Performance Enablers – Realizing Excellence Through Human Resources

Pramod Solanki, Founder , Performance Enablers

A business is more likely to succeed only if it manages all its required talent well. In this scenario, HR’s consulting services play a vital role. This is a responsibility that can be entrusted to smart people that can transform the business with their unique and innovative solutions.

Performance Enablers is a leading team of HR and Management Professionals from diverse industries and academic institutions. They strongly believe that after many years of progress in the HR discipline, the people factor for organizational success is yet to be fully leveraged. And, they are passionate about realizing this potential for the mutual good of individuals, organizations, communities, and the society at large.

Performance Enablers’ team is making smart efforts to transform businesses with their comprehensive HR solutions under the innovative vision of Dr. Pramod Solanki, the founder.

Initial Hurdles that made a smoother way ahead

Before Dr. Solanki started Performance Enablers, he had worked with the corporates for over 30 years. The prospects wanted a reference i.e. where he had carried out similar work as a consultant. It was a challenging time. Fortunately, some senior corporate leaders who had known his work, came forward to vouch for him. That’s how the Performance Enablers journey began.

And Performance Enablers started growing

After about a year as a freelancer, a client came forward and signed up for an ongoing commitment to lead their HR function, with the in-house team as support. More similar arrangements followed and, Performance Enablers had a vibrant business model that was win-win for the clients and Dr. Solanki i.e. a client had a senior HR resource leading the function, without the cost of a full-time resource and he had an opportunity that gave the space of a consultant and ongoing access to the work culture and ethos in the client organization. This greatly helped in re-designing contextual, HR process improvements and working closely with the businesses to ensure sustainability.

This kind of arrangement where Dr. Solanki was a consultant and yet a part of their management team, has helped him drive many sustainable changes and improvement projects in the client organizations.   

From one-off assignments by the clients to long–term agreements have been a very fulfilling experience, professionally. It indicates the trust the clients have in the value they create for them.

Besides the experience that they bring to the table, their approach to co-creating solutions for the clients has proved very valuable. It ensures that they design and implement solutions that are contextual and integrate well with the culture and ethos of an organization. This is not possible with one-off engagements with the clients.

Services that transform businesses Performance Enablers

•    Customized Diagnostic Tools

It’s said that if you can define a problem correctly, you can solve it. Performance Enablers provides customized diagnostic tools that give a 360-degree view of a problem that helps in co-creating sustainable solutions. 

•    CHRO Services

Performance Enablers provides senior HR leaders from their network who are currently freelancing but are ready to discharge the responsibility as the Chief HR Officer (CHRO) for a Company, with support from the full-time, in-house team in the organization.

•    Contextual HR Solutions

While their services cover an entire gamut of HR operations, they particularly bring deeper experience and insights in the following areas:

  • Executive Coaching
  • Crafting Leadership Model for an organization
  • Business Enabling HR i.e. aligning HR processes and practices with the business strategy and the leadership model for an organization
  • Leadership Effectiveness Intervention – Mapping competencies against leadership model, IDP creation, Developmental inputs – action learning projects, coaching and workshops and facilitation of stakeholder reviews. The insights gained can be utilized to build a leadership pipeline and to facilitate succession planning.
  • Business-driven capability building intervention, using state – of – the – art blended learning approach
  • Performance – linked Employee Engagement Interventions
  • Performance Management System- Building capability for goal setting and review of inputs and outputs, Performance – linked Pay (PLP)
  • Performance – linked Recognition Programs to nurture a high-performance culture
  • Talent Acquisition Process, aligned with the ‘Success Profile’ for an organization – Use of Competency-based Interviews (CBI) and Psychometric Tools
  • Strengthen the on boarding process for new talent
  • Building change management capability/institutionalization of the change in the client system

•    Recruit for Growth

Recruit for Growth is a business vertical of Performance Enablers, focused on hiring quality talent. The dedicated team in this vertical takes a strategic perspective to the hiring process, bringing onboard talent that has the skillset and mindset aligned with the strategic focus of the organization.

Factors that make Performance Enablers ‘unique’ Performance Enablers

Performance Enablers’ key differentiator is their approach to work. They do not work as an external agency. They operate more like an extended, specialist arm of the HR function of an organization, on a long-term basis. Even after the assignment is completed, the client is free to call to discuss an issue concerning their assignment. 

