The Shape of Work
The Shape of Work
#508: Akansha Capoor on exploring progressive workplaces and the future of work
"The future of work hinges on empowering teams to celebrate wins, embrace failures, and provide platforms for authentic self-expression, aligning passions with professional endeavours for meaningful engagement."
In this episode of The Shape Of Work, get ready for a riveting dialogue with our special guest, Akansha Capoor, Talent Business Partner at Thoughtworks. A seasoned HR professional, Akansha takes us along her decade-long journey, wearing multiple hats in the industry, and provides a glimpse into the progressive culture at Thoughtworks. She boasts an extensive professional background, having contributed her expertise to esteemed organisations like Syntel, Wipro, and Incedo. She holds an MBA degree from the prestigious International School of Business and Media and is also a Mindfulness Coach.
In this episode, Akansha shares her perspective on how technology, including AI, is impacting the HR landscape and how it has paved the way for hybrid workplaces. We also shift gears to discuss the concept of 'employee experience', a term Akansha prefers over 'employee engagement'.
Episode highlights
- Technology's impact on HR industry and employee engagement
- Importance of focusing on employee experience
- How can workplace creativity contribute to an enhanced employee experience?
- Why should HR managers prioritise empathy and enablement over traditional management approaches?
Follow Akansha on Linkedin
Produced by: Priya Bhatt
Podcast Host: Archit Sethi
About Springworks:
Springworks is a fully-distributed HR technology organisation building tools and products to simplify recruitment, onboarding, employee engagement, and retention. The product stack from Springworks includes:
SpringVerify— B2B verification platform
EngageWith— employee recognition and rewards platform that enriches company culture
Trivia — a suite of real-time, fun, and interactive games platforms for remote/hybrid team-building
SpringRole — verified professional-profile platform backed by blockchain, and
SpringRecruit — a forever-free applicant tracking system.
Springworks prides itself on being an organisation focused on employee well-being and workplace culture, leading to a 4.8 rating on Glassdoor for the 200+ employee strength company.
Hello and welcome to the Shape of Work, a podcast series by Springworks. My name is Anoop and I am your host. Each week, we'll be talking to top people managers across the world on the future of work and how it's shaping our workplace. So sit back and get ready to find out more from these movers and shakers, as we have a no-holes bar. Anything goes. Conversation with them about their journey, their insights, their thoughts, most importantly, their ideas and vision for the workplace of the future. Join in on the conversation, leave a comment and don't forget to hit that subscribe button.
Speaker 2:Hello and welcome to another episode of the Shape of Work podcast, and today we have with us Miss Akanksha Kapoor, who is currently working as a talent business partner at ThoughtWorks. Hello, akanksha, thank you for joining us.
Speaker 3:Thank you for inviting me, arjun. It's a pleasure to be here.
Speaker 2:Likewise so to begin with, could you please take us through your career journey so far?
Speaker 3:Sure. So as a HR professional, it's been almost a decade in the industry. I have won multiple hats, starting as a talent acquisition partner for my organization, cintel. After that I had moved on as an employee relations partner at Wipro, and after that I had had a short career break, followed by a student with InSido, where I had played the role of a talent business partner as well as upskilled the HR function and its processes, and that was again followed by a short break for personal reasons. And then I was fortunate to join ThoughtWorks, where my current role is of an HR business partner.
Speaker 2:So you've been working with ThoughtWorks for a while now, so how would you describe the culture of ThoughtWorks, what are the things that you like and how do you describe your journey with ThoughtWorks so far?
Speaker 3:The culture of ThoughtWorks, if I had to sum it up in one word, it's progressive. It's a culture which is held together by trust. It is a place where we value authenticity, we value cultivation, we value inclusivity. It is a place where ThoughtWorks and the heart is its constant companion. So that's how I would describe the culture of ThoughtWorks.
Speaker 2:Awesome. So, now that you've been working with the HR industry for a while now and there have been a lot of trends happening currently so how do you see technology and AI impacting the future of work, especially from an HR point of view? How do you see them taking over the HR industry?
Speaker 3:I see technology as an enabler. I see technology as a friend. There have been multiple changes with respect to technology in the past few years. As the pandemic happened, it paved the way for a hybrid workplace, and this hybrid workplace could only happen because of technology. Now the ways of being itself have changed today, and when I think of technology for HR, I see that technology has a big role to play in enabling HR to be a more strategic function. As repetitive tasks get automated, we would see that there is space getting created for HR professionals to focus on the things that really matter. As we are seeing a change in the environment today, we also see that HR also has to adapt to new ways of being, culture, collaboration, practices. All of that is happening with HR and technology being friendly companions to each other. With technology, hr will become more efficient. We'll be able to draw value from data that technology can derive for us and make more meaningful decisions and add value to the business.
Speaker 2:Yeah, definitely. I totally agree with what you said. I mean, it's there as an enabler. So another very important thing that people have been talking about, especially from a HR point of view, is employee engagement. This term has also gained a lot of attraction in the latest days, so how important do you think employee engagement has become in today's time and what can we do to have a deeper impact in this scenario?
