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Highlights
- The company plans to hire about 1,000 people at the frontline level, out of a total of 7,000 planned hires for this year, reflecting a ratio of about 1/7th for the entry-level positions.
- At Mahindra Finance, the attrition rate is around 17-19 percent. However, the frontline level sees a higher attrition rate of about 25 percent.
Manish Sinha, CHRO, Mahindra FinanceHistorically, women have been underrepresented in the finance industry. This gender gap was often attributed to societal stereotypes, discrimination and a lack of female role models. However, significant strides have been made in recent years to address this issue and create a more inclusive environment for women in finance.
One of the most notable changes is the increasing number of women pursuing education and careers in finance, and hence they are now entering the workforce too.
Mahindra Finance too is building a strong pipeline to welcome women leaders in the workforce. In an exclusive interaction with ETHRWorld, Manish Sinha, CHRO, Mahindra Finance, highlighted the key initiatives that the company is taking up, and some of its hiring plans for the future.
Sinha at first explains that the future of work at Mahindra Finance will focus on three key areas: enhancing agility, speeding up decision-making and increasing the workforce engagement to drive overall success. Improving diversity to promote equitable opportunities and cultivating a growth mindset with a focus on talent, meritocracy and capability are also priorities.
“The company believes that its most compelling value proposition is offering the employees opportunities for their professional growth within the organisation and the broader Mahindra Group,” he adds.
Women in Workforce
Mahindra Finance has women making up 25 percent of its leadership positions and 9 percent at the mid-management level. However, there is a noticeable drop in female representation at the entry-level positions.
To address this, the company has implemented women-oriented initiatives aimed at supporting and empowering female employees at various life stages. These include maternity support, safe travel and accommodation, IVF support and a comprehensive return-to-work programme.
Sinha explains there is a shortage of women, as the majority of their employees work in sales and collections roles, such as business executives, collections executives, area business managers or circle heads. These roles typically attract fewer women, as there is a lower intrinsic interest among women in pursuing careers in these areas.
To address this gap too, the company has partnered with Manipal Academy to offer a specialised training programme for women.
They have already trained two batches of about 40 women each, who have been successfully deployed in these roles. Currently, they are training a third batch and are exploring additional partnerships with other vendors to further bridge this gap.
Learning and Development Plans
Sinha says that for Mahindra Finance, the people lie at the heart of the business, driving its operations. The strength of the business and the quality of customer relationships directly result from the strength and capabilities that employees bring.
Therefore, creating a culture of continuous learning and development, and nurturing talent to meet present and future business needs, is central to the company’s people development philosophy.
This strategy is primarily derived from the strategic priorities identified in the balanced scorecard, the HR strategy and the Mahindra Rise philosophy, which together form the guiding principles for conceptualising, designing and rolling out development initiatives.
The strategy to maximise human potential is built on a three-pronged approach: a holistic learning architecture focusing on capabilities tailored to current and future business needs, an integrated talent management framework to ensure a robust leadership pipeline, and best-in-class practices to promote diversity and inclusion.
Over the past year, Mahindra Finance has driven key projects such as a business transformation project for digitization and standardisation, multiple programmes on customer excellence, and training initiatives, including the rollout of retail branch structures and competency-based learning journeys. The company has also started implementing the ethics workshops on Collaboration, Agility and Bold, which are the core leadership behaviours.
In addition, there are various mid to senior management leadership programmes such as the Future Shapers programme for senior management, the Accelerated Leadership Track programme for mid-management, and the Transformational Leadership Development Programme (TLDP) for high-potential mid-management employees.
Recently, the company launched the Emerging Leadership Development Programme, which focuses on investing in younger talent and helping them grow in their careers.
Speaking about measuring the ROI of any development programme, Sinha says that they do it by assessing the learning journey of the individuals involved and how many roles are being backfilled by these people.
Sinha explains, “For instance, consider a batch of 35 individuals who have completed the Transformational Leadership Development Programme. When a suitable opportunity arises, the key question is whether the organisation is looking to fill the position with someone from this group, who has been specifically invested in, or if we are turning to the external market to find new talent for that role.”
“The true measure of success lies in how many of these individuals step into positions that become available due to resignations or the creation of new roles. This demonstrates the effectiveness of the programme and the organisation’s ability to grow and promote internal talent into leadership positions,” he adds.
Attrition Rates and Recruitment Strategy
Attrition remains a significant concern within the BFSI industry, with some of the largest banks in the country experiencing attrition rates as high as 40 to 50 percent.
At Mahindra Finance, the attrition rate is around 17-19 percent. However, the frontline level sees a higher attrition rate of about 25 percent.
“We have a very robust Internal Job Postings (IJP) mechanism that we publish every week. All roles available across the country in our four group companies—Mahindra Insurance Broking, AMC (Asset Management Company), Mahindra Rural Housing, and Mahindra Finance—are accessible to everyone. It’s a transparent and merit-driven process of selecting talent,” Sinha says.
Mahindra Finance currently has a workforce of about 26,000 employees.
The recruitment strategy focuses on both lateral hires and fresh talent from campuses. The company plans to hire about 1,000 people at the frontline level, out of a total of 7,000 planned hires for this year, reflecting a ratio of about 1/7th for entry-level positions.
These hires are made through various formats, including management trainees, corporate trainees and graduate trainees. The organisation also explores higher-trend deployment models to bring in the best talent.
“We cannot have all entry-level positions filled solely by fresh talent. Some roles demand experience, and lateral hiring helps meet those needs,” Sinha says.
“We follow the ‘son of the soil’ or ‘daughter of the soil’ philosophy, ensuring that if someone is from a place like Solapur, they are trained and deployed there to minimise natural attrition,” he adds.
The company follows a well-articulated campus recruitment policy, mirroring the NIRF (National Institutional Ranking Framework) ranking list.
Mahindra Finance simply recruits from campuses for corporate trainees, select campuses for management trainees, and sources graduate and apprentice trainees from more localised but high-quality institutions.
