Has hiring come down in your company ?

Bad News !

HIRING DROPS BY 33 %

The financial crisis in the US continued to dampen hiring sentiments with net manpower addition by top 5 Indian IT companies combined tanking 36 per cent in July-September quarter. The net additions by TCS, Infosys, Wipro, Satyam and HCL Technologies were nearly 17,000 professionals in the just-concluded quarter, against 26,500 professionals in the year-ago period.

Seen sequentially, the cumulative net addition is significantly higher than 10,700 professionals added during the quarter ended June 2008, but HR honchos attribute that to second quarter being a traditionally strong one for freshers and campus hires to join, as also the impact of `staggered onboarding' being witnessed in the industry.

"The overall recruitments are lower for the industry this time as companies remain cautious amid the global financial crisis," Mr D. K. Srivastava - Global Head HR, HCL, said. While most companies have retained hiring targets, Satyam has trimmed its hiring targets for the year by around 33 per cent to hire between 8000 and 10,000 in the current fiscal. "IT companies are still visiting campuses and handing-out offer letters, but joining dates are getting pushed by a quarter or so," Mr Rajan Kanagasabai, global head sourcing - Satyam said.

GOOD NEWS -

Attrition falls

The prevailing uncertainty has also had a sobering effect on attrition - once considered the biggest nightmare of HR managers in these IT bellwethers. While Infosys' attrition dropped from 14.2 per cent to 12.8 per cent between the September 2007 and September 2008 quarters, Satyam's fell from 13.89 per cent to 12.27 per cent in the same period. According to TCS, while the company's IT Services attrition is stable, the BPO attrition has gone up slightly in the current quarter.

Overall, TCS was the only, among the top five, to show a rise in attrition from 11.5 per cent to 13.2 per cent. A TCS spokesperson said that the company has made gross additions of 18,664 in the first six month in line with its plans to add 30,000-35,000 people during FY09. "We have also not delayed any campus joinings," he added.

Significantly, companies have also increased utilisation rates (number of people billed per hundred, as against people on the 'bench' who are yet to find a client). Including trainees, utilisation rates for TCS (73.7 per cent to 74.7 per cent) and HCL Tech (69.2 per cent to 74.4 per cent) have seen improvement.

Source : Businessline.com
Authors:Moumita Bakshi Chatterjee &
K Bharat Kumar