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A
nil Kumar Sardana, the CEO of the North Delhi Power Ltd. (NDPL), was
busy in his office attending to calls from different stakeholders of the
company one after another. But, at the back of his mind were several
questions: Could NDPL hope to escalate its aggregate technical and commercial(AT&C) loss reduction exponentially; obtain, what he called, customers’ affection;
increase revenue and shareholders’ wealth as per the company’s strategy; and attain
viability in the shortest possible time period? He was revered by his professional
team which ran NDPL. Members of the NDPL fraternity considered him as passionate,
visionary, transparent, and ethics-driven in the transformational role of running this
power distribution company.
In a way, NDPL could be seen as the lifeline for most of the residents of North
and North-West Delhi where it was the sole agency to distribute electricity. This
company symbolized a kind of a joint venture between private and public ownership.
It took over a portion of the ailing Delhi-Government-owned Delhi Vidyut Board
(DVB) with effect from July 1, 2002, under a privatization arrangement devised by
the government of the national capital region of Delhi (hereinafter referred to as the
Delhi Government). Sardana was called from Mumbai to lead NDPL. He was working
there as one of the Vice-Presidents of the Bombay Suburban Electric Supply Ltd.
(BSES), a Reliance group-controlled company, which became NDPL’s competitor (in
a restricted sense) in Delhi; for, BSES owned the other two companies which took
up electricity distribution in the rest of Delhi as per the privatization arrangement.
Under Sardana’s leadership, NDPL undertook several initiatives to overcome the
problems from which DVB was suffering. Sardana’s immediate concern was to ensure
stabilization of the two-year old association between the Tata Power (the chief
stakeholder in NDPL) and the Delhi Government and eventually to see it becominga lasting success.
The company chose a team of performers to head each of the functional areas,
which, among others, included Abhay K Saini, its General Manager (GM) – Human
Resources. Saini focused himself on future rather than the past. When asked by
Sardana to look into the possibility of investigating the source of wealth that some
of the DVB employees had accumulated through unlawful means in the pre-takeover
phase, Saini advised him against it. He opined that the focus of the company vis-
North Delhi Power Ltd.:Dynamics of Change
Debi S Saini and Jyotsna Bhatnagar
describes a real-life situationfaced, a decision or action
taken by an individualmanager or by an
organization at the strategic,functional or operational
levels
KEY WORDS
Power Distribution
Technical andCommercial Losses
Takeover
Transformational Agenda
MANAGEMENTCAS E
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a-vis these employees should be on bringing them into
the core values of NDPL and should, therefore, rely more
on trust and counselling rather than policing and sus-
picion.
Sardana was aware that a number of eyes were set
on NDPL’s working as it symbolized one of the major
initiatives to reform the power sector in India. The
aggregate annual AT&C losses of all state electricity boards in India had reached a whopping Rs. 250 billion
in August 2004; initiation of privatization in power
distribution in other states appeared only a matter of
time. The success of the NDPL experiment would be
taken as a catalyst for power-sector turnaround and
change management in these states. He was, therefore,
looking forward to engineering fresh initiatives so as to
march towards the company’s vision of “becoming the
most preferred and admired energy company.” Sardana
was wondering whether the strategy of turnaround that
the company had been following would work on the
expected lines. He was asking himself whether he would
be able to realize the basic commitment of the company
to the Delhi Government, as had been agreed upon in
the acquisition deal, to stand on its own within the
stipulated five years and reduce the AT&C losses from
53 per cent at the time of acquisition to 20 per cent by
June 30, 2007.
BACKGROUND
Power consumers were unhappy with the interruptionsin power supply and the poor quality of service provided
by DVB. They faced regular power cuts especially during
peak summer and winter months. They also complained
that DVB employees were indifferent and corrupt. A
backlog of nearly 100,000 consumer complaints of dif-
ferent types was pending with DVB at the time of the
takeover. Its very high incidence of AT&C losses was
believed to be a result of several acts of commission and
omission on the part of DVB’s top management, poli-
ticians as well as employees.
The Delhi Electricity Regulation Act (DERA) was
enacted in the year 2000 to facilitate power sector reforms
in Delhi. As per the philosophy envisaged in the DERA,
the Delhi Government unbundled DVB into three sets
of functional corporate entities related to: (i) distribu-
tion, (ii) transmission, and (iii) generation. All the assets
and liabilities of DVB were acquired by the Delhi Gov-
ernment and were eventually transferred to six succes-
sor companies—one generating company (Genco), one
transmission and bulk supply company (Transco), three
distribution companies (Discom-I, Discom-II, and
Discom-III), and one holding company. The three dis-
tribution companies (or Discoms) were privatized to the
tune of 51 per cent but the three other companies con-
tinued to be wholly owned by the Delhi Government.
In all, the six entities thus created were as follows: Genco
(Delhi Generation Company Ltd.); Transco (Delhi TranscoLtd.); holding company; Discom-I (BSES: Bombay Sub-
urban Electric Supply Ltd., later renamed as Yamuna
Power Limited); Discom-II (BSES: Bombay Suburban
Electric Supply Ltd, later renamed as Rajdhani Power
Limited), and Discom-III (the North Delhi Power Ltd.).
While Discom-III covered the north and the north-west
zones, the remaining two Discoms were operating in the
rest of Delhi. The three Discoms bought electricity from
Transco at subsidized rates; the cost of the subsidy was
met by the Delhi Government. The control in manage-
ment of Discom-III (NDPL) was with Tata Power which
held 51 per cent shares in it; the rest of the shares were
with the holding company, i.e., Delhi Power Company
Ltd., a Delhi Government enterprise. The transition took
place subject to a clear commitment of the Delhi Gov-
ernment to provide financial support to the three Discoms.
This was done through subsidized power purchases
from Transco during a five-year transition period and
a better specified multi-year tariff-setting regime based
on more realistic loss targets that could be accurately
measured.The loss-reduction target in Delhi focused on a
concept called AT&C which meant measuring the dif-
ference between kwhs supplied to a Discom and kwhs
realized by the Discom from the retail customers. It was
estimated that the Delhi Government had already been
subsidizing DVB every year for its losses by about Rs.15
billion through ‘loans’ that were never expected to be
repaid. Thus DVB losses were expected to reach a figure
of more than Rs. 75 billion in five years . The subsidies
were intended to avoid the need for large post-priva-
tization tariff increases which would not have beensustainable for the Delhi Government.
