TRAINING & DEVELOPMENT

Waterlink Pakistan (Pvt.) Ltd.

Company History:
Waterlink Pakistan (Pvt.) Ltd. was established in 2003, is a fast expanding
International Freight Forwarding Company. The company provides the
following services: Air Freight, Afghan Transit, Chartering, Project Cargo,
Supply Chain, Sea Freight, Road Transport and Warehousing. The company
has grown and reached new heights as its subsidiaries and sister concerns
have evolved over the years. Waterlink Pakistan (Pvt.) Ltd. is one of the
leading and active Afghan Transit Trade company with its presence in
Kabul and Kandahar.
Furqan International came into existence in 2003, a subsidiary of
Waterlink Pakistan (Pvt.) Ltd., a well established custom house agent in
Pakistan, facilitating its customers with prompt and efficient custom
clearance services at all major ports and airports in Pakistan. FastTrack
established in 2008, a subsidiary of Waterlink Pakistan (Pvt.) Ltd., and
specializes in projects and warehousing with a bonded facility in Karachi
being

one

of

its

main

strongholds.

MultiModal

Transport

service

established in 2010, a subsidiary of Waterlink Pakistan (Pvt.) Ltd. is

exclusively focused on the road transportation sector and has a fleet of
more than 500 trucks of owned/leased vehicles. Globlex Link in 2010, a
subsidiary of Waterlink Pakistan (Pvt.) Ltd., it deals in commodity
brokerage for all the products offered on NCEL. Having started on a small
scale with only 15-20 employees, Waterlink Pakistan (Pvt.) Ltd. now has
national and international offices covering a large network that its over
200 employees have worked hard to build. Waterlink Pakistan (Pvt.) Ltd.
has its headquarters in Karachi with offices in Islamabad, Lahore,
Faisalabad,

Sialkot,

Peshawar,

Torkham,

Quetta

and

Chaman.

Internationally, Waterlink Pakistan (Pvt.) Ltd. has offices in New York,

Mississauga, Dubai, Kabul and Kandahar.

Organizational Structure
Waterlink Pakistan Pvt. Ltd is an entrepreneur based company that was
started by Capt. Ghulam Mustafa who has an experience of 30 years in
the maritime and commercial shipping experience. He went to United
Kingdom for his education in shipping and from there he started his career
in Pakistan Merchant Navy in the year 1976. He started off as a cadet and
by 1993 he sailed as a Captain under various companies. From year 1993
to 2001, he worked in the Head Office of Pakistan National Shipping
Corporation as a General Manager in the commercial and marketing
department. He decided to take an early retirement and established a
company on a small scale with only 15-20 employees. Gradually with hard
work and strong determination the company grew and now has national
and international offices covering a large network.
Waterlink Pakistan Pvt. Ltd pledge to provide distinctive quality and
unparalleled customer service as it strives to gain the respect and trust of
its customers, suppliers and partner vendors. Its aim is to escalate the
shipping business of Pakistan at least at par with other countries of the
region as well as going further up, to Europe and USA and be recognized
as their competitors.
Pakistan strings with under-developed countries. The goal is To achieve
utmost payback sincerely for self and for the country. Waterlink Pakistan
Pvt. Ltd success is built by creative, productive employees who are
encouraged to make suggestions while thinking "outside the box."

Core Values:
Culture and values plays and important part of the organization. With the
evolving time their old method of working is changing and they are
focusing more on the values that everyone should adhere to. The core
values of the company are as follow:

Regard for the employees

Ethics and Integrity
Quality and Continuous Improvement
Leadership
Individual Growth and Development
Teamwork and Partnership

Training and Development Set Up

Waterlink Pakistan is mainly a Seth company, though the changing times
have brought some changes in the management style of the company but
still it does shows signs of a Seth based management. Our observation
shows that still the main hold lies in the hand of the CEO he makes most
of the decisions regarding many aspects of the company. But now
authority also lies in the hand of the top management. Small decisions
can be made by the top management but for the essential decision they
need to discuss it with the CEO and have to have their approval. The
employees are given the freedom to think out of box and give new ideas
about the way of working and handling the customers. They are given a
chance to apply their new ideas but it is still necessary that they are first
discussed with the CEO and to get his advice on it.
The company is also working toward various levels of empowerment for
their employees. The planned empowerment drive is different at several
levels and is expected to run through to the supervisor level. The senior
management hopes that with additional empowerment there is also
additional dimension of responsibility at an individual employee level and
as such this will also work towards the professional and personal
development of the staff at waterlink Pakistan and affiliates and will also
become embedded in the company core value and belief system.

The company till today did not have any separate Human Resource
department that dealt with the human resources of the company. This
task was mainly done by the administration department of the company.
So there was no training and development department in place
As the company is growing at a rapid speed and due to the changes
taking place in the business world it wants to establish a Human
Resource department which is clearly being driven through the need for
motivated and skilled employees. Furthermore, this will help the company
streamline different services and departments. This will help the company
find efficient employees who are able to mold into the organization
culture. It will also help them find individual who are well suited for
different departments and have the right kind of skills and experience
which is needed in the company.
A good HR department will help the company retain its current and new
employees as they will be able to provide the employees with the right
kind of motivation and compensation.

