Selective hiring goes on in IT, despite meltdown

Amid fears of a global recession and layoffs that are yet to unfold selective hiring across information technology firms continues, underlining the diversity of the sector in which programming and design cater to a wide variety of users, reports Ruchi Hajela.

Amid fears of a global recession and layoffs that are yet to unfold selective hiring across information technology firms continues, underlining the diversity of the sector in which programming and design cater to a wide variety of users.

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Though the mood is guarded, it is mainly the financial-driven-led IT companies like Infosys and Tata Consultancy Services that are watching their steps, particularly in view of their usual tendency to hire by the thousands every quarter.

Europe’s IT and IT-enabled services firm Steria, which had last year acquired London-listed Xansa, plans to double its headcount in India.

“We will double our headcount from existing 6,000 to 12,000 over the next three years,” company’s chief executive officer, Mukesh Aghi told Hindustan Times.

New York-listed Perot Systems Corporation employs more than a third of its global workforce in India and is poised to add to the 9,000 Indians among its global strength of 26,000, said senior Perot executive Anurag Jain.

“This recession is unlike previous ones as more companies overseas are offshoring work to India. We have a project pipeline across health and e-governance sectors for the next five years and we will continue to hire in the country,” he said. But he did not give details on planned hiring.

Telecom technology firm Aricent recently announced that it would be adding another 800 people to its global workforce a majority of which would be in India. Leading call centre firm Convergys said in September that it plans to add another 2,500 employees in India by the end of 2008 while IT consultant Sapient is also hiring.