Tough for media, IT hiring and retaining staff

New Delhi, Aug 20: The sectors like Financial Services, Media and IT are likely to continue facing immense challenge of hiring, training and retaining the staff, on account of employee aspirations, coupled with expansion in the economy, in the next few years.

An Assocham Eco Pulse (AEP) study of about 100 corporate firms, released here today, has reflected that the employees in these three areas have much higher propensity to change jobs seeking better wage packages, which pose a continuous challenge of managing attrition for the Personnel Directors.

The Financial Services sector had to bear a higher salary cost of 54.73 per cent for the period between April-June this year over the same period last year.

This sector was closely followed by Information Technology, with a rise of around 44 per cent. The Media firms including those engaged in production of television serials and Bollywood films were the next in paying higher wages, their cost on this account went up by 29.56 per cent.

Indiabulls Financial Services exhibited 262.44 per cent rise in their staff cost. Firms like Geojit Financials, IL&FS and CRISIL also registered a rise in their wage bill by 82 to 85 per cent.

IT sector, according to the Assocham study, registered 43.87 per cent rise in their staff cost, even higher than their bottomline of 32.56 per cent.

Infosys topped the list with over 53 per cent increase. Patni Computers saw 21.65 per cent rise in its wage cost, with a decline of over 129 per cent in its net profit.

The Media firms saw over 29 per cent rise in its staff cost, with Balaji Telefilms facing over 251 per cent rise in its staff cost.

Firms like Cinevistaas, UTV, Zee Telefilms, Mid Day Multimedia and TV Today also saw huge drop in their net profit, partly because of enhanced expenses on employees.

However, the Pharmaceuticals sector too saw an 18.62 per cent rise in the wage cost, as Research and Development form the core business activity and recruitment of skilled manpower is a necessity. Panacea Biotec recorded a rise of 132.52 per cent in its bottomline as well as a hike of 108.20 per cent in its staff cost during the quarter under study.

Ranbaxy was the only firm in the Pharmaceutical sector in the sample taken for the study to have recorded a decline of 4.71 per cent in its wage cost.

The Automobile sector witnessed around 18 per cent increase in both net profit as well as wage cost. LML recorded a major plunge in its net sales (-94.67 per cent), net profits (-43.70 per cent) as well as wage bill (-82.35 per cent).

Sona Koyo, Hero Honda, Ashok Leyland, Amtek Auto saw an increase of around 23 per cent in their personnel expense.

Steel firms saw over 15 per cent hike in its staff cost.

JSW Steel faced maximum rise of 23.95 per cent in its employee cost, whereas there was a plunge of 15 per cent in its first quarter net profit.

Similar trend was noticed in Essar Steel also which saw a rise of 19 per cent in its wage cost.

UNI