Corona Effect? More Exits Among Seniors in Top IT Company

IT services provider Cognizant is seeing more exits among senior executives, as per recent reports. Among these exits are Jaideep Poondir, SVP in the banking and financial services vertical, Rajesh Balaji, SVP and global delivery head of enterprise application services practice, and Vinayambika Kidiyur, SVP and global delivery transformation head.

Poondir was a Cognizant veteran and Balaji, oversaw a $2-billion portfolio comprising Fortune 500 customers and led its SAP and other ERP practices.

According to a report by TOI, Two VPs, Archana Ramanakumar, global delivery head of the life sciences business, and Vikash Gaur, global delivery head & digital engineering at Cognizant, have also resigned.

The report further states that while Ramanakumar resigned in April, others are serving notice period. Some of these leaders have delayed their exit to support Cognizant navigate the pandemic.

"Without commenting on individual personnel matters, as a company with approximately 290,000 people, new executive hires and voluntary departures are part of the normal course of business. There are no departures that have resulted from the ransomware incident last month involving some of our corporate systems," a spokesperson told TOI.

There has not been any mention of COVID-19 contributing to these exits.

Earlier, Cognizant announced its plan to defer the joining dates of campus recruits to September quarter.

Last year, Cognizant became the second IT company, only after Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), to touch the 2-lakh employee mark in India.