The penetration of flexi staff in the information technology (IT) sector, at 5.6 per cent of the country’s total workforce at present, is set to grow to 14-16 per cent year-on-year till 2020-21, says a report by the Indian Staffing Federation (ISF), an apex body of the flexi staffing industry.
Incidentally, the IT sector has seen one of the biggest layoffs in recent times.
The report, “Indian IT Staffing Industry Landscape”, released recently, said the IT sector, which is undergoing massive transformation with the influx of new technologies such as artificial intelligence, machine learning, cloud, analytics, Internet of Things etc, says that need for ‘niche’ skills would drive flexi hiring in the days to come.
“The pace at which IT sector is evolving, the bench model of the industry where full-time employees are kept on standby in expectation of new projects, is vanishing. Companies have fundamentally started opting for flexi staff to have flexibility and competitive edge over others,” said Rituparna Chakraborty, President, ISF, adding that e-commerce and start-ups alone are expected to witness 17.3 per cent growth of IT flexi staff.
According to the report, the flexi staffing market in India is worth $3.04 billion at present.