E-tailers poach industry veterans for the next phase of growth

E-commerce firms are hiring experienced executives from people-facing enterprises such as FMCG, retail, real estate and technology as they look to clock the next stage of growth.

HR experts indicate that lateral hiring from FMCG, real estate and technology firms to e-commerce companies are on the rise as start-ups are no longer a bad word.

Head hunters point out that in addition to picking up candidates in the senior leadership roles to focus on service delivery parameters, employees are also being roped to address needs of consumers in smaller cities and towns.

Additionally, jobs in the mid and senior level are shrinking in traditional sectors forcing candidates to look at new sectors such as e-commerce. Take a look at some of the recent hiring. Snapdeal appointed former Bharti Airtel executive Jayant Sood as Chief Customer Experience Office. In his role, Jayant will be responsible for streamlining the company’s customer service operations.

Rohit Bansal, co-founder, Snapdeal, said, “Ours is a customer-focused company and all our initiatives have been towards bettering customers’ experience on our platform. Our vision is to build the largest digital commerce ecosystem that creates life changing experiences for buyers and sellers”.

Snapdeal also strengthened its leadership team by appointing former Coca-Cola marketing veteran Idi Srinivas Murthy as Sr VP-Marketing. It also roped in former Unilever executive Vivek Patankar as Senior Vice-President –Finance. Another ecommerce firm Quikr appointed internet veteran PD Sundar for its services vertical and Manish Sinha for its real estate vertical.

A report by Nasscom said hiring in the e-commerce space has been growing at a compounded annual rate of 25 per cent since 2010 and has a market size of around $14 billion currently.

Tolexo.com, an online store for business goods and supplies, has roped in Harsh Kundra as a Co-founder & Head - Product & Technology. In his last position, he was the CTO at Jabong.com where he was responsible for building scalable and high performing web architectures.

Other like Flipkart is understood to have hired Punit Soni as head of product strategy. Soni was earlier associated with Google and Motorola.

Recently, McDonald restaurants’ national head Sriram Venkateswaran quit to join an e-commerce firm.

T Muralidharan, Chairman, TMI Network, an HR consultancy, said, “Jobs at middle and senior levels are shrinking in traditional firms as outsourcing is catching up. E-commerce, on the other hand, is flush with investor money. From an employee perspective, it offers both excitement and quick money. We see job creation happening at supply chain and technology front”.

Several players like Fabfurnish also said 10 per cent of its senior level hiring will be from IITs and IIMs.

“Online players are achieving scale and they need people with experience in verticals like warehousing and customer service. Besides, salary packages, ecommerce players are also offering stock option which acts as a financial cushion in dire situation,” said Sanjoe Jose, CEO, Talview, a video-mobile recruitment service provider.

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