AAA+

Does your employee absent frequently? Does he or she have trouble in execution of the work? Are behavioral issues causing problems in everyday activities?

If you answered yes to one or more of those questions, the AAA+ can help you to understand what is at the root of these issues. It will show you where your human capital strength lie as well as his or her weaknesses and how AAA+ may be able to help.

For over a decade, AAA+ program has helped thousands of employees overcome their behavioral, functional, executive and performance issues through this integrated approach.

However, it is critical to first understand your employee’s particular strengths and weakness and if they have a functional dis-connection or brain imbalance in their executive skill development. AAA+ can help identify your employees behavioral and performance weaknesses through a comprehensive assessment.

The AAA+ is an objective and quantifiable measurement of each area of function - motor, sensory, behavioral, social, emotional and cognitive - allowing us to better understand your employees challenges.

The assessment is tailor made to suite the organization's environment and culture. The assessment consists of evaluation of more than 156 functions and competencies.

There will be series of physical activities that are designed to identify the areas of your employees behavioral strength and weakness, which can lead to an imbalance or functional disconnection. We assess all aspects of skill development - sensory processing during this assessment.

There will be cognitive examinations - a standardized to industry and organizational culture - that measure 120 different skills. Over this course of the test, it becomes very clear which type of the functional - executive skill are strong and which are weak and further, highlights the corresponding areas of affect. Along with their reasoning we assess cognitive skills, listening ability and social development and behavior.

The employees describe our assessment as fun and motivating, while it provides us with invaluable information about your employees current physical, verbal, behavioral, functional skills.

The report of assessment.

Following the evaluation, together we will review a detailed report of your employee's results and discuss how AAA+ will help you. The report will provide you with a complete understanding of your employee behavioral, social and functional skills. We will also explain in detail what we can do to address these cause and help you to reduce or eliminate these issues, resulting in long-term improvement in performance and social behavior.

You can integrate the AAA+ in your organizational development activities to address the human capital challenges.

Mail to pbji@helikx.in or call +91 9524863670. 

How to survive and Excel in College

The first few weeks on campus are extremely critical for all new students. It is during this time that you make critical decisions that will have an effect on the rest of your life. Some of these  tips are critical during your first weeks, while the others are meant for longer-term guidance and survival. Whatever you do, be sure to be yourself and try to enjoy your college experience as much as possible. Expect to feel some stress and homesickness, but don’t let these issues wear you down.

Go to all orientations:

Do you really need to go on yet another campus tour? Yes. The faster you learn your way around campus and around all the red tape the more at ease you’ll feel and the better prepared you’ll be when issues arise.

Get involved on campus:

A big problem for a lot of new students is a combination of homesickness and a feeling of not quite belonging. A solution? Consider joining a select group and be careful not to go overboard  of student organizations, clubs, sororities or fraternities, or sports teams. You’ll make new friends, learn new skills, and feel more connected to your school.

Take responsibility for yourself and your actions:

Don’t look to place the blame on others for your mistakes; own up to them and move on. Being an adult means taking responsibility for everything that happens to you l

Get to know your roommate and others in your residence hall. The people you live with, most of whom are going through similar experiences and emotions, are your main safety net not only this year, but for all your years. You may change roommates after the first semester or you may stay roommates for all four years just take the time to get to know your fellow first-year students.

Get Organized. In high school, the teachers tended to lead you through all the homework and due dates. In college, the professors post the assignments often for the entire semester and expect you to be prepared. Buy an organizer, use an app, or get a big wall calendar whatever it takes for you to know when assignments are due.

Find the ideal place for you to study. It may be your dorm room or a cozy corner of the library, but find a place that works best for you to get your work done while avoiding as many distractions as possible.

Go to class. Obvious, right?

Maybe, but sleeping in and skipping that 8 am class will be tempting at times. Avoid the temptation. Besides learning the material by attending classes, you’ll also receive vital information from the professors about what to expect on tests, changes in due dates, etc.

Become an expert on course requirements and due dates. Professors spend hours and hours preparing course syllabi and calendars so that you will know exactly what is expected of you and when. One of the lamest excuses a student can give a professor: “I didn’t know it was due today.”

