Tahseen: Hello, everyone. Welcome to the People-led Show. I'm your host, Tahseen Kazi. And our guest for today is the exceptional Huma Tariq. Huma is the CHRO at Dvara Kshetriya Gramin Financial Services, and is a seasoned HR leader with over two decades of experience in the field. She's an experienced people transformation leader and a strategic business partner with proven track record in the IT and BFSI industry.

Tahseen: She's also a certified trainer and facilitator. A PPA practitioner and an HR analytics and metrics professional. Welcome, Huma. Thank you so much for joining us today. 

Huma: Thank you very much, Tahseen. And really happy to meet you. 

Tahseen: So that was your introduction. It was from LinkedInsomething that we kind of found out about you, but we want to really know who is the human behind human resources? Who is Huma outside of work? 

Huma: So thanks, Tahseen, once again outside of work, I'm very much the same person as I am professionally.

Huma: So I have a very, very deep passion for HR and corporate social responsibility. And wherever I am, I strive to make a very positive impact through my work. So I've kind of chosen a career path that allows me to contribute to the society.

Huma: So for the last 10 years, I'm associated with a deep rural NBFC, which kind of focuses on financial inclusion, right? Our organization helps the underserved communities gain financial access. Which is very vital for your own development and growth. And more so as a HR professional, I also focus on offering job opportunities to the locals, right?

Huma: I hire the sons and daughters of the soil and in the villages where we serve. Now, this not only supports the local economy, but also ensures us And our team to have a very deep understanding of the communities we work with. And that aligns perfectly with the personal values and desire to make a meaningful difference.

Huma: So at home, I manage my family responsibilities with the same dedication and care that I bring to managing my teams at work. And I believe in the importance of, you know, creating a very supportive and inclusive environment, whether be it workplace or at home. So in essence, whom I'm outside of work is a reflection of my personal ethos.

Huma: Committed, compassionate and driven by a purpose to contribute to the society overall very, very positively. So that's, that's Huma for you. 

Tahseen: Oh, wow, Huma. I think that was such an amazing introduction to this, conversation. And I think you in the true sense of the term brought the human into the human resources.

Tahseen: So that was amazing. And I, I definitely want to have more conversation with you on your past 10 years of experience in the field of rural development and financial inclusion. But before that, you know, I just wanted to understand you have more than two decades of experience in the field.

Huma: Can you tell me of any interesting fun or thought provoking story from your years in HR? You know, anything our audience loves the inside scoop. So as I mentioned to you, I have really not got much of a, a social you know, personality. So everything that I have, be it fun, be it interesting is all related to work.

Huma: So I mean, I have about 26 years of experience and different organizations that I have served. And mostly my experience is all in the BFSI space, banking, financial services and insurance. I would say that my last stint, I was with Equitas Small Finance Bank. That's where I was the Head of center of excellence.

Huma: So that's where I kind of had a very, very interesting I would say the profile, the role that I was handling is extremely inciting. Like we, I just joined the organization, joined the organization when they are an NBFC and wanting to transition themselves to a, a small finance bank. So I joined as the center of excellence talent management. So talent management is a role, which is anything outside hiring. So everything from hiring, hiring upwards, post hiring to exit almost everything you handle. So the role itself will give you a lot of width and depth to manage a whole host of, you know, activities post hiring.

Huma: With their onboardings, we had a 180 day onboarding journey where we kind of take care of employee experiences at different stages of their employee life cycle. So my role was not a very limited plug and play kind of a role, so I was handling the entire spectrum of HR there. But what it was, what was very, very interesting is this was the first opportunity to understand how an NBFC can transition into a bank, right?

Huma: So when we were actually doing the transition right from the kind of grade alignments. Trying to look at how do we kind of an NBFC can become a bank and what are the kind of titles that they have? What is the compensation restructuring and how do we kind of have the construction in place? And all of that was also part of my role.