Entry of The CEO
Sardana joined NDPL on July 11, 2002 as the CEO. Saini
came into his team in December, 2002. Sardana took
stock of the challenges that NDPL was facing. His top-
most priority was to put the dilapidated structures and
archaic processes of the former DVB in order and to
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imbibe an ongoing change in them to gain viability. He
knew that his change agenda was being implemented
in an organization that had a heritage of government-
controlled culture. In his efforts to promote viable chang-
es, his knowledge of all functional areas helped him in
taking crucial decisions quickly.
After constituting his team, Sardana took immedi-
ate steps to stem the rot. He took some incremental stepstowards improvement and some radical performance
initiatives. He regularly reviewed the company’s per-
formance in the monthly top-management meetings
which included all officers above the rank of assistant
general managers (AGMs). His critical focus was on
operations and maintenance and the extent to which
they were in tune with the needs of the customer. He
believed that corporate performance was determined by
‘customer care and empowerment of employees.’ Man-
aging the external environment took a considerable
amount of his time as he had to deal with the local
politicians, bureaucracy, and all other stakeholders in
the company.
Concerns and Issues on Takeover
Some of the key problems that Sardana encountered on
takeover included the presence of a large number of non-
metered and illegal customers, under-billing, and poor
collections. DVB had accumulated a huge amount of
receivables. There was neither any register of assets nor
an accurate master list of customers. He encountered acovert nexus between the vested interests that promoted
and legitimized power theft. In a large number of cases,
meter readers were hand-in-glove with power thieves;
they advised consumers as to how to give a gloss of
legality to the theft they were indulging in.
The distribution network system was much below
the requisite standards and in a state of dilapidation. The
level of hygiene and sanitation at the worksites and
offices showed total casualness in the way the work must
have gone on in the DVB. The common employee en-
joyed over-security and was indifferent to customer
requirements. An army of workforce existed which
fattened the wage bills resulting into further worsening
of the DVB finances.
The workforce was managed in such a way that high
performers had little incentive to excel. Nobody ever gave
them compliments for the good work done. The employ-
ees were not clear about what all they were supposed to
do. Almost all employees were averse to working on
computers. There were just two computers in the whole
organization. As almost all work was done manually, a
large number of files had got accumulated that had even
lost relevance. Ninety per cent of the employees were
paid their salaries in cash which had resulted in DVB
undertaking multiple transactions related to withdrawal
of cash from banks around the beginning of the monthand disbursement of salaries at each zone. Salary dis-
bursement work used to get staggered over a week in-
volving unusually large number of manhours.
The exercise of power in the DVB structure was
highly centralized. Decision-making was slow. There
was no system of job rotation. Once an engineer was
posted in a place, he used to spend 80 per cent of the
time of his service tenure in that area. Any move to
transfer him was opposed on the ground that he was
the main person having the knowledge of the technical
intricacies of the area’s power distribution system and
its geography. The concerned official remained the sole
incharge of the region for a long time. Also, there was
widespread corruption among the officials.
Mapping of the organization was taken as a big
agenda by the company. The hierarchical designations
used, among others, included those such as Junior
Engineer, Assistant Engineer, Executive Engineer and so
on. DVB did not have much of an HR function though
nearly 150 people were associated with the Personnel
Department who were mostly concerned with maintain-ing employee-related records pertaining to leave, per-
sonal files, and benefits availed, etc. NDPL reduced this
number to 51 and planned to further reduce it to a figure
of 25 to 30. DVB neither performed any training function
nor any project or corporate function. It only had a
Planning Department. Operations and maintenance work
was divided into two circles consisting of ten districts
and 40 zones in all. Employees who manned various
positions, among others, included about 300 engineers,
300 supervisors, clerks, and a large number of semi-
literate, semi-trained linemen.
Most DVB-scheme employees had never seen a
training hall in their lifetime; the quality of their work
was low. DVB’s performance appraisal and review system
mainly consisted of confidential reports as found in the
government. Even if some one got a poor rating, he was
expected to be promoted on completion of a certain
number of years.
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CHALLENGES
NDPL faced the key challenge of bringing about the
desired changes in different spheres of organizational
working. DVB was the largest exclusive urban utility in
India at the time the transition happened but its crisis
had reached serious proportions. The DVB had made
little investment in infrastructure for the last two to three
years as talks for takeover were going on for quite sometime. NDPL first made a Rs. 12.5 billion capital expend-
iture plan for five years. Running expenses meant an-
other Rs. 2.5 billion annually, on an average, for five
years.
Some of the key challenges that the company was
facing since the acquisition included dealing with ram-
pant theft by slum dwellers as well as industrial/com-
mercial consumers; improving the sub-standard and
dilapidated distribution network system; reducing the
AT&C losses within a period of five years from 53 per
cent during the takeover to 20 per cent after a period
of five years; improving system reliability so as to be
comparable with the best utilities in India; changing the
consumer perception of NDPL; promoting consumer
service and IT interface at a level comparable with world
standards; tackling the nexus between the vested inter-
ests who were responsible for power theft; securing a
more comprehensive information on its assets; decreas-
ing restoration periods to acceptable levels; internaliz-
ing in the company’s culture a concept of consumer
priority and service; changing the mindsets of a neg-lected and semi-trained workforce; enhancing role clar-
ity to the employees so as to increase the quality of
performance; imbibing transparent and ethical working
in all administrative centres and among the employees
of the company; and establishing the Tata brand image
in terms of the standards of the Tata Business Excellence
Model (TBEM).
A significant development in the power sector was
the enactment of the Electricity Act, 2003, by the Indian
Parliament, which was a major step forward in improv-
ing and speeding up the power sector reforms in the
country. The only other such experiment took place in
Orissa which could be said to be quite successful.
Consequently, the power industry opened up in the
generation, transmission, and distribution sectors. The
Delhi Government also expected the three Discoms to
deliver performance in consonance with the changing
climate and expectations.
THE TRANSFORMATIONAL AGENDA AND
ACTION
In order to deal with the problems the company encoun-
tered, the top management of NDPL took the following
major steps:
Performance Initiatives
On takeover, one of the key priorities of the companywas to improve operations and maintenance. This meant
minimizing the number and duration of interruptions,
making the fault-repair system simpler and consumer-
friendly, improving power-supply reliability, minimiz-
ing or removing the faulty billing, and replacing the old
meters by electronic ones. The long-term measures
included substantial improvements in the hygiene levels
in zonal and district offices. Huge quantity of scraps had
got accumulated, the removal of which was a priority.
