Having global experience of 20 years, our guest, Ashish Lone, founder of Kheti-badi.com, is on a mission to solve pressing issues related to farming and agriculture by using cutting edge technology like Blockchain.
Ashish shares the learning and development programs to run in a tech-led agricultural company. He also shares the impact of organizational culture on recruitment and employee retention.
Tune into this interesting conversation about subjects of the remote work model, employee productivity, diversity, employee feedback, and a lot more.
An initiative to support farmers:
Since its first day, Kheti-badi.com has maintained a lean model. Their main goal is to give market support to the farmers. They do not have a warehouse or transport. Instead, they approach the already established logistics company for the delivery.
“We have a pull model, not a push model.”
They ensure quick delivery to any city in India. The organization empowers farmers to handle the packaging and shipping while they take responsibility for the orders. They have a very transparent model with a win-win situation for the organization, the buyers, and the farmers.
The organization experiments with specific farmers trying out new products and expanding the opportunities. As they grew, they started including more products and onboarded more farmers.
The major issues in job applications:
The biggest problem, especially among freshers, is irrelevant applications. People start applying for jobs in organizations that hardly relate to their expertise. They spend a lot of time going through the resumes.
Ashish explains that even when they find relevant candidates, a few important details can be missing. Some candidates might lie about their work experience. These things can affect the culture of the organization.
“Having an idea of the technology and having a good experience of technology has a huge difference.”
Impact of culture on employees:
Many organizations have strict guidelines for their employees. They follow a strict hierarchical culture where employees cannot always reach the CEO directly. On the other hand, some organizations are flexible and know what their employees like or not. They try to make particular changes according to the requirements of their employees. Adopting and listening to the employees is necessary. Because, sooner or later, they will look for a change if they do not get what they require.
Challenges that come with diversification:
Our guest feels that the set of challenges associated with diversification is the beauty of it. Language barriers can be one example of these challenges. Moreover, people are working from different regions with different working hours. Holidays might not be overlapping in all locations as well. However, the company can resolve these issues if they focus on the outcome rather than the method. It should not matter how an employee is delivering the work. Ultimately, it is the task that is important.
Importance of employee feedback:
Feedback is an extremely important factor that drives employee motivation. If an idea is rejected, the employee should be told the reason behind it. The organization should help its employees know the areas where they have to improve and where they are doing good. The goal should be to keep the employee convinced and happy. The feedback should be supported with valid justifications. However, employees should have open ears to what the management is trying to say. Kheti-badi.com is very open and attentive to its employees.
Follow Ashish on LinkedIn
Produced by: Priya Bhatt
Podcast host: Lokesh Gautam