Those working in IT giants of India are facing serious crunch due to the recently executed large-scale layoffs. While this comes soon after the industry slowed down in growth, giants ranging from Infosys to Cognizant, almost all are witnessing the crunch.
As per reports, the layoffs are attributed to growing digitisation, automation and cost cutting mechanisms and has nothing to do with the H1-B visa regulations.
Giving an overview of the layoff, Telangana Information Technology Association President Sundeep Kumar Makthala told Telangana Today, “Let’s say a company management decides to downsize 7 per cent of its employees, and then these employees are given the fourth rating. As soon as a fourth rating is given then Performance Improvement Plan (PIP) is initiated wherein the employees have to show better ratings in 60-90 days. Once the period is over, the management will not increase the ratings and call the employees and tells them either to resign voluntarily or they will be fired. As the employees fear bad review of their tenure due to firing they opt to resign themselves.”
Notably, most people who have been laid off are mid-level employees as the company feels that they are ready to adapt to the new technological schemes of the company.
“Employees who have been on the job for almost 35 years are not in a position to upskill themselves and adapt to the changing technologies. Thus it is important that these people take up entrepreneurship and become job creators,” said Makthala.
“The IT industry is going through a transition and there is a requirement for new skill sets. Thus, this is a very normal process of layoffs that are happening and it will only be a short-term scenario. The employees will have to look at improving their skills,” said an IT expert.
