Monday 6 March 2017

Notice Period?Be Nice to them! : Blog #289

Notice Period?Be Nice to them!




              Notice period is a tricky time in all of our careers. It becomes even more difficult when managers try to be at their insensitive best. If anyone from your team is on notice period, be nice to them. I have seen some managers making the foolish decision of being nasty to their employees during those times.

 To begin with, it is nice to be nice. If that isn’t reason enough, they are going to be your company’s brand ambassadors to the world. They have a lot of credibility having worked in your firm and being fresh out in the market. An employee going out with a bad experience is the worst branding that your firm can have. If you are not concerned much about your firm and if you think that the larger organizational performance has nothing to do with your growth, my condolences. You may stop reading this blog right here.
Notice Period, Work, Career, Office, Job
Now, how much of a difference can one person make in an organization? By now, those who have a thinking mind would know that each person is important in a company’s organizational structure. Be it a company with 100 people or with a few lakhs. One person can bring about a huge change in an organization. That person need not even be at a leadership level to impact a change. Having said that, much greater is the impact a person can cause in a team. If one of your team members is leaving, you will need to find a good replacement. If you give a tough time to an employee of yours, they will not go out silently. Thanks to social media channels, it doesn’t require much of an effort for a job seeker to find out who one’s reporting manager is going to be. All it takes is one ping to the disgruntled team member to find out what managerial style a person has. The moment a candidate gets a negative feedback about a manager, he/she will pull back. Every good candidate these days will have multiples offers on hand. Right there, you lose out on a good candidate.

Is this a one-way street? Absolutely not. The outgoing employee is also expected to be graceful in the exit. One must not forget that the organization and the team would have contributed a great deal to one’s growth. One should ensure that transition is smooth and the team is well equipped with the knowledge needed to induct the next new recruit. More often than not, the managers ensure that this knowledge transfer happens effectively. It is the treating-the-employee-well part that is often taken lightly.

Organizations often take great care in welcoming new employees. However, minimal effort goes in to ensuring that an employee who has stayed with an organization and contributed to its growth for quite a number of years goes out with a smiling face. At best, the teams organize a call, cuts a cake and everyone speaks like the person is dead. It is more of a eulogy than an appreciation session. How about dropping the person home?  How about giving the person a collage of hand written notes and a plaque of appreciation? How about a chance for him/her to bring the family to office on the last day? These are tiny gestures which will go a long way.   

Arun Babu

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