This approach has created a high level of trust with the clients and they want to partner with them to deal with more and more of their challenges.     

Being an HR-focused outfit, they begin work with the clients on their HR needs /concerns. As the partnership develops, you realize that some of these concerns have their roots in the style of managing the organization. And, that’s when the engagement gets more holistic where you try and work with the management team of a client organization to bring about changes at the decision–making levels, so that downstream HR activity and processes are positively impacted. This is how they bring about substantive and sustainable improvement in client organizations. 

Dr. Pramod Solanki, A solid Leadership at Performance Enablers

•    After his Post-graduate degree in Industrial and Organizational Psychology from Delhi University, he began his career with IIM, Ahmedabad, assisting the Faculty in teaching, training, research, and consulting. In terms of learning, the two years spent here have been of great value throughout my career.

•    He then served as a full-time Faculty at Jamnalal Bajaj Institute of Management Studies, Mumbai for 5 years.

•    His corporate career began in 1994 with TCS as a part of their Corporate Training Group, taking care of in-house Management Development Programs. Dr. Solanki’s first job as an HR Manager was with L&T Finance (1997 to 1999).

•    Dr. Solanki took up an overseas assignment as the Head – Group HR for a diversified group in Nigeria and worked there from 1999 to 2005.

•    He re-joined L&T as the Head – People & Organization Development, for the Hydrocarbon Engineering division, in 2005.

•    His last corporate assignment was with Sun Pharma from 2012 to 2016, as the Head – Learning & Organization Development.  

•    Since 2016, He has been running his HR consulting outfit. Through their full-time and impaneled resources, they offer the entire gamut of HR services to the clients. He also serves as a Consultant Chief HR Officer to mid-sized corporates, leading the HR function with the support of the in-house team, largely remotely, and being physically present for the management meetings.    

The key achievements of Performance Enablers

Dr. Solanki says, “the biggest achievement has been the belief of the clients that we can co-create value for them. Increasing no. of clients for us is the biggest achievement.”

The magazine ‘Insight Success’ wrote about Performance Enablers as one of the 10 dynamic HR consulting companies for 2019.

Every experience with a client has been a unique and special achievement. The most inspiring has been the progression from a small, one-off assignment to long-term engagements lasting two to three years. For them, this is the biggest professional recognition of the value they create. 

My associates are like my partners. They know and understand everything that we do to almost the same level as me.

Dr. Pramod Solanki

Being part of the management teams to plan and review businesses, has given tremendous insights into opportunities that HR has to add value to a business and they leverage the same in servicing the clients.

Uplifting the quality and speed of HR processes

Supporting clients with strategic talent acquisition has been a later addition to their services.

Acquiring talent is not a purely functional activity of HR. It needs to be derived from the strategic focus of Performance Enablers. The talent to be acquired needs to fit not only into the current role requirements but also with the emerging, strategic focus of an organization. This understanding develops only when you are part of the strategy discussions with the management team. Performance Enablers’ long-term engagements with the clients have enabled them to bring this strategic perspective to the hiring process for the clients.

Together with the strategic perspective for an organization, the functional HR skills (use of psychometric tools, Competency-based Interviewing, Assessment Centres) and the sense of ownership to service a client, ensure the quality and speed in the hiring process. 

The Workforce

Dr. Solanki says, “My associates are like my partners. They know and understand everything that we do to almost the same level as me.”

This inclusiveness results in a sense of ownership, initiative, and creative contribution by the team. The synergy in the team, a strong sense of ownership, and the zeal to surpass their standards have been the key differentiators of the team.  

Words from the founder

Constant vigilance is a need. When you are always vigilant, you can craft and fine-tune your strategy aligned with the ground reality- be it internal or external to an organization. 

It’s a rat–race out there. However, if you are true and consistent with your values and approach, you are soon differentiated. And that helps you grow.

Technology has played a significant role in taking HR solutions space to the next level. The standardized part of the services has been digitized- be it recruitment, onboarding, performance management, or any part of the employee life cycle, for that matter. This has released significant capacity for HR service providers – whether external or internal. While there are differences among the service providers and the client organizations, mature solution providers and client organizations, have leveraged this free capacity to play more and more strategic roles. As a result, HR solutions providers are seen as playing a bigger role in the success of businesses.

If your actions inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more and become more, you are a leader.

John Quincy Adams

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