Duties of HR and GenSvc functions

This page lists the tasks that need to be handled by the GenSvc and HR teams in Merce.

The term GenSvc means "General Services". This is the same as what is called "Admin Dept" in other companies. We refuse to use the word "Admin" because the "Admin" department does not "administer" anything -- it only provides services to other departments so that they can run smoothly. So "General Services" is a better name for it.

HR in our company focuses on (i) recruitment processes and (ii) handling the operational tasks, tracking, and paperwork of existing employees.

HR: recruitment

1. Campus recruitment: aim for 3-4 campus recruitment drives per month. During some parts of the year, this may not be possible, but in Bombay, it is usually possible for more than six months of the year.
2. Recruitment from jobsites: search for candidates as per search criteria given by Kishan, Shraddha or Shuvam. Show short-listed resumes to the right manager, then follow up with candidates for bringing them for interviews.
3. Backup services to KP/ST: for senior position recruitment, Kishan and/or Shraddha drive the process. Backup support is needed for them to follow up with candidates, coordinates for meetings and interviews, etc.
4. Campus relationships: build relationships with a few engg campuses with the aim of becoming a preferred recruiter there. Organise talks, workshops, there at which our team will deliver talks. Facilitate internships and projects from their students in our company.
5. Response to queries: respond within one working day to all queries about positions that come in from our Website
6. Walk-ins: handle walk-ins in a systematic manner, without leaving it completely to peons
7. Offer letters: create these letters as per standard template, in LaTeX, and keep a copy on record in CVS. Send offer letter with covering letter to candidate. Later, insert a PDF version of the offer letter into SBR when the officer joins. Offer letters are not to be created in OpenOffice or MS Office.
8. New employee management: when a new officer joins the company, a few tasks have to be performed, listed here, with the deadline for each task in brackets against it:
   • get his account created on the system (same working day on which he joins)
   • create his record correctly in SBR (three working days)Note: the resume and offer letter fields are not optional items.
   • give him an introduction to his reporting officer and key members of the company (three working days)
   • collect papers which every officer is supposed to submit on joining (by the end of the calendar month)
   • edit the Merce User Manual and give him his customised copy (three working days)
   • inform Accounts about the person, his position, salary, division/group, and joining date by email to accounts@merceworld, not verbally (three working days)
   • do all paperwork for opening a salary account for the employee in our specified bank for salary accounts (currently it is SBI Konkan Bhavan) and give the account number to Accounts (seven working days)
9. Pipeline tracking: use a spreadsheet to track the status of each candidate, with one worksheet per position. It should be possible to know at a glance how many have cleared the test(s), how many have cleared the interviews, how many have been given offers and are yet to join, etc.
10. Business card: After the employee completes his probation period, get his business card printed, and give him a set of 100 cards.
11. Identity tags: Photo identity tags with neck straps must be printed for all employees, and for each new employee.

HR: existing officers

1. Leave: track leave balances of all employees -- the rules are given in the Leave page [1]. Credit the right number of days of leave into each employee's balance on 1 Apr and 1 Oct every year. Keep track of unpaid leave. Inform Accounts about unpaid leave by email to accounts@merceworld, not verbally, for updating salary calculations.
2. Company accommodation: for those officers who stay in shared company-provided accommodation, do the following:
   • track who is occupying each apartment, how many vacant rooms are there, occupying and vacating of apartments
   • inform Accounts of each case of an officer occupying or vacating an apartment
   • visit the housing society's management committee once a quarter and maintain relations with them
   • give a written one-pager with photo and details of the officer to the housing society, whenever any of our officers moves into any apartment or moves out
   • visit each apartment once a quarter and see the condition, cleanliness, maintanence, curtains, signs of defacement of walls, unauthorised occupancy, etc, and escalate problems
   • manage the lease renewals of existing apartments, shift from existing to new apartments when needed or requested by resident officers.

   Remember that we have company-leased apartments in Bombay and Gurgaon, and this list of locations may increase.

