National Institute for Smart Government Reviews in New Delhi, India Area

Pros

Nature, scope, reach and impact of projects for the nation and citizens.

Cons

No professional growth. No appreciation. No career advancement seen.

Advice to Senior Management

The organization must have a focus on employee growth as well apart from just executing projects

Pros

1. if anyone have desire to work in egovernance
2. Govt like job, very less work pressure
3. work life balance
4. work in the central team

Cons

1. it is a 2 years contract job, which was not disclosed till we get the offer letter at our symbiosis campus which is very very bad practice to get employee on board without thinking that the employee may get demotivated later when they will come to know.
2. they just don't value MBA graduate degree. they just consider what was your last drawn salary before MBA, based upon that they decide package which is a very wrong aspect. They should maintain a minimum standard.
3. appraisal 5% in 95% case, rest upon recommendation from top management goes up to 10-15% which is much much below standard than market. That is why people start oiling top management which is a very bad practice.
4. work gets delayed due to file process, very bureaucratic nature of work. repeatative processes.
5. decision made upon suggestions based on hierarchical aspect. junior management has no scope of say.
6. More like coordination kind of work whereas in private one get more ground level work that certainly gives better exposure. One face this when they gets demotivated and start searching for next assignment.
7. For eGovernance, don't WORK IN GOVT, rather WORK FOR GOVT as an outsider to get better learning exposure.
8. The Recruiting panel told us that it is a govt job. But actually it is not. We don not get any benefit like actual govt employee.

Advice to Senior Management

1. Please be transparent about HR Policies (like contractual job etc) & actual work exposure when recruit people from bschool campus as well as lateral hire.
2. Maintain a industry standard salary for hiring MBA graduates. If lateral people gets hired, it is reasonable that offered salary will be based upon last drawn salary but it is not actually work for MBA graduates those get recruited from campus.
3. Appraisal of 5% in 95% case is not at all a industry standard practice. Employee get demotivated.

Pros

Join NISG if:
1. you want to get exposure to the public sector without bothering about issues like salary, work environment, freedom to take decisions, career growth etc.
2. you want to be part of the projects with extremely high citizen impact
3. you are looking for a career in eGovernance

Cons

1. A CEO who has a false understanding of the kind of work people are doing at the lower levels and hence portrays a wrong picture of the work in the company during presentations and interviews
2. Minimal authority to take decisions or shape the projects
3. Often engage in the kind of clerical work demeaning to your education, experience and expertise
4. No career growth. No promotions, no annual increments and even too much delayed variable salaries
5. No feedback system or regular meetings within the organization to take employee feedback on basic issues
6. Treatment of a Personal Assistant even to people with 15-20 years of experience
7. No standards for assigning designations/roles while people are joining. Thus a person with 5 years of experience and 20 years of experience may be working at the same designation and even lower salaries

Advice to Senior Management

If the company wants a mix of public and private people at the junior level then there needs to be a mix at the senior management level also. The leadership is purely government who have no knowledge about the corporate practices. Thus the people with private backgrounds at lower levels are left asking for more in terms of better HR and admin policies, a sound performance review system, a better compensation package, career growth etc. The senior management is generally least bothered about these things and even if you resign it wont make any difference to them since the work in government has no deadlines. If you leave, somebody else will come and start on. Performance doesn't matter to the senior management.

Thus the senior management urgently needs to adapt themselves to the people issues and people practices. They should leave their individualistic attitudes (a typical of the government employees) and start thinking as a "Team". They should care about the people under them and help them grow ahead in their careers. They should stand by them when they raise issues rather than leaving them to fight of their own. Finally senior management should leave aside their ego issues and start respecting each individual as equals.