Cognizant to reduce 5,000-7,000 employees by mid-2020!

Speaking to the Times of India, CDM of India operations Ramkumar Ramamoorthy detailed a few initiatives.

Following the economic slowdown, IT companies laid off midlevel employees to restructure the pyramid.

He said, digital has the potential to grow significantly faster and that they need to find money to invest in the business for growth.

He said that their 'Fit for Growth' initiative is to unlock the full potential of Cognizant. As a part of this initiative, the company has announced a global cost rationalisation programme on the most recent earnings call.

To evolve the skill set and free up capacity, 5000 associates will be reskilled and upskilled and that globally there could be a net reduction of 5000 to 7000 associates by mid-2020 through either natural attrition or role elimination.

He also said that in the past, they have reskilled over 1,50,000 and in the year 2020, they are looking to double up the investment in technical education. He also agreed that not everyone can be reskilled and this will lead to role redundancies.