High attrition rate cause of concern

New Delhi, Aug 19 (UNI) Unabated level of attrition rate continues to plague India Inc and spreading fast from IT and ITeS to other service sectors such as civil aviation, financial services, retail and engineering, industry chamber Assocham has said.

''The attrition rate in IT and ITeS sector has slowed by 10 per cent to fall in the range of 25-30 per cent in the year 2007 as compared to 35-40 per cent rate in previous year,'' it said.

The services sector including civil aviation, financial services and retail are facing tough times in retaining their staff, Assocham said in a study.

The study has found that the maximum attrition is taking place among the employees in the age group of 26-30 years and the segment of employees who are most vulnerable to change are with experience range between 2-4 years.

Consolidation in the civil aviation sector has fuelled attrition to an unmanageable level of 46 per cent as the pilots and cabin crew spot opportunities in growing demand by domestic as well as foreign airlines.

Dearth of professionals, technical nature of operations, increasing finance-KPOs and attractive salary packages have led to rising job hopping at entry and middle level in the financial services sector, the chamber added.

''Human resource is the most valuable asset for any company in the modern economy. Companies would have to not only benchmark the compensation levels and upgrade the reward structure time to time in order to retain their employees but also have to integrate human resource management with overall corporate growth strategic,'' Assocham President Venugopal Dhoot said.

The attrition level has increased from 32 per cent in the year 2006 to 44 per cent in the current year. Banking, trading and real estates are facing maximum problem due to the job changing by the human resource.

''Massive expansion in the retail sector is accompanied with rapidly increasing attrition rate to even to the extent of 50 per cent in few cases. The companies now prefer to sign bonds for three years as they are imparting them the necessary training and specialised knowledge of retail functions.'' Level of attrition rate in the manufacturing sector has remained almost same at 20 per cent in 2007 as previous year.

Attrition trend also reveals that women employees are less prone to frequent job changing than their male counterparts. For every 10 males jumping the fence by changing the job, there was only two females crossing over, the chamber said.

UNI