IT companies show the door to deadwoods

This is a eye opener for all who think IT career is like bed of roses. There are lot of things that happened in IT industry which created a very beautiful picture and people thought this to be the best place to be, even if one might not have all the traits which are needed to survive and sustain the growth. Yes the good thing that IT has done is it opened doors for lot of deserving ones who had good analytical and reasoning skills, although these people could not pursue a direct course in engineering or Bachelors in IT. Opportunities did come up indirectly when these same people went in for focused courses, which lead to entry positions in IT & then it was the hardwork and efforts put in by the people to grow and get themselves adjusted and finally experts in their skills.

This article should not be taken in the wrong sence, but like all things in life, everything has a good side and a bad side. It is a matter of which side of the fact is highlighted more & which side comes up on its own. Hope you like this article and do leave your comments.

Deadwoods’ is how they are known in recruitment circles. And there seems to be a rise in numbers of this bunch of guys who have flunked their appraisal test (been rated bad performers) in IT/ITES companies and are being chucked out by employers. According to sources, the top IT companies — both Indian and MNCs — are asking their deadwoods to leave, even as they are in an aggressive recruitment mode.

Recently, IBM India is reported to have asked over 1,000 people to leave because of bad performance. That’s about 1.9% of its total headcount of 53,000 and on par with the 2%-3 % that Wipro sees in terms of percentage. According to industry sources, while the average attrition rate for a well managed company stands at around 18%- 20%, about 50% of this are actually nonperformers who go out of a company.

Wipro HR executive vice-president Pratik Kumar said, “We hate to weed them out. So our effort is to put them on improvement programmes. We have formal discussions with them, do an analysis and give them about six months to improve. If they still can’t perform, then we shake hands.” Stating that one needs to look at it not just from the human angle but also from the business impact, he added that “if you want to be competitive , you can’t shy away from it.” The entire process of appraisal is done very systematically and there are two-three stages before any employee is put in the underperformer category said Vati Consulting CEO Amitabh Das. “I think it is a good sign that companies are taking this very seriously as in the long run, it helps in improving the productivity of the company,” he added. Mr Kumar also points out that though the category has remained steady in percentage terms (about 2%), the bigger numbers being seen now are a factor of scale and size. After all, the major IT companies in India have been adding between 12,000-25 ,000 people each in the last couple of years, to take their headcount beyond 50,000 people.

So what happens to these guys? Adecco India CEO Ajit Isaac said:,“People shown the door by the big companies are willing to go to the tier II and tier III companies, which welcome them since they have the brand in their resume. An HR person can’t always know why the candidate has left his previous job. So for these people in the smaller companies, its a honeymoon period for first 6-8 months but if their performance continues to be bad, then they hit a career crisis. Some of them are looking at joining startups while a bunch of them go to BPO firms.” Ad Astra Consultants founder Nirupama V G said, “Some people get jobs on contract basis to ensure they get the relevant experience before trying for another good position . Or some go in for temp jobs.”

I guess, one must never stop learning & if they feel they have learnt everything they had to learn, then it is time for them to look for another job or the company might ask you to look for one, since you would then would not be contributing in anyway to the company.