There are two ways of losing a job at HealthScribe India Pvt Ltd. One, if an employee’s performance dips. Two, if he addresses managing director Suresh Nair as ‘Sir’. As with scribes of the more common or garden variety, such formality just isn't acceptable in this medical transcription outfit.

Nair is a firm advocate of an open door policy. His office door is always open ? anyone can walk in for a chat. The best place to find him at lunchtime is at the company’s crowded cafeteria; he’ll probably be chatting with an intern. Towards the afternoon, all HealthScribe employees leave their computers and get together for some bend-stretch exercises. Nair doesn’t like missing the session.

Nair joined the Bangalore-based medical transcription firm in November 2000 as chief operating officer. In September 2001, he was heading the company. The US firm was incurring losses when he joined the bandwagon. “The Americans had imported their processes to India. They didn’t realise India had no experience in medical transcription. Employees needed greater training,” says Nair.

For starters, he introduced quality standards in the company. Everything, from performance and the franchisee selection process to even the amount of fun that each employee had at work was measured and standardised.

“Standards reduce the scope for personal biases. It brings consistency in deliveries,” says Nair. HealthScribe turned profitable, for the first time, in 2001, says Nair. It has grown three times in size since then. Currently, the company employs 1,600 people ? up from 500, five years ago. It has franchisees in Mysore, Trivandrum, Calcutta and Bhopal.

Nair started his career as a manufacturing man. After studying chemical engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Kharagpur ? where he says he did everything but study ? Nair joined FMCG major Reckitt & Coleman. He stayed put in the company for 16 years. He was in charge of manufacturing, planning and logistics. He set up and managed company factories across the country. He went on to manage the southeast Asia operations for the company.

Running a factory is like doing a crash course in human resources management. Nair’s experiences on the factory floor sound like HR lessons. “If you involve the workers in decision-making, then 99 per cent want to do something positive,” he says. “Make them feel like pawns, and they try to gain importance by being impediments,” he adds.

Nair quit Reckitt & Coleman in 2000, for purely personal reasons. “I had to choose between my wife and my work,” he says. Nair’s wife was working with Wipro in Bangalore. He was based in Delhi. The couple did not want a long-distance marriage.

The transition from manufacturing Dettol, Disprin and Cherry Blossom to running a service-sector firm was smooth. Whatever the industry, the principles remain the same, believes the HealthScribe MD. “Quality management and sound measurement standards produce profits anywhere,” he says.

The Fun ‘’ Meter is Nair’s new brainchild at HealthScribe. It measures the frequency of fun in office. The chief fun officer is the most hard-working man in office, as the targets for fun are steep. “Good HR practices are important in a service-sector company,” says Nair.

Fun is a year-round activity. Everyone in office wore blue on the day of the final India-Pakistan one-day match. One-handed transcription competitions are held. Employees organise an annual cultural show. The biggest treat is the all-paid two-day trip to a resort.

Nair has big plans for HealthScribe. He wants to standardise every area of work, sign up more franchisees and increase manpower and profits. The company was recently taken over by the Spheris Group, which gives it an additional edge in the business. But business is a given. What is more important at HealthScribe is that people have fun doing their jobs. And the fun has only just begun.