Infosys chief Sikka relaxes norms for employees

Infosys Ltd's new CEO has come up with a novel approach to revive the financial fortunes of India's trailblazing outsourcing firm - use Facebook at work, tweet, but get the job done, IBN Live reported.

Infosys is known for its conservative outlook, keeping strict tabs on work hours and at times even fining employees for failing to wear ties on specific days. But the approach seems to have delivered declining returns, with the former leader of India's outsourcing industry falling behind rivals in bagging contracts from the west.

It also remains confused as regards choosing between high-margin projects and low-margin bread-and-butter IT deals.

Commentators say Infosys had been ploughing into new technologies such as cloud computing and smartphone app development to regain its former glory, though Vishal Sikka, the company's first non co-founder CEO, is pursuing an employees-first policy.

According to Shreya Bajaj, a Bangalore-based head hunter who helps IT companies recruit senior level executives, these changes might not look big or material but Sikka is trying to tell people this was a start, bigger things were on their way.

Attrition rates have risen with the decline in the company's fortunes, while employee moral has fallenwith members of top management quitting.

Meanwhile, though the IT major had reportedly hiked the salary of its top executives, the base scale for entry-level software engineers had not changed for over five years, The New Indian Express reported.

Entry-level software engineers with BE degrees get around Rs23,000-27,000 per month, while BSc freshers draw Rs 12-15,000, reports say. Starting salaries offered at other IT companies are in the same range according to experts.

The company reported attrition rates of 19.5 per cent in the April-June quarter as against Rs 16.9 per cent reported a year ago in the same period and from 18.7 per cent reported in the previous quarter.

Shibulal had said while announcing the first quarter performance that the company added about 11,500 employees (gross) in the last quarter. He further pointed out that net addition was only approximately 800-900 people as attrition continued to remain high.