Journey So Far
In Search of Excellence

This was the statement of intent propounded by our Chairman fondly called as "Saharasri" way back in the late seventies, when the corporate world was still struggling to understand the meaning of terms like Total Quality Control (TQC by Japanese) and Total Quality Management (TQM by Westernized definition). The operational part of the above statement might be differing from the point of view of corporate world, but the essence could be felt in all the activities of Sahara India Pariwar in its various businesses.

As the Sahara India Pariwar grew from strength to strength, over a period of 25 odd years, need was felt to learn some of the latest management tools and see their impact in their business activities. It was basically due to this need that a team of quality professionals started their organisational assessment journey in 1997, on the auspicious day of 10th June, "Prerna Divas", our Chairman’s birthday. The team visited various activities of the housing business division based at Lucknow, Noida (near Delhi), Amby Valley, Sahara Lake City - Taluka Mulshi, dist. Pune. The team met various cross-sections of people covering the length and breadth of the above-mentioned business activities and became familiar with the culture of the organisation based on family values, philosophy and collective materialism. This assessment study threw the need of bringing in customer sensitiveness and process improvement needs in the customer interface processes, as the Amby Valley, Sahara Lake City, was aspiring to be developed to world-class standards. Workshops on these twin subjects got conducted for the top and middle management using the Crosby approach to quality, and people got trained on documenting the customer interface processes, using the flow chart methodology.

Since this brand new city (Amby Valley, Sahara Lake City) is being planned in the midst of a valley surrounded by forests, cause for taking care of the environment came naturally to the Sahara India Pariwar. This awareness resulted in celebrating 5th June "World Environment Day" in 1998 by way of planting 1,25,256 saplings of 68 species involving 1400 volunteers in a record time of 6 hours 35 minutes. This feat has been recorded in The Guinness Book of Records, and plantations are carried on relentlessly every year as a token of its commitment to environment.

Moving on its journey of Quality Amby Valley, Sahara Lake City formalized the Quality and Environment function during Sept. 1998 and training was taken as a priority. To bring in a synergy between Human Resource Development and Quality, HR Quality Network got formed and monthly meetings were scheduled to chalk out strategies for improving  effectiveness and efficiency of the organisation. During these meetings the need was felt to establish Quality Competency Centre so that quality movement can be taken to other business units as well. Professionals got inducted into newly formed Sahara Quality Competency Centre (SQCC) and their development schedule got developed to address the business needs. Based on the business needs and after scanning the environment, SQCC professionals designed a three-step strategy of conformance, integration and business excellence. An awareness module of four hours duration was developed and conducted for businesses like Aviation, Products Division, Housing and of course, Amby Valley, Sahara Lake City. Two certification initiatives namely Quality Management System (ISO 9000) for Housing & Environment Management System (ISO 14001) for Amby Valley, Sahara Lake City, got initiated in early 1999 based on business needs of these two specific businesses.

In the meantime Workforce Preparedness plan also got undertaken to impart a new skill set for the management team of Amby Valley, Sahara Lake City, comprising Problem Solving, Process Improvement and Facilitation. Meeting structures were designed to review the hardware (business plans) and software (people and organisation) aspects of the business in a problem-solving mode, using four-quadrant structure.

SQCC took the lead in networking with various professional bodies such as Environment Management Division & TQM Division of Confederation of Indian Industry (CII), Indian Institute of Quality Management (IIQM), Registro Italiano Navale (RINA), so that knowledge and skill set of its professionals can be updated on a continual basis. To synthesize the overall effort and develop a big picture a visioning workshop spread over four sessions was conducted at Amby Valley, Sahara Lake City, to develop its Vision, Mission, Values and Quality Policy.

In the meantime, parallely, Systems Implementation drive was going on schedule, EMS for Amby Valley, Sahara Lake City and ISO 9001 System for Sahara States, Lucknow. M/s. RINA were appointed to carry out the third party audit of these two sites (Amby Valley, Sahara Lake City - Dec ’99, Sahara States, Lucknow, March 2000) and both the sites got certified to their respective Systems. Amby Valley, Sahara Lake City, earned a name for itself to be certified to ISO 14001 System - the first in the world of its own kind. Some of the benefits accrued by implementing ISO 14001 System are shown in figures below:

The Amby Valley, Sahara Lake City team, was so excited and motivated by this achievement that they resolved to go for OHS AS 18001 and SA 8000, a formidable combination of management systems. Team also consciously decided to move on the path of sustainability pursuing the three Es principle, i.e., Environment,
Ethics and Economics. To move on the bandwagon of Sustainability another Competency Centre by the name of Sahara Environment Excellence Destination (SEED) got conceptualized and Mr. Joe Cascio, Chairman, US technical advisory Group (USTAG), on 18th April 2000, at Amby Valley, Sahara Lake City, laid the foundation stone.

