Nasscom sees wage moderation from next year

The Indian IT-ITeS sector, which has seen an upward revision of salaries in the last two-three years, is likely to witness moderation of wages from next year with the supply of human resources improving gradually.

In the last two years, all leading IT and BPO firms enhanced the wages of its employees by 12% to 15%. Nasscom, the premier trade body of the Indian IT industry, said its initiatives to improve the supply of human resources are yielding results.

"As talent and workforce development take roots, you will see a moderation in wages. We will see the beginning of this trend (moderation of wages) next year itself. Overall, the demand-supply gap is more or less balanced," Nasscom chairman Lakshmi Narayanan said.

Speaking to reporters on the sidelines of the Nasscom Quality Summit here today, Narayanan, who is also the vice chairman of IT major Cognizant Technologies, pointed out that the supply of human resources has improved on account of combined initiatives taken by the industry, companies and academic institutions.

"For instance, the number of engineering colleges in Tamil Nadu has gone up. Consequently, the intake of students will also increase. This is a good development. Similarly, Nasscom has launched various industry-academia programmes and they are yielding results," he added.

Earlier, addressing the summit, Narayanan stressed the need for improving the quality of services to win customer confidence. "There is a lot much to achieve. The end users in the West are not convinced of the services provided by Indian IT companies. The industry has to move from quality deliverable to the quality of outcome," he said.

He said the industry has to reorient its mindset. "We have to look at it in an innovative way. Excellence is no longer a goal. Excellence has become a standard today," he said.