The real value of the Bond.

While there is no doubt that employment bond are used by organisations as a means to deter their employees from leaving, the opinions differ when it comes to actually implementing it. Some have argued that companies are not that strict on it and give partial relief depending on the situation while some of the experiences of my friends suggest otherwise. Though it is beyond my reach one of the interesting statistics to get would be the ratio between the “income” the company had from these bonds (determined by the attrition rate and assuming a recovery rate say 90 percent) and the total amount the company spent in training these employees. I fear that this ratio may well be over 1. One of the reasons is that many companies give on the job training where the trainee is expected to work on some of the real projects under a guide and so the value delivered by the trainee justifies the cost of the training. In fact it is same as a regular job except it’s a little less rigorous and accountability is low. Also in many cases the trainer is an employee of the organisation and doesn’t charge as much as an external trainer should. So the employee who left within 2-3 months of joining gets a raw deal. One of the ways in which this situation can be alleviated is that the bond should be priced at a pro rata basis. Suppose the bond is worth Rs 100 and for 2 years. So if an employee leaves in 6 months he should pay Rs 25 (one- fourth of the value). This will prevent hardship for the employees who go for higher studies or discover that the job does not suit them and they have to look at other avenues. Ending on a personal note I would say I was lucky to work for an organisation who didn’t believe in employment bonds though the training given to all new joiners was very enriching and one of its kind to say the least.