Huma: And equally, I was also IPOs responsible for doing a human capital management SAP SuccessFactor implementation for the bank. So the experience was like a rollercoaster where. I, if I can, you know, help you visualize. I was trying to fit a wheel to a train, which was running at a 10,000 kilometer speed, right?

Huma: So you're actually doing a transition of the entire bank into a, from an NBFC to an SFB. We were trying to change the grades, the departments designations, titles, comp structures even the wages structures, everything was getting changed as per the bank. We were trying to merge two organizations into one, so we had a.

Huma: Equitas Finance Limited, Home Finance Limited was merging into Equitas Finance, and that was getting name changed as Equitas Small Finance Bank. And when all this was happening, imagine implementing a Success Factors app, right? A HR system, which kind of have to have a legal entity. It has to have the entire master data.

Huma: So it was like a fantastic opportunity to kind of, you know, make the change and also automate it and make sure that the entire piece of HR, right, from hire to retire is completely automated. And we went paperless, absolutely paperless in, in a short span of about eight months, we went live. So that was a really you know, enriching and learning experience.

Huma: It was, it was giving me a complete spectrum of how to automate an HR activity in a very, very you know, sophisticated platform like an SAP SuccessFactors. So that's one that I could kind of think of now. 

Tahseen: Wow. I think any kind of change management, right? Even if something small can be so, you know it can, it can take a toll on what you're doing.

Tahseen: And then at so many different levels and so many variables and so many changing factors, I, I mean it's incredible what you have done. And at that scale also, right? And I'm just curious, Huma, like, You know, and like you rightly said, right, you were changing the wheel of a train was that was going at a really high speed.

Tahseen: And which means that at that time you were doing a lot of things like just You were in your zone, you were in your flow, you were doing things, but once all that was over, once you kind of reached equilibrium in that change management, what was the one biggest learning that you had from that entire you know, experience and that's something that somebody else can, you know, take away from it?

Huma: So one very, very definite experience is change is difficult. Changes, but constant, but it's inevitable, right? So everybody are resistant to change, but if you're able to give it to them at a very, you know ease of access and easy to use, you know, keep it simple, and if you're able to give it to the the end user, if you're able to actually do it making it simple for the end user is something which can make things very easy, even a difficult thing possible, 

Huma:  There are only three things that we need to really work on the change management. So it's just about communication education and incentivizing, right?

Huma: So you will have to make all of these three work together. Like you'll have to make the awareness. Communicate, communicate and over communicate. So you'll have to keep building up that kind of a excitement to the employees that something new is going to come, which is going to have give them access on the go, it's going to be available in a mobile phone in a click of a finger, they will be able to access all the 18, 000 contact numbers which they cannot practically save it in a mobile phone. 

Huma: So all of these small features, which is what is in it for me as an employee, we are able to tell this to them in a very small form at a very consistent manner. So the communication was very, very critical telling them that. 

Huma:  Second is awareness. They really don't know. Change is very, very difficult when they look at it. The first thing that comes to my mind is fear of the uncertainty. Right. There's a lot of ambiguity. How do I use it? It's so complicated. It's so complex, many modules, many multiple things.

Huma: So we kind of, you know, gave them a small bits learning, you know, know your policy, know your system kind of a series. So learning is something that we kept doing, knowledge consistently. And the third thing is anybody likes to be rewarded. So incentivizing them. The early bird, first 50 users will get a small award.

Huma: So usually you will find the employee records half complete, right? So we kind of did a drive where we said that, you know, you update your personal profile, update everything about you, be it personal, educational, qualification, or your experience. And your emergency family details for insurance, et cetera.

Huma: And whoever is able to complete it, the first hundred will get rewarded. So these small incentives made them also use the platform. So you give it to them simple, make them use the platform. Once they start using it, then you don't have to push it. It's more of a pull. 

Tahseen: Got it. 

Tahseen: I think, you know, this, this, this topic in itself, change management is going to be like a masterclass in itself.

