Shibulal says Infosys will promote 9,000 employees

BANGALORE, INDIA: In a welcome move after its above-expected third quarter results, Infosys Limited has decided to promote a considerable number of its 1.55 lakh-strong employee base by April as well as roll out an on-site salary hike.

"We plan to give onsite wage increase of 2-3 per cent in Q4. We added 7,500 employees gross this quarter. We are looking at promotions this quarter, 6,000 to 9,000 people," Infosys chief executive officer and managing director S.D. Shibulal said at the third quarter (Q3 FY2013) results announcement on Friday.

On this, some insiders point out that the company is yet to effect the promotions it announced during the last cycle.

For the record, the company added 8,390 employees, including 891 from Spanish consulting firm, Lodestone AG, which it acquired last September. In the previous quarter, it added 10,420 employees. The attrition was 6,522 employees - 15.1 per cent - compared to 7,810 last quarter.

As far as new recruits are concerned, they would have to wait till Infy's employee utilization rates increase by another 7-8 per cent, according to chief executive officer S.D. Shibulal. The current utilization rate is 70.1 per cent. It may be recalled that Infosys had deferred the joining dates of fresh engineering graduates, who were offered jobs on campus last year.

Infosys, however, will absorb junior level employees into its consulting division by re-training them. "Till now, we used to have only middle- and senior-level employees in the consulting division, but expect more projects coming in under consulting segment and have started training juniors in this vertical," said Nandita Gurjar, senior vice-president and group head, Human Resources.

She further added, "We have just rolled out a 6-8 per cent raise for our employees and 2-3 per cent for onsite ones in October. As far as industry is concerned, our studies show that their next increment may be half of what we have given."