PUNE, INDIA: Lay-offs is no more an alien word for professionals long pampered with heavy packages, yummy perks and a flashy visiting card embossed with a big company name. And the big word has hit hard, especially on the people employed in banks and financial sector and those indirectly associated with that through captive arms and IT service providers.

It's almost like an exodus of talent, and talent which is high-skilled in areas of specialized domains like finance etc. Just the kind of skills that other employers would have dreamt of but couldn't afford the high-flier salaries that their bigger counterparts flaunted.

Now the same high-bracket talent is a deluge, that could very well be the pond of resources KPOs can fish in, because it fits well owing to the domain and skill buckets these organizations fall in.

So is anybody fishing?

A KPO specialist from the Analytics domain of a top-tier IT firm admits that the hiring market eases up for sure. "It's the same customers, and much more qualified people. A lot of high-end talent is captured in captives but which is now available for us for recruitment. We are definitely seeing an early trend."

However, the cross-sector movement is quite early and in some pockets and as this expert adds, there should not be any floodgates expected to open with the recent lay-offs.

The skills fit for sure, though on a case to case basis. Some of this talent has very good skill-sets that KPOs like us can leverage, he adds. "What they bring on the table is good specially at the price points we now can put forth."

But there might be issues like non-attractiveness of a KPO profile given the same monotony of work. Even if it's available, for a high-key ex-employee, it might not be attractive, he says.

It's noteworthy that about 30 per cent shortfall is likely in the size of KPO business by 2012, and according to The Associated Chambers of Commerce and Industry of India (ASSOCHAM) this would stagnate at $10.5 billion against the projections of $ 15 billion mainly on account of dearth of talented  professionals in the absence of relevant institutions for imparting KPO skills in India.

According to another study by UK-based research services company RocSearch, there is a high probability of India cornering a sizeable chunk (around $5 billion) of the estimated $17-billion knowledge process outsourcing (KPO) industry by 2010-11 but currently, under 0.1 per cent of the total number of people employed in the public and private sectors are engaged in KPO jobs.

Only a few Indian KPOs have over 1,000 employees in their rolls today. The study estimates the total number of people working in this industry would not be more than 1,00,000 by 2010.
 
Poonam Vasudeva, delivery head, LPO Services, Infosys doesn't deny this suddenly available talent pool through lay-offs as a good opportunity but qualifies that it has its own set of problems. "One or two strategic level resources are ok but it's not a ready fit when it comes to matching the erstwhile level of packages."

Speaking with CyberMedia News on the sidelines of the fifth ITES summit 'Outsourcing Ventures' by VisionIndia in Pune, Sandip Deshmukh re-iterates the price factor. "Even if they are available, they are still expensive. From a cost perspective, the opportunity is still prohibitive but it may become attractive later."

What may happen, however, in his view is that Indian professionals who were onshore till now may choose to come back and that could be a better pool.

There's no denying that the skill pool deft in areas like with financial modelling is quite attractive. Not only that, the ex-employees also have the experience of working with a US customer.

"There are a lot of grey areas, and an opportunity as it surely is, it's still not a black and white one." Deshmukh stresses.

But Neeraja Kandala, senior analyst, ValueNotes has a different take. "Amongst other industries being impacted with slowdown, also lie the KPOs, specially the Research and Analytics parts that were servicing the investment banks. If there's any opportunity in the laid-off talent pool, it should be only in Engineering design outsourcing, and that too depending upon qualifications."

So, for an employer, the current series of lay-offs from other companies may be an opportunity albeit with challenges on salary levels and work-profile. For an employee, it's a safety net, if not anything else.

Would you call a move to KPO a downgrading of one's career or a smart, practical strategy in the current scenario?