Once in HR, Always in HR

My driver is on NCNS (No Call No Show – which means unscheduled absence from work, for all you Non Call Center Fortunates) for the second consecutive day today. And my first instinct was to search for some tool where I can raise the NCNS so that I can track it to 10 days before terminating his services (another instinctive move which automatically gets institutionalized when you become a HR generalist in a Call Center). Alas, there was none. So I did the second best alternative that we preach in the Organization, pick up the phone and speak to the Employee. Afterall, we need to engage, don’t we?……….. !!!

Trring Trring Trring Trring Trring Trring Trring Trring Trring Trring Trring
Trring Trring Trring Trring Trring Trring Trring Trring Trring Trring Trring
Trring Trring Trring Trring Trring Trring Trring Trring Trring Trring Trring
Trring Trring Trring Trring Trring Trring Trring Trring Trring Trring Trring
Trring Trring Trring Trring Trring Trring Trring Trring Trring Trring Trring
Trring ………..click cluck ……

“HeLLO??????????????” (As if the call was unexpected !!!”.

“Haan, Suresh, Main bol raha hoon ….(Dilemma of who should I say was calling, Poor guy doesn’t even know my name…he calls me Saab)”.

“Kon….(I realized he doesn’t have my number stored…how wonderful and convenient)”.

“Main…..uh…. Sheel……uh…….Ruby block……”

“Oh haaan……. Saab…..bolo saab” (As if the world was running normally without any aberration).

“Suresh, tum aaya nahin aaj…kya hua”

“Woh Saab aankh lag gayee …kya ki bahut late ho gaya tha na kal”…

“Late …? Kal ? ….Kal toh tum aaye nahin the”

“Haan sir woh mera 2 acre zameen hai sir….Zaheerabad kanne…….udhar govt. waale kya ki problem kar diye sir…..”

Me thinking “Gulp….breathe…..gulp…... @#$%%^^&* ………….. 2 acre zameen!!!…….
Thanks for making me feel like a pile of dirt……………. “

As if that wasn’t enough …….. “Udhar kholi banaaya saab…….. pehle maale ko girane ki dhamki dere saab…yeh logan….udhar gaya tha”

Again thinking……..”Kholi…pehla maala………….(my ego is like minced meat by now)”………”Suresh phone karna chahiye tha na…………”

“Haan saab…………..kaam khatam hote hi karne waala tha”

Click ………………………Bleeeeeeeeeeeeeep Bleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep
Bleeeeeeeeeeeeeep

I am standing with my handset to my ears feeling like a chunk of Thermocol………….weightless, gutless, loosely held by a few useless cartilages ……….. thinking was it really necessary to make that call?

With a hollow feeling in my heart, I wandered around my rented abode, looked at the Dell Studio XPS – on which I have been contemplating many a business models of a successful start up…………and sighed.

The Operations Manager (my better half), screamed – “Sack him”. (What’s new with that, its like Raghukul reeti, Ops. to bulldoze HR to sack people and HR to always get back stating lets follow the right procedures, engage and empathize, blah blah – in my house I am the HR guy w.r.to Drivers ‘cos I recruit and induct them and they are then deployed to serve my wife, hence she the Ops. Manager). Yet again, meekly I presented my case of holding onto the incumbent based on his past performance which has been flawless – with a shift which included 30 minutes of driving and 8 ½ hrs of sleeping, there hardly is any scope of any flaw. Again, like traditional HR, I didn’t have the courage to tell Ops. to build the necessary competence that will eradicate the need for outsourcing and thus high Operational Expenditure. So, I called the incumbent yet again and this time pumped up my chest with a complete fake & falsified authority and raised my otherwise baritone voice to say “Suresh, Kal aao, baat karni hai”.

Ops. manager, just looked at me…If I can read the look well I will interpret that as “Oh you HR people, why can’t you come out of those emotional people centric cocoon and be the more hardbolied hardnosed operational sharks and for once………and show some spine…………..”.

I put some clothes on and carried myself along with my overloaded lunchbox and laptop bag, and walked out to encounter yet another day of being the Friendly Neighbourhood HR.