BLOODBATH: India’s IT market crashes, 500,000-600,000 LAYOFFS over the next THREE YEARS

THOMAS DISHAW.COM reports:

Very bad news coming out of India. According to this ZD report, approximately 500,000 IT professionals will be losing their job over the next three years. To make matters worse there are now reports that IBM India will also be dumping 5,000 employees over the next few quarters.

Over the last week, the one thing that Indian IT professionals were most dreading began to be talked about in earnest.

First, Mint newspaper disclosed that after conducting interviews with 22 current and former employees across seven Indian IT companies, it was clear to them that at least 56,000 engineers would be given pink slips this year. That figure is double the number let go last year.

Apparently, one immediate sign of the axe about to fall is if you are given a “low rating” by your company that then impacts subsequent opportunities at the firm — in other words, a pre-cursor towards being fired.

This year, for example, Mint said that 15,000 of Cognizant’s employees have found themselves placed in the bottom-most tier, or bucket IV, while Infosys has deemed 3,000 of its senior managers needing improvement. Mint said that in a normal year, around 1 to 1.5 percent of an Indian IT company’s employees would be shown the door, but this year that figure is going to be between 2 and 6 percent. None of the Indian companies confirmed the report.

Then, a few days ago, the managing director of executive search firm Head Hunters, K Lakshmikanth, dropped a bombshell. “Contrary to media reports of 56,000 IT professionals to lose jobs this year, the actual job cuts will be between 1.75 lakh (or 175,000) and 2 lakh (200,000) per year in the next three years, due to under-preparedness in adapting to newer technologies.”
IT Giant IBM to layoff 5000 Employees

The ongoing layoffs by the leading IT companies in India is continuing, in fact on an increasing note with IBM joining the league newly. In a major development, sources close to IBM disclosed that the company may release at least 5,000 employees over the next few quarters.

“The process has already started. Managers have been asked to identify under performers,” says a person close to the development.

Though the IT major didn’t confirm the exact number of employees to be impacted, it further said that, “Re-Skilling and rebalancing are two ongoing processes as we accelerate the benefits of cognitive and cloud technologies for clients around the world.”

Currently, 1,50,000 persons are employed in IBM India. With this decision, close to 30,000 IT jobs are in danger this year.

SOURCE: http://www.thomasdishaw.com/bloodbath-indias-market-crashes-500000-600000-layoffs-next-three-years/