The Hindu Business Line : India needs to develop leadership talent, says Infosys COO

INDIA needs to focus its attention on creating world-class leadership talent, as it is to benefit from the emerging economic milieu that will see more manufacturing shifting to the country from around the world, said Mr Kris Gopalakrishnan, Chief Operating Officer of Infosys Technologies.

"The most important aspect in future will be leadership. Do we have sufficient global managers?" Mr Gopalakrishnan asked while delivering a speech at the 25th annual convention of the Kerala Management Association (KMA) here today.

He said India's one billion population, which gives one billion consumers to world, will drive more manufacturing and production into the country in the coming days as companies will vie with each other to be closer to their user base.

"In many sectors such as banking, insurance and tourism, India is already a large consumer of the world," Mr Gopalakrishnan said.

Gone are the days when availability of resources would make and break economic powers.

Today the economic power is determined by the knowledge and talent a country has at its disposal. Innovation and creativity are playing a crucial role in this regard.

"The value of a product depends today on the knowledge and content within it," Mr Gopalakrishnan said, adding that Indian corporates must benchmark their products against the best in the world.

"Even in agriculture, we have to do this," he said.

Boundaries are coming down and the move is towards a single market place where everybody will freely compete with each other.

Even for jobs, a person will have to compete with talents with other parts of the world, Mr Gopalakrishnan, one of the founders of Infosys, said.

Earlier, in his inaugural address, the Kerala Governor, Mr R.L. Bhatia, urged companies to tie up with universities to develop and source the talent they would require.

He said the shrinking of the world to a global village also presents huge opportunities for Indian companies to tap into, as much as it presents a set of new challenges.

The KMA is holding its 25th convention around the theme, `Shrinking World - Mounting Challenges.'

Three technical sessions to discuss different aspects of the theme would be held as part of the convention.

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