3. Identity tags and business cards: whenever a persons's designation or department changes, re-issue new business cards and identity tags. Take the old identity tag back. Whenever an officer's business cards are exhausted, give him a new box of cards.
4. Personal errands of officers: See the page on personal errands [2]. Handle requests that come from officers. In addition to such requests, a regular set of tasks for ST, SM, and KP need to be handled, including home phone bills, home electricity bills, maintenance charges to housing societies, etc. These bills need to be obtained if they have not been received on time, and then payment hast to be made from their personal accounts. The job of writing out the personal cheques will be that of GenSvc.
5. Resignations and settlement: On resignation, the following has to be done:
   • inform Accounts (by email) about the exact last working day of the departing employee
   • Track notice periods and inform Accounts about any employee where there is a shortfall.
   • Recover all pending returnables, including photo identity tags, library books from the office library, laptops, cellphones, data cards and dongles given by the company, etc.
   • Update SBR as soon as formal resignation is received.
   • close the officer's salary account with the bank, and intimate both the bank and the officer about this in writing
   • Issue (i) experience certificate and (ii) relieving letter, only in case of those who have worked through full notice period and have cleared all other pending returnables. These are to be withheld for those who do not work through their notice periods or have returnables pending.
   • Calculate leave balance and inform Accounts so that pending leave balance can be encashed in final settlement.
   • Check with management what needs to be done about the system account of the employee, and ensure that Support Group deletes the account as per your specifications.

   The settlement of money dues and receivables will be done by Accounts directly with ex-employee.

Board related processes

1. Board resolutions: whenever there is a need for a Board resolution, get the wording corrected and checked from our Company Secretary, then get the details checked with ST/SM, and finally, take instructions about what date to put for the Board resolution from ST/SM. Do not create random dates for Board Meetings.
2. Minutes of Board meetings: with the help of Company Secretary, get the old Board resolutions incorporated into Board meetings, and get them included in the Minutes of Meetings register. Get Chairman of the Board's signature on the Minutes. Repeat every quarter.
3. Annual returns of MCA: Check that our annual company returns have been filed with the Ministry of Corporate Affairs. Take help of Company Secretary to get this completed. Repeat every year at annual closing time.
4. Physical share certificates: check that the physical shares of ST and SM in Merce Technologies exist. These are in the office. Tally the counts with the Share Register. Repeat every year.

General Services

1. Answering the phone: From 10AM to 6PM, no phone will be answered by any office assistant, driver or housekeeping staff. Only officers will answer the phone. It could be someone from Accounts, HR or GenSvc. But no peons, no Mahadev, no Krishna. This must be fanatically implemented. If we don't do it, there is a terrible negative impact on the company's image. Senior managers we are trying to recruit will make one phone call to our board line, get that terrible response from one of our housekeeping staff, conclude that we are a lala company, and forget about joining us.
2. Housekeeping: handle the two employees, assign tasks, track attendance and timings, etc.
3. Consumables: handle the purchase of consumables needed for office, both for staff welfare (tea, coffee, biscuits) and stationery. Actual procurement is done by peons. Minimum quantities must be maintained in office at all times. It has often been found that the laser printer's toner is running dry late at night when some urgent printing is needed, and there's no cartridge in office. This should not be allowed to happen.
4. Bills: the company receives bills for all services it avails of from service providers, including (i) phone bills, (ii) Internet access bills, and (iii) electricity bills. All these bills must be obtained if they are not received on time, and then each must be presented to Accounts by inserting in a Pending file maintained for this purpose. Responsibility for delay in obtaining a bill lies with GenSvc. The job of releasing payment is that of Accounts. Responsibility of delay in payment lies with Accounts. Once a cheque has been made out by Accounts and signed, the job of depositing it is with GenSvc.
5. Mail from NP address: ensure that all mail received at our Nariman Point address is brought to New Bombay office within a max of two working days.
6. Outstation trip assistance: for all outstation trips, all bookings are to be done by GenSvc. They will know how to book rail and air tickets using cash or official credit cards (details of such credit cards available with Accounts). Before each such booking, GenSvc will ask Accounts and get exact account ledger name and cost centre name for each expense, fill a voucher with these details and hand over these vouchers to Accounts with exact amounts and details after bookings are done. GenSvc will maintain on the Intranet a list of hotels, one page per hotel, with full details including telephone numbers, rates, etc. These will be updated periodically by GenSvc based on latest info. Whenever an officer returns from an outstation trip, the hotel details must be taken from that officer and the Intranet page for that hotel must be updated.
7. Car usage tracking: there are three personal cars whose usage is to be tracked by GenSvc for official use. These cars are of ST, SM, and KP. Their logbooks must be obtained once a month, all official entries must be noted down in a spreadsheet in a specific format (Accounts will instruct you about format), and passed on to Accounts. If any entry has unclear or incomplete text for cost centre or reason of trip, then get it clarified from the respective car owner.
8. OT: track the overtime sheets of housekeeping staff, driver, and peons. Ensure that these are filled every week, and check them for reasonableness. Cross-check with mgmt if a particular duty entry is unusual.
9. Manage peons: assign tasks to peons, coordinate their errands, manage their presence and absence to ensure all deliveries are done, report to management in case there is shortfall of resource.
10. Petty cash: track petty cash and ensure that statements are filled every week by each employee who takes petty cash. The physical withdrawing of cash is done by Accounts, but the tallying of petty cash balance in the cash box is to be done by GenSvc.
11. Office premises: physically inspect and track each office premises a minimum of twice a day to ensure
    • water supply in toilets
    • consumables in toilets, e.g. toilet paper, liquid soap, etc.
    • cleanliness of entire premises
    • tea, coffee, biscuits supply
    • electrical supply working, AC working, etc

