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“Management is doing things right; leadership is doing the right things”

-Peter Drucker

What exactly makes you a good leader? Do you believe if someone speaks the old age adage that Leaders are born and not made? Why are some many articles published on Leadership? Why so many books? Why so many courses offered?

Is the topic Leadership that complicated? Who can be a Leader? Who can’t?

Today I would like to reflect on this topic called Leadership. True leadership is a result of experience, emotion, and evolution. Leadership comes from mistakes, comes from the emotions you lived through, life’s you left, and the strategies that have failed. Though it’s been a tough journey to comprehend the article, here are the top qualities you should possess in order to be a successful leader.

1. Take the lead

Good leaders lead from the front, not from the back. Never command people to do something, make a lead, and then let the people follow you. Don’t be the hound, who barks orders at people and assign everything. Hire charge, roll up your arms, stick your hands dirty, and finish off THE MISSION. It helps you establish rapport, feel the difficulty, and builds a good amount of respect among your people.

2. Be responsible

Responsibility usually refers to the performance of a duty, making sure it’s happening and it’s happening right. When you are trying to avoid accountability, you not being a good leader. Leadership is taking responsibility not avoiding accountability.

3.Have a sharp perception

Learn how people perceive you. All great leaders do. Keeping asking everyone and analyze the feedback you receive. Open, honest communication with everyone can really help most times. Let them speak on your good and bad. Good would let them follow you and bad would help you correct yourself.

4.Self-Assessment

Assess your weakness, realize your strengths, do a SWOT (Strength, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threat) analysis, and think about it. Working on the negative areas would improve your leadership abilities and releasing them from time to time would make you more human.

ZIGSAW is looking out for interns who are willing to be a leader. We are looking out active and self-driven individuals who can communicate, who can motivate their teams, in fact, build teams and take risks. #bezigsawed.

Wanna be a Zigsaw Ambassador? Fill in the form 🙂

[contact-form to=’vaibhav@zigsaw.in’ subject=’Campus Ambassador Internship’][contact-field label=’Name’ type=’name’ required=’1’/][contact-field label=’Email’ type=’email’ required=’1’/][contact-field label=’College’ type=’url’/][contact-field label=’Pen Picture’ type=’textarea’ required=’1’/][/contact-form]

Watch the video to get better inspired http://go.ted.com/GNW
chetan.banala@gmail.com

As the winter gets warm and the year comes to a close, I want to reflect on this term Business Development that my internship experience brought to life. Business Development Internship at Zigsaw is a combination of strategic analysis, marketing, and data research.
Zigsaw welcomed me with open arms and over the winter I have had the opportunity to broaden my knowledge in a number of business concepts. The internship helped me prove that I was ready for a leadership role and pushed me on entering the business consulting sector due to the vast skill set I acquired. This intern was definitely a great experience where I learned how to grow a business.
My passion for business development was unveiled. I have a point here, We all have goals, dreams, ambitions, and passion. There will be bumps in the road that attempt to hinder us away from our goal. Nevertheless, we must remain committed, follow our passion, and let life lead us as it may. I love my work here. I received many backlashes from friends and family for moving to Udaipur this winter, but I felt I had to earn the decision for me. When your passion runs parallel with ambition, be quick to tag it by whole means.
Zigsaw gave me one of a kind experience, I was well compensated for my time spent. In real terms, I was more than recompensed by the experience I gained, bylines I have earned and the connection I created. It afforded me a chance to prove myself worthy to my future employers. Vaibhav of Zigsaw made it imperative that I took in all my succinct requirements, so as to avoid any confusion at work.
Holding away the work part of it, I definitely was moved by the exciting part of Zigsaw.
Of all the plethora of events spread, my birthday was the best. Everyone here made sure, I was surprised. The weekend trips, the bowling sprees, the big lunch breaks, the awesome friends I made here, and all the Bhindi Masala jokes make it unbelievable that my internship is already wrapping up. I believe it Zigsaw-s into the old adage, Choose a job you love, and you will never have to work a day in your life. I barely passed any time here in Udaipur but every day I spent is going to be an awesome memory.
Every day I arrive, learn something, earn some skill, drop some lines, make some jokes, and apprehend a deeper understanding of what business development means.
Never did a day go slow, never did I look behind.

