we're live again for another episode of hr shouts and whispers episode number 110 natalya and shamry are exciting and on topic okay and topic nothing for tonight is managing rewards with hr technology my name is ken cansomera and i'm host nathan for tonight uh george ramos of course and christina reclamado hi chris hi george yes guys okay so good evening to everyone well we're once again live because actually ken and george what we do is uh we're trying to look at other unique aspects of delivering hr interventions this pandemic already was challenging and most of the organizations or work from home so technology will always be well that is technology with hr because it entails a lot of investment in the company but there are companies like the one okay like our i know our guests will be talking about his uh service okay the congress company service and we will see how it complements with delivering a better engagement program but i'll ask george okay for the benefit of this as our viewers are coming in um so mostly people have been doing gut feel work okay for hr but nowadays since pandemic people are rely are being more logical and scientific so analytics so how does analytics play in employee engagement [Laughter] um okay for for employee engagement typically when it comes to metrics when i say this traditional hr people the number one thing that you really take a look at is either yeah modeling you measure your hiring time to higher time to feel modeling performance management and all that paid determinations somehow when it comes to employee engagement [Music] uh it's not really a challenge but i think it's it's been one of the norms before but don't you know and i think uh more importantly [Music] for the past 15 years known as massive development young augments measurement engagement and to think that engagement actually encompasses everything that has something to do with young uh relationships [Music] so that you can make better decisions now in that decision uh we'll be able to make sure also if you're actually earning you know as a business is part of a business then so most especially when it comes also to that portion of engagement especially with the guest interesting relationship analytics engagement so actually i just wanted to make a point because we often get the questions about uh you know how do we make our employees happy okay so no more questions and then uh young engagement and then the number one question that i also received is in this time okay for work from homework what are creative ideas for um you know for employee engagement activities but i just wanted to stress that employee and engagement is actually about the relationship employee engagement specialists they would just think of somebody who will host your company events but employee engagement is very complex in fact there are schools of thought employee relations because it's more tweaked into something positive and into like measuring happiness level and the employee experience and the amount of commitment that's generated you know but it's generated of your programs that it actually entices commitment from employees encompassing that employee engagement as a strategic hr okay young first level hr employee relations and then delivering services a gigging admin now as you become transformational and as you lead change in within the organization in the google's happened at an employee engagement that's a very complex topic so we have here the role of technology and being and delivering okay well your rewards program which is actually a component of employee engagement so our guest now okay uh well our guest is the founder of carrots.ph and we have here mr james cruz hi james nice to meet you guys good afternoon or good early good evening so it's a saturday so so how are you how have you been this week well it's been a no it's been a good week we've been talking to customers and then we were learning about their problems and having conversations with them in terms of their challenges and how we can help them you know deploy engagement improve performance and and face the challenges brought by the content in the workforce so so i noticed that you have a website okay but uh you have had like uh quite a presence during uh this pandemic because everyone went on a work from home arrangement but so given your background okay so uh you are an i.t expert and then how did you get into having a service that intertwines your passion for i.t
and then something that's related with management or hr interventions okay let's go just a step let me introduce myself i've spent more than 15 20 years working for four to 100 companies so i've i've worked in asia pacific north america and also western europe so i went back to the philippines kind of like to see what what contributions can i can i do though and i've seen that one of the biggest challenges of of companies in the philippines and also in southeast asia the tremendous stress brought about by the challenges of the pandemic and also the transformation of the workforce so when talking to prospects and talking to customers the biggest challenge is how to engage motivate uh their their employees and that problem was exacerbated by the pandemic because now the manager has to motivate and manage employees which are not in the office and that's become a very big challenge for them though and on top of that playing managers in personal problems the normal ability line tools are not there because there's no face-to-face communication anymore so we've seen that throughout the years now the union challenge of how can you effectively engage employees given that business plans and businesses are transforming in a faster rate compared to 10 years ago the transformation of the workforce is happening at the rapid pace so it came about where customers are asking us digital valuable solution uh software pending we can use for employee rewards the traditional approach but then when you ask themselves my biggest problem biggest problem now is motivating employees our biggest problem nominees attention our biggest problem is uh global software available right now that combines performance management employee engagement and rewards so please please play peace no so we realize now this is something that should be you so that that was the evolution of the of a solution which which brought about the birth of carrots so carrots base is that platform that helps in these three areas so the neutrogena organizations to really effectively engage their employees by aligning their goals rewarding them for their performance and because you create that positive employee experience becomes a win-win for the organization and also for the employees and since it's a