Produced by: Aakanksha Ram Chaturvedi Designed by: Manoj Kumar
The Indian IT sector is facing headwinds due to the broader macroeconomic conditions and cutbacks on discretionary spends. Amid this another prominent trend is multiple senior level executives across major Indian IT players.
Infosys has witnessed several high level exits in the past year. Most recently, EVP Rajeev Ranjan quit the company to join Ness Digital as their Chief Operating Officer. Ranjan had been working at Infosys for over 25 years.
Infosys has also lost three of its executives to rival firms in the past year, where the Infosys executives took charge as CEO. President Mohit Joshi joined Tech Mahindra as CEO and MD. Ravi Kumar S also stepped down as Infosys President to join Cognizant as CEO. Infosys SVP Vishal Salvi joined Quick Heal as CEO.
Some of the senior level executives who quit Infosys also exited the industry. EVP and HR Head Richard Lobo exited Infosys to join Indian edtech BYJU's as advisor. Co-Head of Delivery and Head of CIC Narsimha Rao Mannepalli resigned from the IT company to take a career break.
The senior level attrition is not limited to Infosys. Wipro has also witnessed senior level attrition in the past year. In May 2023, Mohd Haque, SVP and head of healthcare and medical devices for the Americas, and Ashish Saxena, SVP, and head of the manufacturing and hi-tech business unit, quit the IT company.
Many of Wipro’s senior executives quit the company to join other rival IT firms. Rajan Kohli, who was president of Wipro's integrated digital, engineering and application services business line, joined CitiusTech as CEO in April. Gurvinder Sahni, who was VP and strategic advisor, quit in April to join Persistent Systems as chief marketing officer (CMO).
Angan Guha, who oversaw a portfolio spanning financial services, manufacturing, energy & utilities, hi-tech and Canada operations at Wipro, quit to take charge as CEO & MD of Birlasoft. Sanjeev Singh, who was COO at Wipro, quit in January to join CMS IT Services as CEO & MD.
Analysts and industry insiders see the constant attrition at senior level positions at major IT players as a negative sign. Some experts noted that the churn could impact deal flow while others said that IT players need to strategize to ensure senior executives are not poached by rivals.