The Hindu : Karnataka / Bangalore News : When life skids on the pink slip

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Friday, Feb 08, 2008
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Karnataka

Karnataka - Bangalore

When life skids on the pink slip

Deepa Kurup

Techies are in a tizzy guessing where the axe will fall next

Employees resent lack of transparency in the whole process
Those in small and medium enterprises are the worst hit

BANGALORE: Amid the sea of pink slips issued by IT majors are stories of young careers going into a tailspin and self-esteem taking a beating.

With reports of Information Technology giants laying off employees, mostly at the entry level, coupled with the slowing down of the U.S. economy, techies here are in a tizzy guessing where the axe will fall next.

While companies deny any “downsizing” and that laying off is a routine exercise, what causes worry among techies is that freshers are being targeted. “I was asked to resign after working at the company for eight months. I had three job offers but I chose IBM, a decision which I now regret. Given that the market is down, it will be almost impossible to find a job especially as I will now compete in the experienced category,” says Shyam Babu, who recently lost his job.

Although IBM says that it is part of its exercise to certify skill levels and improve quality, most employees say there is no transparency. Those who have lost their jobs say they were not given any explanation, marks lists, scores or cut-offs.

No sympathy

“While the company reserved the right to fire employees who do not perform, it is not fair to target those without experience,” says Shiva, an employee. He feels that the future of his colleagues is at stake and it distresses him to see that everyone is unsympathetic and not forthcoming about the process.

Take the case of his friend Nawaz, for example. He worked for six months with a smaller firm on the Oracle platform and traded that job for a cushy future in IBM where he worked in Java. Now that his dream job is gone, he will be branded “inexperienced” in both programming environments and will have to start from the scratch.

And this is only the tip of an iceberg. Several software professionals allege that companies indulge in mass recruitment to project their image in the market. Most companies are reluctant to divulge the number of employees on the bench. While a fresher loses out on project experience during this time, major IT companies keep their employees waiting for want of projects. “Besides losing out on projects we are not even paid, which makes it even more difficult for us. My joining date was postponed thrice,” says Mihir, an IT employee.

Safety net

“Attrition and flexibility are two sides of the same coin. Job insecurity is a huge problem but companies view the whole process in terms of a demand-supply equation. There is no regulation and companies obviously do not want to regulate themselves,” says Carol Upadhya, researcher at the National Institute of Advance Studies.

Dr. Upadhya, who has surveyed the IT/ITeS sector, says that industry spokespersons have acknowledged the need for some kind of social security measures or safety net and have suggested that some kind of unemployment insurance could be created to which both industry and government contribute, on the lines of Provident Fund. But no concrete steps have been taken in this direction.

In what is perhaps India’s largest informal sector there is a hidden informal sector which lies in “body shops” or employment consultants who contract out software labour. These employees are paid less and are left without a job at the end of every project. This sector is never acknowledged by big companies because it does not make them look good and hence are left unaccounted for even in NASSCOM studies, says Dr. Upadhya.

Apart from this, there are small/medium enterprises which may be involved in outsourced projects which will take advantage of the situation. “Following media reports our bosses are pointing at these market trends and threatening us that we may lose our jobs in the face of a market slump. They will hold over us the fact that more people sacked means more options for them,” says Vijay Murthy, who works for a software developing firm.

(All names have been changed)

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