Axis Bank: Why the banking major believes inclusivity should be the buzzword in the workplace

For Axis Bank, acquiring the consumer business—loans, credit cards, wealth management and retail banking—of Citi India was a big win as it positioned the country’s third-largest private sector bank (in terms of total assets) for accelerated growth in the premium segment. Axis Bank reported total income of Rs 82,597 crore in FY22.

However, the Rs 11,603-crore buy—that Axis Bank completed on March 1, 2023—also meant integrating around 3,200 people into the lender, which already had more than 88,000 employees on its rolls. And that wasn’t the only challenge for the bank’s HR—it also had to deal with the cultural differences that typically exist between a domestic entity and a foreign one. “In any integration, we need to recognise that as much as it is about embracing the others, it is also about managing our own people... So, the entire process was collaborative,” says Rajkamal Vempati, Head of HR at Axis Bank.

For her team, the integration meant longer-than-normal working hours for more than a few weeks. But they had an ally—technology. This ensured that the on-boarding of Citi employees—around 97 per cent of the Citi consumer business staffers came on board—was as seamless as possible. The highlight was an app designed specifically for the process.

That says a lot about Axis Bank, which started operations back in 1994, and was promoted by government-owned entities such as Life Insurance Corporation, General Insurance Corporation, National Insurance Company, The New India Assurance Company, United India Insurance Company and the erstwhile UTI.

While integrating the former Citi employees is an ongoing journey involving town hall meetings, one-on-one interactions and even a “buddy” system wherein Axis Bank staffers who have had earlier stints at Citi help the new lot ease in, the domestic lender has ensured that its HR practices are in sync with the changing times and there is no bias. As a result of these measures, Axis bank is one of the top companies in the BT-Taggd Best Companies to Work For in India ranking this year.

“I think the secret sauce for us is the fact that people have been able to settle, assimilate and just adapt; everybody is very, very supportive and helpful,” says Vempati, who has been with the bank for more than seven years. Adapting and assimilating has been smooth and easy even as the bank has continued with its hybrid work culture while encouraging aspects like diversity and inclusion.

For instance, the bank launched its GIG-A Opportunities platform in 2020 to provide alternate work models, and the programme is still in force. Even today, the bank offers a hybrid culture wherein non-customer facing employees have to come to office only twice a week. The bank also has around 4,000 employees working from home on a permanent basis—the bank classifies them as ‘GIG-A Anywhere’.

“We even have GIG-A freelancers who come for fixed-term assignments. Just to give you some context, we put out 50 jobs on a pilot basis in 2020 and we received 66,000 applications in just three weeks. That’s when we realised that things are changing,” says Vempati. “We cannot say we have scarce talent. We’ve got to figure out how we hire people, train them and develop them because [talented] people are there. So, once we put out our GIG-A Anywhere programme, our metrics started improving,” she adds, while highlighting the fact that the overall productivity has gone up. People working remotely even had better ratings in terms of performance and promotion rates in a completely organic manner. “If your performance metrices are more output-driven, the organisation will thrive. So we do not bother about where the employee is as long as the outcome is there,” she says.

Then there is the ‘ComeAsYouAre’ charter aimed at the LGBTQ+ community—both for employees and customers. This allows all employees to list their partners for medical benefits irrespective of gender or marital status, and dress as per their gender or gender expression. Further, customers from the LGBTQ+ community can open a joint account with a same-sex partner or even name them as a nominee, adding their title as ‘Mx’.

Vempati adds that the bank ensures there is proper mentoring across all levels. The bank has also put in a system wherein each senior manager—including Axis Bank MD & CEO Amitabh Chaudhry—mentors nine employees. Meanwhile, in addition, the bank also offers a host of learning programmes in terms of upskilling employees. For this, it has partnered with US-based online course provider Coursera.

“As an organisation, we all have become very tech-driven. But having conversations in terms of where you are, [and] where you want to be—we need to pay attention to those. Mentoring interactions ignite such conversations. We want the bank to be an organisation that is development-focussed in a very human way,” says Vempati.

@ashishrukhaiyar