Meet with your professors. 

Speaking as a professor, I can assure you there are only upsides to getting to know your professors, especially if later in the semester you run into some snags. Professors schedule office hours for the sole purpose of meeting with students — take advantage of that time.

Seek a balance.

College life is a mixture of social and academic happenings. Don’t tip the balance too far in either direction. One of my favourite former students always used to say her motto was to “study hard so she could play hard.”

And final one “Stay Healthy” the most important one for students excellence is Health.

How college is different form High School

Being a First-Year Student/Orientation

Being a first-year student is fun! Unlike high school, where your first year is usually filled with anxiety and the occasional wrong-classroom mishap, colleges prepare first-year students with an orientation that builds a strong bond among class members. Many colleges offer additional early orientation programs to foster relationships before the school year even begins. Attend as many orientations options as possible. It will make your college transition easier if you already have bonds with your classmates. Once orientation is over and the upper-class students are back on campus, you will find that they are excited to meet the first-year students, and you become very comfortable in the college setting very quickly. 

The Learning Environment 

You are no longer a passive learner who just sits and listens to a teacher, occasionally writes a paper, and takes a test in which you are expected to simply reiterate what you have learned or been told by the teacher. You will not be provided with notes; rather, you are expected to figure out on your own what’s important. (Professors are available during their office hours for help if what’s important is ever unclear.) In college your professors are expecting you to voice your thoughts, and disagreeing with the professor’s opinion is considered an interesting debate, not deviant behaviour. Class participation and providing your own perspective and analysis are key to success in the college learning environment.  
Culture 

If you are from anywhere other than a big city, most of your friends are probably a lot like you. You may not all share the same personality, but the things you consider “normal” are probably the same. Your parents are probably a lot like your friends’ parents. They probably even share the same tax bracket. You go to the same type of restaurants as your friends. You and your friends probably share similar ideas of what is fun to do on a Friday night. Until you get to college, it rarely occurs to you that life could be any different — until you find yourself surrounded by hundreds of students just like you, with very different stories. You quickly learn that “normal” simply doesn’t exist. One of the best things about going to college is the opportunity to interact with a wide variety of cultures.   

The Downside of Work-Life Balance

One way to think about work-life balance issues is with a concept known as The Four Burners Theory. Here’s how it was first explained to me:

Imagine that your life is represented by a stove with four burners on it. Each burner symbolizes one major quadrant of your life.

¨ The first burner represents your Family.

¨ The second burner is your Friends.

¨ The third burner is your Health.

¨ The fourth burner is your Work.

The Four Burners Theory says that “in order to be successful you have to cut off one of your burners. And in order to be really successful you have to cut off two.”

Three views of the FOUR burners

My initial reaction to The Four Burners Theory was to search for a way to bypass it. “Can I succeed and keep all four burners running?” I wondered.

Perhaps I could combine two burners. “What if I lumped family and friends into one category?”

Maybe I could combine health and work. “I hear sitting all day is unhealthy. What if I got a standing desk?” Now, I know what you are thinking. Believing that you will be healthy because you bought a standing desk is like believing you are a rebel because you ignored the fasten seatbelt sign on an airplane, but whatever. 

Soon I realized I was inventing these workarounds because I didn’t want to face the real issue: life is filled with tradeoffs. If you want to excel in your work and in your marriage, then your friends and your health may have to suffer. If you want to be healthy and succeed as a parent, then you might be forced to dial back your career ambitions. Of course, you are free to divide your time equally among all four burners, but you have to accept that you will never reach your full potential in any given area.

Essentially, we are forced to choose. Would you rather live a life that is unbalanced, but high-performing in a certain area? Or would you rather live a life that is balanced, but never maximizes your potential in a given quadrant?

What is the best way to handle these work-life balance problems? I don’t claim to have it figured out, but here are three ways of thinking about The Four Burners Theory.

Option 1: Outsource Burners

We outsource small aspects of our lives all the time. We buy fast food so we don’t have to cook. We go to the dry cleaners to save time on laundry. We visit the car repair shop so we don’t have to fix our own automobile.

