Siraj A Chaudhry, chairman of Cargill India, took the stage at Gurgaon leg of SAP Human Capital Connect on 14th of March 2018 and mentioned that managing employees was like managing customers and HR needed to create an experience with employees. This process was just like we do with our customers to make them happy. 

Chaudhry believes that the transformational change for HR professional is that one has to be prepared with the thinking of the ability and the need to change ourselves and accept technology. If someone can believe in this change, it will help the person and organization to grow at the same time. 

"I want my CHRO to connect the dots and predict patterns in the organization," says Siraj A Chaudhry, Chairman, Cargill India

Siraj Chaudhry has high expectations from the HR personnel. He said, “I want my CHRO to connect the dots and predict patterns in the organization and I want him to be the bad cop.”

He pointed out that HR should be the one who should send out the nasty messages and bad news in an agreeable manner. But at the same time, he should also be responsible to explain the vision and mission of the company to the stakeholders; and also check the pulse of the company. 

Relationship between the CEO and CHRO

Chaudhry noted that because of the role of the CHRO, the relationship between the CHRO and CEO is very critical and there has to be a strong partnership and bonding between both the leaders. 

Chaudhry mentioned that the objective behind him playing a good cop and the CHRO playing the bad cop is to give a second chance. He pointed out that, if the chairman sends a feedback or a bad news to the employees, then all the doors are closed for him/ her but if the CHRO does the same, there is still a second chance where the employee can work on the feedback and bounce back. “The idea is to create a filter between the CEO and the employees,” He said. 

When asked, who gives him the feedback? He replied, “My CHRO is my biggest critic and he can come into my room and tell me what I did was wrong.” 

Employee Experience

Creating an employee experience is important for any organization because only employee satisfaction will not work. The organizations need to do the same way they do for the customers, which involves creating a satisfactory experience. He said, “The employees can bring his/her full self to work if given the employee experience and technology can play a vital role in it.”

Chaudhry values the employee’s feedback towards the organization because it’ll help them to make a difference. Technology now allows the employees to give feedback and how they feel about the organization which will help the talent leader to work in the appropriate direction.

"Whether the technology is available or not, the transformation that we talk about now is going to happen. I don’t want HR jobs to become less relevant or limited to just doing things. They have to apply more minds and bringing more solutions and more analytics that the organization didn’t know existed earlier," says Siraj A Chaudhry

Sharing pitfalls to avoid, Chaudhry once again touched upon the employee experience and mentioned no matter what technology an organization uses, at the end of the day, the employee’s experience and happiness are what count. 

He said his big fear is that change is happening and everyone focuses on what is best for HR. “Ideally, we should think what is best for the business and understanding the business needs and incorporating them is more important.”

The Cargill India chairman concluded by saying, “HR functions must help their companies increase sales and create new sources of revenue now and forever.”