Training Program
Indicators & Methodology for designing a T&D program
Proposition of the T&D program was done after doing a training need
analysis .Training need analysis helped us to find out the gap between the
current and the desired individual and organizational performances. It
saved time, money and effort by working on the right problem areas.
Process of conducting a training needs analysis was a systematic one
based on specific information-gathering techniques. There was no easy or
short-cut formula for carrying out this process. Each particular situation
required its own mix of observing, probing, analysing and deducting.
Training needs differed with the backgrounds of the employees to be
trained, and their present status in the organization. A typical training
need analysis grid is given below for reference:

Techniques for determining specific training needs

Following techniques were used to determine the training needs at
Waterlink.
Observation
In the first phase, we evaluated workers performance through first-hand
observation and analysis. This was accomplished by watching the worker
and playing the role of non-participating observer. We watched and
listened and evaluated what we saw and heard, but did not get involved in
their work process in any way.
To make this activity more productive, we used a checklist to remind us of
what to look for and take notes.

The physical space employee was using

The tools he/she was using to perform his task

The attitude he possessed in performing his task

The

confidence

level

he

showed

during

his

task

performance

The number of people he was interacting with during work

The communication skills he possessed.

The

time

management

techniques

or

multi

tasking

managed by the employee

The objective during observations was to identify both the strengths to
build on and the deficiencies to overcome. A key advantage of using direct
observation in the needs analysis is that we gained first-hand knowledge

and understanding of the job being performed and the strengths and
weaknesses of the relevant worker.

Interviews
During interviews, we asked each worker a number of predetermined
questions. This allowed us to meet employees face to face to discuss their
impression of performance. Because we were in conversation with
workers, we could explore their responses in depth. We asked for
clarification of comments and for examples of what they are trying to tell
us. In this way, we obtained a full understanding of their performance
deficiencies.
Following were the questions asked:

What are your routine activities?

What are the areas that you spend more of your work hours
in?

What do you think is the most important and crucial task in

your job?

What problems do you face in daily tasks performance?

What is your area of specialization?

Do

you

face

problem

in

working

communicating your ideas?

What are your achievements so far?

What do you want to improve in yourself?

in

team,

or

What drives you to take extra work?

How do you feel being here?

Job Descriptions
Before establishing a job description (JD), a job analysis was done. This job
analysis involved a thorough study of all responsibilities relevant to the
job. Scope was companywide and detailed to such a degree that we used
the job analysis as a yardstick for finding out training needs. After the job
analysis phase was completed, the writing of job description was another
rigorous task. We tailored the employees trainings to the job descriptions
he performed.
Job descriptions are generally designed for a specific job and in cases
where is a certain degree of overlap in job roles and responsibilities the
job descriptions may be made for a certain type i.e. making the job
description fairly generic in nature.

Key Organizational Goals/ Objectives

We developed the case study of Waterlink which helped us to find out the
company goals and objectives of expansion and operations in the future.
Its is safe to stated for the purpose of this research that the overarching
goal for this organisation is the following:
a) Maximize shareholder value and ensure that the company meets
their revenue and cost targets.
b) Become a strong force in the industry and attain a greater more
dominating market share.
c) Be an employer of choice in the industry and be able to carry this
reputation through a good employee morale and safety record.

These goals help us to determine what skills organization needs to have in

the future, in order to meet its objectives.

Proposal-How to conduct Training and Development in

the organization:
Since there is no structured HR department at Waterlink and the activities
of HR are distributed among finance and Admin, so a proper in-housing
training is not an option. Resources required for running a separate
training and development department as of now is not possible too
because of monetary, space and structured foundations.
Keeping in view the above stated issues we proposed the idea of sending
the employees to various training sessions organized by professional
trainers. For this purpose we prepared a training calendar. Some areas
were recognized through job analysis for which training calendar was
made

Time management
Human Resource Management
Communication
Customer Care

Training Evaluation & Impact in the organization

Since, we will not be at Waterlink after the training exercise is done. We
have proposed a post training evaluation method based on Donald
Kirkpatrick Model. This model was chosen out of many, because it is
the most linear, conventional or traditional method. It is easily applicable
in an organization like Waterlink. The four levels for judging the training
method are as follows:
Evaluate reaction
It can be determined by finding out how favorably the
participants reacted to the training. This is about asking the
satisfaction

level

of

employees.

It

can

be

based

on

questionnaire method. It should be done immediately.

Learning
The KSA (knowledge, skills, attitudes) should be evaluated.
Methods should be used to measure learning:
Interviews
Surveys
Tests (pre-/post-)
Observations
Combinations
Also the PMS will help us to find out the improvement in the
learning of the people

 Behavior
It should be seen if there is a positive change in the behavior
of people.

Observe performer, first-hand

Survey key people who observe performer
Use
checklists,
questionnaires,
interviews,

or

combinations

Results
It should be seen that the training objectives have been met.
There is a positive and substantial gain from the training
program which was adopted. It the training goals are met then
it can be repeated else modification is required for better
training programs in the future.

Training and development in such an organisation presents a unique

challenge to the management and as such this is a similar challenge for
most of the emerging medium enterprise companies in Pakistan.

The

challenge of development for staff at both personal and professional level

is what will be the cornerstone of numerous factors such as loyalty,
hardwork and above par performance.
The training needs can be met through outsourcing the training part to
experts i.e. training houses conducting specialised trainings or the content
can be developed in house.

Nonetheless, the fact that training and

development play a vital role in the enterprise development it needs to be

viewed as a critical function and as such must be hold importance in the
eyes of senior management who may also link it to other human resource
areas such as performance management, compensation, benefits etc.