TATA Motors – Fast Track Selection Scheme

Problems :
Fast track Selection Scheme at Tata Motors has been in place for more than 20 years now
and its aim is to get the right employees for leadership roles in the firm. However , the
selection criteria of the program , which involves 4 phases testing certain skillsets of a
candidate, is currently being looked down upon by the employees. The main reason cited is
that the selection procedure has remained the same over the last 20 years, barring a few minor
changes. The written test is heavy with quantitative questions, which have proven to be
advantageous for the younger employees and CAT aspirants among them. The weightage of
all sections are equal , irrespective of the nature of job , which again shows that FTSS has
been following a one-size fits all approach. The success rate in the exam is very small , as a
result of which employees are often discouraged. There is no feedback given to candidates
who made it to the final round and this has proven to be detrimental to the organisation.
Employees have begun to see this as a “Do or Die” situation as they are not provided with
opportunities to grow if they fail to clear the exams. The results are often declared 6 months
after the final phase and this waiting period has proven to be detrimental for them as
managers tend to give low performance ratings to such employees and not assign good
projects to them. There is an absence of robust talent pool to select candidates for leadership
roles as the development centres are not very effective. Even after being selected for FTSS ,
the path ahead is not clear as people are expected to perform on their own without adequate
training.

Recommendations:
 Change the selection pattern by making first round non-eliminative. The weightage of
quantitative techniques can be reduced, and instead logical reasoning be given higher
weightage. A combined cutoff can be implemented for all 3 sections of Paper 1 rather
than keeping non-negative cutoffs. Paper 2 has functional component , which should
be the focus of to test employees on various fields within the organisation which a
leader is supposed to know
 Weightage can be given to tenure of service as this will then motivate senior
employees to appear for the exam.
 Their needs to be a proper feedback system in place which informs candidate of their
performance in each phase of FTSS. The long cycle time has been a demotivating
factor and candidates should not be kept in the dark for a long time.
 The path after selection should also be clearly charted out as leaders need to have a
goal that they go after. A proper training schedule should be developed for the
selected employees to groom them for leadership roles
 Opportunities to work in subsidiaries of TATA outside India should be opened up
under the FTSS program as this will give them a global exposure and motivate them
to work harder as well