Is Moving Employees Between Branches a Win-Win or a Risky Move? Let's Discuss!

Hello everyone, I just wanted to know, "Is internal transfer (one branch to another) of employees good or bad?"

1. If it is good, please support your answer.
2. If it is bad, explain why.
3. Who is the ultimate beneficiary?
4. Who is the ultimate loser?

Thank you.

I feel it's quite good when internal transfers don't create a panic situation among people.

There is no fixed answer to the questions raised by you. It would vary depending on the circumstances. The provision of internal transfer should have been already mentioned in the appointment orders issued to the employee or in the Standing Orders of the establishment. The management should utilize the resources of internal transfer for the advantage of the organization.

Regards,
M. Venkatraghavan

It is rightly narrated to have a clause of internal transfer either in the appointment letter or in standing orders. However, care shall be taken during the transfer to ensure that the category of work remains the same.

Instances for Transfers

There are instances for which transfers are being made:

1. **Actual Work Necessity:** This can be used by the organization based on requirements, without disturbing the current job or analyzing the urgency of the transfer job demand.
2. **Maintenance of Workplace Discipline:** This can be analyzed by looking at short-term or long-term strategies.
3. **Creation of Bench Strength:** This serves as a business continuity planning strategy.

My views are that considering the situation's demand, we may have to take risks when necessary, as the right and quicker decisions determine the cost-effectiveness of time demands. Invite valuable feedback.

Regards,
Bharat Adhia

Factors Affecting Internal Transfers

The answer to each question will depend on various factors. It depends on what the branches are dealing with. If an employee is transferred to a branch in which they have experience or qualifications, both the employee and the organization will benefit. However, if they are placed into the wrong branch, both will lose.

If the organization feels the individual is fit for another branch but the employee does not want to go, then again, both may be at a loss. Conversely, if an employee manipulates (hypothetically) to go to another branch but it is not good for the organization, then the organization will be at a loss, and the employee will be happy.

There could be many permutations and combinations. Therefore, you have to clearly raise the question as per the situation to get the correct advice.

Benefits and Challenges of Internal Transfers

Internal transfers can be beneficial to an organization for several reasons:

• The organization doesn't require training the employee, as they are already familiar with the company's policies and procedures.

However, there are challenges as well:

• It's difficult to define the ultimate loser or beneficiary. If public interaction is involved, the organization might be at a disadvantage because, after a transfer, the employee has to establish new relationships with the public.

Regards

In my opinion, 70-80% of an employee's development occurs through transfers, with the balance achieved through organized training. Transfers within the organization, including moves to alternate locations, are associated with many challenges. For example, changes in bosses and reporting channels, changes in subordinates and team members, changes in the workbench and work environment, changes in goals/KRAs, and changes in school/house if you move to a different location, and so on. Each change requires mental realignment, besides an effort to adjust and align. This process of adjustment and adaptation is self-motivated. It awakens your hidden potential and makes you creative. You become a problem solver.

I wish to point out that an armed forces officer moves every two to three years to a different job and location (sometimes to non-family stations). All this exposure trains him/her to face challenges with a smile. Every move transforms him/her and impacts the development of personality. It ejects the fear of the unknown and creates a more optimistic outlook.

Basically, we employ people to deliver certain results. This delivery of results depends on the competence of the individual doing the job. Competence depends a lot on the exposure and experience one gets on a job. Going by this logic, we should try to build domain experts so that we get the fullest advantage of their employment. Exposing a person to so many areas will make him a master of none. His/her use to the organization will also be lesser to that extent.

Exceptions to Building Domain Experts

But there are two exceptions to this. One is avoiding over-dependence on some person only and for that purpose, developing standbys or substitutes just to step in in case of need or contingency. This way, no expert can think that the company is entirely depending upon him and him only for the functions he/she is performing and with such thinking blackmailing the company. Developing such standbys will also ensure continuity of operations.

The second exception is the deployment in sensitive areas where there is scope for corruption or misdeeds which may very adversely affect the company. In such areas, persons should be rotated at periodical intervals so that the scope for indulging in corruption or misdeeds is reduced.

Internal Transfer: A Mixed Bag of Good and Bad

My views are maintained in the same order as your questions.

A transfer is always a mixed bag of GOOD and BAD.

1.0 Come to the GOOD first: new environment, new boss (may be a better boss), new place (better weather), new subordinates (may be better colleagues), new learnings, etc.

2.0 BAD aspects: new environment (tougher), new boss (may be a bad boss), new place (language difficulty), new subordinates (may be bad work culture), etc.

Eventually, you can make this also good. It will increase your patience, hone your behavioral skills, provide an opportunity to learn a new language, etc.

3.0 Beneficiary: Management (because it wants), Employee (since he uses the chance), Both (possible).

4.0 Loser: Management (the individual would get richer in experience and may move out), Employee (if he has been separated from his family), Both (when an employee cannot perform in the new environment).

So there you are. There are many possibilities, and you have to consider case by case and cannot generalize.

Regards,
V. Raghunathan

I agree with most of the respondents that, like many management questions, there is no one answer to these questions. However, in certain organizations, for example, in my organization (a central PSU), such transfers created a peculiar situation. There was mass redeployment of staff/officers from one department to another, such as Finance, Personnel, Materials, and Maintenance, to the Commercial department. The designations, although not changed, resulted in having a sales assistant, a stores & purchase supervisor, and an accounts assistant doing the same job sitting side by side! This was done to avoid issues relating to inter-se seniority.

Well, basically, it has some mutual benefits, but usually, it depends on the situations and various factors. For example, if an employee resides too far from the branch where he is working, a lot of time is spent traveling. In that case, he can be transferred to the branch nearest to his home.

Alternatively, if a company starts a new branch, some trained individuals are needed to initiate operations there and train new employees. This process helps in the smooth functioning of the new branch and ensures the transfer of knowledge and skills to the new workforce.

Lots of valuable inputs have already been effectively provided by our learned friends. Apart from the pros and cons of internal transfer of employees within the organization, I would like to state something from the employees' perspective. Though admittedly transfer is an incidence of service, is it wholeheartedly welcomed by all employees, particularly in the private sector? I am afraid that it is not. In my 32 years of State Government service in the Labour Department, I had the opportunity of serving in all the industrially concentrated cities of the State. My interaction with private sector employees, irrespective of the color of their collars, shows that most people do not like transfers and want to stay put in the particular place of employment. Even some of them prefer a change of companies within that particular place to transferring out for obvious reasons.

It is the prerogative of the management to decide who is to work where and when, depending upon the exigencies of work. Generally, the Standing Orders and the letters of appointment empower the management to effect internal transfers. But I do believe that an individual employee's status and personal hardships should not be simply brushed aside. Would it be prudent to transfer a fitter working at the Chennai site to Gurgaon just because a branch site is there? So, transfer should not be a colorable exercise of power or victimization. The benefits of transfer are generally manifold, both to the employer and the employee, depending upon the organization's size, multiplicity of locations, diverse employment ethnicity, and the operational challenges faced, as well as the employee's age and nature of the job.

Regards.