Mr. Prakash Kulkarni
M. D. Thermax, Pune.

Thermax exited from peripheral businesses choosing to concentrate on core areas instead. What we did was looked at our portfolios, says Mr.Prakash; we saw that among our many businesses some were making profits others did not have a consistent record. From the 13 to 14 businesses we owned we now have only 6. We realized that there was no sense in having so many businesses when management time was precious.

We weren't getting returns on the investment made. We asked ourselves 'are we the best owners?' 'Does the business have great growth and good profitability?' The answers were NO. That's when we decided to prune our portfolio, by closing down some concerns, selling of some and retaining only the rest.


We thought we could do with some external help. There was a need to take a very objective and impartial view of the situation. There were different views on which business was good or bad but they were based on intuition. No doubt the BCG helped us but all decision making power lay with us. In fact we decided not to shut down two companies, they had recommended axing, which are doing well now.


When it is a question of survival, implementation of change becomes easier. Of course it was a huge job, which required a lot of hard work and a tremendous change in mindset. Our previous performance culture silently said 'we will carry you'; losing a job was unheard of except in an integrity issue. Now you stay on as long as you perform. We were quite arrogant previously; our salaries were 15 per cent lower than the rest of the industry because we offered what was called the 'Thermax' factor. Not any more our salaries are on par with everyone else's because that is what people want.


When I took over as MD, VRS was not my priority; it was to build confidence among people that they could bring a turnaround. Reorganizing and restructuring was done. Each business was divided into a profit center and employees regrouped, there was now a surplus of employees. So it wasn't as if we had a target of say 20 percent employees. Even before VRS was implemented, employees were put on a matrix of capeable / incapable, willing/unwilling. VRS was applicable to the blue-collar employee too, however since they are unionized the process was more difficult. Other changes like improvement in discipline and individual efficiency were implemented.


We continue to take support from consultants on various matters. Personally I think there is nothing wrong with that. An outside view is always good, however ultimately execution depends on us.
As for our future plans we need to bring in the same vibrancy we had two years ago, which will come with the growth, we know we have to work towards it. The last couple of years we have been more matter of fact, there is a need to focus more on soft issues. In fact we have carried out an employee satisfaction survey, the results of which are awaited, then surely some changes will be made.


Earlier HR managers used to work only with soft issues today they must work on the hard issues as well. People have to be made to work There has to be a positive confrontation. No use being goody-goody anymore.

                                                  Face-to-Face Interaction with : Mr. Rajesh Hurkat,MBA(HR)-II
                                                                                                 Ms. Roshni Nair, ACM-I