Infosys, Wipro to Hire U.S. Technical Staff
Recent news reports suggest that Indian outsourcing giants like Infosys and Wipro will be hiring U.S. technical personnel. This is a direct shift from the offshoring model that most Indian outsourcing firms have been engaging in.
Until now, the idea was to get the job done by Indian engineers. However, under current economic conditions, top IT outsourcers say that it is feasible to hire U.S. nationals for about the same rate that is paid to Indian engineers. The pay range for graduates from U.S. universities ranges from $50,000 to $60,000/year, which is what Wipro pays its Indian technical personnel.
Nandita Gurjar, Infosys' group human resource chief, said that the U.S. has a massive talent pool that is untapped due to the recession. And now is a perfect time to incorporate some of that talent into the global team at Infosys.
Interestingly enough, Infosys is not the only IT outsourcer to scout for U.S. staff. Wipro recently opened shop in Atlanta, and the site has about 200 programmers and product architects working there. Executives at Wipro say that they plant to have approximately 750 employees joining them in the next year. Additionally, Wipro will hire another 1000 from Chengdu, China next year.
Despite the fact that Indian outsourcers have hired local salespeople, account managers, and consultants, this is the first time that they are hiring on a large scale for onsite operations. With India producing more than half a million engineers each year, it was always understood that they would be the doing the technical part of the work and that the offshore model was working perfectly.
However, one of the key changes in the work done today is that there is a lot more client interacting, which demands sophistication, understanding of the technology and industry and requires customer proximity, says Pratik Kumar, Wipro' s executive vice-president of HR in an online Business report. Since local staff are better able to communicate with clients and understand cultural issues, they are better equipped for problem solving. Most importantly, this helps in getting to the bottom of a problem in the shortest period of time, which also means cost savings.
Additionally, hiring from the U.S. contains some of the anti-outsourcing rhetoric that has been voiced since the Obama administration began. Hiring from the U.S. is also a lot easier in the economic downturn. Experts say that the shift in hiring is an indication that the outsourcing sector is ready to give up the idea of making a 30 percent profit by hiring dirt-cheap talent offshore.