In response to growing concerns over workplace pressure following the death of a young EY employee, Deloitte has established a three-member independent committee to review its employee practices, policies, and processes, CEO Romal Shetty announced Friday.
The panel includes former Revenue Secretary Tarun Bajaj, ex-Airtel CEO Manoj Kohli, and former CBI Director Subodh Jaiswal. The move comes after the death of 26-year-old Anna Sebastian Perayil, an EY employee who reportedly faced severe work pressure.
“… Very unfortunate, very tragic, young child losing her life. We are in the client service business and in the client service business there will always be deadlines… having all of those pressures,” Shetty told PTI in an interview.
Perayil, who joined EY in Pune in early 2023, died in July. In a letter to EY India chairman Rajiv Memani, her mother said she had been overworked with a “backbreaking” load, impacting her physical and mental health.
Shetty stressed the importance of fostering an open work environment, noting that Deloitte employs a chief happiness officer to manage work culture and mental health concerns.
“We have instituted a panel post this.. Tarun Bajaj who used to be the Revenue Secretary, Manoj Kohli who used to be the CEO of Airtel, Subodh Jaiswal who used to be the CBI Director to relook at all our people practices, our policies, processes. How are ethics cases… We have an ethics helpline. How do they get actually managed? What are our mechanisms in place to do it?,” Shetty said.
Deloitte’s committee aims to reassess its internal mechanisms, such as handling ethics complaints, to better support its employees.
Shetty acknowledged the stress new employees, particularly from Tier-2 and Tier-3 cities, may face both personally and professionally, suggesting that resilience and open communication are key to addressing such issues.
“The concept is, if you can ask your CEO any question, including, little bit embarrassing one as well, then you can actually walk up to a senior person and say, I don’t enjoy this… Can we also have an environment to ensure that people are comfortable with what they do, because sometimes you spend 14 hours in the workplace,” Shetty said.
Deloitte is one of the “Big Four” global tax consultancy firms, along with EY, PwC, and KPMG.