Indian corporate houses hiring foreign managers

By siliconindia   |   Monday, 24 January 2011, 23:28 IST   |    14 Comments
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Indian corporate houses hiring foreign managers
Mumbai: Call it reverse outsourcing or local talent hunting, but high-tech Indian firms have been hiring foreigners as part of their long-term growth strategy. Top firms in the country increase the proportion of foreign employees in their workforce as they seek to address protectionist lobbies and position themselves as 'job creators' in the markets they serve. Mahindra Group is hiring managers from overseas stating, it wants to master the complex technologies in their businesses ranging from automobiles to the making of aerospace. IT firms like Wipro, TCS, Infosys has always been hiring foreign employees at lower level. Globalization of the Mahindra Group has opened routes for Indian executives who were sent to the markets of U.S. and China. Alberto Strazzary, an engineer who has worked in companies like BMW and Ducati, is heading a project to bring cutting edge design to Mahindra's two-wheeler business, which is dominated by giant rivals Hero Honda and Bajaj Auto for several years. Peter Schmidt and Gabriel Periotti have also been brought on the board to make the technology meet European standards. The group has a total workforce of 1.17 lakh, out of which 9600 are non-Indians. Of its total revenues worth $7 billion, almost 10 percent come from global markets. While TCS aims to double its foreign workforce from the current one over the next few years, Infosys and Wipro could see non-Indians account for 10-15 percent of their total employee base in three to five years time, from around 5 percent now. "It's a strategy to reverse the trend, as we realize that it's necessary to shed the old way of getting only Indians to do the jobs," said Pratik Kumar, Corporate Vice-President and HR Head of Wipro. "How can you justify the fact that despite significant overseas revenues, we still have over 95 percent Indians on the payroll?" he added.

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