastructure engineering.
Anchored by professor John Stopford of London Business School, the global leadership programme is split into two modules, each lasting a week. Nissan in Tokyo hosted the first module, while Wipro hosted the second module this year.
The first module exposed all the participants to common issues and challenges related to globalisation. The second module, discussed challenges faced by each companies while taking the business global.
So, while Wipro managers raised the issue of forming and managing client relationships across industries, Nissan’s challenge was how to form cross-functional teams to solve business problems and the L’oreal team worked on a herbal formulation for the Indian market.
“Most organisations tend to be very inward-focused, this programme exposes our managers to real issues faced by other global companies. They also understand how to resolve these challenges,” says Mr Acharya. Wipro then channelises this learning into its strategic planning cell.
“For me the really exciting thing was that I could sit down and chill with all these participants, not as clients but as friends, and soak up all the cultural nuances” says Sangita Singh, senior VP, EAS, Wipro Technologies, a participant in the first programme.
For someone like Ms Singh, who has spent almost her entire working life at Wipro, this provides an opportunity to “experience the insides of another organisation”. “We swapped stories about our work-life and organisational issues and I came back with some fascinating insights” she says.
One such insight came directly from the Nissan CEO Carlos Ghosn. Ms Singh had just taken over a business unit at Wipro and was struggling to come up with a vision statement for her team. During the leadership programme Nissan shared a presentation that Mr Ghosn had made to his colleagues 60 days after joining Nissan.
“Normally vision statements are made from 60,000 ft, but this was so simple, capturing all that Ghosn had learnt in his first two months at Nissan. He then followed it up with simple operational metrics with timelines in which they were to be achieved”. Ms Singh now follows the same format for her business.
What started as an experiment for Wipro has turned into a huge success internally. So positive has been the first group’s response to the global leadership programme that it has created a huge demand for more such initiatives.
The company has responded by putting together another such programme hosted by Professor Henry Mintzberg, an internationally renowned author of management, which has two other companies (one of them is Motorola) apart from Wipro.
The company sent 14 managers for this programme, which has three modules, spread over three continents. The first module was held in McGill University in Montreal, the second module will be held in IIM Bangalore.
Apart from the rich experiences that these initiatives bring to Wipro employees, the company also benefits from the fact that these programmes cost about a third of the money charged by IVY League schools such as Wharton and Stanford.
But it is the intangible benefits of the programmes that will really benefit Wipro. Its managers get to build deep and relationships with a set of people who might become a potential customer some day.
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