Learning the issues within an organisation and applying it is a huge ROI for an organisations, said panelists during the session “Navigating the biggest workplace challenges for 2024” at HRSE Summit & Expo.

“Environment sometimes pushes you to do things and it’s after you have been pushed, you see what you can do about it” explains Kunal Wadhwani, CHRO at Choithrams Group

“If you have an idea, put it on the table and if it makes sense, people end up enjoying doing these things, beyond the routine work,” he added.

Wadhwani explains that it is important to evaluate the retention of talents to be able to understand what are the red flags within an organisation. He explained that one of the key issues is that HR needs to evaluate how they can be more than HR and a driver of the organisation.

“How do you know which are the most important things for your colleagues and to do that is by asking them rather than assuming you,” said Sally Ashford, the Group HR Director, Informa Group.

Ashford explains that they run their annual engagement survey and get data from that and supplement that by asking colleagues when they join the company within 30 and 90 days. Hence, she explains it is important to ask, understand and lead from there.

“We recently ran a survey that 69% of the employees thought that managers were doubling down on them and taking their time with the meetings” Ramya Prasad – Director – Client Solutions & Delivery, Darwinbox. The survey has led the organisation to have no meeting Thursdays for example.

“One of the questions we ask the employees is, would you bring your friends to the organisation,” explains Prasad. She added that it is important to ask that because good talent attracts better talent. Through that they can understand what can be improved within the organisation. 

“Our brands play a huge role, the vibrancy of the brands play a massive role for people wanting to come and work for us,” said Farid Khan, Head of HR (People Lead) UAE, Mondelēz International.

Khan explains that the brand affects people’s willingness to work for them. By showing the human connection to people’s stories, brands can attract talents that would dedicate their time to the benefit of the brand.

“All of these things combine to foster the kind of organisation for people to come and grow,” Khan added.

Khan explains that it is vital that organisations evaluate themselves internally, even looking at meetings and checking if everyone has to be in them. 

“Barriers to execution such as how we can reduce the red tape and make things efficient for decision making,” he added.