Let us Bond!!

Employment bonds have become an integral part of most organizations that have high number of employees leaving the organization within short periods of time.
I would like to share a personal experience here. After I was recruited, we had a small meeting with the recruiters who had come on campus. When the HR asked us if we had any queries, pat came a question from a student, “Sir, you didn’t mention anything about the bond during the pre-placement talk. Is it true that there is none?” The SBU head also present in the room took the lead and said, “We believe in forging a bond and not signing one”. We were all delighted to hear the same.
However, why did the absence of a bond give us such a sigh of relief? For most of us, it meant free exit from the organization according to our own convenience. It meant we could walk out of the company and pursue our goals without any bindings. However, what is rather disturbing is the attitude that we possessed as fresh graduates. We were already thinking of leaving the organization even before we had joined it. The low accountability that creeps in with the absence of a bond is not very encouraging to a company. There is nothing wrong on the part of an employee to take leverage of the brand name of the company and float his resume in the market after a few months of service. The organization doesn’t really have a smooth ride though, when a resource quits.
Some of the best software names in India are well known for the quality of training that they impart to the trainees. These companies are soon becoming a training ground. Trainees do well in the training programme, get certifications and then begin hunting for a higher paying workplace. Training centres are cost centres. They work in anticipation of getting returns from the trained employees in the long run. It is becoming a short run rather fast. In some cases, the volume of employees hired make up for the loss incurred due to the employees leaving.
Many times it is extremely difficult for managers to convince clients that a fresh graduate can do the assigned work. Clients always prefer people who have had prior exposure in the related field. After much convincing and when the project is in full swing, the young lad decides to quit for a better future. Hell breaks loose as the schedule gets haywire, new resource has to be found and then trainings have to be identified. Amidst all the commotion, the client is fuming at the manager for irresponsibly allocating the module to an unreliable resource.
It is with these and several other issues that most companies have gone the bond way. Imposing a bond does not stop an employee who has made up his or her mind to quit.
All it does is that it ensures the employee also has his share of troubles.
But then, why just have the length of service as an employment bond currency. We should not have only the length of service, as a determinant in bonds. If an employee is a poor performer and leaves the organization after serving the bond but bringing very little value to the company, has the company achieved what it wanted to? A high performer leaves a company before the bond term is completed, and pays the amount, is the company not loosing more than the bond amount?