As the dreary funding winter soars, at e27, we are kickstarting a new article series Line of Hire to understand a company’s culture and hiring philosophies to empower tech workers with the right growth tools to enable business owners to attract talent.

Madhura Moulik is a marketer, entrepreneur, DEI advocate and angel investor.

With close to two decades of experience, she enables startups and SMEs of any size or industry to drive sustainable change and impact through digital transformation with Skilfinity, her entrepreneurial venture, and lately, KarmaV, an AI-based SaaS platform that improves an organisation’s diversity, equity, and inclusion (DE&I) status.

A technology and marketing professional by vocation, she spent almost half of her professional life with corporates, in various roles establishing processes and functions for APAC, EMEA and the Americas.

What personality traits/qualities do you look for in potential employees?

Understanding the integrity of the person is critical while hiring. Most other skills can be developed or nurtured during the tenure of the employment, but if the person lacks integrity, it can pose a significant risk in achieving the organisation’s growth.

Evaluating analytical skills is also critical during the interview process since it is the key to the essential problem-solving ability of the person. Building a high-performing team and achieving sustainable growth can be more straightforward if we can understand these two qualities of the candidate and foster the same amongst the existing workforce.

How do they fit into your company culture? Tell us a little more about your company culture.

KarmaV is operated by a team of individuals in varied time zones and caters to customers on three continents. To build a truly global company with borderless operations, we must take complete ownership of our work and maintain 100 per cent transparency with the rest of the team.

We emphasize that every team member is accountable and committed to their role. Hence, despite this diversity and geographic challenges, we strive to deliver high-quality solutions to our customers.

How do you foster transparency and encourage achievement in the workplace?

We are a lean team with the privilege of shaping the culture as we work towards common business and functional goals.

Lead by example; the ownership is with the leadership and people managers to be honest and respectful with the team members. Encourage the team to step up in someone’s absence, own their mistakes, and behave ethically under high-stress situations. KarmaV believes in an open-door policy where constructive criticism and feedback are appreciated.

The organisation celebrates individual employees’ successes, and it also gets translated into rewards and inputs for career growth. The objective is to avoid stereotypical celebrations and pay attention to personal preferences that suit their personality type.

Do you have a mental health policy? What does that look like?

Our policy is to be more inclusive that support employees in every aspect, including mental health. The approach ensures that all employees have access to equal opportunity, anti-discrimination, and human rights standards.

We encourage employees to talk openly and spread awareness about mental health challenges. KarmaV allows employees to take extended time-offs and ease back into work without stress or burnout with heavy work pressure.

WFH or WFO, or hybrid?

WFH but employees are welcome to come to the office if they wish. According to us, this provides more choices and greater flexibility for the employees.

How should a tech worker prepare for the funding winter?

Industry leaders should be more cognizant of economic downturns and resort to realistic and ethical hiring practices. Each tech professional’s responsibility is to upskill themselves and remain relevant in the job market.

While organisations also look at the larger picture and invest in empowering their workforce with improved individual branding and technology skills. Improved employee advocacy can have a long-term positive impact and help save time and money to build trust and establish a brand in the market.

How do you measure the performance of your employees?

While we use Management by Objective (MBO) to set clear expectations and set measurable goals to track progress, we pay attention to personalising the thresholds and include behavioural attributes in the performance assessment process.

Will you consider a moderately skilled person with great honesty or a highly skilled person with less honesty when hiring?

As they say, skills can be acquired, but attitude can’t!

Since integrity is our critical criterion while hiring, we always choose honesty over other skill sets. However, the candidate should qualify for the minimum screening factors and be willing to learn as per the role’s demand.

Do you encourage ‘intrapreneurship’ in your organisation?

As most of our employees are individual contributors, we want them to take more ownership and be action-oriented like entrepreneurs. Lean teams and startups such as KarmaV have high regard for “intrapreneurial” qualities.

How do you support upskilling for your employees?

Team members are part of various professional forums and attend events and courses that help them gather new insights and share them with the broader team. This creates an incredible learning ecosystem that builds a habit of being more curious about various subjects and aware of the advancements.

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Echelon Asia Summit 2023 brings together APAC’s leading startups, corporates, policymakers, industry leaders, and investors to Singapore this June 14-15. Learn more and get tickets here. Echelon also features the TOP100 stage, where startups can pitch to 5000+ delegates, among other benefits like connecting with investors, visibility through the platform, and other prizes. Join TOP100 here.

The post The ownership is with the leadership to be honest and respectful: Madhura Moulik of KarmaV appeared first on e27.