Speaker 3:All right. So when I look at employee engagement, I would like to replace it with the word employee experience, and when I think of employee experience, I see a multi-generational workforce that has come in today. I see a workforce which has varying needs. I see a workforce where people have departed from the traditional way of working. There is a need for flexibility. There is a need for ways of being which allow people to be their authentic selves, be it in the physical workspace or be it in the remote workspace. I also see that there is a higher emphasis on inclusion and equity, so employee experience needs to encompass all of this to be very meaningful for a employee to be part of any organization today.
Speaker 3:What more we can do over here is we can look at focusing on environment, which has given utmost importance to psychological safety. It is very easy for us to get disconnected in today's world, given that we are in a digital environment today. So to make sure that this disconnection does not increase, we need to have a fine balance, and that could be done by focusing on one psychological safety. Two, creating meaningful collaboration practices and when I say collaboration practices, practices anywhere. These practices are very important, because one is that you're able to do your work, and we have a new term that has come up for it, that is asynchronous communication. So we have a lot of emphasis happening on asynchronous communication, given the fact that we are in a new environment. But at the same time, this asynchronous communication should not take away from the informal bonds that people build at work. They should not take away from the meaningful connections that you built and the sense of belongingness that gets inculcated along the way. So how can we promote such practices and empower our leaders, our teams on the ground, to be self-sufficient in creating such environments for their teams, which can in turn, lead to higher productivity levels and higher sense of belongingness within that camaraderie is extremely important today. So can we strike a balance in terms of having work done meaningfully and, at the same time, having the team come together and celebrating their wins, celebrating their failures also?
Speaker 3:I think these are some of the things where we could lay more emphasis on in the future of work, in the future of employee experience, and also give people spaces for self expression. That's another thing which keeps on coming to my mind. As humans, it's the most natural instinct to be able to express yourself. Can we create enough of those platforms where people can express themselves with respect to their craft, with respect to their interests, with respect to causes they are very, very passionate about, and bring it together at the workplace so that the term bringing your authentic selves to work does not remain bookish. It becomes a reality for people. And that is what the future generations also looking for.
Speaker 3:Generation Alpha they are very much focused on bringing together what they feel passionate about vis-a-vis what they want to do at work. Similarly, for Gen Z they are looking for flexibility in work. Why are they looking for flexibility in work? Not only because they value having that time on their hands, but it is what they want to do with their time on their hands. Do they want to invest time with their family? Do they want to invest time in another area that they are interested in exploring? We are also breeding another set of intrapreneurs, because when we give space for such creativity, we also give space for intrapreneurship to rise, which is very meaningful for organizations in the long run. When we talk about creativity, when we talk about innovation, it will all come in when we give space for self-expression. This is what we could do more when it comes to employee experience.
Speaker 2:That was an awesome answer. I relate to almost all the points, because we do have a time when employees we are in a time where employees have definitely become more aware of what they actually want from an organization and hence they look out for that. When they go for a job or when they are already working at a workplace, they already know what do they want and in case the organizations are not able to fulfill that, the employees also know that they do have options available. Both of them have found common grounds where they have come both the organization and the employees. It has been working in the favor of both of them, which is amazing, because through this, we create a place where everybody feels belonged. As you said, another important part of it is to have good leaders, good managers, who can actually make those policies work for you. What, according to you, are some of the qualities that are non-negotiable for a good HR manager?
Speaker 3:For me, the word manager is a little redundant in today's world. I feel we are in an era where autonomous teams is the way forward. We would have senior team members guiding us, senior leaders guiding us. However, do we really need people to manage us? I would like to trust our teams today and say that they don't need to manage us. Rather, they would need to enable us. So I think that is one thing I just wanted to share.
Speaker 3:The other part, coming to the qualities that are required, the quality the first quality that is non-negotiable, is empathy. It's empathy. We're dealing with people. We are talking about human centric cultures. They are built on the basis of empathy. The second quality I would like to talk about is ability to think independently. You'll have multiple views coming to you from various quarters, various perspectives. How are you able to assimilate all those perspectives that are coming to you and still have an independent point of view? It's going to be critical because, at the end of the day, when you're taking a stance, it's the stance for the right thing. For that you need conviction, and that conviction is not going to come till the time you have carved out an independent point of view. So we need more of thinkers rather than doers.
Speaker 3:The third thing that I could think of is resilience. There's so much changing in the world today. I don't think that organizations have themselves figured out how to deal with these changes. We are evolving in a very agile fashion. The resilience to deal with all these changes that is coming forward and, as an HR professional, you are a strategic business partner, you are a people champion and you are an anchor for transformation. So to deal with so much, there is a lot of resilience that is required. So these are the three qualities that I think are a must have for any HR professional. Honing the craft will have been on its own, no matter which field you choose within the HR domain. You will continuously keep on honing your craft, learning through various methodologies, be it on the job, be it in classrooms, be it in workshops, be it through your mentors, coaches. You will keep on doing that. However, these three qualities are going to hold you in good stead for the longer.
Speaker 2:Yeah, definitely Awesome. That was some amazing answers. Thank you, Akancha, for taking time out of your schedule and coming over this podcast. I hope you had a good time.
Speaker 3:I had a wonderful time. Thank you so much once again, it's been a privilege to be here.
Speaker 2:And thanks to all the listeners for tuning in to this episode. Thank you.