IT firms raise contract staff as they seek to hire quickly for short-term projects

16-Nov-2020

There has been a significant rise in contract staff in the IT Business Process Management (BPM) industry as companies are looking to hire people quickly for short-term projects. The IT-BPM sector is likely to add an estimated 24,900 employees on contract this fiscal year, compared to a little more than 10,000 such staffs last year, the Economic Times mentioned in a report citing industry trackers. Of the 44,16,000 employees in the IT-BPM industry, the number of contract hires stood at 1,11,975 last year, the business daily mentioned citing staffing and research firm Han Digital. This year, the number is expected to increase to 1,36,962 out of an estimated total workforce of 45,95,000 in the industry. IT services companies, global inhouse centres (GICs), BPM companies, the Big Four consulting firms and others are focusing on adding more talent with digital technology skills, on contract. �Employers are benefiting as contract staff can be deployed within a few weeks. At the same time, many organisations are looking at headcount optimisation and do not want to increase their workforce,� Saran Balasundaram, CEO of Han Digital told the business daily. Huge demand for people with skills in emerging technologies has led to an increase in contract staffing, said Mehul Shah, executive board member, Indian Staffing Federation (ISF). �We are about to witness the third wave of IT outsourcing, much like Y2K and 2008-09. Every company has been mandated to invest in digital transformation. Contract staffing is going to increase, especially for digital technology skills,� Shah told the business daily. Worth mentioning here is that over the last 6-7 months, globally companies are investing on digital transformation as they want to pivot to online amid the breakout of Covid-19 pandemic. So most of the IT companies and BPM companies have witnessed a significant rise in the number of digital transformation projects during the past six months. Even though very large deals are fewer, there are many short-term deals, IT companies said during their recent results. Balasundaram said there has been a �big change� in the hiring trend over the last few months.