There are mainly 3 types of recruitment sites-

• Job Sites- These are operated by private companies wherein they charge an organization to place an advert on the site and may contain millions of vacancies ranging from entry level, middle level, senior level hirings to adverts from organizations of various sectors be it IT, Pharmaceuticals, Real Estate, FMCG, Tourism, Human Resources, Construction, Retail, Oil, Financial Services, Energy, Telecom etc etc
• Agency Sites-These are operated by recruitment agencies that charge an organization once the candidate whose details have been sent is confirmed as an employee by the organization. Candidates can register online but are expected to be discussed in detail over the phone or in person before their details are forwarded to any organization.
• Media Sites-These contain general external descriptions of an advert that has appeared in the press regarding a vacancy along with a link to the organization’s website.

An impressive venture in this direction has been www.hellointern.com This is an example of agency recruiting specialising in intern & fresher recruitments. A brainchild of young IIT-ians from Mumbai, ‘HelloIntern’ has recently tied up with Indian Institute of Management, Kozhikode (IIM-K) for ‘Start-up Intern Day 2009′.

 Organizations interested can participate on-campus while those that would not be able to make it can even participate via video conferencing; another feature of virtual working  ; gaining popularity in HR grounds.

Interested candidates should apply -the earlier, the better. More information is also available on HelloIntern’s facebook page

Virtual working has slowly but steadily become an integral part of the working of most organizations helping build long lasting relationships all over the world, even if they are via electronic means. Infact the 21st century has been touted as the millenium wherein email will be a dominant medium for interpersonal telecommunication; ‘approaching if not overshadowing voice’

Policies have been set up by companies & laws by the government to ensure fair & smooth functioning online helping to maintain the employment relationships.

An online privacy policy protects the information given by a person & does not allow to sell, rent or own it unless consented by the individual concerned.

An online pay policy ensures that e-workers are paid at the regular intervals agreed upon, by the means agreed upon like cheque, direct debit etc so that the amount, method & timing of wage payments comply with the applicable laws & regulations.

An email policy ensures control over content sent across by employees only if it has been notified in advance that emails are intended for business purpose only & are the sole propriety of the employer giving him/her the right to access, review & monitor any data that is stored or transmitted. This is usually done during initiating the online relationship by making employees sign a form expressing consent to the monitoring. Pop Up messages also act as a reminder to employees about the email policy in place.

The Data Protection Act 1998, Electronic Communications Privacy Act, the Wiretap Act etc are some of the other commonly used regulations by the Government to ensure fair monitoring of data & privacy protection.

Employee Perspective

Virtual working could be a boon to many people as it renders a lot of flexibility & independence in work. An employee could start work late in the afternoon or in the wee hours of the morning. One could just be working in pyjamas with no worry of a formal attire and hence save on time which would either have been spent getting ready or travelling to the workplace, also saving on the expense incurred on clothing, travel as well as avoiding the peak hour rush. It is ideal for employees who have dependents on them like old parents or small children. Many people are just comfortable with the idea of not going to a particular place to work everyday and can get more work done otherwise in an efficient and speedier manner.

However, virtual working could also provide constraints in terms of overdependence on ICT (Information & Communications technology). What if an email does not reach on time? What if a reply is not received within an expected time limit? What if there is a virus? What if a computer crashes? etc etc. There could be a possibility of complacency from an employees perspective. Also lack of personal contact could lead to miscommunication and lack of motivation as well as stress -with least or no knowledge on how to manage it.

Employer Perspective

Having a virtual working environment can allow an organization to create a world class team with experts from around the globe.This can lead to an improved corporate image and profile as projects are handled by knowledge workers with utmost efficiency & productivity. Costs are also controlled to a large extent as there is no mandatory requirement for office space, travel costs are much lower as experts worldwide can contribute to a project without relocation and concurrent engineering allows processes to be completed faster. An employer can just hop around time zones knowing that his project is being worked upon 24-7 at no extra premium and the wide range of interaction across Europe or Asia or any other continent enhances the virtual culture.Training can be tailor-made to address the concerns of e-workers by laying special emphasis on communication via technology and imbibing team spirit across cultures.

Even though virtual organizations provide so many advantages to corporates there are certain issues of concern as well. Over dependence on technology is one of them wherein if technical problems are encountered they could lead to delay in submission & hence inconvenience to other e-workers or the client. Working across cultures can be exciting but also challenging when transfer of business policies has to take place across dispersed e-teams. This could lead to miscommunication & lack of trust and respect which inturn hampers performance. Also no contingency plans & lack of specific ways to monitor performance could all overall affect the quality & time of a project leading to delays or even possible abandonment without completion. An employer may not be fairly aware of the problems faced by an employee having not met face-to-face.Also there could be legal compliance issues. At times set-up costs could be massive catering to setting up the entire system and of the knowledge workers as well.Other costs may include on-going costs, extra software licenses,additional training & technical support,backup systems,security issues,allowances,support etc

Hence the need was felt for collaborative working systems wherein people within an organization as well as people of different organizations who were working together on a project could interact, pool skills and share information & knowledge for distributed business processes which were owned by one or more organizations acting in partnership. This led to the rise of a new form of an organization known as “Virtual Organization”

So, a Virtual Organization, simply put, is the assembling together of resources by conventional companies to perform a business process & even fronting the market as one organization with common means of communication or electronic channels.

Characteristics of a Virtual Organization

• Electronic Linkage: Technology plays the foremost role in a Virtual Organization. Employees are linked together electronically which makes their work easier & faster.
• Integration: The combination of the core competencies & distribution of resources among real time organizations without relocation or physical duplication of work places makes integration an important characteristic of a virtual organization. It allows 1 project to be distributed to branches or companies internationally & still offer an integrated product.
• Remote Working: Working from different locations along with flexibility in work is a new concept in work practices. It also allows unification of different workers as part of a single organization.
• Knowledge Workers:Experts can be selected from all over the world and accessed through networking. This has given rise to the new concept of ‘knowledge workers’ and can help form a world class team
• Virtual Working Environment:People working in virtual organizations are linked by a communications network