Client visits to CSR Projects - Seeing is believing - January 22, 2009

Marks & Spencer visit to the Padma Adarsh School, Home for the Aged, and Orphanage on 16 January 2008. The team included Helena Miles - Head of HR Transformation, Mark Smith - Business Solution Manager, Linda Reed - Procurement Specialist.

Whitbread visit to the Padma Adarsh School, Orphanage and Old Age Home on 22 January 2009. The visiting team included Andrew Brothers - Change Program Director, Andy Pellington - Finance Director, Paul Dexter and Mukunth Rajaram from Steria.

Rianna's Trust Visit - Annai Fatima Trust Chennai - January 21, 2009

On 19 January 2008, a team from Rianna's Trust a UK based charity visited Chennai. The team included Joanna, Torrie, Tania, and David. Steria CSR has been associated with this trust on the Annai Fathima Orphanage project. During their last visit to India in November, they had in principle agreed to provide funds to support this home. Based on Steria CSR recommendation it was decided to complete some important construction work within the orphanage premises. This included, refurbishing the sewage and sanitation pipes and tanks, building new wash rooms, providing a new RCC roof for the boy's quarters and also covering the open area with RCC tiles to prevent collection of rain water. During their visit a budget of - 10000 was approved for all this work except the roofing which would be taken up at a later date.

The Steria CSR team had arranged a meeting with the contractor who was to execute this work so that the details could be understood and the contract finalized. While Rianna's Trust would provide the funds, Steria Chennai CSR would be the execution partner who would arrange to oversee the work and ensure the agreed plans are implemented fully.

The children of Annai Fathima had put on a small show for the guests as a token of appreciation for the support.

Pongal Bazzar - Chennai - Rs. 50000 Sale - January 16, 2009 

On the occasion of Pongal, an important and traditional harvest festival in Tamilnadu, a two day Pongal Bazaar happened at Steria Chennai campus. This bazaar was conducted by the women of various self help groups jointly promoted by TNWDC (Tamilnadu Women's Development Corporation). The bazaar held on 12 and 13 January, was able to generate sales of almost Rs.50000. Items on sale were garments, dress material, pickles and juices, costume jewellery stationary products and so on. Pongal being a very important festival, Steria Chennai staff very wisely decided to complete atleast a part of their festival shopping in the office itself.

Employability Job Fair - 2009 - January 12, 2009 

Ability Foundation - Employability Job Fair

Employability Job Fair for the physically challenged organized by Ability Foundation was held in Chennai on 11 January 2009 was a great success. It was a success because we could short-list as many as 40 candidates for further interviews and selection. It was even a bigger success because of the huge numbers of prospective candidates who preferred to throng the our stall, rather than the stalls of the well known IT majors and the other companies. This was a very striking observation that was there for all of us to see. It even prompted the organisers to wonder and express their surprise in so many words. The reasons are clear.

'Job fairs' are a routine occurrence especially for recruiters from the IT industry. It is so routine that the whole process becomes almost a mechanical exercise and we could see the executives from the other companies going routinely through the motions. A 'job fair' for the disabled is different. Here are young people who are not as fortunate as all of us but who still have the ambition and determination to make a success of their lives. We therefore need to be extremely sensitive to their sentiments and give them the respect and understanding that they deserve. This was what our own our staff volunteers who helped out with running our stall understood very early and demonstrated in great measure. This explained the big crowds at the our stall and why the hundreds of candidates were so comfortable at our stall, talking to our people.

Our CSR team would like to thank all the staff volunteers who participated in running our stall at the 'job fair' and for making it such an outstanding success.