This operation was still going on when the case writers
completed the data collection; every day, three trucks
were operating in scrap-removing operations. Infrastruc-
ture received the top attention of the management.
NDPL’s new state-of-the-art corporate office that was
coming up within the next two years was expected to
facilitate a much better coordination of the company’s
activities. Table 1 shows some of the performance in-
itiatives that the company took in relation to people
issues and a comparison with the earlier scenario.
In order to expedite its functioning, the company
started working towards building a management infor-mation system (MIS). Sardana sat till 2 o’clock in the
night to develop a system of daily reporting of opera-
tions. The MIS (built through software programming)
was eventually fully internalized which was being
considered necessary for knowing where the company
stood. A centralized control room was established which
was located in one of the grid stations and the report
on operations was circulated to all the concerned depart-
ments through e-mail. A full-fledged performance
monitoring cell was created in the corporate office which
directly reported to Sardana. The respective functional
heads prepared the functional reports on a monthly basis
including, among others, the monthly human resource
information system (HRIS).
Another important performance initiative was the
holding of the top management meeting on the 20th of
each month which included all AGMs and above (this
came to 26 people including the CEO and the seven
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departmental heads). Presentations were made in thesemeetings by different departments which were followed
by discussion and action formulation. This forum helped
a great deal in ensuring performance monitoring. The
senior management meetings, which included Sardana
and his seven departmental heads, were held on the first
Saturday of every month. The DVB-scheme engineers
initially showed total resistance to the computer system
but gradually realized its importance. Eventually, they
got well-versed in handling computer technology; in
fact, each one of them prepared his own presentation.
After some time, some kind of competition developedamong them to demonstrate their performance with the
help of PowerPoint.
Since January 2004, a system of zonal performance
monitoring was started. Internet facilities were installed
in each of the 46 zones. The zonal managers (who were
mostly employees under the DVB scheme) started send-
ing zonal performance data to the corporate office by
e-mail. The company started giving zonal performance
scorecard which provided the relative performance of
the zone. All these activities came under the Perform-
ance Management and MIS Department.
In order to deliver improved performance to the
consumer, the company adopted a 5S concept which
consisted of: sugam (easy), sahyog (cooperation of con-
sumers), spasht (unambiguous), sankalp (determination),
and sampark (communication). Implementing the 5S
concept meant, among others, the following: billing and
payment details of all 0.8 million consumers were
uploaded on the NDPL website with facilities for print-
ing duplicate bills, payment of bill on the website, andviewing consumption graph and payment details from
the date of inception of the NDPL. These initiatives were
the first of their type in the power sector anywhere in
India. In order to promote the payment facility, NDPL
came up with other initiatives. They included, among
others, setting up of NDPL Consumer Care Centres for
payment by cheque or cash; 24-hour manned drop-boxes
at the announced NDPL premises with stamped on-the-
spot acknowledgement; and payment of bills through
the internet. The company appointed a Customer Rela-
tions Coordinator to whom complaints on power theftcould be made confidentially on the telephone, post or
the web. Some of the other major initiatives undertaken
under this concept included strengthening of the call
centre by increasing and rationalizing its work stations
which led to improvement in the response to consumers
from 50-60 per cent to 98-100 cent; auditing of equipment
and installation and asking the original equipment
manufacturers to take corrective measures to improve
the overall system; restructuring of the organization;
training of manpower; communicating with the consum-
ers about the expected power interruptions due to various
reasons and load-shedding schedules; and taking steps
to introduce the state-of-the-art technology in all spheres
of business functions.
Rightsizing and Service Conditions
As per the memorandum of understanding (MOU) signed
at the time of acquisition, NDPL inherited 5,368 employ-
ees from the DVB. Sardana devised an attractive volun-
Salary was being disbursed in cash/cheques to subordinate staff/ executives starting from the last day of the month till the 7th of thefollowing month. There would be 500 to 700 errors in salary disbursementevery month which necessitated a continuous audit system.
Only two computers were provided for 5,500 employees.
There was no scheme for any technical, behavioural, quality orcomputer training.
There was no ISO certification of any function or process.
No mobile phones/pager was provided to the field staff.
Junior/field staff were hardly sponsored for exposure/training in foreigncountries.
Table 1: Major HR Initiatives of NDPL
Pre-takeover August 2004
Delhi Vidyut Board North Delhi Power Limited
Salary was being transferred through electronic clearance to therespective bank accounts of the employees directly; every employeegot his pay on the last day of the month. Error level was negligible.Audit was done randomly to stabilize the system.
1,200 computers were provided for 3,400 employees.
18,000 mandays training was imparted in the last two years in quality,customer orientation, and computer handling.
ISO certification was obtained for engineering, projects, IT, humanresource, and stores departments.
Mobile phones were provided to all executives, junior engineers, andother field staff for better connectivity.
Executives/field staff were sponsored for training under peer exchangeprogramme to different countries; 32 personnel were sent under thisscheme till August 2004.
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tary retirement scheme (VRS). The employees who had
earlier worked only occasionally were aware that they
would have to work for the new company. They were
also apprehensive of their suitability in the new scenario.
Out of the total DVB workforce, 1,794 employees sought
retirement under the VRS. This included nearly 90 per
cent of meter readers who availed the VRS; the remain-
ing 10 per cent were re-deployed after training. Theunion was involved in the rightsizing process through-
out. Some forms of separation, which facilitated right-
sizing, among others, included 375 cases of superannu-
ation since the takeover and 70 cases of voluntary re-
tirement. NDPL employed 482 new employees to var-
ious positions with new service conditions which, among
others, included more than 300 engineers to facilitate the
operations and maintenance work and 15 fresh or ex-
perienced MBAs in different functional areas. In addi-
tion, 72 persons were taken as consultants or on contract-
tenure in different departments. Twenty-six were on
deputation from Tata Power; their compensation was
governed by the Tata Power compensation norms. The
DVB-scheme employees got their pay and compensation
as per the Fifth Pay Commission of the Government of
India including the dearness and other allowances. They
continued to be governed by the old DVB pay structure
as per the MOU and were also entitled to pension and
retirement benefits as per the DVB structure. The service
conditions of NDPL employees were incentive-linked.
Thirty per cent of their pay was variable.Sardana was facing the challenge of downsizing/
redeploying about 750 employees including about 190
women who were earlier involved in serving water in
DVB offices; they had little role in the new scheme of
organization. At one of the joint interaction forum (JIF)
meetings, Sardana said to the participants: “One of our
concerns has to be improving the skills of our employees.
