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The new head of Tata Motors, Karl Slym, isn’t the only high-profile expat in India’s growing automotive sector.
A number of expats and overseas Indians work the back-end, but in such critical areas as research and development.
With years of experience in developed markets, they are much in demand as auto majors such as Maruti Suzuki, Hero MotoCorp and Mahindra & Mahindra (M&M) sharply step up investments in developing local models and vehicle technologies.
A year and a half back, M&M hired Richard Haas as automotive R&D chief.
Haas, an American, worked with Ford and was last with Tesla Motors, an electric sports car-maker. M&M’s head of testing and validation, Paul Harvey, is from the UK.
Pawan Goenka, M&M’s President for Automotive & Farm Equipment business, joined the company in 1993 after a 14-year stint at General Motors in Detroit. For Tata Motors and M&M, a global talent hunt is critical as their footprint spreads across geographies post their recent acquisitions, respectively, of the UK’s Jaguar Land Rover and South Korea’s Ssangyong.
Rajeshwar Tripathi, M&M’s Chief People Officer (Automotive & Farm Equipment), says the overseas hiring will only rise as the sector now has the capability to absorb the talent.
“In India, the pool is limited… and every company is vying for the same set of people. There are exchange programmes on with our operations in the US, China and Korea… we see a lot of synergy.”
Tata Motors has 6-8 foreign employees, while 10 Indians have returned from abroad. Hero has five foreigners at the brand new R&D establishment it set up after splitting from Honda last year.
Global standards
“Professionals who have worked abroad adopt global practices and have experience of working with global suppliers and technology partners. Growth in India is attracting many multinationals,” a Tata Motors spokesperson said.
Six of the nine foreigners Maruti hired in 2009 are still with the carmaker, apart from four Indians who have joined after overseas stints.
“Around 2008-09, when we became more aggressive in local R&D work, we started looking for professionals from Detroit and Japan. We took some on… We keep looking for more such talent,” says C. V. Raman, Maruti’s Executive Director for R&D.
General Motors (GM), which runs a technical centre in Bangalore, has about 50 Indians who have done global stints.
“Many shifted back when the West went into recession in 2008-09,” says P. Balendran, Vice-President at GM India. There are six expats at GM’s India R&D hub.
Culture Training
The challenge, says Tripathi, is training these people in Indian and the company culture.
“Expats have to fit into the system. . It’s not easy to work here after working abroad.”
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