web-based tool it doesn't matter where your employees work work anywhere work anytime as long as they achieve their goals which is aligned to the expectations of the company chem primary rewards at the same time your recognition happens instantly so indeed at the end of the year in the quarter recognize your employee it's instant whenever you achieve your goals uh monthly basis predicament recognize predicament reward or advocate they're not recognizing instantly they leave the company so that so those were the problems that that we saw from our customers that say okay let's find a solution for them well i agree with that because i actually have often been asked okay so kaka hire palang after three months oma miss chris okay she can actually unrepresentative nanjing looking looking at the logo i mean what what led you to actually name the company carrots wow uh younger generations they don't respond to the stick they respond to the positive so if you're going to lead your organization if you're going to respond to the new environment of the gen z the gen x and and gen [Music] i mean i think we need to do something that creates a positive environment because it is younger generation and if you want to have a strategic platform strategic program we have to address human book newer workforce well actually it's better than a month convince or persuade with honey then you know with vinegar's happiness so actually that's the whole gist of like you know creating a positive or progressive work workplace um you want to be able to pray not just motivate people but just create that plot that environment for people to be able to have harmonious relationships with each other and then that they can you know collaborate with each other so anyway uh well well i think you've been busy during this time because you know i you know they've been asking you because employee employee motivation employee you know uh engagement has always been an issue okay so with your clients what are their concerns james i mean number one like if you can name like the top two concerns okay our top two questions uh what are what did you deal with and why are they getting their service i think uh engagement and motivation is the i think they're combined into a major area of concerns especially brought about by the path from home or from anywhere so how do you maintain communication engagement at the same time motivating your employees given this negative environment um they're not competing with themselves the philippines they're also competing with other countries or other companies in other countries so you need two areas you know engagement motivation attrition i think these are the two two challenges that uh are most of the companies are currently facing now i see and then um um i'm just curious no i'll introduce a big word they say with a performance management usually they have a framework so uh servicenow do you what is the framework what is the basis for this like do you use balanced scorecard management that's a very good question krishna but actually our platform is quite flexible so the companies they can adapt any framework and they are the ones who define the the goals or objectives for each employee you know so they can use okrs they can use uh kpis or or what kind of framework that they're used to uh they're the ones who define it to so basically what happens is they can use any framework and then they define the goals and the objectives or the expectations set to each and then if he performs then he is recognized immediately recognized and then rewinded at the same time it becomes a conversation for the for his or her supervisor and manager performs for next month for [Music] with the manager is not asking the manager now or you manage your primarks to start the conversation focusing okay so i believe you have something prepared for us james i think it's a video of testimonials of uh the ones that are using your platform okay sure that thanks that's okay so let me share that video and then the item that you want then check out then they will process it normally uh or the system would say uh five uh or a week or two but it normally takes just three three days and i'm in the province not just in metro manila within metro uh different uh moods different let's say uh meginogo tayo let's say for for this month i have a whole beauty product and then uh um in december i want to go somewhere so if you reach gold coast so i'll see so uh i'll take my points with with uh them using carrots uh not only give us the flexibility to choose what we really want they also tell us on our performance so what do we need to improve what we need to maintain what we need to um what we need to do so that we can do better so that we can get more points we can get more rewards so it's how it's really helpful and it really motivates me me myself it really motivates me to be a better employee to do better so that i can have what i really deserve so it's really based on the performance on the of the employee it's just really a motivation that we're being rewarded for what we get and well what what we perform or what we give to the company [Music] is what is the best way in a nugget to motivate employee online working from home okay who is not tech savvy well motivation uh actually has a lot of components but uh when you are somebody who the first thing is actually the company can actually provide the person the resources to be able to work so it has something to do with this is when you motivate people okay it has to because some people are not also prepared to work from home equipment then you need to be provided the equipment or help or have some assistance in providing you know the company should be able to you know give resources for that to to happen the second is okay uh the so you have given some help and then you have given materials to motivate that person and we learn something or we have to give resources or some examples on how to do things so you give the materials you give the equipment provide give assistance and then also constant communication with the person let's say and work from home is really a total shift okay from the workforce and i mean the traditional way of doing things this is the office department connection so and then if the person is not tech savvy there will be remember that in past episodes part of shifting to work from home set up is to be able to deliver orientation and some training and policies to be able to transition smoothly to that kind of setup so that employees also know expectations yuan so for me that is actually from managing the shift so george and james do you have your take on this uh very complex question it seems simple but it's a complex it could either be in