Sai Chaitanya Banala
Business Development Intern
Zigsaw Consultancy Services
chetan.banala@gmail.com

Are you thrilled by being social, enthusiastic about being a professional and involved in your school communities?
Doesn’t matter what your major is, from Computer Science to Anthropology, to Business, to Zoology. Zigsaw Ambassadors have the opportunity to enhance their professional development, leadership, and communication skills, and get access to a unique network of Zigsaw Ambassadors across the country. Plus, there’s a swag!
Spend your free time at college for one of the young and innovative consulting companies which you might have come across at an internship fair or on the notice boards of your placement cell.

What’s the swag?
1) You are the voice of Zigsaw!
Zigsaw is a young and out of box consulting service company looking forward to working with you by letting you be its voice at your college. Zigsaw is your road to opportunities, possibilities, and success.
2) Because we all love goodies 🙂
It’s raining gift vouchers, recharge vouchers, personalized business cards, and lots more. You would be surprised if you have done justice to the job. On successful completion, you will be a lot more than surprised.
3) Because we love what you love <3
You matter to us. Are you a reluctant engineer? Do you love writing? You play guitar to express out yourself ? or write poems to impress someone? We shall give you a platform to express and impress. Hashtag #bezigsawed on every work you do. Be Zigsawed and express it out. Together we create a movement, a culture because #bezigsawed is a lot more than an internship.
4) Resume builder? Yeah! Bragging rights for your resume!
How many times did you apply for something by a “ctrl c ” and “ctrl” job? The time has come to boost your resume, update your LinkedIn profile, and score something you are dreaming of. All the campus ambassadors will get an internship certificate from Zigsaw Consultancy. So eventually, you have something which does all the talking in an interview.
5) We don’t ask you to go “Premium “, you don’t have to shell out a buck
You don’t have to drive anywhere, no taxi fares, no formal dressing and no, you need not use your wallet.
Spend the awesome time of being a campus ambassador right from where you are and eating the same Maggie which you eat daily.
We can write more reasons, but we thought these would be sufficient for you to join us and #bezigsawed.

Network: We are in touch with placement cells of over 150 colleges and have an excellent campus reach. Besides, our platform for Crowd-sourced applications is also growing rapidly. We have a partnership with marketing agencies that take our reach out to the next level.

Work Profile Bench-marking: We have a unique work profile bench-marking procedure that helps us understand organizational needs for specific roles. Companies such as Zigsaw Consultancy help the employers and the employees to find out about the best option for them. If we go by the definition then Job Benchmarking can be told as a method of getting the general details regarding the job or the company such as-the role of the employee, the level of responsibility, the qualifications for the job the qualities required, etc. Job bench-marking can be an efficient way to find this out.

Assessments: We offer scientifically designed assessments that standardize the evaluation of talent across various competencies which are critical to forecasting on-job performance and fitment of a potential recruit.

 1. To ensure the highest standard of fairness in the assessment of skills, the tests are designed to be objective.
2. Reliability is ensured by evaluating and re-evaluating candidates with questions in his difficulty band.
3. Since the HR personnel specifies essentials and less-essentials of the Job profile himself with the degree essentially against each attribute, the test is bound to be valid. Furthermore, we benchmark Job roles with feedback from 2 top-performers in that role; thereby triple checking the validity of each mapping.
Psychometric Profiling: Our Bi-polar analysis and MBTI tests provide an insight into the candidates’ aspirations and psyche which are instrumental in predicting the On-Job performance of the candidate.

• Full range of Psychometric Services by registered Psychologists and Psychometrics.
• Science-based assessments help organizations assess, select, and develop the right people for the right roles.
• Screening tests for employees take on to advanced psychometric profiling.
• Assessment centers and competency measuring for students and job-seekers

Large talent-pool: You have access to the premium database of job-seekers at Naukri & Monster, we are premium on LinkedIn too. We introduced a referral program to expand the database of students. So the pool is deep, are you ready to dive in?
Candidate Profile Validation: We follow a rigorous validation process to ensure the validity of each resume that we evaluate.