Outsourcing small portions of your life allows you to save time and spend it elsewhere. Can you apply the same idea to one quadrant of your life and free up time to focus on the other three burners?

Work is the best example. For many people, work is the hottest burner on the stove. It is where they spend the most time and it is the last burner to get turned off. In theory, entrepreneurs and business owners can outsource the work burner. They do it by hiring employees. 

In my article on The 3 Stages of Failure, I covered Sam Carpenter’s story about building business systems that allowed him to work just two hours per week. He outsourced himself from the daily work of the business while still reaping the financial benefits.

Parenting is another example. Working parents are often forced to “outsource” the family burner by dropping their children off at daycare or hiring a babysitter. Calling this outsourcing might seem unfair, but -- like the work example above -- parents are paying someone else to keep the burner running while they use their time elsewhere.

The advantage of outsourcing is that you can keep the burner running without spending your time on it. Unfortunately, removing yourself from the equation is also a disadvantage. Most entrepreneurs, artists and creators I know would feel bored and without a sense of purpose if they had nothing to work on each day. Every parent I know would rather spend time with their children than drop them off at day-care. Outsourcing keeps the burner running, but is it running in a meaningful way?

Option 2: Embrace Constraints

One of the most frustrating parts of The Four Burners Theory is that it shines a light on your untapped potential. It can be easy to think, “If only I had more time, I could make more money or get in shape or spend more time at home.”

One way to manage this problem is to shift your focus from wishing you had more time to maximizing the time you have. In other words, you embrace your limitations. The question to ask yourself is, “Assuming a particular set of constraints, how can I be as effective as possible?”

For example:

Assuming I can only work from 9 AM to 5 PM, how can I make the most money possible?

Assuming I can only write for 15 minutes each day, how can I finish my book as fast as possible?

Assuming I can only exercise for 3 hours each week, how can I get in the best shape possible?

Option 3: the seasons of life

A third way to manage your four burners is by breaking your life into seasons. What if, instead of searching for perfect work-life balance at all times, you divided your life into seasons that focused on a particular area?

The importance of your burners may change throughout life. When you are in your 20s or 30s and you don’t have children, it can be easier to get to the gym and chase career ambitions. The health and work burners are on full blast. A few years later, you might start a family and suddenly the health burner dips down to a slow simmer while your family burner gets more gas. Another decade passes and you might revive relationships with old friends or pursue that business idea you had been putting off.

You don’t have to give up on your dreams forever, but life rarely allows you to keep all four burners going at once. Maybe you need to let go of something for this season. You can do it all in a lifetime, but not at the same damn time. In the words of Nathan Barry, “Commit to your goal with everything you have -- for a season.”

For the last five years, I have been in my entrepreneurship season. I built a successful business, but it came with costs. I turned my friends burner way down and my family burner is only running halfway.

What season are you in right now?

Model to SHARPEN Employees

Today’s rapidly evolving workplace requires employees to constantly upgrade their skills. They must be equipped to find knowledge quickly, be proficient with technology and be able to interact and collaborate using a variety of communication tools.

Forward-thinking training initiatives can help employees be successful in a rapidly evolving environment. Yet many companies continue to use old-school training methods that have failed to keep pace with major trends affecting the workplace.

A survey by Indian Consulting Group found that companies spend tens of billions of rupees globally each year to train employees, but the money often is wasted because “the training is not geared to drive business results.” It also discovered that business leadership training and talent development often overlook frontline leaders, who create value for customers and that the training employees do receive often doesn't have a meaningful impact on business results.

According to "The Impact of Employee Engagement on Performance," a 2013 report by Indian Business Review Analytical Services, having a highly engaged workforce “not only maximizes a company’s investment in human capital and improves productivity, but it can also significantly reduce costs, such as turnover, that directly impact the bottom line."

Yet only about 32 percent of employees in the India are engaged, involved in, enthusiastic about and committed to their work and workplace, according to recent surveys by Gallup. That means more than two thirds of employees are not engaged. 