Tahseen: And I can have a complete one hour conversation with you. But since our topic today for today is state of AI in HR, I'm going to stick to that. But what I like about what you spoke you know, one thing you mentioned is, You said, what's in it for me? And I think that kind of really encapsulates everything that there is, you know, in terms of driving adoption, really making it known to people what's in it for them, because still they don't know that there's not going to be any kind of change taking place.

Tahseen: Awesome. I think moving on and, you know, I'm going to kind of change gears a little bit here. I want to understand from an HR perspective, what, there has so much happened since, you know, the pandemic, and there's so much that has changed in the, in terms of, you know, people management and people strategy.

Huma: In this year, what are the three challenges two or three, you know, challenges or priorities that you are trying to solve for? In the current organization, if you look at it, my top three challenges or priorities, I would say, for the HR team is attracting and retaining talent. This is going to be a very consistent, continuous process.

Huma: Because in an organization like us, NBFC especially, attrition is the main challenge, right? It is a constant churn. People just jump jobs for a few hundreds. And if I just have to give you a market industry data overall NBFC industry, MFin you know, records 74 percent as the attrition for a mid to large company like ours.

Huma: So with 74 percent attrition, the industry is suffering. And this is a reflection of all the companies put together. Right. So we are trying to keep it under 50%, right? 45 is what we had registered as the attrition for the year. So that when compared to the industry, we're doing much, much better. So retention, attraction.

Huma: And building an inclusive culture, which is, you know, fostering an inclusive culture where all people, all employees in the organization feel valued, respected, and have an equal opportunities to advance in their own career is something which is going to be my top three priorities, I would say. And which also becomes a challenge as well because everybody are unique, everybody have different aspirations in life.

Huma: So kind of getting an going and doing this for each employee customized in their own way is equally challenging for an HR team like this. So innovating enriching careers. And making a meaningful contribution is something that will be the priority for me. 

Tahseen: Great. I think, yeah, you know one interesting thing here that you said is that while there has, you know, there have been reports and trends about how You know retention and you know, attracting the right talent and retention is not, is, you know become a reduced problem, but I think what has the, the problem challenge that has, you know, increased for HR leaders, which I'm seeing is not only attracting and retaining talent, but Attracting the right talent and retaining them.

Tahseen: Attracting and retaining your top talent. I think that has become one of the biggest challenges. So like from that perspective and I, you know, I want to kind of go into the conversation that we have here for today. You know, using those challenges as like a backdrop in terms of AI I, you know, are you using any AI tools?

Tahseen: Have you evaluated, discussed or used any AI solutions so far? 

Huma: So, as I mentioned we are present in my current organization is Dvara KGFS, so that's what we call our organization, so we kind of operate across 10 states 400 plus branches and we're a deep rural NBFC, so catering to these kind of population, which is kind of spread over these geographies.

Huma: So, that's one big challenge, or one big I would say priority for us. HR person like us is to have a knowledge base, which is attract and retain these knowledge base. And more importantly is to keep them learning. It's a continuous learning for them. More so because we have a lot of product and process features, which keeps changing.

Huma: Regulatory implications are very high, right? RBI is what is our regulators as well. And so we have every other day, a lot of regulatory challenges, which keeps coming in. This is more of uncontrollables. So what, that is something that we cannot really expect. So anything, and anytime the regulator can come forward and put in a a kind of you know, restriction on the way we operate restriction on the product, the pricing, the interest rates, it could be a lot of these.

Huma: And then a diversified population, which is spread across 10 states, 400 branches we have close to around 2000 plus wealth managers. We call our frontline as wealth managers. We will have to keep giving them these informations on the go because they cannot be any miscellany, or they cannot be any mistakes, right, and they cannot be any process gaps.

Huma: So we've kind of recently come up with a a learning tool, a GPT tool, which we have developed in house and we've kind of branded it as 'DOST'. Dost means friend. So it is like you know, we do have a six day induction training for all our newcomers who come into the organization, right? And we also hire only freshers.

