IT cos not in a hurry to fill vacant jobs

Bengaluru: Indian IT services companies are not filling up vacancies created due to resignation of staffers, leading to higher workload on people working on those projects. Such lack of backfilling, which started from first quarter of ongoing financial year, has not seen any change in the second quarter so far.

Sources in the know said project managers are complaining about overwork owing to lack of such backfilling of positions. In the second quarter, total employee count of large IT firms is likely to dip for a consecutive second quarter, sources added.

“When we speak to managers in operational role, they are complaining about overwork as IT firms are not filling up vacancies created due to resignation. So, there is short of hands in projects. Despite this, the intent to hire of IT firms remains low at this point of time,” said a top executive of a top staffing firm on condition of anonymity.

In the first quarter, most large and mid-tier companies have seen dip in their total headcount. Experts said IT firms were not filling up vacancies created due to attrition owing to low demand environment.

During the first quarter, Infosys total headcount fell by 6,940 to 3,36,294, indicating a tepid hiringtrend. Its attrition trended down to 17.3 per cent in June quarter, a reduction of 360 basis points over the previous quarter.

For Wipro, total employee count dropped by 8,812 from the previous quarter to 2,49,758 at the end of June quarter. The company saw a sharp fall in its attrition level which came at 17.3 per cent, a fall of 2.1 per cent over the previous quarter.

Similarly, HCL Tech’s headcount fell by 2,506 employees in Q1FY24 to 223,438 people as against 225,944 employees in Q4FY23.

Many mid-tier IT firms have also reported a dip in total employee count as companies let go of employees in a low demand environment. Protection of margin is another factor that prompted IT firms to hire during the last quarter.

“The hiring intent still remains low. Companies are not talking about hiring except for some specific skills. Backfilling is not happening. The situation may be little different in October-December quarter, if companies start filling up some vacancies. Otherwise, January-March quarter may see some revival in hiring,” said the source.

Backfilling of positions usually happens in the experienced role where staffers are hired laterally. Since last quarter, while lateral hiring is literally frozen, onboarding of freshers have been deferred multiple times.