the form of like love or reward or it could also be in the form of fear all right okay i think as an employee uh to do the work i mean it takes two to tango it's either the employee actually finds a way to actually push themselves actually to learn technology is very very important there's there's uh how to give instructions better because sometimes you give instructions based on your perspective not understanding the perspective no making it again when you work with people you have to also understand how they communicate how they understand if you get to adjust your communication style it would be easier to actually understand what motivates them okay so you plug in tech savvy i think they have to adjust uh pero if it becomes easier if you get to communicate the importance of understanding the the tech at hand okay i think uh we have zoom right now and we're putting in um i mean they're not fit for the job yeah oh i would i would agree with that because if surprisingly this will perhaps the solution rodel learns no now for somebody who was not tech savvy and how to motivate that person is not even tech indeed and solutions is to really understand and communicate better uh motivation [Music] better deeper [Music] well this one uh you have to think about it because this has something to do with change okay so a lot of people uh communication is the key but it's it also has something to do with you know having having a team leader that understands okay this new one says okay so the team need their team leaders now in fact it's it's actually much more complex to work nowadays because they learn you're actually you don't really have any physical connection with your staff so the most that you will have is actually if you've prepared for this kind of setup the most is that you know your skype is open and then of course you will have to have like some you know policies in place like when to time in when to time out etc so communicating those policies and communicating expectations okay with regards to human details style that's one number two is if you know yeah it's fear okay so this one tech savvy okay so the training has training will play an important role because a motivation has something to do with being successful you know having done the job and then you were able to do the job and then you saw the tayamupala that's that's one definition and then number two indeed this one hindi rewards a issue this has something to do with a knowledge gap okay so i don't think at this point you will have to reward people for just learning something okay so this one has to do with teaching a person how to change one's uh viewpoint on work from home setups okay on using technology etc there's a there's actually a popular story in school okay you know when we did payroll so people use excel pero there was a boss that i used to report to when you should be able to use the formulas and then generate you know tables etc don't use excel as a typewriter excel and then once we were given the training we were now more motivated to use that uh app that software okay so different perspectives in it okay so with with james you were able you actually do but under is a set of program of course the your condo company that goes to you what happens is that they probably they have an employee performance management program and then they need the aspect of delivering the rewards so what are i know what are the examples so this one is like a store can you describe it further uh in a nutshell uh basically it's uh creating that alignment with the manager and then the employee so what happens is uh clear young goals or clear young expectations and objectives for the for the person for the employee and every time they hit their targets they earn their earn points and they're also uh a messaging component where they're sent they sent an email recognizing their performance and so automatically whenever they achieve their goals or whatever their awarded points they get an email so that supplements the recognition component where and at the same time they earn the points and then they can choose the reward that they want and they can choose a digital reward you can add a digital voucher or a physical reward and if it's a physical reward we can deliver nationwide so they can deliver to their monkey in cagayan they can deliver send the reward to their grandmother in baguio so we we basically create the environment where we help companies empower their employees motivate them achieve your goals let's work to you to become a better version of yourselves if you contribute to the company we will recognize you and then reward you so it's a platform where it when it makes it easy you know important to make it easy to use but most employees most persons now can use the web they can use facebook it's as easy as using facebook so we make it as easy as possible you can use any device both the manager and the employee will see co-name performance and targets now again results from performance now and i recognize that narrative workshop so very simple to use but union platform i mean indica complex even the even uh a person who's doing a very simple job can actually access it so you mentioned okay when they get the rewards okay so when they claim their rewards they actually don't claim it for themselves but they send it to their family members yeah sometimes in a company but they actually have an extended family or you know they sometimes send it to somebody else and it's become a very very you know and you know now you know so because it's easy to use it and it can be delivered anywhere in the philippines as long as my access delivery service so you know okay so uh well i'm sure uh the i know your your partner companies don't want to show the sample okay but i guess it works like it's it's web-based so it actually functions like so if you earn the reward they can choose you know it's a digital vow so what happens but what kind what is part of your service like with vendors do you still tie up with the vendors or help companies tie up with vendors of these products so we we already have a catalog of different types of rewards and we handle the if we handle end-to-end so though we will deliver that product anywhere in the philippines like it's a physical reward and if there's a problem the same a problem in delivery or malayan prada we handle the returns ourselves because we always focus on the employee experience so the platform itself gives online status and if there are problems with delivering the casa known service delivery or catalan warehouse or cinema inventor we will hand it ourselves we become a partner of the company so we align ourselves to create that very positive sustainable recognition and reward