ANZ was fun, i must admit. I met some really cool people with whom i never realised that an year had gone by. Since i knew the system they were using pretty well, it made life a lot easier. I was given the credit for contributing and my designation reflected that when i quit. Having said all this, i would still suggest ppl to give it a long hard thought before joining ANZ. Reason? well,
1) first is the question of existence. Since its a bank,u dnt get the best of tech work. As far as the business is concerned, its done out of Australia and u dnt get to know much. End result: frustration. If you are looking for a cool life which pays well with an occasional trip abroad, go for ANZ.
2)ANZ's habit of experimenting too much with everything. Yes, they love to change things around, starting from groups to managers to policies. You never really know whos heading which group and which group you gonna belong to the next day. Its called "change" in ANZ.
3) IJP !! Its actually internal job posting which means all jobs are advertised internally and all can apply. Sounds good? ok, here is the downside: lets say you want to move to Database side. In TCS or Infosys, they will send u to some 1-2 month training and get you a project where you can learn on the job. Here its different. There is no separate training centre. An effort may be made to get some external trainer. But heres what takes the cake: officially you are supposed to get in touch with team which is handling dbase and ask them to help u outside office hours !! LOL !! Do u expect that to work? ANZ does. Wanna know more? here goes: in an interview for a job, if an external candidate has also applied which in all probability will happen, ANZ guys will not be given any advanatge!! So if that guy has worked in Dbase as in previous example, you know your chances are next to nil. So how are u supposed to shift to anyplace where the skills are different from what you already know? humm...ANZ doesnt like to answer such questions.
4) HR believes they rock the place as ANZ employees command above avg salaries. Well, that may actually be true. But there are lotsa exceptions to that :). E.g. A fresher is recruited at 4.5 lacs package(yes u got it right,its 4.5 !!). Now lets say a guy with arnd 3 yrs of work-ex is recruited from outside. He would be given a salary of arnd 5 or 5.5 !! LOL!! yah, thats their idea of lateral recruitment. Theory is lateral guy will get promoted soon and will get the package he deserves. Downside is, since he is at the lower side of package at the previous level, he will remain at the lower side of next level also. This may not be always true but its highly possible. Also, they love to change things right in the middle. Let me tell you what happened when i joined ANZ. It so happens that after 6 months of probation when i am eligible for promotion, our esteemed HR dept has made it illegal to promote anyone. Yah !! Coz IJP was getting rolled out. So everyone is supposed to wait and when finally IJP got rolled out, they took their own sweet time in advertising, interviewing and finally selecting. All this nonsense delayed my promotion by six months. Whos responsible ? Well, no one !!
5) Then theres a small matter of changing the definition of TEC. When i joined bonus used to be part of CTC offered. Bonus was offered assuming i will get an avg ranking. And bonus used to be offered twice coz there were two ranking given in an year, one in sep and the other in march.I thought it was fair. In between , in oct,they changed the policy saying ranking will be given once in an year.So in effect, u got ur sep bonus but march bonus wont be given as it will be an annual event now. Sep to Sep would be the ranking and hence the bonus. Cool. But what if i quit in april? Shudnt i get the bonus which was due in march since that was part of the CTC offered to me on the basis of which i joined? Why was the policy changed midway?It shud hv been changed in april so that effect was minimal. Well, in ANZ, u dnt ask all this.
I dnt think i need to mention small problems like if u want to delay your last day in ANZ after having given an earlier date in the resignation by a few days for whatever reason, its not possible !!
Anyway, all said and done, ANZ was probably the best time in my working career of 3.5 years. Ppl were really really cool. We had parties for no reason at all !! You will find some really supportive team mates. After leaving ANZ , i have realised i made some really good frnds there. Thanks ANZ.
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6 comments:
hmmm.. u cudnt have put it better :).. n doesnt look like things r gonna "change" for a very long time.. but then i guess it'l be a little too late :).. the way some things work....
Yup..... completely agree with these.....the policies......!!!! too many changes....rather shud I say experiments.....still goin on.....really sucks.....:((((
Dear Sunny,
The problem is a little bit more systemic and not limited to ANZ alone. It has to do with people with greater than average brain sizes and ambitions working in India's IT services industry.
The problem is due to the mismatch in what the individual needs to quench his/her creative urges v/s the organisation's business plans for the unit where the individual operates.
