Coming from a background of MNCs where rules are relaxed and people are judged by their work performance, it was a total culture shock to me when I learnt of the practices of this particular organization.
1) What happens if some people are perpetually late for work? Do you deduct their salary by the minutes of lateness or deduct a portion of their bonus? Or motivate them to be punctual by rewarding them when they aren't late for a period of time? This organization chose to punish latecomers.
2) We are not machines and we do fall sick sometimes. Some are strong enough to report for work despite running a temperature whereas most of us are probably half-dead at home. That's the reason why we are entitled to 14 days of Medical Leave a year. However over at this organization, people are penalized for taking more than 5 days of Medical Leave a year.
Give 14 days entitlement but penalize for taking more than 5 days? What a joke! Might as well say give 5 days of Medical Leave entitlement. While I understand it's a way to discourage abuse of MCs, I prefer the rewards system of giving an incentive for staying MC free for a year.
3) Saturday is an alternate week, half work day of 4.5 hours. If someone wants to take leave that day, it is considered a full day leave of 8 hours. Is this fair? Why are employees being punished for taking Saturday off?
4) All thanks to point 3, when a Public Holiday falls on a Saturday, we don't have to work. If it happens to be the Sat we were supposed to be off, we gain 1 day Annual Leave in lieu. Is this fair to those poor fellows who didn't have to work 4.5hrs on that Saturday yet their colleagues don't have to work 8 hours just because it happened to be their non-working Saturday?
5) Most companies I've been to send their employees on training to upgrade their workforce. I was most surprised by this organization's clause on repaying the training fees when one resigns. And we never asked to attend those training in the first place! I've heard of many companies sponsoring their staff to study cert/diploma without any strings attached. This is what I call generosity!
6) There is a practice of making employees sign a 1-5 year employment bond, yet the bond doesn't come with sponsorship of anything. It's basically a contract that doesn't allow one to resign for that period of time. What purpose does it serve? Lower staff turnover? Wake up! It's just delaying the turnover rate while tarnishing the organization's reputation in the job market coz unhappily bonded employees will be spreading negative comments about it.
7) Some employees are bonded for a few years at a fixed salary & position. I seriously do not understand why anyone would take up it up. Where is the motivation to excel at work if there's no salary increment or promotion no matter how hard you work?
8) Apparently some people are hired through the back door and that really puts me off.
9) Whenever someone tries to propose bringing in vendors (without cost) to do roadshows for staff, the Management's reaction is "What do we gain out of it?" and not "How can our staff benefit from it?". Obviously no roadshows were done in the end and staff have to wait forever for the "corporate discount" that will never happen.
This seems like quite a suffocating place to be in but yet people have stayed for 2 - 5 years. Probably they have been through worse company culture and find this ok. But not for me!
1 comment:
If I remember correctly, MOL has very strict limitation on what an employer can deduct from an employee's salary. I don't think an employer has the right to deduct salary if an employee is late. Also medical leave is an entitlement according to the labour law, company has no legal right to penalized. In both cases company can give warnings, etc but no monetary deduction is allowed. I think you should write in the MOL to officially lodge a complain on this company.
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