Huma: Freshers who are fresh out of college in the villages that we hire from, they may be the first graduates or even undergrads, and they may be the first postgraduate in the entire village. So that's the kind of a deep rural communities that we serve. And we hire the locals from there. So these people who come in have to be completely trained on our product processes and our organization as well.

Huma: So this GPT tool that we have developed gives them an opportunity for them to learn on the go, right? It's more of a available with them all the time. It's a mobile platform where it is voice enabled and it is also available in vernacular languages. So the employee has any kind of a doubt or a challenge.

Huma: While he's on the job or would like to understand some product features, all you have to do is to just call out and ask for it. And it's a just in time support for him where he can learn it on the go and get all his questions and queries answered. All frequently job knowledge base is kind of enriched with a lot of FAQs.

Huma: There, which picks from there and gives him very relevant information, what is required for him to service the customer and give the customer a delight while he is servicing them. That is something that we have recently launched. 

Tahseen: Wow, that is amazing. 

Huma: Apart from that, I just wanted to understand what are some other barriers that are, you know, there in terms of adoption of AI? Because we ran a survey recently, and what we found was that 90 percent of HR professionals said they either don't use AI or don't plan to.

Tahseen: So what do you think are the main barriers to adoption? 

Huma: No, I would only say that, you know, people will have to use it to experience it and to believe in it. Right. So we also earlier felt that, you know, you cannot replace a classroom session. People are important. You need to stand there and speak to them.

Huma: You know, we need to understand the body language. We need to know who you are, what you are, what you feel, what you think. All of these are misconceptions, right? So I do have a lot of such misconceptions, which will kind of Tell me that I really don't need that. I need a person. The machine can only do so much.

Huma: So it's about me. So I'm not saying that, you know, we should completely do away with people like us. So we are definitely there, but we will also be the ones who will make the tools richer. Right? So that kind of a understanding, or I would say, More of you know, believing that it will help optimize your work life balance.

Huma: It will make you more smart worker rather than hard worker. And it will also do consistent delivery, right? So as a human being, I may have my emotions. I may be up. I may be down. I may be energetic. I may not be at some point in time that the mission is going to be the same, right? So this is going to be a consistent platform, which will never fail me.

Huma: That's one thing which definitely everybody should understand and once they know that this is going to really help me, like we are also trying to do this . One other thing in HR that we are trying to do is we do, did develop a GPT tool, which will help filter the candidates. The first level shortlisting, like if I if I go to a, a campus and I get about 200 profiles mm-Hmm.

Huma: Now sitting and screening these 200 profiles will take this many number of time, right? This much time. So, but this platform will help me screen those shortlists and give me only that three which I need to interview. So it is going to really enable me and help me do my job much faster and better and in the shortest possible time and more effectively and efficiently.

Huma: So that way I think it is more to HR professionals or be it anybody to have a mindset to believe that this is going to support them, enable them to become more efficient and productive. And it is about, you know, the timeline that is given, given the timeline, given, as you said, the right people at the right time in the shortest possible time.

Huma: So it is about making more hands to do work for you. I think that's what I believe in personally. 

Tahseen: Got it. 

Tahseen: But at a broader, you know, HR level or people strategy level. I just wanted to understand how has the expectations from HR leaders changed in this past year?

Tahseen: Like what are CEOs or leadership teams looking at now in terms of people's strategy? 

Huma:  One definite change that I'm seeing is HR used to be an allied function. It's just a support function.

Huma: We used to call ourselves a support function and that has kind of got changed to our business partner. So we have kind of, you know became enablers of business. And I would say personally as a HR leader, I do have a seat at the table. Right. That is definitely a teach they are, there is more importance and gaining importance of.