How do we multi-skill a large number of assistant linemen
(ALM), drivers, cleaners, pharmacists, shift engineers,
women who supply water, and clerks whose skills have
hardly any relevance in today’s environment?” Hewanted to do this in a manner acceptable to the union.
It was not certain whether he could succeed in that
endeavour. In fact, the union leaders were pressurized
by this group of employees for maintaining the status
quo about their service conditions. The re-training po-
tential of especially the women who served water in
terms of learning any sort of technical skills was almost
negligible.
Changes in Organizational Structure
After the acquisition, NDPL carried out changes in the
organizational structure. It increased the number of
circles to five; districts to 12; and zones to 46. It
wanted to emphasize the company’s 24x7 accountabil-
ity to the consumer. A circle, which was responsible
for operations and maintenance of the area in its
jurisdiction, used to be earlier manned by 30 to 40
people. In the post-takeover scenario, only five people
worked in it. This was possible due to the use of
technology, computerization, and organizational re-
structuring. With new induction of engineers to facil-
itate the operations and maintenance work, the number
of engineers reached nearly 700 out of which 300 were
under the DVB scheme (as on September 1, 2004). In
place of one engineer earlier, three engineers were
given the responsibility of an area to work in three
different shifts in a day. The person concerned wasresponsible for his shift of eight hours. General shift
working was introduced for attending to the day-to-
day problems; major problems were handled by the
staff of the general shift. Shift working fostered com-
petition for efficiency even within the zone. The
concept of ‘ideal zones’ was developed wherein few
zones were to be selected and developed as world-
class model zones. The new arrangement gave oppor-
tunities for job rotation and wider job roles.
The NDPL top management consisted of the CEO,heads of seven main departments, which were headed
by a General Manager (GM) or a Deputy General
Manager (DGM), and the circle heads. Besides, there
were seven cells which directly reported to the CEO.
Almost all the designations were rechristened. The
new designations were changed to manager, assistant
manager, office associate, work attendant, and so on.
Re-designation aroused considerable resistance from
most DVB-scheme employees including senior officers.
Most of them had not yet reconciled to this reality.
On the contrary, some of them felt empowered, e.g.,when stenographers and daftaries were designated as
office associates, they felt more dignified. So did the
operator, who was now called a ‘Service Associate.’
Since meter readers were one of the biggest sources
of corruption, this function was completely outsourced.
A considerable number of meter readers took VRS; the
remaining ones were re-deployed to undertake other
functions.
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Quality Focus
NDPL’s quality concerns could be inferred from its
mission statement which read: “To be the most preferred
and admired energy company, we will strive to deliver
quality and cost-effective services….” It had a quality
policy which stated that the company “will deliver error-
free services to our consumers by doing our jobs right,
the first time and every time.”
The company considerably revamped its grid sys-
tems, transformers, sub-stations, distribution cables, and
conductors. During the year 2003-04, it revamped 1,500
substations. Conversion of low-tension (LT) distribution
system to high-voltage distribution system had been
carried out to improve the quality of power and to reduce
AT&C losses. The ring main units were installed in the
distribution sub-stations in place of existing LT distri-
bution panels. Of the 40 grid stat ions that it had at the
time of case writing, only one was fully automatic andremote-controlled; the plan was to make all 40 remote-
controlled.
There was a full-fledged Inspection and Quality
Assurance Department which was accountable to the
GM-Operations. This department ensured right quality
of the equipment by inspecting samples. Also, there was
a separate department of ISO and TBEM which was
accountable to the GM-Technical Services and Projects.
This department prepared and implemented the sys-
tems and procedures for implementation of ISO in a
phased manner. It was also responsible for implement-
ing the TBEM in the company.
The Institute of Quality Enhancement, New Delhi,
was engaged for giving quality training to employees.
This institute followed the Philips Crosby model of quality
enhancement. The trainer started with the top manage-
ment and later on trained the supervisory group and the
operational associates.
The company secured the ISO 9001: 2000 certifica-
tion for Quality Management System from Det Norske
Veritas of Netherlands for its five departments: engi-
neering, projects, IT groups of technical services, human
resource management, and stores group of operations.
And, out of the 150 companies which participated in the
Grow Talent survey of the best quality companies in
2003, NDPL got the 27th rank.
Employee Welfare and Performance Incentives
Improving the working conditions, welfare facilities,
and employee care became the core concern of the
company for implementing NDPL’s transformational
agenda. One of the most unique features of employee
care at NDPL was its employee helpline, named Saarathi.
Any NDPL employee could submit his/her grievance
by e-mail or telephone and this helpline assisted in
giving a time-bound reply to him/her and helped in
processing grievance handling. The grievances could
even relate to issues like promotion, posting, error inpay-slip, administration-related issues, and other per-
sonnel matters. NDPL was supposedly the first such
company in India to have started this kind of a helpline.
Table 2 reveals an overview of some of the welfare and
performance measures that were being undertaken by
NDPL and compares them with the pre-takeover situ-
ation. Besides, the company introduced an incentive
scheme to promote performance-based culture for
employees who successfully achieved their targets. It
also launched a reward and recognition scheme with a
view to recognizing ingenuities and promoting talent.
Training
NDPL aimed at improving the quality of the employees
and hence invested Rs. 0.4 million towards making the
state-of-the-art training facilities available to them. It
defined job descriptions and key result areas (KRAs) for
each position based on the suggestions made in the
report of the Shriram Institute Committee. It designed
and administered training modules on quality, team-
building, behavioural aspects, and business develop-ment. This helped in improving the overall level of
competency in the organization.
The company carried out a training need analysis
in a larger perspective taking into account the skills and
the knowledge required by different pockets of the
organization. For example, when computers were
brought in and about 100 employees who were earlier
involved in salary preparation were to be re-deployed,
it was necessary to train them for different jobs including
computer handling. Imparting quality training helped
in improving the general technical proficiency in the
organization.
The company’s policy emphasized training for all.
It was envisaged that every employee had the right to
receive need-based training at regular intervals as per
organizational, functional, and individual needs. Ini-
tially, the company planned to have at least a minimum
of two training mandays in a year per employee for the
whole of the employee base. It also designed a peer
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in India and abroad. The HRD Institute conducted 300
training programmes in 2003-04 in areas such as quality
improvement, customer orientation, and computer han-dling for all employees. In the last two years, 18,000
mandays of training had been imparted.