The systemic problem is somewhat magnified in a cost center which is what ANZ is in India. Unlike a TCS where clients/ technologies/ domains/ "what have you" are many and there abound many oppurtunties for a "change of scene", these are very limited in a cost center which by definition is in India "purely" to take advantage of the cost arbitrage. At a management level, there might be the intention of making the India campus more stategic etc, but, all that ends up being just lip service to a majority of the employees in the India campus.
Lets call a spade a spade, cost centers are in India to take advantage of the cost arbitrage. A person who joins a cost center usually gets a higher than industry average salary (otherwise there is no reason for him to do so) but he/she should take that decision after carefully considering who he/she is. Once on board, some people go on to like the relaxed (compared to an Indian IT services company) work atmosphere, the higher than industry average pay, the fun atmosphere etc. Other people like you feel frustrated.
Going by the theory "may the best man win", my take is that with time, cost centers will become unviable and would pretty much be run by professional IT services companies.
Cheers
I am somewhat an activist when it comes to the popular perception that Indian IT = Indian IT/ITeS. Its really sad when an organisation like the NASSCOM points out major issues to the Indian IT industry as - shortage of manpower and the strengthening dollar.
It seems that we have adjusted our minds to being followers in the Global IT inustry by selling the time of our IT professionals for the greenback and hence the risks to this being - 1) Not enough billable people (lower revenue) 2) Stronger rupee (lower margin).
It bothers me that noone worries about the fact that there are very few true product companies coming out of India and serving the burgeoning market. We are happier being consumers and mechanics for already built technology/solutions.
I write a blog covering some of these issues. http://www.icreate.in/wordpress/?cat=1
Cheers
Anup.
Ah..Anup..glad u read my words.. I agree with ur comments on IT as a whole in India.However contextually ANZ has its own set of probs which i wanted to highlight.Yes, it has inherited the limitations which Indian IT has but there are many which it has created on its own:
1)Drastic pay difference b/w lateral hire and campus recruitment.TCS has struck a balance.IF ANZ is paying higher to retain ppl, it shud pay all.Laterals shudnt be made to feel second-class.
2) For every 4 ppl u hv a manager in ANZ. Worse, he/she is supposed to be a non-technical manager. This is where money which shud rightfully go to develop resources gets wasted. Lets face it: If an immediate manager in IT company has to be hands-off(which means he need not know which release is going in the team, what tech the team works with etc in ANZ parlance), he has no business being in IT.Let him go manage a cowshed in Bihar.
These are just examples. There is a whole bundle of these.And its because of these reasons ANZ will face problems.
Such cost centres have a general mgmt problem. They cnt retain good ppl coz of the absurd environs (yes ambition is a reason too), and then they pay below-avg ppl mighty salaries.When such ppl leave,more sub-standard ppl are recruited with even higher salaries.This is a circle. End result: a day will come when the quality will be next to nothing and salaries will sky rocket. This is what NASSCOM fears. I blv NASSCOM is right when it says talent scarcity is a danger.It becomes a danger coz you have entered into a loop of ever-rising salaries for a work which essentially remains of same nature.Another aspect of talent crunch: every s/w engineer over a period of few years becomes a manager.Can you blv it? And then he is supposed to deliver as a good manager.No wonder many dnt knw what to do.Result: SBI TCS mgmt.Forget abt the talent scarcity in future. We lack good managers right now and the enormity of the problem will be understood slowly over the next few yrs. Why is it that every year HP survey yells out that managers are the biggest reason for attrition?
Yes Indians will move into innovation.Products will be created here. Thats a natural step fwd.But again, such will be few in no.This is true in general.So NASSCOM need not worry abt them. By the time such companies becm huge in size, we may hv another version of s/w industry and hence NASSCOM itself.A repurcssion of this movement will be a further lack of talent in services which compounds the problem.
Future is exciting but indian IT can do without: absurd HR, hopeless learning departments, selfish managers who just want to protect their paychecks, incompetent managers who dnt know a thing abt what the team is doing, incessent clamour by the ppl abt salary nt being enuf(i hate it when freshers in IT say it) and companies who just want to make more n more money by getting work shifted to offshore sites w/o thinking that they need to develop ppl coz tech keeps changing.
Hmmm ..Well said ... Things have nt changed much and are getting worse day by day ... May be i need to 'change' myself !!!
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