Premium Candidates: We have already handled profiles of candidates from Top engineering colleges and are exploring the best Management colleges of India. You must get in touch with if you are planning to hire the best.
Flexibility: We offer unique flexibility in terms of the service we offer to suit the requirement of our clients: Opportunity Propagation, Preliminary Screening, Candidate Profile Validation, Assessments, Skill-set evaluation, Psychometric Profiling, Personal Interview, etc

Are you an ambitious start-up that is finding its ground and has plans to fast-scale its operations? If yes, read on.
3 years back we came across a piece of Philip Kotler arguing Employees are the most valued assets. Being a lot of data-driven individuals that we are; we had our share of skepticism for this line of ideology. Now, a year into watching start-ups fail & flourish, We appreciate and idealise his ideology. We at Zigsaw firmly believe that a good team is what makes an organization flourish and the lack of it causes it to collapse. If you as an organization share our line of thinking, we would like to get in touch with you.

Employees are usually the difference between good ideas and great companies.

At Zigsaw, we are connecting students and companies with services that are equally flexible and customizable to suit the needs.

Every organization wants to ensure that they recruit the best-fit candidate for fresh recruitment or an internal movement. Doing this only through the interview is a subjective procedure and is also very difficult.

So we conduct high-quality psychometric tests that help you to assess the strengths of an individual and also predict behavioral patterns while working in a role and a team. So it will also add to objectivity in the decision of any kind of recruitment. This test can also be used to identify the training needs of a particular employee.

So at Zigsaw, we are solving the puzzle for students and calling the “calling ” for employers!

Here are the top 5 reasons explaining how Knowing your personality type would change your life

• You learn that people aren’t wrong, they are different
• You can better manage your day to day routines
• You can recognize why you feel out of sorts, and know how to deal with it
• You can be reassured that you are not crazy
• You can learn to manage your energy

Well, we are hosting a personality assessment test at the Zigsaw Servers. The personality development test would start at 20:00 hours on 31st Oct(today). This simple,yet certified 10 minute test would help you better understand your strengths and acknowledge your weakness. An easy SWOT analysis, would help you unleash your full potential & help you peak in your career.
Also, find a sample report of the test at http://www.zigsaw.in/PDT.pdf. Feel free to share it with your friends who could benefit from this test. In-case of any clarification, feel free to call me at 9099072249
Some Common FAQ’s
Qs: I want this report for me. How can I get one?
A: You will have to appear for a 10-minute personality test. Questions would be multiple-choice questions
Qs: How do I appear for this test?
A: Go to http://www.zigsaw.in/public?test=MBTI and type in a KEY at 20:00 hours on 31st October 2014. Kindly note that the test window will remain open from 20:00 hours to 20:15 hours only. Interested candidates can either drop in a mail to zigsawconsultancy@gmail.com showing their interest to give the personality assessment test or message the same to 9099072249
KEY will be shared at 20:00 hours on 31^st October with all the interested candidates via email and on the WhatsApp group. To be added to the group, kindly message Add to WhatsApp group to 9099072249
Qs: How confidential is my report?
A: Zigsaw reports are kept extremely confidential. They, under no circumstances, would be shared with anybody other than you.
Qs: How can I ensure an accurate report of the test?
A: The above test is certified. The more honest you are to yourselves, an accurate analysis will give you a clear picture of yourself which would help you identify your strengths and acknowledge your weaknesses. The best suggestion I can give is Don’t overthink, just select the first option that comes to your mind.
Qs: What is the cost to appear for this test?
A: As an introductory offer, this is offered absolutely free.

In our college days, we may have come across many students who are regarded as an all-rounder. Now days in corporate world employers and organisations instead of looking for all-rounder are focussing on building well-rounded classes or organizations of specialists. One way to stand out your job applications and also to develop your skills and interest in a particular field is through internships.

Internships are beneficial for college students as they provide hands-on experience that will be valuable in finding jobs after graduation. In foreign countries students after their high school tend to go into internships to find out their interests and based on their interests opt for a course in college. If you are planning to find an internship now is the time to begin.

Here are a few methods on how to find the internship that suits you:

Follow what interests you

The objective of the internships should be to find out the areas of your interests and also see if you can really pursue a career in the future. This helps you develop and hone your skills in a particular field. If you’re interested in graphic design, see if local firms are looking for a design or administrative interns. If you like biology and medicine, find a local lab that has an opportunity for a research internship. Even if the position isn’t exactly what you imagined, you can still learn about the industry, how the profession works, gain insight into the skills and tools necessary to succeed and begin building your network with professionals in this field.

