Shaw Wallace plans human resource revamp

NEW DELHI: A company that never believed in modern human resource practices, Shaw Wallace is turning a new leaf now. The liquor major is undertaking a organisational human resource revamp and has mandated HR expert Mercer Consulting to align its HR practices with that of global standards. And, this HR revamp exercise has been initiated by Komal Chhabria Wazir, executive director, Shaw Wallace & Co.As an initial step, the company plans to trim the executive workforce by about 45-48 in the various corporate functions. An overall need for redeployment, realignment and golden handshakes has arisen after the hiving-off of the beer business to a separate JV with SAB Miller and demerger of the liquor business through an alliance with Kyndal International, a company spokesperson said. The exercise is aimed at developing a lean and efficient organisation, he added. Also, Shaw Wallace and SAB Miller have set up a joint team under the new beer JV. The objective is to check out the suitability of the Shaw Wallace beer division people to the functioning of the new JV. The executives to be found non-suitable for the new beer JV for any reason by the joint team will be either redeployed or asked to leave the organisation, the spokesperson said. Under realignment exercise, Deepak Chaudhuri, who was director of beer business under Shaw Wallace Breweries has been moved to head of Shaw Wallace's traditional businesses to give MD Richard Rushton a free hand to form his own team in the JV. Other reshuffling include, Rajiv Suri will take over as head, finance (liquor and corporate). Suri will report to the group CFO PM Nene. Ashok Kapur will be responsible for gelatine division at Jabalpur. Kapur will report to Chaudhuri. Srijit Mullick will move out of corporate finance to Shaw Wallace & Hedges in Sri Lanka as director (finance) and will report to Chaudhuri. And, K Sundarraman is being nominated by Shaw Wallace to the beer JV as deputy CFO. Mercer Consulting is also implementing a performance-pay system. The HR revamp exercise is in line with McKinsey's advice to streamline operations and cut costs.