People

INVESTING IN HUMAN CAPITAL

PNB Housing strongly believes companies that create a productive work environment, offer development opportunities and quality training, and place equality and fairness above all are the organisations of the future.

Employees are PNB Housing’s most valuable assets and constitute one of the key pillars of its strategy. The Company’s human resources (HR) policy can be summarised as putting employees first by continuously investing in them.

PNB Housing has built systems in place to recruit, train and develop a first-class workforce. The Company strives to inculcate a culture that helps employees reach their potential, offers a wide range of learning opportunities and ensures recognition and rewards for their accomplishments. Further, people practices have been developed, aimed at increasing welfare, ensuring well-being, and improving work-life balance. The Company also collects and analyses employee feedback to improve its HR practices and policies, aligned with organisational and individual objectives and aspirations.

1,549

Employees on PNB Housing Finance payroll

2,498

Employees on PHFL payroll

18.33%

Ratio of women in workforce
(vs. 17.34% last year)

52.60%

New hires in the age
group 20-30

Learning and development

In keeping with the dynamic business environment, the Company conducts learning and development (L&D) programmes round the year to upskill and reskill employees. Its L&D strategy aims to fulfill three needs: organisational, functional and individual. Some cross-functional L&D themes are addressing business requirements, formulating succession planning, conducting behavioural trainings and fostering team camaraderie.

The Company’s learning management system (LMS), known as eGURU, is extensively used, in this regard. Besides, the LMS acts as a repository of all process manuals as well as compliance-related training modules, including Prevention of Insider Training, Prevention of Sexual Harassment, cybersecurity, among others. It also contains e-induction modules for new recruits. The LMS can be accessed through computers as well as mobile phones.

KEY INITIATIVES

Leadership development programme aims to enhance the Company’s bench strength and create an internal talent pipeline. Over the past few years, PNB Housing has identified high-performing individuals, taking cognisance of their strengths and moving them up the ladder. The programme consists of six months of training (both online and offline), 360-degree feedback and psychometric tests, among others. During the training, emphasis is given to business insights, clarity in communication, executional excellence and team handling.
Management trainee programme aims to orient the newly joined management trainees through the 70-20-10 induction model (70% of on-the-job training, 20% of mentoring/coaching at an individual level and 10% classroom training). 90 management trainees were recruited in FY 2019-20.
Academic collaborations enable the Company to send select employees to eminent universities, such as the University of Nottingham, Malaysia and the Indian Institute of Management (IIM), Bangalore, for higher studies and workshops.
‘Reconnect’ assists the Company’s sales team to build rapport with channel partners, educating them about different customer segments and products, thereby helping increase volumes.
Leadership development workshops are managerial workshops that take place at three separate levels: Senior Management, Senior Middle Management and Middle Management. Sessions are conducted, with internal and external speakers, to make them understand the nuances of leadership. A similar workshop was organised for junior managers as well.
Function-based trainings are conducted periodically, for SME, Legal, Fraud Control, Accounts, Underwriting, Deposits, Sales, Collections, Customer Service and other technical as well as business teams, with both internal and external trainers.
Cross-functional behavioural training allows the Company to redirect its surplus talent in the sales team and retrain them to support the collections team. Reskilling involves imparting an understanding of the changing market dynamics and the external challenges. 300 members of the Sales team were reskilled for Collections in FY 2019-20.
Compliance training is critical to the ‘first time right’ goal of PNB Housing. Through this, the Company apprises employees about its core values and ethical standards.

270

Training programmes (19% increase over last year)

2,558

Employees trained (35% increase over last year)

82%

Unique employees trained

1.84

Training person-days per employee

COVID-19 response

As a customer-facing business, remote working is not instinctive. However, with the help of the IT team, the Company transitioned its employees to a virtual environment with ease. A trial work from home was conducted on March 21, 2020; remote working was initiated with the announcement of the nationwide lockdown on March 24, 2020.

A robust network of zonal HR managers, administrative staff members and BCP committee members oversaw the coordination between teams and sought to iron out any employee concerns.

Once branch operations were permitted by the Government, a week-long trial was conducted at four branches across the country – to implement new operating norms in accordance with the State and Central Government guidelines, as well as to identify any gaps.

The Company resumed operations at all other branches in phases, in accordance with the containment zoning guidelines.

Employees resumed work in shifts to adhere to social distancing norms, with shift rosters prepared keeping in mind the right mix of skills and experience.

KEY ENGAGEMENT INITIATIVES (APRIL 2020)

‘Sampark’ helped connect with 200-300 employees every day
‘Extend Family’ helped connect with employees living on their own to boost their morale
Various L&D platforms were launched to engage employees, enhance their knowledge about product policies and upskill them (soft skills, behavioural training, certifications, assessments). These included micro learning modules that are easy to consume.
Daily BCP calls were centrally conducted with the Middle and Senior Management, to receive updates from different domains and geographies
Commitments made to employees were honoured in a timely manner (including fresh hires)
Information on HRMS, such as emergency contact, was updated
Multiple initiatives launched to encourage employees to explore past hobbies and create new ones

KEY L&D OUTCOMES (APRIL 2020)

8,000+ training modules accessed
1,000+ employees participated
300 modules accessed daily on average (mostly on conflict management and presentation skills)
‘Course of the Day’ published to garner more traction
800+ business partners trained via 22 programmes