Insisting that Tata Consultancy Services was sensitive to staffers, Chief Executive Officer N Chandrasekaran said that the company continues to be people-centric, and that hiring and lay-offs are a normal process.

“I joined as a trainee and I have gone through all the processes that every other employee in TCS goes through. Performance-linked separations are a normal process every year,” said Chandrasekaran, who is also the Managing Director of TCS.

“I don’t know if it’s a communication failure or something else, but we have to reflect, in all humility, why this has created so much noise and dissatisfaction this time around,” he said.

TCS recently clarified that it would terminate the services of around 1 per cent of its staff this year. This means that the axe could fall on over 3,000 employees as the company had 313,757 staffers on its rolls as on September 30. However, some reports suggested that the firm would dish out pink slips to 25,000-30,000 non-performers, a figure Chandrasekaran strongly contests

“There are no bad performers. It is a question of finding the right role. I don’t think it’s logical to expect a company with 86 per cent utilisation to cut 25,000 jobs,” he said.

The alleged layoffs have created a storm in IT industry circles as the Tata group company accounts for nearly a quarter of the total number of private sector jobs in the organised IT sector.

However, the company said that the onus lay on its staffers, especially at senior levels, to sharpen their output.

“Our Human Resources department does not have a policy to take a decision on the basis of one rank or one year’s rating. It’s a multiple-year process,” said Chandrasekaran, adding that the company continues to hire and train people as demand for its services is growing.

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