Meanwhile, Millennials and Gen Xers are a growing majority of the workforce. Millennials last year surpassed Gen X as the largest cohort of the Indian labour force. 

These trends are driving many companies to take a hard look at costly, ineffective and time-consuming traditional training - the kind involving daylong workshops and “death by PowerPoint” presentations. Today’s employees want opportunities for on demand, on-the-job training and feedback.

Progressive companies are opting for a more immersive, interactive and ongoing training approach that typically involves technology. Toward this purpose, many are utilizing micro learning - delivering training content in a bite-sized, on-demand format.

Micro learning can include anything from simple methods, such as directing employees to research topics online and reporting what they discover, to customized digital libraries that offer leaders and employees on-demand access to a constantly evolving set of topics.

Companies that utilize micro learning effectively focus on providing rich content in a variety of formats so learners can focus on the right knowledge and skills in multiple ways. Here are some tips for building more agile, effective and efficient training.

Offer flexible options. 

Learners are no longer tied to their laptop or PC. They use Twitter, YouTube, Pinterest and other social media networks to get information. Give them specific skill building content they can use in a moment of need via social media or other online tools.

Provide both short and long learning opportunities.
These can range from a 30-second video available on their phones, focusing on a specific job challenge, to in-depth elearning courses and one-on-one coaching. 

Make it practical and interactive. 

Effective training shows employees the connection between what they are being asked to do and why. It should connect them with the specific skills and information they need to do their jobs, and give them opportunities to learn, practice and get feedback. 

Make it social, and fun. 

Including a social element that involves community sharing and learning, and perhaps gaming elements, will intrigue learners to return frequently.

The new reality of training is the 70-20-10 model, in which learners get 70 percent of their knowledge from job-related experiences, 20 percent from interactions with others and 10 percent from formal educational events. 

I expect interactive, on-demand, on-the-job learning solutions will remain critical to helping companies remain agile and adapt to rapidly changing business environments, though the form of these solutions will undoubtedly continue to evolve. Be open to experimenting with new modalities. 

Stepping Stones to Success : BRANDING

Just yesterday I was talking to marketing head of an e-commerce company and he shared lots of insight about Branding. He talked how his company is more focussed on building the brand and retaining the loyalty of customers than actual selling. A brand carries that strength and it takes a lot of effort and time to reach there "on the pinnacle". Brand building is the most important factor to pay attention if we want to exist in long run  

What is Branding ? 

Is marketing equivalent to Branding ? Maybe yes , maybe no . Everything a company does contribute to its branding and Marketing is a function which aids in visibility of those activities. If I want my customer or end user to be advocate of my product or services, I need to brand that. I need to etch in their mind our values and worth. Brand is an image of our product in consumer's mind and branding is a process of creating that image. If we follow this process of seven steps religiously, we can be sure of building a great brand. 

Build your brand in the minds of consumer  

A brand is not just a name that possess unique identity. Power of brand lies in its ability to influence its consumer to buy. Power of brand lies in creating that loyalty in our consumer's behaviour. As a consumer I may not be able to differentiate between taste of different breads or maybe different packaged drinking water, but still I prefer one above the other. 

Its because that product has followed the branding process better than the other  

Be specific -Don’t be everything to  everybody 

Branding curtails the thinking of “ being everything to everyone “ There should be a differentiation, I may be very good at selling cake but if I end up bringing chocolates, wafers, soft drink, cookies everything in one name, I would lose the charm. It confuses our customers about speciality. Don’t expand your umbrella to bring everything underrate. It would gradually decrease the viability and undermine your brand name in consumer’s mind.  

Focus on your speciality 

Every shop has a masala powder but when we think about a brand , we think Sakthi Masala. If I want a milk paneer I would prefer Milky Mist or Amul. Your consumer should think of you when it comes to that category. Just be excellent in not think, specialize in that one skill and you will be forever etched in the minds of your consumer. Branding can also be synonymous to dominating the category  

Publicise your brand  

Why XYZ and not ABC is a big question. In a start-up phase you cannot reply  on advertising. You are just born and you need to be in news for good reasons. Reach out to people, travel, interact, discuss and debate around your idea and it will attract the consumer to your brand. To develop a great brand, scare away from negative news. What others say about your brand is a big way to publicise. Help your consumer in having a good experience. Their experience will generate loyalty and that would help in massive branding.                                 

