Overview
IT Kontempore, Bengaluru was the 1st Edition in the series for Co-creating a Sustainable Approach for Talent management in IT/ITES Sector. It was held on 8th February 2019. The event at Bengaluru deliberated to create a sustainable approach to Talent Management in the IT/ITES Sector with views taken from various Industry leaders representing operations, project delivery, product development, talent acquisition, start-ups.
The event witnessed the coming together of industry stalwarts on a common platform for identifying the present and prospective challenges faced by the IT/ITES and IT ancillary sectors related to talent sourcing and management. Participants explored issues from the widest possible perspective and endeavored to come up with some innovative and bold solutions to the most imposing questions on talent issues being faced by the industry.
Process
IT Kontempore pushed the boundaries of ideas and dared to explore beyond where most industry events venture. The opening address and context setting were done by Mr. Krish Shankar, Group Head- Human Resources at Infosys and Honorary President of National HRD Network, Bengaluru Chapter. This was followed by a true crowdsourcing of ideas achieved through a Large-Scale Interactive Process (LSIP). As part of the LSIP, the participants were divided into 7 tables to have a 4-step discussion process. In Step 1 participants made their individual observations regarding talent-related concerns faced by the industry and their ideas to action to help mitigate or solve these challenges. This was followed by, in step 2, intense discussion among the group members. In this step various challenges, their impact and ideas to solve them were collated at each table and curated on a separate chart sheet. Step 3 was a world cafe, where various table members visited other tables and each table presented their collated work in the earlier step to all other table members. As step 4, the tables regrouped and prioritized top challenges and actions to help solve those challenged. The outcomes were noted by the groups and became the backdrop for panel discussions of all the table leaders.
The table leaders then participated in a panel discussion to discuss and present their table’s and their ideas.
Outcome
Mr. Krish Shankar, in his context setting address, pointed out the various challenges facing the IT/ITES industry – starting from ready workforce with current technology skill, digital business adoption challenging whom to train & how to train, diversity including bringing back experienced women after their societal breaks, career definition identifications, future managers & leaders leading to talent acquisition, engagement and development.
He highlighted challenges in training the millennial workforce and leadership challenges faced by the leaders belonging to earlier generations. He proposed a model of developing talent pipeline by collaboration of various stakeholders like the government, industry and academia. He addressed the need for millennium talent acquisition
under the changing scenario of digitalization, various new technology adoption and cultural shift of new generation. He showed the path on how to go about addressing the talent challenge in the IT/ITES industry.
The list of prioritized challenges and the respective ideas for action which were the outcome of the LSIP process discussions are summarized in the following table:
| Challenge | Actions |
| Employability
– Skill gap – Communication – Global work culture – Campus to corporate conversion/readiness/ employability – Career path/growth |
– Integration with Universities
– Direct connection between Industry & University more frequently – Flexi benefits in employment contract & life events – Distinction |
| Talent
– Quality of talent in Universities – Deployable talent – Need of Hybrid engineers – Meeting employee aspirations & expectations – Lack of Business acumen |
– Coaching
– Getting accustomed to volatility of talent – Stability Vs Risks – Flexibility/ part time work – Design customized courses to meet industry needs – Initiatives like hackathons to on board/ spread awareness |
| Diversity & Inclusion
– Diversity challenges- global cultural alignment – Gender – Retention – Maintaining appropriate diversity |
– Unconscious bias program
– Encouraging women to return after their social commitment leave by skilling them through online platforms. – Diversities across human barriers should be considered – Tie-up with Tier 2&3 areas, train before joining & prepare for corporate readiness (Early engagement) – Well defined training program for women who join back after gap due to personal reasons – assign a mentor – Incentives, Support & facilitate choices – Assigning responsibilities so that employees have a feeling of associativity towards organization – Hard target with Challenging projects – Flexible work models & Gig environment – Managing millennial – Honest feedback |
| Career
– Attrition management of Gen Z employee – Instant gratification – Managing millennial – Changing career choices – Gap between different generation in expectation w.r.t work – Definition of career growth expectation – Changing mindset in campus – Time invested in training – Talent shortage for start-ups – Creating good managers |
– Reverse coaching
– Behavioral & sensitization meetings – Creating different roles according to the skills in which people excel – Disconnecting roles from titles – Flexible policy making/ dual employment – Manager enablement/incubation programs |
| Industry Readiness
– Changing Technology fast- Pace & Scale – Attractiveness of Industry – Globalization with localization |
– Solving real life challenges at school e.g. freelance, Tech talks etc.
– Career counseling – Learning agility through POCs – Partnering with Academia & Industry – Celebrate the Failures & learn – Customer focus: Shift from Project Management to Technocrats – Flexibility, differential benefits |
| Skilling
– Skill gap with new resources – Missing incubation by industry representation at institutional level that leads to job – Project monitored/sponsored by industry – Internship program by the industry at colleges – Communication: Verbal & Non-verbal – Existing & Up skilling – Set up COEs for new generation – technologies and build the coaches – Give them customer centric training – Skill shortage : Clarity of demand & skills – Better demand forecasts – Being relevant & staying relevant |
– Set up incubation centers at academic level implemented by industry
– Train basics first needed to build the project – Identify unique industrial/ real time projects. Skill training can be followed by project implementation – To carry out unique projects using basic skills because industry is looking for strong basics – Ecurie vertical funds for innovation in these sectors – Better organization constructs/ organization models – Investing in up-skilling / re-skilling – Industry academia collaborations to understand the future skills |
| Leadership
– Leadership development – Larger organization – Build smaller organization inside larger organization – Have multi CEOs & Give them stakes – Lack of innovation/ entrepreneurship/ ownership |
– Train all managers for better leadership skills
– Encourage risk, failure, empowerment from early stage of career – Investment in focused global leadership – Incubator program in Academia/Industry – First time manager development |
| Retention
– Lack of opportunity – Empathy – Health chapter – Automation taking jobs – Rate of technology change |
– Encouraging good retention policies
– Employee friendly policies to encourage & attract more diversities – Adaptability of people, ready to learn & come with new initiatives |