Union Dynamics
NDPL inherited the DVB workforce along with its re-
cognized Indian National Trade Union Congress (IN-
TUC)-affiliated union and seven staff associations. While
it accepted the workers’ union, it refused to recognize
any of the staff associations. Except for some minor
disturbances, the company witnessed a peaceful acqui-
sition process. The concept of JIF was put in place at the
district and circle levels; monthly and quarterly meet-
ings of JIF were held regularly. One of the case writers
attended some JIF meetings. Even a semblance of ad-
versarialism was not visible in these meetings; a few
union leaders from the unrecognized unions occasion-
ally made their points which demonstrated some degree
of suppressed dissent. In one of the JIF meetings, the
secretary of the recognized union made a PowerPoint
Table 2: Welfare Measures of NDPL
Pre-takeover August 2004
Delhi Vidyut Board North Delhi Power Limited
Medical claims of indoor patient/ treatment were reimbursed by DVBafter the expenditure was incurred by the employee from his pocket.
Forty hospitals were empanelled; no payment was required to be madeby the employee concerned; the employee had to just show the identitycard and avail treatment.
A Janata Insurance Scheme with a cover value of Rs. 0.1 million wasin place for accidental injuries; premium was paid by the employees.
NDPL got every employee insured against work-related accidents fora cover value of Rs. 0.25 million at company’s cost.
There was no forum/platform for interaction between management andemployee representatives.
A JIF was launched at the district and circle level; monthly and quarterlymeetings of JIF were held.
Time-bound promotion scale was being allowed to the eligible employeesafter considerable lapse of time. Many cases since 1994 onwards werepending.
Time-bound promotion scale cases were updated. All employees whowere eligible for this were allowed the same on 30th June and 31stDecember every year––No case was pending.
Pathetic working conditions existed in offices; there was no cleanlinessand hygiene maintenance.
A number of buildings was renovated; hygienic conditions weremaintained.
Potable drinking water was not available in many district/zonal offices. Proper drinking water was made available in all district/zonal offices.Water purifiers were installed or filtered (bottled) water was provided.
No tea allowance was paid. All NDPL employees were served tea twice a day at company’s costor tea allowance was paid every month.
No gift was given to employees on any occasion. A wrist watch was given to every Group D staff and contractual
employee to commemorate the Raising Day on July 1, 2003.No function was ever held to celebrate the Labour Day on May 1. Labour Day was celebrated every year by observing Industrial Harmony
Week; it involved employee participation.
Summer and winter uniforms were almost never supplied to the eligibleemployees on time.
Cash payment (allowance + tax at company cost) in lieu of uniformswas made to eligible employees.
Group D staff appointed on compassionate grounds were not givenany training before regularization.
Group D staff were provided with 12 to 16 weeks’ technical trainingat an industrial training institute (ITI) at company’s cost and inductedat a higher salary, i.e., Group C on regular rolls.
No sports meet was organized. Sports meets were organized for employees and dependants.
exchange training programme with Baltimore power
utility and Columbian power utility in the US with the
host company taking care of all the logistics. Later on,some employees were sent to Sri Lanka, Bangladesh,
Hong Kong, and Nepal to know how things were
managed there.
The Centre for Power Efficiency in Distribution
(CENPEID) was established by the company to impart
training. This centre got the accreditation of the Ministry
of Power, Government of India and was partly funded
by USAID. It had three wings: the HRD Institute (Delhi)
that catered to the training needs; the Skill Training
Institute (also situated in Delhi), which was expected to
become fully functional in December 2004; and Policy
and Research, which was expected to start functioning
in December 2004. While the former two functioned
under the HRM Department, the third was expected to
function under the Entrepreneurship and Knowledge
Management (EKM) Department. The Skill Training In-
stitute was being built to impart world-class skill de-
velopment in the power sector. The company proposed
to sell the services of this institute to other companies
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presentation on “How NDPL employees could contri-
bute towards greater efficiency?” He openly applauded
the company for its proactive policies and for sending
the union leaders to Tata Steel at Jamshedpur for ob-
taining a first-hand exposure to situations of cooperative
industrial relations. The company’s consultant, Dr S N
Pandey, who was the former Director-Industrial Rela-
tions at the Tata Steel, was guiding the working of the JIF; his contribution to JIF was largely appreciated both
by the union leaders as well as the managers.
Saini and his team also worked towards implement-
ing the Tata culture in the company as per the TBEM.
The payment of retirement benefits to employees for the
period for which they had rendered service to DVB in
the pre-takeover phase was the responsibility of the
Delhi Government. When NDPL announced the VRS
scheme, the Delhi Government could not meet its re-
sponsibilities of paying the workers’ dues even after
more than two years of privatization. This aroused deep
resentment among the retired as well as the serving
employees against the government. Saini issued a cir-
cular to all the employees that the Raising Day would
not be celebrated on July 1, 2004 due to the non-receipt
of retirement benefit by the 1,797 retired employees. He
also issued another circular suggesting that the NDPL
fraternity would not celebrate Puja and Diwali festivals
in 2004 as a mark of protest against the Delhi Govern-
ment.
Sardana too gave priority to the issue of union–management relations. According to him, he “consid-
ered it important to focus on removing any fear psycho-
sis amongst employees related to their job security in
the new dispensation.” While commenting on the un-
ion’s role in NDPL’s functioning, he remarked, “Unions
played the inevitable role of facilitating communication
and rumour management. The union leaders have shown
remarkable maturity in the acquisition exercise and
handling of the consequential issues. We read positive
in anything they asked for as our initial response. Happily,
we have thus been able to forge cooperative relationswith them.”
NDPL prioritized the improvement in working
conditions. Employees saw this as company’s concern
for orderliness in work organization. Old furniture was
replaced by new. Buildings were renovated. People were
made to feel better by providing facilities for comfort-
able work atmosphere. A manager remarked: “Espe-
cially the rank-and-file employees initially resisted a
switchover from payment of salary in cash to credit in
bank account. The union raised slogans against the
management but no deep-rooted feeling of injustice was
visible from their body language. The management stuck
to its guns. Gradually, the employees saw the positive
side of the management’s position and relented.”
The management did not view union resistance as
a serious roadblock in implementing the company’stransformational agenda. Both Sardana and Saini fo-
cused on problems of the rank- and-file. Sardana took
a positive stand on three of the burning issues which
were of grave concern to the common employee. This
was done partly on the advice of the two NDPL advisors
on employee affairs who were earlier officers in DVB
and, on retirement, were taken by NDPL as retainer-
consultants. They could feel the pulse of the entire
organization and were also aware of the sensitivity of
the issue from the employees’ point of view. They advised
Saini to take a soft stand on these three contentious
issues that the employees were facing since long.
