G Y Suhas: How Lay Off Was Avoided With Excellent IR Strategies A Success Story

surabhiisgr8
Excellent Sir.
Hats off to you !!! Congratulations for your achievement !
Regards,
Surabhi
vkokamthankar
Many thanks Mr. G Y Suhas for the post.

I have few queries on terms of agreement.

• It was decided that, 5 non working days will be compensated by working on Sundays in the year 2009 and 2010.

I understand that, 5 days and 4 days working during 2008 resulted in additional offs to workers and workers and management agreed to compensate them @ 5 days a month by working on Sundays in the year 2009 and 2010.

My query is: this is possible only if market situation improves in 2009 and 2010. If market remains sluggish then you may not be in a position to restore 6 days a week plus working on Sunday making it 7 days a week. What has been your experience in the year 2009?

Secondly how did you manage to work for more than 48 hours a week without break/weekly off by contravening provisions of Factories Act? Moreover you may have to bear additional cost on Overtime payment for working on Sundays, in spite of adverse financial condition.

• Workmen agreed for adjustment of incentive hours for 5.5 days.It is not clear, workmen agreed for what adjustment and what are incentive hours of 5.5 days?

Please reply and help me in understanding the terms of agreement.

Thanks & Regards

gysuhas23
Thank you all very much for appreciating the presentation.
I would like to clarify your queries as follows:
During the recession our Company declared holidays for 20 days during 2008-09
especially on Fridays / Saturdays. Before declaring holidays, there was a meeting every
week between management and union to review the business situation. These holidays
were compensated, after discussions with Union, as follows:
(a) To compensate by working 5 days (on Sundays) during 2009-10 after September
2009 when the situation improved (based on the prediction of Market situation).
There was no additional payment for working on these Sundays as the work was
in lieu of holidays availed during recession and in pursuance to the agreement
with union to that effect. These Sundays were chosen from October 2009 till
March 2010 in such a way that whenever a Sunday is declared to be a working
day, a National / Festival Holiday would fall during that week. This was to avoid
continuous working beyond nine days. As such there was no contravention of
Factories Act.
(b) Since we had a good market forecast, we planned and agreed for Sunday work.
However if market situation was not to improve, we would have given up the
Sunday work. However, our well calculated risk paid us rich dividends.
(c) Employees produce certain number of machines during the month based on the
market requirement. We have criteria of Base output (defined based on the
manpower strength & standard hours for each machine). Any production
beyond the Base output is called the Incentive output. The hours manufactured
beyond the base output is called incentive hours. Such 5.5 hours were
deducted from the Incentive hours after October 2009 till March 2010. Workmen
agreed for this deduction of amount.
In fact, the situation improved after October 2009 and we could achieve whatever was
agreed to.

My contact address, email and cell number are as follows, for any further queries on this.

G. Y. Suhas
Head-HR, IR and Admn
L&T-Komatsu Limited,
Bellary Road,
Bangalore 560 092
Karnataka – India
Email:
gys-bw@bw.ltindia.com

Mobile: 0919740111889
MANDYA VENKAT RAM
Dear Mr Suhas
Thank you for an educative and inspiringaccount of the way in which you handled a difficult situation common to several organisations around the world. Your approach is innovative in the sense that a mix of techniques have been cleverly used ranging right from rational explanation and seeking cooperation up to invoking the statutory authorities .
Hearty Congratulations on a commendable achievement and even more so for sharing the rich learning! I look forward to further interaction with you
Best regard
M Venkat Ram
(former DGM TATA POWER, Mumbai)
Trainer, Certified Senior Assessor and Business Excellence Champion,
CII Institute of Quality
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