Huma: People which are the most important assets for any organization and that has not changed and increasingly because you know, like I see HR is been heavily looked at as promoting a high performance culture driving productivity, driving profitability. Engagement in true sense, you know, engagement makes business sense.

Huma: No, that's what it is. And it is HR who can make this engagement possible. This kind of, you know, even be it adopting a new technology, it is about us driving this culture of innovation, transformation and these new edge thinking, I think it all has to come from us. And I think we have a very big responsibility of doing this across the organization.

Huma: And I would only say that, you know, people have been the same. It is only about the pace at which we adopt things and how fast are we able to really acclimatize our people and get them to also adopt it is the current need. And I think that's the challenge me as a HR leader has. My priorities have also been that.

Huma: And I think it starts with first believing in it. And I think we have kind of almost there. 

Tahseen: Got it. 

Tahseen: Huma, most of the things that we've spoken about today and we've, you know, discussed in length about various aspects has been about, the end employees the employees in the organization.

Tahseen: But if I want to speak from an HR team perspective and in terms of, you know, improving the efficiency of the HR team. What are some of the initiatives that you, you know taken to improve the efficiency of the HR team, you know, at an overall level? And what are some tasks that, you know, you've seen yourself or your team doing manually or, you know, repetitive tasks that you would like to automate at this point?

Huma: I would say in terms of our you know, repetitive tasks I would more look at the some kind of a technology for our recruitment process. Because at the end of the day, since the churn is very high. Attrition is very high. The need to backfill is also there, and it is a continuous process.

Huma: People leave, people join. So at some point in time, I also feel that there's a monotony that sets in, even for a HR person or the recruiter, I would say, to keep recruiting continuously. So that is something which you know, the tool where it helps in filtering you know, I'm really not very sure whether we will even have some tools which can interview the person, speak to them, and then it can kind of, you know, talk about, do the pitch of the organization, create that interest.

Huma: We do have small process in place, like we have a wealth manager assimilation program. So we kind of make the wealth manager do a typical day in a life of, you know, it, he, it'll help him to go and do a field visit for three days. And then only he gives his intention to join. So, you know Can any of these things be replaced by a tool which can do all of these activities, where coaching on the job, mentoring on the job telling the new employee how to navigate in the organization.

Huma: For all of these, we just, you know, like, it's only about a wishful thinking. So looking at, you know, if these kind of tools will help replace and make our efficiencies. Yeah, 

Tahseen: I, I have in my conversations with other HR leaders, it has come up while recruitment, there are several tools, but maybe the level of advancement still, you know, is not there yet.

Tahseen: But yes, I see that happening very soon. Because this is a conversation we've heard over and over again. 

Huma: Great. This was an amazing, fulfilling conversation, Huma, and I have my last question for you. Which is, and we ask this to all, you know, HR leaders we speak with, because you come with so much of experience, so much wealth of experience, right? What is the one advice you would like to give, you know, budding people leaders, first time CHROs?

Tahseen: Anything that they can learn from you. 

Huma: We spoke a lot about innovation. We spoke about automation, so many things about HR business and all of that. Just coming back to what I started as a person. So I just wanted to have a very small you know, I've been personally following this. So, you know, people will forget what you do for them.

Huma: People will forget what you spoke, but they will always remember how you made them feel. Right. So always strive to make. make everyone feel good. So that's the one small thing that I've been holding on as a piece of advice for myself. And that is something that I would want to share for everyone. 

Tahseen: Wow.

Tahseen: Simple and sweet and straightforward. Thank you, Huma. Thank you so much for joining us today. We like you rightly said, we covered a gamut of things and I can't wait to, you know, share this with the audience. But right from you know, automation, technology, challenges. The kind of challenges that HR leaders are facing, the kind of challenges employees face, we've covered, you know, a broad spectrum of, you know, topics today.

Tahseen: And it was, it was great having this conversation with you. Absolutely enriching and fulfilling. Thank you so much, Huma. 

Huma: Thank you so much, Tahseen. Thanks for having me over.