Wipro’s rejig yet to deliver dividends

Despite the restructuring, Wipro’s large deal wins remained lower than its peers. Definitely, tough economic environment has negative impact on the strategy. So, it has to be seen how the current integration plays out - Pareekh Jain, founder, Pareekh Consulting, tells Bizz Buzz

New Strategies

• Wipro integrated chief growth office into Strategic Market Units (SMUs)
• It’ll depend on improvement in macroeconomic conditions next year
• It’s subject to ability to win more large outsourcing contracts in coming quarters
• Despite rejig, Wipro’s win rate of large deals remains low
• Tough demand environment playing spoilsport in IT firm’s new initiatives

Bengaluru: Success of Wipro’s integration of chief growth office into Strategic Market Units (SMUs) will depend on improvement in macroeconomic conditions next year along with company’s ability to win more large outsourcing contracts in coming quarters.

Last week, the Bengaluru-headquartered firm announced the resignation of its chief growth officer Stephanie Trautman and subsequent integration of the chief growth office, which was created three years ago into strategic market units. The chief growth office under the outgoing Trautman was mandated forwinning large deals, account development, partnerships and sales processes, as well as to develop a blueprint for building strategic solutions for clients.

Experts in the know said that though exit of Trautman may not have much impact on Wipro given the deep bench of leaders, the outcome of restructuring will depend on many factors.

“Wipro has done many organisational restructuring under the current CEO. Strategically, the company has invested to grow its consulting business. Now, it is time for those bets to deliver. Despite the restructuring, Wipro’s large deal wins remained lower (than its peers). Definitely, tough economic environment has negative impact on the strategy. So, it has to be seen how the current integration plays out,” Pareekh Jain, an IT outsourcing advisor & Founder of Pareekh Consulting, told Bizz Buzz.

He, however, said that senior-level exits wouldn’t create any disruption in large IT firms like Wipro, given the strength of their existing bench of senior leaders.

“We have seen many CXO-level exits this year across both large and mid-tier firms and Wipro is not alone. Companies like Infosys and others (TCS) have also seen many senior-level resignations this year. These have not created any disruption in their operations,” Jain said.

Trautman’s resignation was the tenth exit in the CXO level at Wipro this year. Two months back, Jatin Dalal stepped down as the company’s chief financial officer. He was replaced by Aparna Iyer in September. Similarly, Chief Operations Officer Sanjeev Singh, Americas 2 CFO Nithin V Jaganmohan, India head Satya Easwaran, and iDEAS business head Rajan Kohli also exited the company this year.

Infosys has also seen several senior level exits this year. Market leader TCS has witnessed the resignation of its Rajesh Gopinathan from CEO role this year.

Despite such high profile exits, all three companies have not seen much disruption and were able to replace those roles internally.

Experts opined that ongoing tough demand environment may prompt many more senior level exits in coming quarters as companies will increase scrutiny over performance.