Even as TCS leadership is reluctant to call out long-term recovery for the Indian IT sector, it has commenced hiring associates seeing better days on the horizon. In a one-on-one chat with businessline, TCS CHRO Milind Lakkad discussed what it is like to have their workforce back at office and much more. Excerpts:

Q

You are yet to indicate if tech spends are going to come back, at the same time you have resumed hiring in numbers, finally increasing your headcount. How should we perceive this change in hiring strategies?

We look at hiring as a long-term phenomena. So for our projects in the last six quarters, we had made investments much before. Similarly, it also means that we have to plan for the next year. These things are what lead to the numbers you are seeing at the moment.

Q

You are in the process of conducting interviews for candidates shortlisted under the National Qualifier Test (NQT). Campus hiring has always been important for TCS, how does it change with the NQT in place?

It is very important for us to continue maintaining a close relationship with the academia, to tell them what TCS does. Just having the test does not work. We should have engagement, excitement and awareness about TCS in the campuses, and help them prepare for the skills that we need. Curriculum designed by TCS is being taught in 79-plus colleges. There are a lot of specific courses we are driving here to bring people up to mark to work with us. 

Q

By tying bonuses to attendance levels, you have finally brought workplace occupancy largely back to pre-pandemic levels. What has the experience of getting your workforce finally back been like as an organisation?

I cannot put that into words. We just did a well-being mohatsav, for holistic well-being for our employees. June was a well-being month for our employees, where we held many functions to drive engagement and bonding. This included family meets, sports days, yoga day etc. I think these initiatives are very critical – we got a lot of positive feedback from our employees, speaking about the positive impact this has on their personal life and how they see it changing perception of things around them. We have three lakh people overall coming in. All these things are critical, and drive a sense of belonging. Obviously, you have to present good opportunities for them to learn, to show them a good career path, but we are working on the personal front to drive a stronger sense of belonging to the institution. 

Q

TCS reorganisation of business verticals was announced nearly a year ago. At this point, is the re-org complete?

We did some consolidation of business as part of this re-org. We made an attempt to consolidate some of our competencies; as a result, some people left. We continue to make changes in the organisation based on various parameters. Overall business situation, evolution of business as a result of technology changes, geopolitical changes. All of that requires continuous thinking on how we tweak this organisation. We have a very strong leadership layer, which will take on new roles as they come. Those changes will continue to happen. 

Q

How is GenAI being used for workforce management at TCS?

We are looking into adopting GenAI into every aspect of talent management. Talent acquisition, talent deployment as well as talent development. One of the most interesting applications of GenAI can be how it will streamline the interview process.