program so you don't get aguana i mean we manage it into it yeah because imagine if uh you're an hr assistant or you're the hr manager shout them out if you have an activity and then you would have to send out this you know this rewards okay these products you would have to coordinate with grab or any delivery service cataloging or inventory management it takes a no it takes time from your you know from your usual program companies for how well i think for 100 employees is so on top of that uh we provide a feedback mechanism where employees can give us their feedback commercial item novel as a catalogue so you allow employees of all our customers to give so that allows us to proactively identify where the gaps uh where what our customers needs are so let's source it for them so indeed that's part of our service james um hi sorry [Music] [Music] [Music] of flexible nominal code and uh in terms of goals they define the period it doesn't it can be monthly it make it weekly it could be quarterly up to the company to define the goal uh and the period that that the goal is measured for so balance a company and they can change it along the way since having an i mean you can start first with basic things see how the program is uh working for you and then we can make some changes along the way because at the end of the day what we're trying to do is we're creating a culture the right cultural performance of recognition and reward and no i will not claim that so i think you have to be flexible and that's what we did for that we have the flexibility to adapt to the needs of our companies of our customers and to the needs that's happening in the marketplace and in in the workplace james without naming i know any cause any client you know that that you've had with any of your customers how you were able to successfully help them well we have one of our customers where their biggest challenge was attrition before the pandemic patono and they were doing a manual manual program unless you are touched by god you won't be able to know what that person will want so that um expectation aside from the positive experience but eventually i have a question so this is like a selection of products but like can it also be programmed that you would have like certificates etc uh well we we basically have a catalog where you use the points to the employees will earn the points based on their performance and then they they get the demon but in a flexible daniel platform where actually you can have a certificate program and then you also give them points for example customers no you have put training let's say you have a 3000 employee you know training if you are the best performer for the month additional points or you can get another reward so we make it very we make it a lot of fun make it interesting right for the employees yes yeah you mentioned gamification but well gen xinjiang okay like okay like very competitive okay but it's competitive in a very positive way so you and then you can actually make them into like a longer term one where they can achieve certain things okay in the operations maybe separate that but alliance's objectives more and then when they achieve it spreading them on they can either redeem it that must make a certificate because actually recognition accommodations is also a very big thing too employees oh definitely so we're still evolving you know what would be basically listening to the needs of our customers so that we can uh make the product [Music] i remember there was like one incident okay um when a friend of mine she was you know she was like uh you know [Music] we can just like deliver the activity okay but um like for example our christmas party something that you look forward to because you prepare for that and so you can actually create a multi-media approach multimedia approach okay so anyway uh james we're also curious because uh you're you're also your projects are you know quite dynamic and then you're you're with in partnership with a lot of organizations okay so can you tell us about uh well your other activities aside from developing your platform well i've uh active with the id pub so the umbrella organization of the bills and call centers because i think we strategically uh selected ib as a a partner because this is they have that industry is a big contributor of jobs to the filipinos you know and and uplifts the the well-being of most of our of the philippines of combined so we strategically partnered with them to understand the needs of the industry and how can we really uh help uh the the members of that industry to to become truly successful and that's one partnership we've developed but also we're doing partnership with other companies what are the companies that can that we can provide or associate with us a partner with us so that we can help our customers know something there's a trusted relationship with hr [Music] but it's good but it's good and then but sometimes when you see a problem that's very pervasive across our i know our across our conversations either customers or prospects how do you effectively motivate and how do you effectively retain valid i think i think that's very important because companies are not just competing with other uh companies in the philippines actually right now you're also competing globally and some people get it some people do but you should understand that you are competing with the global workforce so that's what we do we partner with other talented organizations that have the same vision and have the really the objective to really contribute to the success of their of their of their clients and their customers so that to help them in the areas of attracting motivating and retaining employees so um do you have like when i go to your website i went to your website earlier so you have like a recruitment is that you have a partner recruitment company yeah we partnered recently i did last year with crab jobs so we explored partnership with them where you know um if you subscribe to carrots then you can avail of the promotions jointly between carrots and grab jobs and and so we're trying to do that and actually because of the pandemic we actually also have a gilas one offer where we allow prospects to try it for free for several months and then okay then they can continue the subscriptions they can terminate any time no money but so far what you've seen is unless you want to spend like so many uh so many so much money to hire your team build your team that not just only do hr but will do inventory supply chain you know uh all those things now so then technology stamina when you have the digital platform you can really uh scale and improve the you know reward experience the the positive employee