Build contacts and reach out people

Try to find out local companies and organizations at which you would like to intern, find people, and build contacts. Try to find out opportunities that they may have and also to find out more about a particular position. Just like in the college search process, it’s helpful to do your research and talk to as many people as possible in order to learn more about a specific field, company, or internship opportunity.

Be sure to link to your relevant online profiles.

When it comes time to apply for an internship, be sure to provide links to other resources like your personal website, blog, online portfolio. You can include these in your resume or in the signature of an email. This way, employers can learn more about you, see some of your work, and gain insight into other accomplishments and interests that you may not have been able to include in your standard resume.

Bring your A-game to the interview

Finally got selected for an internship and now being called for an interview? Remember to bring all the documents that they requested whether it is an extra copy of our resume or the list of references. Dress appropriately and bring in your own questions to ask during an interview. This is an opportunity to know the organizations as much as you can and also it is a chance for them to get to know you.

Don’t take rejection personally

Waiting for the company’s decision can be daunting and it stings if you get No as an answer. Do not take rejection personally and instead try to find out why they decided to go into a different direction and hence try to use this as feedback in your next search.

Standing out from the pool of applicants is the key to getting selected for an internship. The applicant pool is highly competitive, so it is important to take grab opportunities such as internships that help develop your interest. By following the steps mentioned above you will definitely be able to find the internship that suits your taste and need.

Human Resource consulting or HR consulting is the branch of management consultancy that focuses on the effective utilization of Human Resources to obtain the goals of the organization. It can also be defined as a process that addresses the specific need of the business in a manner that serves the interest of both the company and the employee workforce. A Human Resource consultant tends to make and provide and advise companies over the wide range of issues that can help the business to become more productive.

A wide range of skills and techniques are used as part of the process of HR consulting. The HR consultant may have a background in such disciplines as accounting and finance, legal matters as they relate personal issues, health benefit packages, and management education. A human resource consultant may also hold credentials in a specific area of human resources.

HR consulting has turned into an industry worth $18.4 billion as per the data collected until 2006. And most of the HR consultancies are based upon the following core fields:

• Human capital, including remuneration (also called total rewards), employee rewards and incentive programs, and talent acquisition and management
• Health and benefits, orchestrating optimal employee health plans with the carriers themselves
• Mergers and acquisitions, examining fit across culture, job-type, transaction costs, etc.
• Communication, including surveying employee attitudes, satisfaction, engagement, and other employee behaviors
• Retirement
• Recruitment process outsourcing

Benefits of Human Resource Consulting

HR consulting is of benefit to businesses of every size and description. Start-up companies require guidance in establishing and deciding policies and procedures that agree with the law as they relate to hiring and firing personnel. Small companies and organizations may require the HR consulting in developing specific programs and taking the companies to a new level. Larger companies may require consulting regarding the development of mediation processes or evaluating the current size of human resources and providing suggestions on how to reorganize the department to provide the best possible output. People or organizations may choose to hire an HR consultant for a specific task such as developing strategies and techniques to enhance overall human resources function.

To summarize HR consulting can serve the following purposes:

• Help in structural reduction of the Human Resource Managing (HRM) cost base, by identifying the non-value adding activities and eliminate the hidden HR operations costs.
• Help in identifying the inefficient Human Resources (HR) Administration processes and HR practices.
• Help organizations to focus on human resource performance.
• Help organizations to serve their employees better, as the people come first.
• Help organizations to improve efficiency, productivity, and communication and employee morale.

In all cases, the ultimate goal of HR consulting is to leave the client with a solid and fully efficient human resources department. The department will have specific guidelines and procedures that can adapt to any type of personnel issue and all employees assigned to the department will have a clear understanding of their duties and responsibilities. When HR consulting is fully successful at attaining these goals, the consultant becomes redundant and is no longer needed in order for the company to competently deal with human resource issues.