    Take immediate corrective action when you see a problem. Once a week, also take a look at all fittings/fixtures to ensure they're okay. Leaking faucets, broken fittings, etc, are common. Get them fixed immediately.

12. UPS: There is a large UPS and a battery bank in a separate room. This is the lifeline of the company. It's maintenance must be outsourced to a maintenance company, and GenSvc will ensure that quarterly visits are done.
13. General infrastructure: all electrical supply, electrical fittings, telephone links and Internet links are to be kept working by GenSvc. If someone reports a malfunction, please check and follow up with the service provider immediately. The basic office infrastructure, common facilities (e.g. lights in toilets and passages) must be constantly monitored so that malfunctions are detected by GenSvc without anyone having to report it. Coordinate with Accounts for release of payment when needed.
14. Shops and Establishments registration: Ensure that this is kept up-to-date.
15. Merce CD sets: A set of Merce CDs must be kept with Gen Svc in office at all times, as per prescribed procedure. Check separate email describing this procedure.
16. Sales collateral: a minimum quantity of each sales related document must be kept in office at all times. Whenever quantities drop below a minimum, ST must be contacted and new copies printed.
17. Movable assets check: track all company assets which are assigned to specific officers, including books from the company library, laptops, cellphones, external hard drives, data cards, etc. These need to be tracked once a month for the first three months, then once a quarter. A register needs to be maintained.
18. Library: There are many books in the company library. Stocktaking needs to be done every six months.

Note: The job of getting signatures of Authorised Signatories on cheques is that of Accounts. The Accounts Dept may take the help of peons to move the papers, but all queries from Authorised Signatories will go to Accounts, therefore this task is an Accounts task.

Calendar

A lot of the activities of HR and GenSvc are periodic repeated events, e.g. getting one phone bill for each phone every month, one electricity bill for each premises every month, etc. These are to be driven by a calendar of events. In HR, there are calculations of leave balance, adding of leave in April and October, etc.

HR and GenSvc must maintain calendars of tasks. This could be in a spreadsheet, where one worksheet is for each of (i) daily, (ii) weekly, (iii) monthly, (iv) quarterly, and (v) annual tasks. This calendar must be updated whenever a new type of task is added to the list of duties.

Reporting

Once a day, an email needs to be sent to gensvc-report@merceworld.com about all GenSvc tasks done that day. A similar daily report needs to be sent to hr-report@merceworld.com listing the HR related tasks done on that date. If there is a periodic task done, e.g. a monthly stock-taking or a quarterly check, then a separate email needs to be sent to the same addresses (depending on GenSvc or HR) about the results of the exercise.

Tasks done by HR and GenSvc are in two categories: one-off tasks that are requested by an officer, and those that are part of the general ongoing work of the Departments. For the former case (one-off requests), it's almost always GenSvc tasks. For such tasks, create a ticket in the GenSvc queue for each task when the request comes in, and then update the ticket and close it after the task is done. You can take help from Support Group about handling the ticketing system. Do not work on a one-off task till you have created its ticket. Over time, the management wants to monitor the one-off task workload by reviewing the tickets.

In people terms, the HR and Gen Svc functions report to the top management.