Perhaps the most complex of these issues was the
payment of Rs. 10,000 out of the Widows’ Fund to each
of the employees’ widows whose husbands had died on
service. The issue was whether this money should be
paid from the Employee Welfare Fund (which was raised
by contribution from employees) or by NDPL. This issue
was pending with DVB for quite some time; the man-
agement had refused to pay them from the DVB re-
sources. It was a question of only Rs. 0.4 million. Sainimade Sardana agree to pay from the company’s funds.
Another hot issue related to the employees’ uniforms.
The management had been discussing the issue for the
last two months. Employees were demanding Rs. 5,000
per month as uniform allowance. The company felt that
only Rs. 1,100 per employee was justified in this case
and hence thought of a quid pro quo. Saini preferred to
settle this matter on employees’ terms; the settlement
on uniform allowance took place at Rs. 2,700 per em-
ployee per annum. Saini also closed about 70 of the 80
files of employees who were facing disciplinary action but their cases involved petty issues. Another important
issue from the employees’ point of view was that of
promotion. DVB had a time-bound promotion policy
which assured three promotions to all the 75 categories
of employees; but promotions had not taken place since
1992 due to financial stringency faced by DVB. Saini
convinced Sardana about the need to take a positive
stand on the time-bound promotion issue; eventually the
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issue got cleared. In the last two years in question, time-
bound promotion was given to 350 employees governed
by the DVB scheme; some got a higher designation while
the others were just promoted to the next scale. Two
batches of union leaders were sent to the Tata Steel plant
in Jamshedpur in September 2003 for ten days each to
observe how the cheapest steel was made in the world
in a climate of harmonious industrial relations among40,000 people.
Performance Management System
On acquisition of DVB, a key priority of the management
was to differentiate between the performer and the non-
performer employees. The company was keen to devise
a performance management system. The first step in this
direction was to develop people for assessing the train-
ing needs. Initially, since people did not understand
their own training needs, efforts were made to build
capabilities in them. It was decided that the performance
appraisal (PA) system for the employees should be kept
simple; the PA form comprised of only two pages. It
contained parameters such as technical knowledge, team-
building capability, strategic initiatives, behavioural
inputs, and man-management skills. This was applica-
ble for the first year. From 2004, KRAs were developed
up to the level of Assistant Manager with a view to
assessing individual performance. The company pro-
posed to provide two sets of PA systems: an operational
performance management system based on targets set by the company in different business areas such as
financial performance, commercial targets achieved,
consumer billing, capital expenditure, etc, and an indi-
vidual performance management system whereby the
performance of the individual was judged on the basis
of his KRA. The key responsibility of every individual
was expected to flow from his KRA. For each set of
positions, certain level of competency was felt desirable.
Performance management system was viewed as an
attempt to measure one’s level of competency for a given
position.The Tata group of companies had identified 14 broad
leadership practices to facilitate people development.
NDPL worked towards establishing these practices so
that the requisite capability including knowledge could
be developed among the employees.
Communication
NDPL’s top management forum aimed at ensuring multi-
pronged communication amongst members and also
performance monitoring. Initially, it used to meet every
fortnight which was later on made a monthly event.
Sometimes, meetings went on for as long as eight hours.
Sardana took a lead role in many of these meetings so
as to convey his pressing concerns. Since he had the
background of technical expertise, he was even seen
explaining a circuit diagram to the members concerned.Some of the sessions got converted into training sessions
as the situations so demanded. Most of these 20 members
were erstwhile DVB people. They were initially some-
what docile in these meetings. An HR manager remarked:
“Their body language showed that they were question-
ing their own competence as they had perhaps never
done those things at a critical level.” Apart from these,
Operations Review Team meetings took place at the
levels of circles and zones under the chairmanship of
the GM-Operations. These meetings inspired members
to do self-introspection and eventually in better artic-
ulation of performance-related and other issues.
JIF too proved to be an important forum where
representatives of union and management aired their
respective issues of concern. In some sense, it helped
grievance articulation and redressal. An in-house quar-
terly magazine named Navodaya was launched in No-
vember 2003 which contained in-house articles and
information that the management wanted to deliver to
the employees.
Human Resource Management InformationSystem (HRIS)
The company started the process of establishing its HRIS
system in January 2003. The HRIS software installation
work was given to Tata Consultancy Services (TCS). The
system was customized for NDPL’s needs. It had two-
fold objectives: to link salary with the employee and to
keep accurate data related to all the employees. For this
purpose, two different modules were created: the HRIS
module and the pay roll module. The modules were still
in the process of comprehensive development and werenot fully integrated. The base module had nine appli-
cations linked through network. In each module, there
were sub-modules. The system was designed in such a
way that offline data could be loaded. The system could
help generate any kind of report.
HRIS reflected the changes that NDPL was witness-
ing. Among others, ID numbers were provided to all the
employees. For each position, KRAs were designed. If
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the position was filled up, it got updated in the system.
Each position thus had an employee number, a job
description number, and a position ID.
Managing Knowledge
NDPL set up an EKM cell which reported directly to the
CEO. It had four wings, i.e., benchmarking, knowledge
management (KM) portal, customer and external anal-ysis, and sectoral analysis. Each of these wings was
headed by an MBA graduate. The role of the EKM cell
was performed with the belief that there was a wealth
of knowledge within the company as well as outside
which had to be tapped for delivering a better value to
the customer. Entrepreneurship was seen as a function
involving formulation of strategy and its deployment
(i.e., action plan) and KM was concerned with collecting
and processing of information for facilitating the real-
ization of the organizational goals.
NDPL hired AC Nielsen, an American Company,
for conducting surveys on customer aspirations to know
how soon the aspirations changed. This agency selected
15 parameters on which information was collected. A
sample of 2,500 consumers in the NDPL area was se-
lected on whom it administered a half-an-hour interview
schedule. The EKM cell chief remarked: “It was the first
time that an electricity-distribution agency undertook
this type of an exercise.” In the April 2003 survey, it was
revealed that 85 per cent consumers expected ‘power
reliability’ to be one of the most important expectationsfrom NDPL. As power reliability increased in the NDPL
area, in the second survey conducted by the same com-
pany, the importance of ‘communication about load-
shedding’ increased from the earlier 60 per cent in the
first survey to 72 per cent. Following the survey result,
NDPL sought the help of Radio Mirchi, an FM radio
broadcaster in Delhi, to announce communications about
power cuts in different parts of its operational area on
a particular day. It also started a system of munadi
(Hindi), i.e., a van with a loudspeaker going to a locality
and announcing a message.NDPL got feedback about its service from various
sources including the communication received on its
website. It also had a telephone service which could be
used by whistle blowers for reporting power theft or
indifference of the NDPL staff. An action plan was
followed by the top management every month.
