Indian tech giant Tata Consultancy Services is not considering firing employees, and is rather hiring those laid off from various tech startups. While tech giants are going for layoffs globally, TCS is looking to hire those who have lost their jobs, Chief Human Resources Officer Milind Lakkad told PTI. Milind Lakkad said that the company believes in grooming talent for a longer career once it hires an employee. Lakkad also hinted that TCS, which employs over 6 lakh people, will announce hikes similar to earlier years. The statement comes amid a slew of tech companies and startups firing employees due to various reasons.
“We don’t do that (layoffs), we believe in grooming talent in the company… (there will be) no layoffs,” Lakkad told PTI on being asked if there will be layoffs or involuntary attrition. He further maintained that many companies are forced to take such a step because they hire more than they wanted and that TCS is cautious and believes that once a staff member joins, it is the company’s responsibility to make them productive and derive value.
TCS looking for these skills in employees
“It is a very large canvas, we are doing exciting work across different industries in different technologies. I think all of that requires some phenomenal talent to come in and participate. we are getting it obviously from startups, people who have actually done some good work in those companies and have short-term career challenges,” he said. TCS is specifically looking for talent in “user experience design, artificial intelligence, many aspects of cloud and having product experience”.
TCS had reduced its workforce by 2,197 employees sequentially in the third quarter of FY23. On being asked if the decline of over 2.000 workforce in overall employee count in the December quarter was a one-off, he declined to comment on whether the March quarter will have an addition or continue with a decline. TCS has hired over 2 lakh people over the last year, he said, including 1.19 lakh trainees who are “still getting into billable projects and hence, the slowdown in new hires resulted in the decline”.
Lakkad added that TCS is also open to hiring people of Indian diaspora in the US who have lost their jobs with the tech majors. Currently, 70 per cent of its US employees are Amaericans, which, as Lakkad informed, the company would like to lower down to 50 per cent because it also wants to offer global opportunities to its staff in India.
Talking about another major concern for IT giants, which is moonlighting by employees, Lakkad said that action against potential violators is work in progress at TCS and it is accumulating data on the same. At TCS, close to 40 per cent of the staff are working from offices three times a week and 60 per cent come to office two times a week, he said. “By Q1 (FY24) it will significantly go up. By Q2 of FY24, we will decide the way forward,” he added.