Attrition woes ease for tech firms

Global economic turmoil and a changing environment for export oriented technology firms is bringing about a key change in them. High attrition, the chief headache for such firms, appears to be easing off.

The change in employee sentiment is being driven by two related developments. They are getting fewer offers and those that are coming do not have the attractive packages which were earlier common.

This has created a new cautiousness which is resulting in fewer offers being taken up. Hence there is an overall deceleration in employee churn, much more than that indicated by the actual fall in offers.

"Today, the fear of the unknown has affected employee sentiment. They are less ready to move to unfamiliar environs amidst new people," said Srinivas Rao Kandula, head-human resources, iGate.

Those that want to move "want to go to firms that are showing strong growth. The risk appetite may have slackened. Hanging on to the present job is the main aim of employees today and this is a trend being seen more in the BFSI (banking, financial services and insurance) segment with financial market severely affected," said Sudhakar Balakrishnan, CEO, Adecco India, the Indian arm of the European staffing solutions major.

The fall in attrition seems to have affected the earlier growth in disposable income."While earlier most clients who were from the IT or IT-related sectors used to call us frequently to incr-ease their monthly contribution to investments in mutual funds, now, we hardly come across such cases," said the partner of the investment consultancy.

An affirmation of the change in sentiment also comes from the real estate sector. "IT employees are not as demanding as they were earlier in choosing homes," said Samira Chandra Gupta, regional director, Colliers International. "Second and third home buys, which were common, have dried up," adds Samira Chandra Gupta, regional director, Colliers International.