Advertise as a leader  

Spending on an advertisement is like spending on a good security system for your house. It helps you lose against your competition. When you have done things discussed above , you have paved the way to good advertisement. Leadership is a great way of projecting your brand . Advertise yourself as a leader in the category/domain. 

Who sells the best Penthouse Who delivers pizza fastest Who kills mosquitoes in most harmless way Chose your strength and play around it. 

Own that one word 

Branding means owning that one word . that one word should generate something in your mind.  If I talk about building a brand , I would focus on etching that word in consumer’s mind. It should create an image and should be synonym of something to focus on.

• A Five Star hotel name should portray “luxury” 
• A baby shop should portray “care” 
• A health drink should portray “nourishment”  

That word is the key to brand building . If I want my health drink to portray nourishment , I would add the most nourishing ingredients and also find a code word for nourishment and finally play around these two things to create a nourishing image  

Build the credibility 

Customers are suspicious, they tend to see a company as a profit maker and as a brand we need to work on reliability factor. When we advertise on leadership factor , we equally need to validate that point. We have to get our credentials correct. If we want to be successful brand we need to do everything it takes to reach there.  

Do you mind waiting for a table outside that leading restaurant for lunch ? No we don’t? the link of customers waiting outside has paved the way of its credibility. Be authentic and build on your credentials. 

The Google Tool That Helps You Make Better HR Decisions

Data has the power to strengthen everything businesses do, from the new products they launch to the marketing campaigns they use to promote those products. Gathering information and putting that information to use has become big business, creating jobs and cloud solutions. When a business is more informed before making decisions, that business can get more return from every dollar it spends.

People analytics in big business.

Google is one of the highest-profile users of people analytics for human resources. The company bases many of its decisions on data analytics, believing that the choices it makes about employees are more important than any other decisions, impacting the organization at all levels. By labeling its human resources department “people operations,” the company is saying that HR is as integral as any other area of operations. With the right people in place, businesses can provide better customer service and increase productivity while also minimizing cost.

Engineering firm Stantec uses people analytics to predict outcomes, including employee turnover trends. By looking at areas of the company that seem to have an increased rate of employee resignations and terminations, Stantec can determine where changes might need to be made. Predictive analytics help the company to maintain adequate staffing across the entire organizations. This sort of analytics has been used in retail for years, as companies look at last year’s numbers to determine how many employees are needed on the floor this year.

Small business applications.

Although small businesses can get the same benefits as larger businesses from people analytics, they often lack the resources necessary to gather information on employee actions. While cloud-based solutions provide an answer to that, often businesses simply need access to general information about hiring the right employees and getting the most out of them.

Google’s Work is likely to become a go-to resource for businesses in this situation. With re:Work, Google provides the results of the research it has done in the form of articles, case studies and tips from experts in various industries. Businesses can search re:Work for keywords or browse topics like hiring, managing or training. The platform is designed to demonstrate how organizations can help each other better cultivate and nurture top talent.

Analytics makes HR more effective

As businesses launch their own people analytics programs, Google is offering support in that area. The company offers guides specific to topics like running employee surveys and identifying and defining metrics. Following the guide step by step, businesses can learn how to set up their own people analytics and make the most out of them. The company also has a book on its insights, as well as a people analytics-based hashtag called  “ Make  Work Better”.

By observing the way Google has changed its HR activities as a result of its analytics efforts, businesses can determine which behaviors work and which might be less effective. One major change Google made was in its interview process. After discovering that more than four interviewers didn’t increase the quality of hires, the company decreased the number of interviews required. The company also implemented an onboarding process that it found increased productivity by 15 percent.

Businesses are using analytics to power every important decision they make. A business’s employees are its most important assets, so why not use analytics to make decisions about hiring and employee retention? By following the example of large companies like Google, businesses of all sizes can gather the information they need to improve their hiring, training and employee promotion efforts.