Take a situation in which 300 stones were dropped on the ground and 50 people were allowed to look at them. Out of the 300, 50 were precious stones and rest were valuable- but not as valuable as the previous ones. But they all looked identical. You were asked to choose one of the stones from the given stones. Which one would you choose?
In the above situation it doesn’t matter who picks the stone first, what matters is who has an eye for identifying the precious one and then picking it up.
Today the hiring process is the same as the situation mentioned above. For each post, we have 300 -400 candidates who are qualified and fit into the position but out of the given 50 candidates are exceptionally good. What we need is a method of identifying those 50. And at the same time, we also require that the process should go on quickly as this would give you an upper hand over your competitors. But also do remember that hiring a wrong person versus the right person can cost you a lot of money. While the right candidate will be 15 times their salary the wrong one would cost you 30 % of theirs.
Real work is to identify top talents faster than your competitor. How does one do that?

• Invite as many applicants as possible: Never hesitate in spending a few more bucks in the proper advertising and inviting as many people as possible. These few more bucks would be a sort of investment that in the future will help you earn more than you invested. More applicants you have greater are the chances that you will have the best.
• Conduct a quick Screening: The most time consuming and tedious task is to conduct the screening. It takes a lot of time to sort the candidates. For this purpose, you can have some of your employees to conduct a quick screening. Companies can also get and help from consulting companies such as Zigsaw that will help you meet the candidates who are suitable.
• Conduct Personal Interviews: As soon as you have got a list of the most suitable candidates go on and conduct a quick interview.  Great talent goes out quickly so quicker you meet with them the better.
• Be prepared to make an offer: Say you do have three candidates you want to talk to in-person, it is probably best to interview all three before making an offer. But not always. If you interview someone and your entire hiring team is confident it will be a great fit, not a good fit, but a great fit makes an offer right there. Again, top talent goes fast, and the faster you can get an offer into a person’s hand, the faster your company is zooming along again with a new, great employee helping lead the way.

The hiring process on an average takes about 47 days to conclude, but following the above steps and making sure everything works perfectly it would take about 30 days to conclude. If you have found the diamond in the pile of stones don’t hesitate to make an offer.
And in the same way, if you haven’t found a suitable candidate do not hesitate in conducting the recruitment process again. It is agreed that you want to hire a candidate quickly but at the same time you also want to hire the right person. No matter how crucial is the position hiring out of desperation is a recipe for disaster.

Why should we hire you?

This question is asked by almost all of the companies in the corporate world before hiring an individual for any post. Depending upon the person there can be numerous answers to this question. This question is more about selling yourself to the company. Consider yourself as the product and employer as the customer. The questions why should we hire you are pretty much similar to the question asked by the customer Why should we buy a particular product?

There are two ways of answering the question:

The Wrong Way:

Many of the people answer Because I want the job. The answer is nice but it is not what the employer is interested in. The bottom line of the question is What can you provide to the company?

Some people might answer the question in the following manner Because I am hard worker and really want to work for this company. Now, this is something that the company might be listening to from each and every individual as everyone thinks that they are hard-working.

The Right Way

You can proceed to answer the question in a warm manner such as Because I am fit for this position and then can proceed telling how you fit into the position.

The most appropriate answer to the question can be Because I have what it takes to solve problems and do the job  A little more expansion on your skill can surely get you a job.

Develop a Strategy

Try to develop a strategy and focus on giving details. The more details you give better your answer will be. An interview is never a time to discuss what you want rather it is a time to summarize your accomplishment and show that what makes you unique.

Understand

As discussed bottom line of the question is what can you do for the company?

You can try and look out in the job profile that what the employers seek or what will it take to meet the job requirements.

Next, do an inventory to determine what you have to offer as a fit for those requirements. Think of two or three key qualities you have to offer that match those the employer is seeking. Don’t underestimate personal traits that make you unique; your energy, personality type, working style, and people skills are all very relevant to any job.

Sales Pitch: You are the solution

Think of yourself as a product and the employer as the consumer. Make a list of the company requirement and what you have to offer. Merge these two to form the conclusion of the discussion. It should be no more than two minutes long and should stress the traits that make you unique and a good match for the job.

What makes you Unique?

Completing an exercise around this question will allow you to concentrate on your unique qualities. Like snowflakes, no two people are alike. Take some time to think about what sets you apart from others.

Let the interviewer figure out that you know what they require and you have what it takes to get the job done that you are the solution to their problem.