PERFORMANCE AND ACHIEVEMENTS
NDPL targeted at bringing about changes in several
spheres. Large-scale changes took place in operations
and maintenance work which were facilitated by the
MIS. The company developed a system-orientation in
most of its key processes. It improved its functioning
on several operational parameters. It benchmarked itself
against the top five utilities in the world. The companyadded an international concept called n-1. This was
meant to ensure that even if one part of the equipment
failed to function, the system kept functioning and the
consumers did not suffer. The company was working
towards making all its 66 kv and 33 kv stations on n-
1 concept by the end of 2004 with all of them having
a back-up. Operations and maintenance work had been
facilitated by ‘one store concept.’ The store was housed
in an area of about five acres at a central place and was
responsible for delivering material to the places where
it was required––also called the ‘home delivery’ concept.
At the time of takeover, the number of provisional
billing had reached 0.2 mill ion consumers. NDPL was
able to reduce the number of provisional bills only to
1,45,000 at the end of March 31, 2004. Larger the number
of provisional bills, greater is the possibility of loss of
revenue for the company. In relation to billing errors,
while a substantial reduction had taken place since the
time of takeover, they were still believed to be an area
of concern. Sardana admitted at one of the recent JIF
meetings: “Billing errors of our company are still in the bracket of 1 to 1.5 per cent which are high against the
international benchmark of 0.3 per cent.”
The company attained better level of performance
and consequently achieved a gradual reduction in AT&C
losses. These are visible from Figure 1. On September
30, 2004, the AT&C loss stood reduced from 53 to 41.3
per cent which meant a reduction of about 12 per cent
in a period of 27 months from the takeover. A reduction
of one per cent in AT&C loss roughly translated to a
corresponding gain in company’s additional revenue to
the tune of at least Rs. 220 million. The steps taken
towards reducing this loss included: energy audit of the
distribution network, rationalization and updating of
billing database, installation of low tensionless systems
in theft-prone areas, replacement of faulty meters, and
aggressive enforcement activities. The company became
cash-sufficient too. It expected to better the target of loss
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Figure 1: Twelve-month Rolling AT&C Loss at NDPL
reduction in the financial year 2004-05.
Speaking of the change progress on HR front,
Sardana observed:
Our biggest achievement so far is that we have
been able to secure our right to govern vis-à-
vis our employees covered under the DVB
scheme. This category of employees has no fear
psychosis about the new milieu in which they
would be working. Yet, the environment is one
of accountability. We have also been able to
institutionalize the concept of what the con-
sumer wants from us; this is surely the first step
in our working towards the consumer affection.
The union cooperation could be secured through
our transparent attitude to collective concerns
of people, our belief in their right to play their
role, and our decision to take on issues head-
on rather than avoiding or suppressing them.Sardana continuously interacted with Delhi politi-
cians with a view to changing their attitude towards
issues in the Delhi power sector. While commenting on
the progress towards this goal, he remarked: “Each
member of the legislative assembly (MLA) of Delhi is
regularly invited to have lunch with our team. Politi-
cians have realized the need for radical reforms in this
sector. When we ask them to allow us to manage our
commercial concerns as per the demands of an enter-
prise, they tell us to give them more time rather than
rejecting our demands outright.”
Table 3 presents the company’s performance since
takeover on several parameters. Also, in the year 2003-
04, it earned a net profit after tax of Rs. 292.9 million
compared to Rs. 222.1 million for the year 2002-03. NDPL
got a better media response of its performance than had
been the case with the two BSES companies operating
in the remaining parts of Delhi.
And, in a recent survey of power consumers by the
media, 57 per cent respondents felt that the three Discoms
had improved power supply in Delhi. But, 80 per cent
of them felt that the meters used by them were not
working properly. Sixty-five per cent respondents opined
Table 3: Improvement in Power Supply Position sinceJuly 2002
Parameter On FY Q1 FYTakeover 2003-04 2004-05
Reliability index (%) 98.5 99.57 99.61
No. of transformer failureper annum
584 248 37
Capacitor availability (MVAR) 252 506 669
Mean time taken to repair cablefaults (days)
11 7 2
No. of supply complaints receivedper day at call centre
8,000 2,578 2,419
Load-shedding share in Delhi (%) 40 17 6
Street lights in working condition (%) < 50 > 80 99
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that their main problem was the faster running of the
new electronic meters. However, a majority of them were
satisfied with the system of consumer grievance redressal
provided by the Discoms. The case writers talked to a
cross-section of the DVB-scheme employees about how
they felt working for NDPL. They considered Sardana
as a highly competent CEO. While comparing their as-
sociation as employees with DVB and NDPL, they couldnot pin-point any specific reason to be excited about
working for NDPL.
Comparatively speaking, the media had reported
that NDPL fared much better than BSES. Some of the
excerpts from reports in the leading Indian newspapers
reflecting the performance of these companies included
the following: “Dikshit (Chief Minister of Delhi) ap-
peared not too pleased with the performance of the BSES
which supplies power to most of the city but praised
NDPL for its work. NDPL is doing extremely well, be
it with regard to metering, service to consumers or
recovery of dues” (Indian Express, December 16, 2004);
“…Sheila Dikshit seems to have genuine reasons for
being upset with BSES…the areas under the Tata-Power-
managed NDPL are fast emerging as islands of quality
and reliable power supply in the capital…Last year, 64
per cent of the power cuts were because of BSES, while
19 per cent were because of Delhi Transco, and 17 per
cent due to fault at the level of NDPL…while billing
errors are rare in NDPL, they are massive in BSES” (The
Hindu, May 22, 2004); “Reliance Discoms spent peanutson Network: DERC” (Financial Express, May 12, 2004);
“CM praises NDPL work” ( Asian Age , December 16,
2004). It was widely believed in and outside NDPL that
some of the key factors responsible for major differences
in the performance of BSES and NDPL included the Tata
culture and the leadership of Sardana. The former com-
pany had changed four CEOs in the last 18 months but
NDPL could retain Sardana to carry out its transforma-
tional agenda.