experience recognition the instant recognition can only be done with the right technology if you do it manually so people can try before they buy i see so this is important for our community members okay so what they can do is so they can go to the website or maybe lay after our interview we can post the link uh on the chat there's a thread going on uh with our fb live we can post the link and then they can try your service for free because of that heal as one project that you have yes sure so and so important actually uh the reason that we actually invited you james they said this is like a unique way one of the unique ways of delivering of course uh those kinds of i know rewards and then so so anyhow okay so good to know that you have that they can try it for free so how long can they try it for free anyway uh right now it's uh four months they can try it for four months and uh whatever happen if they need to extend it uh as long as they are actually using it they subscribe for three months so we work with them but we are already in good faith we want you to be successful and if you're not convinced try it out for free see how it really can help you in a month if not then okay but if you really see this value it's very difficult to do it manually it's very difficult to do it manually if you want to really if you're serious about recognizing and rewarding your employees especially again you really have to look into this and you really need to use technology to empower your managers and also to motivate the more that they need to act like for example you have a project may plan on how to communicate the instructions and then you follow up more actually it's not i mean people have been saying it's not that easy okay since the summer so communicate but definitely okay it's doable it's just that the the amount of time that you're using for communication and you know uh also feedbacking much more less so that's one okay that's one change that happened uh that's the shift okay yeah people are more keen on having good communicators especially for you in general to say all the more the most important young communication skills i know exactly but anyway going back i have one another question is is there like a minimum size or minimum requirement for your service we make it easy to leverage the the service in the platform depend it can be a five site five employee company or it could be a five thousand size in company doesn't matter so we cater to them because our objective is to really help uh organizations grow so you become a partner so you're partnering for growth yes so anyway ken and george do you have questions or [Music] george do you have insights or questions with uh from james actually i did my research today um very unique telugu i know you in the james to the the hr community so i think you know it's it's it's uh typically because when you talk about hr techniques of pilipinas applicant tracking helping not just uh employees but also the companies that employ these employees at least this one we can actually uh concentrate on the performance management program itself okay tap delivery well taken care of nani anonymi they can focus on more strategic work that's correct in terms of you know into the more strategic aspect of rewards and recognition so glengaling and then that's it actually we're surveying so that's why actually when we invited james okay thank you james for being our guest today actually next to survey you know when we started we started actually three years ago a little before the pandemic okay and then we actually bloomed and what we're trying to do here in nature shows is to explore uh techniques and methods to make hr more efficient okay and we're actually very surp well we're pleasantly surprised that this kind of service exists already i think it will it will make the lives of like a lot of hr people easier yeah first i'd like to thank also chris ken and george for inviting me and to your thoughts no chris uh actually what we do is we really help each other focus on their core attack as long as expectations is we help them create that really positive employee experience administrative so we take on that and we do and we become better in doing it so that we can really deliver positive employee experience so thank you again for inviting me yes and then um i hope that in the future if you have other projects or other services okay we can actually click connect again and then we can um provide uh information on that new okay evolving carrots.ph we can add on a news chapter to our conversation and then also present it to our hr community sounds good thank you very much sure definitely okay so anyway okay so george and ken okay uh to round up the discussion do you have like your final insights that could help companies actually adapt the word adapt say people are meant to adapt i'm very happy for this episode and glad to see all of you guys here yeah yes and super super thank you james for sharing his insights nice thank you thank you again and thank you james for resting as well thank you chris if you're if you're an hr you know if you're part of hr you're part [Music] for free without spending anything yeah i think that's a very good very good uh proposition well for me okay uh when george and i were discussing this episode okay and then of course uh we i went through the website and then uh being always in you know hr admin for us okay number one along with christmas or whenever whenever we have a special activity we always have to conceptualize and we have to deliver and then we have to also have our postmortem report okay and then madame come on timelines jen and then the delivery itself it eats up when you imagine like if you have like to you have a gift package okay you have to deliver it so you have you would have to devote one week 100 employees 150. no so this one since it's already there in one platform you just have to integrate it with your program so important well of course important performance management program okay and then okay you can partner with carrots.ph to be able to deliver first to fine tune it and then be able to deliver this rewards products or certificates or cash vouchers so that's the takeaway in this episode so anyhow guys it's a saturday okay you're like itching to have your dinner with your you know family stuff and then for now we will just say a temporary goodbye and then until the next episode so keep on sending your feedback and then your questions and then if you wish us to have a topic or discuss a topic please send it to hr shouts and whispers gmail.com okay for now okay
james ken and then george okay goodbye for now okay and then we'll reconnect bye-bye bye and to our hr friends bye
2022-08-01