TCS is numero uno IT employer, says Dataquest-IDC IT Best Employers' Survey

New Delhi

September 4th, 2007

The seventh annual Dataquest-IDC IT Best Employers' Survey (BES) throws up a
lot of surprises, where India's third largest software company Wipro does not
feature among the top 20 IT employers, and the industry bellwether Infosys has
slipped four places to number eight rank.

The survey of 2,844 software, hardware and marketing professionals from 33 IT
companies employing 304,834 people in the top seven cities threw up the Top 20
Best IT employers based on a combination of Employee Satisfaction and HR scores.

The top five ranks went to TCS, HCL Infosystems, iGate, RMSI and Synechron.
The next five positions went to IBM, Capgemini, Infosys, Tavant Technologies and
Sun Microsystems.

India's largest company, TCS, retained its numero uno status in the BES Top
20 survey for the second year running. The challenges of scaling up were
countered through innovative HR practices. With almost 15 percent of its 90,000
employees based in foreign shores, TCS has replicated not just its programs but
also its ethos across multiple geographies, to achieve consistency in the
workforce.

HCL Infosystems at number two retained employee satisfaction on all
parameters with significant rise in satisfaction on preferred employer. HCL
employees are found to be very satisfied with the growth opportunities, job
security and relationship with peers.

Commenting on the high points of the seventh Dataquest-IDC survey Pradeep
Gupta, CMD, CyberMedia said, "Multinational IT employers IBM, Capgemini,
Sun Microsystems and CSC have mastered the art of managing Indian employees to
rank among the top 20 best IT employers in the country."

"Others, especially many India-based IT employers, will need to balance
aggressive recruitment with the warmth and personal touch they used so
effectively thus far, to retain people as they ramp up headcount," Gupta
added.

Average attrition rate

The Dataquest-IDC survey points out that the average attrition rate is down
marginally to 14 percent from 15 percent last year. The top five reasons why IT
professionals changed their jobs were compensation, job posting abroad, growth
opportunities, job location and technology area of work.

When asked what gave them satisfaction on the job, the employees voted career
development opportunities, work life balance, organizational culture, job
security and technology as the five top areas. Even though compensation was the
top reason for job change, it ranked at number seven when asked what satisfied
them the most.

Industry wide, Infosys remains the dream company with one tenth of the
respondents choosing it as the dream company to work for. TCS came second with
one in 14 respondents and IBM was at number three with one in 20 respondents
voting for it as their dream company.

Among the existing employees of Infosys, only 28.2 percent voted for it as
'my dream company' in the 2007 Dataquest-IDC survey, compared to 36.6 percent
last year.

The employees of Infosys ranked their company very low on several parameters
like growth opportunities, compensation and relevance of perks and benefits.
Ironically, among the rest of the 2,844 employees of this industry-wide
survey-those not working in Infosys-Infosys topped the votes as their dream
company to work for.

Company image and organization culture

The respondents gave top rankings in terms of 'company image' and
'organization culture' composite score to HCL Infosystems, RMSI, iGate and
Tavant Technologies. The lowest scores in terms of 'Company Image' and
'Organization Culture' derived from a set of parameters went to Infosys, Aricent,
Geometric software, Ness Technologies and Cybage. Clearly firms with smaller
employee base seemed to enjoy a better organization culture.

Referring to the drop in ranks by Infosys and Wipro, the Dataquest-IDC survey
points out that, as both companies ramp up rapidly, there seems to be tradeoff.
Employees joining the organization now might be expecting the same informal
atmosphere, which these companies have been known for. But the personal touch
appears to have been lost in the number game. Whatever might be the case, one
thing is certain, the Bangalore tigers need to get their act together, the
Survey adds.

IBM achieve the sixth best IT employer status beating all large firms who
compete directly with it, barring TCS, thanks to its belief that HR has to be a
competitive strategy. This is despite the fact that IBM ranks at the bottom of
the table when it comes to compensation. It earned its number six position
largely due to its strong brand image, and high standards of corporate values
and governance. IBM also scores high in training and development.

Sun Microsystems with an employee base of about 1,000, made its entry into
the Dataquest-IDC Best Employers listing at number 10, largely driven by a high
employee satisfaction score. It scores high on compensation and topped the rank
on the new age priority, work-life balance.

At number 11, Cognizant is the only large company in the list where employees
see a lot of opportunity for their individual growth while believing that the
company's leadership is doing what is needed for the growth. Cognizant's major
HR focus revolves around helping employees acquire, improve, and harness
industry skills for faster professional growth.

At number 12, CSC recorded the second highest jump in the Dataquest-IDC best
employers top 20 list, India is CSC's second largest operation outside the US.
Knowing that India's fiercely competitive labor market requires some special
initiatives, CSC launched two Indian specific employee communication programs.

This is the first time that Cadence, a regular in the top five list, slipped,
also from the top 10. At number 14, Cadence's fall reiterates what industry
captains are now beginning to realize-you cannot buy employee satisfaction only
with a big pay package and by caring for them.

Women work force

Women constituted 23.7 percent of the total staff employed by the surveyed
IT companies. In the 2004 survey only 14.5 percent of the total IT professionals
were women. This percentage improved to 19.7 percent in 2005 and 23.6 percent in
2006.