Whats a PIP in TCS ? – Performance Improvement plan

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TCS is trying desperately to damage the name it had with associates few years back. Now the HR has totally different role in this organisation, how to reduce cost at any cost.

Earlier TCS had PIP – Process Improvement process which were suggestions given by employees to improve company in any area. But now after the TCS numbers started going down, the company has come up with one more way of firing employees – PIP (Performance Improvement Plan). Though TCS claims this process is for improving and motivating employee the truth is this is one more tool in blackmailing employees into submission and firing them when they need to reduce the employee count of highly paid staff.

A PIP is sent to the supervisor of the employee who has a lower score in annual performance evaluation and bar for lower score has been increased recently which will cover almost 20% of employees. Since TCS has curve fitting model for giving performance rating ,15-20% of its 1,20,000 employees will get band D or Rating 2.  Now they have introduced PIP to send out this employees out. The funny part is this whole performance evaluation never reflects actual performance of individual rather it  depends on various factors as I had mentioned in my previous post here.

Now what happens if your supervisor gets a PIP for you ? . Either he can save you by giving you a rating(this is PIP rating) of  2.5 or above (for 5) or he can give you a lesser feedback and get you fired. As if the PL’s and PM’s in TCS doesnt have enough say in your salary now one more way he can make you a slave.

So how does this process work and what is the criteria for receieving a PIP (ie ur supervisor getting one for you).  Refer the below table for verifying the criteria for PIP this year (and past year)

TCS PIP chart for 2008 -2009

According to this chart released by TCS HR anyone at C3B level and above will be fired if they get continous 2 rating or Band D as I ahd earlier mentioned in the previous post. For employees Below AST ir ITA or ASE, they will be fired if they get a Band E or Rating 1  twice. In all other scenarios they will get a PIP and your PL / PM has to save you.

So do pass the word to other TCSers and also cautions the others interested in TCS about the same.

TCS asks employees who got continous 2 ratings or Band D to resign

Yesterday some of the TCS  employees who have obtained two or more years of continous 2 rating or Band D have been asked to resign from TCS even if they are currently allocated in projects.

Though this might look strange but it might be a relief for unlucky ones in Bench at the moment and create panic among associates who have got 2 rating last year. This appears to be a strategy of HR making way for associates with good performance rating not to be fired from TCS.

By firing the currently allocated associates with poor record, the company tries to give opportunities to  associates with good track record and  currently unallocated . In a way this ensures the employees are not fired on pure luck and their influence with top management.

But to most this has been a bolt out of clear sky, and set the tone for Performance evaluation negotiations.

Fennec -Firefox for mobile out for Nokia N810 (Beta)

For those who surf the web in their firefox a good news, Mozilla’s community browser Firefox will be soon available for All Symbian devices and Windows mobile devices in the form of Fennec Mobile Browser. Now the Fennec is in Beta and released for Nokia’s Internet device N810.

Fennec - Mobile Firefox logo Full size
Fennec - Mobile Firefox logo Full size

Considering the most of Symbian softwares are released first on N800 and N810, it shouldnt be too long before we get Fennec for other Symbian devices. Mozilla also is developing Fennec for Windows Mobile Platform and would be launched along with Symbian launch.

The below is simplified version of Fennec logo for small screened devices

Fennec Simple Logo - Firefox for mobile

Fennec is poised to be main competitor for Nokia’s S60 3rd version builtin browser Opera Browser and Windows Mobile IE.

Fennec team aims to achieve following features for Fennec in the initial stable release.

1. Faster/Simple and less memory hungry broswer with intuitive mobile UI.
2. Support for all the features of desktop Firefox engine like AJAX meaning ‘FULL’ web browser unlike other mobile browsers. Developers need not worry about writing a separate web page except adapting for the disaplay size.
3. Secure Browser implementation which will mimic its desktop brother.
4. Fully integrated application instead of just browser, aim is to make Fennec fully compatible with other phone feautures like Call,Contacts,Mapping applications and even more.
5. With addons Fennec will act like a mobile platform itself.

The Fennec team is also working on some of the cool touch screen UI proposals which could hit Iphone later but expect Fennec to be available on Nokia N97 much earlier than Apple’s Iphone.