International HR: Meet Nisha Raghavan

Good morning Women of HR! Here we are, back again with our Women of HR interview series. We've brought you some amazing and diverse interviews so far but this time, we are going international without a passport.

Meet Nisha Raghavan!

Nisha is the author of Your HR Buddy blog. A former HR Generalist with extensive experience in Talent Management and Development, she specializes and writes about Employee Relations, Organization Development and how companies can keep their employees more engaged through Employee Engagement Initiatives. Her experience in the corporate world was as an HR Deputy Manager at Reliance Communications Limited, India. She is a contributing writer at WomenOfHR.com. Married to Nishant and settled in Dallas, she loves to do acrylic and oil paintings, clay sculpting and enjoy networking in Dallas area.

How did you get started?

After my MBA program I was inducted into the cooperate world of Reliance Communications Limited, India, a leading telecommunications company with enormous growth opportunities. I got an excellent platform to utilize my skill set and knowledge for creating better employee relations and building a value based culture within the organization. I always like to interact with people and love to know about what makes one different from others. Therefore it helped me make the most out of this opportunity.

I have worked with the company for the past 4 and throughout my career I brought up innovative ideas and helped build great employee relations and organizational development. My initiatives were accepted and encouraged in such a way that I was given the authority to become the process owner of Employee Engagement Initiatives and Talent Operations for two states.

Being in HR function responsible for more than 2000 employees, my necessity to travel across states and all the district offices was huge. Though out my experience meeting employees, keeping my fingers on the pulse of workforce has helped to learn wide aspects of Employee Relations and Organizational Development. Last year I relocated to US, now I am delighted to share my experience and knowledge in HR realm through my writings.

So Nisha, can you finish the following thougths for me?

My best advice… Don't compromise on your career for anything and settle where you are now. This is one thing which I always go by. My goal was to always pursue a career in HR. I would not have been satisfied with a career in say sales or marketing even though I may be excellent in it. Do what you love to do and only then you can find yourself continuing that with passion, fun and excitement.

I challenge… Myself, any time I am committed to a project, to not just complete it but to raise the bar higher and finding what makes me different in what I do and attaining success. This has helped

me understand my capabilities and realize who am I as a professional, and this boosts my confidence every time.

I encourage… everyone to boldly voice their opinion and do what is important for you as a person and for your family, friends and beloved ones without worrying about what others will think and how they gauge you. What others think about me is their problems not mine.

Leaders… I adore those leaders who spend time with their team regularly at all levels to understand what they have been going through. I think the successful leaders are those who maintain a relationship with their team where they can openly express their views and suggestions back and forth. Leaders should reinforce the things that can create an impact and optimize their team’s performance by connecting, engaging and influencing the team.

HR… Is perceived to be a thankless function in an organization! I don’t agree with this at all. It is all about give and take. If you can be little more empathetic towards your employees and make sure that we are not creating any ambiguity but rather creating transparency in what an employee is suppose to know and do, it can make things go smoother. Being a little friendly and approachable to attain employees respect and recognition is most critical in this profession and that will ease our people management challenges.

Every HR Professional… Being in HR, I know that there are times that HR is forced to close their eyes to mismanagement by leaders in an organization. Come on!! Sometimes leaders can talk only about numbers and business and fail to recognize the valuable efforts of those who work in the grassroots giving their sweat and tears to make their contributions a value addition to the organizational growth. When this happens please voice your concerns and get back to action.

Thoughtful answers Nisha! Now never mind all this HR stuff, can you tell us more about your art?

I like to spend my time doing acrylic and oil paintings and clay sculpting (artnisha.com). I think the skills that I acquire while painting will also serve me well in other facets of life. A lot of our success on life is determined by our problem solving abilities whether it is managing our relationships, our work or creating great art. Even though I could not necessarily point out how my paintings and art work would help me with my career in HR field, I strongly trust that in many ways that it will and while in future when I get my career going again I might be able to look back and point out to specific skills picked up doing my art work that helped me achieve my goals.

You can follow Nisha Raghavan on Twitter @thehrbuddy, and her blog here.

Nisha, thank you so much for your time!