Udaya Kumar Kannan is one of our recruiting managers at HGS India. Being a PwD himself (Post-Polio Paralysis), Uday has a passion for combating employability challenges and creating employment opportunities for PwDs. Having faced social and employment rejections early in life, Uday understands the needs of this fraternity and brings in strong commitment to hiring and integration of PwDs at HGS.
In his two years with HGS, Uday has contributed commendably at every juncture of the hiring lifecycle—manpower requisition to workforce onboarding, identification of various roadblocks and obstacles at every touchpoint, clearing those roadblocks, and bringing in efficiency in the workflow. One of his laudable contributions has been to drive Disability Recruitment in the existing Talent Acquisition strategy of HGS.
Until September 2015, HGS had only 34 PwD employees. In the 21 months since then, HGS has witnessed a spurt in the inclusion of PwDs within the workforce. As of June 2017, HGS had 273 PwDs in its employee pool, comprising five out of 21 types of disabilities recognized by the Government of India.
Upon joining HGS, Uday presented a business case for hiring PwDs in the organization including operations team. As a pilot for the suggested program, 38 PwDs were hired in outbound sales accounts where keyboarding skills are not as critical as inbound accounts. Post hiring, these PwD candidates underwent customized and accessible training programs designed by the Operations, Training and HR Teams. The pilot was successful in showcasing the value addition that PwDs can bring to the table, and has been a primary factor to include PwD hiring in the mainstream HGS hiring process.
Another example of his contribution is helping evolve HGS’ 30-60-90 day performance evaluation mechanism. Led by Uday’s passion, the TA and Operations teams have now made it mandatory for all PwD employees to undergo this mechanism, wherein productivity and quality of service of all new candidates is measured. The initial study done by the team in October 2015 had revealed that PwDs who were hired were at par with the abled employees. Subsequently, the organization realized the enormous talent and engagement that the PwD employees were bringing in speaking to the clients. This has ensured that hiring PwDs is a business-as-usual activity in HGS today.
In his capacity as a subject matter expert in hiring PwDs, Uday is now working with an organization to roll out a scientific methodology of conducting a job evaluation exercise for generic roles in Domestic and International businesses, and corporate functions at HGS. This activity will help sensitize the TA teams and hiring managers about how best to fit PwD candidates in the right profiles, and provide equal opportunities to job applicants in future.
Uday’s contribution has helped in making HGS a future-ready organization and his role in this journey has been acknowledged by the leadership and teams. He is a role model in the HGS family, whose contributions visibly echo our commitment to one of our seven core values that respects diversity of all kinds—Global Mindset.
Find opportunities in a workplace that bolsters the growth of all its employees alike, with us at HGS.