CHALLENGES AND LOOKING AHEAD
While Sardana looked back at the progress made on
various fronts, he was cautious not to feel complacent.
He was well aware of some of the challenges lying ahead
of him. Reliability of power supply had not been achieved.
Only about 30 per cent of the equipments had been
changed; 70 per cent was still old. Its anti-theft drive
against the power thieves was not fully effective. The
company was looking forward to drawing clearer plans
that helped sustain and catalyze the efforts in terms of
framing a long-term roadmap. But, something that it felt
was critical was the need to change the mindset of the
Delhi power consumers, a large number of whom were
used to consuming power for 50 years without paying
adequately for it; and changing the attitude and skill
levels of a large number of DVB-scheme employees. A
union office-bearer thought that employees remainedfearful of losing their jobs in the new scenario despite
the security provided to them by the tripartite agreement
signed at the time of acquisition. The nexus between the
power thieves and the political configurations was seen
as quite strong and breaking its steel-frame a complex
task. NDPL had made a far higher capital investment
in the infrastructure than its competitor BSES. It was to
be seen whether that was the right way of facing the
challenges. The media reported that the two BSES Dis-
coms were to spend Rs. 7 billion on the infrastructure
but had actually spent only Rs. 1.47 billion till March
31, 2004. On the contrary, NDPL made a capital expend-
iture of Rs. 2.88 billion against Rs. 2.87 billion that the
Delhi Electricity Regulatory Commission (DERC) had
required it to invest till this period. Despite the above-
mentioned performance indicators, Sardana felt that it
was a great challenge for NDPL “to make the Delhi
Government openly acknowledge that NDPL has per-
formed far better than BSES.”
NDPL had not yet got 100 per cent loyalty of its
people. The administration in the zonal offices was stillfar from satisfactory. Commenting on the change of
mindsets that had taken place, one of the GMs observed:
“We have been able to acclimatize about 50 per cent
employees into the NDPL ethos; about 30 per cent are
fence-sitters; and about 20 per cent have not changed
at all.” On being asked the same question, an HR manager
remarked: “In my opinion, only 40 per cent of the DVB-
scheme employees were fully acclimatized, 50 per cent
had partially changed, and 10 per cent had not changed
at all. These 10 per cent employees have no fear at all
as they have the union’s support.” But, the DVB-schemeemployees were not believed to be less competent. An
operations manager considered a large number of them
as “far more intelligent and competent than the new
employees of NDPL.” While elaborating on some of the
challenges that NDPL faced, Sardana observed: “We
have not been able to enforce a sense of responsibility
amongst the consumers.” Another manager remarked
that while 95 employees knew Sardana, not more than
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60 per cent knew the General Managers. The authors’
interaction with some of the employees at the field level
revealed that they still had no idea of the company’s
vision and mission. Of course, they could read it on the
wall hangings. The training imparted could have fo-
cused more on functional capability. The incompatibility
between the fast-track NDPL-scheme employee and the
old DVB-scheme Junior Engineer was worrying themanagers in Operations and Maintenance Department.
A recent survey undertaken by AC Nielsen revealed:
“Employees were involved in tampering of meters of
consumers and also their own meters at their homes.
While the employee behaviour has improved for the
better, the contractors’ staff should also be trained and
subjected to behaviour modification exercises.”
The company planned to bring about substantial
increase in its performance by regulating power supply
and feeders. Considerable investment was required for
this. Many policy decisions had to be taken. Sardana was
deliberating on many other questions: What would
happen in 2007 when the five-year subsidy contract
between the Delhi Government and the three Discomswas going to be over? Where would NDPL then stand
in competitive reckoning? What roadmap should the
company draw and focus upon so as to march towards
its vision? He was searching for possible directions that
he and his team would adopt so as to move ahead with
greater speed and vigour.
Acknowledgement • The authors thank Professor C P Shrimali,
Chairperson––HRM Area at MDI, Gurgaon, for his help in
introduction to NDPL; Pratish Thakur, Rajgopalan, and Vimal
Ojha, students of MDI National Management Programme,
Gurgaon, for their assistance in coordinating the initial case
construction process; and Professor Mukesh Chaturvedi of
MDI, Gurgaon, for his insightful comments on the earlier
drafts.
Debi S Saini, Ph.D. (Delhi) is Professor of HRM at Management
Development Institute (MDI), Gurgaon. He has authored oredited seven books including Change Champion’s Field Guide
(Editors: Dave Ulrich, Louis Carter, Marshall Goldsmith, and
Debi S Saini) published by Excel, New Delhi, 2005. He is
the author of a book-size volume on “Social Security Law:
India,” which forms part of the International Encyclopaedia
of Laws (Kluwer Law International, The Hague). He has also
authored 46 papers and management cases in the area of
HRM, change management, labour relations, and employment
law. He is the Editor of Vision––The Journal of Business
Perspective, the journal of MDI. Among others, he has been
on the Editorial Board of Industrial Relations Journal , Blackwell,
Oxford (1998-2002). He has been invited to chair sessionsand make presentations in a large number of workshops,
seminars, and MDPs in India and abroad. Among others, he
has done consultancy assignments for ILO and GTZ (Germany).
He is on the Board of the Best Practice Institute, Boston, USA,
as well as on the Advisory Board of the Society for Leadership
of Change, Huntersville, USA.
e-mail: [email protected]
Jyotsna Bhatnagar (Ph.D., IIT, Delhi) is Assistant Professor of
HRM at Management Development Institute, Gurgaon. She
launched her academic career at IIM, Ahmedabad in 1990
and has over ten years of experience in teaching, research,
and training. She has published around 40 papers in national
and international journals including International Journal of
HRM, Journal of Labour Research, Asia-Pacific Business
Review, HRD International, Vikalpa, Management and Labour
Studies among others. She has been invited to provide training
on HR issues to IAS officers and defence officers, managers
of American Express, ONGC, PGCIL, ABB, BEL, NTPC, IOCL,
etc. She has also been invited to present papers in international
conferences including at the Knowledge Management
Conference at Amsterdam, the Netherlands (2000); European
Academy of HRD (UK, 2004, ’03, ‘02), Asian Academy of
HRD (Bangkok, 2003), European Consortium for the Learning
Organization (Birmingham, UK, 2005), and APROS 11
Conference (Melbourne, Australia, 2005). She is an activeconsultant in competency mapping and talent management
in India.
e-mail:[email protected]
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