When simple efforts at team-building and camaraderie went a long way at Tata Coffee

At Tata Coffee, we believe in delivering the best. From hand picking the best coffee cherries to processing them to create aromatic coffees, all our processes are designed adhering to strict quality controls. Our workers, the heroes of our estate, spend long hours to ensure that only the best is made available to you. In order to provide this wholesome experience, team work and camaraderie play a big role at our estates. Our estate managers ensure that the estates function smoothly to achieve the targets set for each year. From employee performance to efficiency of our machines and processes, our managers make it their mission to ensure that each passing day only means better results at Tata Coffee.

One such story is of Varun Ganapathy, an estate manager, who took the initiative to turn matters around at Cannoncadoo estate.

From the eyes of our young estate manager, read on to find out how simple acts of camaraderie and team building transformed an estate into one of the most prosperous coffee and pepper plantations under Tata Coffee.

We break walls:

We believe in building a relationship with each employee, irrespective of the hierarchy and the titles attached against each of our names. Having noticed that a few of the estate workers were very shy and distant, our estate manager Varun decided to break the walls and get friendly with them. Everyone was encouraged to warm up to everyone else around, in order to develop a bond that would liven up the estate and make working together easier. This was done using various ways – developing free communication via informal and formal gatherings, listening to the grievances and encouraging the “talk-more” culture and so on.

We build relationships:

When we work together, it is imperative to know our colleagues and team on a personal level and understand and appreciate their stories. To do so, the team at Cannoncadoo Estate started organizing fun activities and tried to know each other in an informal space beyond work hours.

From celebrating staff birthdays to monthly barbeques and sports, our estate manager ensured that feelings of team spirit and friendship were fostered. These activities broke away from regular working days and added a dash of life and fun to their lives. Not just that, colleagues from different teams were paired together so that everyone understood and appreciated the differences and working styles of other individuals.

We work towards employee welfare:

We, at Tata Coffee believe in making life better for everyone around us, even outside our work spaces. For the same reason, there is always a consistent effort done by us to provide good living conditions to our workers all the time. However, Varun took a step further in ensuring that his entire team was taken care of really well. He took the initiative of colorfully painting the estate crèche and the worker houses. The team took to the task of beautifying the estate and he was joined in by his entire team in ideating, painting and designing the place. This made a huge dent in the personal lives of the workers and other members of the estate.

We received a warm response:

We at Tata Coffee believe that beautiful professional relationships fostered with care bear the sweetest fruits. In due course of time, Cannoncadoo Estate began showing the sign of an incredible change. Workers and staff had suggestions to give – to improve the estate and its operations, to adopt practices followed in other estates, and to improve the overall functioning of the estate. From harvesting rain water to meet water demands of the estate and developing a very interesting way of segregating wastes, to converting land-fills into beautiful, prosperous gardens; the very own employees of the estate started taking initiatives to make the estate better and better, above and beyond the so-called KRAs and designated job responsibilities.

The success at Cannoncadoo estate was marked by a sharp increase in welfare at the estate. Not just that, the estate also showed a sharp rise in the Arabica, Robusta and Pepper crops only because the estate members, employees, managers and everyone associated decided to stick together and work together in unison towards the sole aim – of being the best in what they do.