Sahara India Pariwar showed its commitment to sustainability by networking with International Institute for Industrial Environmental Economics, Lund University (Sweden); IIIEE India office - NetPEM, CDG (Germany); AIT (Thailand); GRI (Global Reporting Institution, US); GR (Global Responsibility). In recognition to its commitment to the cause of sustainability GRI, US invited representatives of Sahara to be part of their founding members in Washington DC during October 2000 and Global Responsibility (GR) made Sahara India Pariwar as Founding Forum member at Monaco, France. This whole effort got strengthened by forming an Advisory Board for SEED, comprising renowned professionals drawn from national/international bodies such as CII, IIIEE, AIT, CDG, USAID, OHM (Canada), IRG (USA), RINA (Italy) and the first meeting of the Advisory Board of SEED took place
in Jan 2001.

The year of 2001 saw various scholars from IIIEE, Sweden, visiting Amby Valley, Sahara Lake City for conducting social and environmental assessment and workshop on Sustainable Energy.

The year also saw rapid EIA conducted for Amby Valley, Sahara Lake City, and Joint Expression of Interest signed between IIIEE and SEED to take up various sustainability initiatives. In the last quarter of the year it was also decided to make use of GRI indicators for the business review processes. Amby Valley, Sahara Lake City also got certified to Occupational Health and Safety OHS AS 18001 System, giving benefits to various stakeholders such as:

• Health History for each person working on site

• Establishment of a full - fledged Health Care Centre

• Process on Emergency Preparedness

• Use of PPE (Personal Protective Equipments) by all site personnel

• Reporting and analysis of all accidents/incidents.

Sahara India Pariwar's keen interest on sustainability issues and its commitment have been observed keenly by its partners in progress namely IIIEE, Sweden and NetPEM. In recognition of its efforts NetPEM proposed a Joint Workshop of IIIEE scholars as part of their credit earning towards Ph.Ds, Jan 2002 Workshop undertook business assessments for Products Division, Amby Valley, Sahara Lake City, (sectors of study: energy, water, transport, tourism and management) and Sahara Arts and Management Academy (SAMA). During their two weeks in India, the scholars not only visited the in-house activities of above-mentioned divisions but also various business associates of Sahara India Pariwar to assess their capabilities. The visit resulted in developing an action plan to be implemented by Sahara India Pariwar and a joint Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) got signed to further strengthen these initiatives. The following action points were evolved:

• Develop a strategy for a "City of Tomorrow" with a focus on the concept of "East West Eco Experience Centre" (EWEEC)
   

• To develop Sustainable Water and Energy Management strategy for the entire city
   

• To develop a proposal for INTERNAL GREEN FUND to stimulate Green Behaviour
   

• To examine models for a sustainable tourism strategy in relationships with the neighbouring village communities
   

• Designing the transport management model for Amby Valley, Sahara Lake City, looking into the possibilities - biking, electrical/battery - operated/solar - driven vehicles (buses, etc.), video conferencing, etc.
   

• To develop and identify the possibilities for short-term training of the professionals within Sahara on various environmental issues (for instance SEED, SPD, SQCC, SAMA, etc.)
   

• Preparation of an Environmental Action Plan based on the above activities for the next two three years for Sahara
   

• To form a working group within Sahara to get actively involved in implementation of the above - mentioned activities
   

• To form a working group comprising members of the three organisations (Sahara, IIIEE, and NetPEM) to detail the scope and review the implementation process of above activities
   

• Develop a concept note on sustainable village with focus on:

  • Sustainable village as a tourism attraction
     

  • Sustainable rural products focusing on utilizing local resources and craftsmanship.

Amby Valley, Sahara Lake City, earned the distinction of being the second site in India to be certified on Social Accountability SA 8000 System (probably the toughest system in place) and the first private hill-city in the world to be certified on three systems: ISO 14001 Environment Management System, OHSAS 18001 Occupational Health and Safety Management System, SA8000 Social Accountability Management System. By achieving this milestone Amby Valley, Sahara Lake City, has cleared the first hurdle of becoming the first sustainable private city of its kind in the world. As a recognition to this effort, we were invited by GRI, South Asia, where we shared our case study in the international conference held from 16th - 19th July 2002, in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. This case study has put Sahara India Pariwar in league with international/national industry captains like the Ford Motor Company, Calvert, Environmental Resource Management (ERM) and TISCO.

To spread the message on Sustainability SQCC and SEED celebrated the Environment Week from June 5, 2002 ‘World Environment Day’ simultaneously at eight sites. To take the message to each karmyogi and all associates four categories were formed and different strategies got designed to address each need, by way of involving various professionals drawn from ICLEI, SENES, NetPEM, Modular Consultants and RINA.

We are further strengthening our resolve by undertaking the following initiatives -