Employees First, Customers Second: Turning Conventional Management Upside Down

Abstract

From a brand losing market share and customers to an organization that delivered accelerated growth by focusing on employees and leveraging the value zone. Nayar narrates how he defied the conventional wisdom that companies must put customers first, and then turned the hierarchical pyramid upside down by making management accountable to the employees, and not the other way around. Nayar fired the imagination of both employees and customers and set HCLT on a journey of transformation that has made it one of the fastest-growing and profitable global IT -one of the twenty most influential companies in the world. Nayar recounts the exciting journey of how he and his team implemented the employee first philosophy by: creating a sense of urgency by enabling the employees to see the truth of the companies current state as well as feel the romance of its possible future state; creating a culture of trust by pushing the envelope of transparency in communication and information sharing; inverting the organizational hierarchy by making the management and the enabling functions accountable to the employee in the value zone; and, unlocking the potential of the employees by fostering an entrepreneurial mind-set, decentralizing decision making, and transferring the ownership of change to the employee in the value zone."Employee first, Customer Second" (EFCS) is an engaging philosophy. It's a serving CEOs account of working with day to day challenges of gravity, established mindsets and capturing markets which were unthinkable. EFCE is as much a book on strategy as it is on Execution. It is the story of HCL Tech's evolution from being a software outsourcing outfit for mid size companies to one cracking mega deals with large corporations globally. It's a tale of unconventional management practices which have succeeded in transforming an Indian organization into a global name with presence in multiple geographies and competing with the very best in business. Looking at the reality, accepting the problem and creating a vision around the solution to create the future. The book has five themes:Mirror Mirror: It was created to allow managers & employees to accept reality about their performance & accountability. Managers need to know where their businesses stand and where their business is headed, even if the journey is a successful one or failure. Acceptance is the key to first improve your business. EFCS states, Mirror is a communications exercise that involves talking with employees throughout the organization about the truth as they see it and getting them to acknowledge the reality. He classified employees as "The transformers are the Gen Y employees". They are employees who asked questions and expected logical answers. They are individuals who spend a lot of time surfing the internet and new technology. They do not make themselves readily available to any company and will leave company for the next best opportunity. The "lost souls" are the employees that are more negative than others. They are the ones that are convinced that n...