Bharti faces HR challenge

Acquisition of Zain's African operations may be an unusual HR challenge for Bharti, as it is somewhat different from its forays in Sri Lanka and Bangladesh.

By Shalini Singh, TNN | Feb 16, 2010, 08.41 AM IST

NEW DELHI: The acquisition of Zain's African operations may be an unusual human resource challenge for Bharti, as it is somewhat different from its forays in Sri Lanka and Bangladesh.

This is for two reasons. First, Zain is a loss-making operation, which has been a borderline performer where financials are concerned. This means it needs upliftment operationally which will require more people rushing in from Bharti than in normal circumstances.

Bharti may not have an aggressive HR mindset, considering that in Sri Lanka over 99 per cent of the workforce are Lankans with just a network and marketing head from India. So while sources close to the developments suggest that Zain's workforce will remain untouched by the sale, this may not be entirely true.

According to Uday Chawala, managing partner of Transearch India, the deal poses both opportunities and challenges on the human resource front. People in Airtel would be thinking what's next in terms of professional growth? This deal will give Manoj Kohli, Akhil Gupta and others a bigger canvas as Bharti morphs into a multinational enterprise. This will become a good retention tool for top talent going forward, he said. Chawla feels that the Zain workforce may be largely insulated from the changes.

Sources say Bharti's strengths: the ability to rollout telecom and distribution networks rapidly and the ability to kickstart an efficient telecom minutes factory given that it is the lowest cost producer of minutes in the world. Given that Zain is weak in these very areas, Bharti's workforce will have to be sent in big numbers to correct this if the deal goes through.

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