Varun Aggarwal

Thomas K Thomas

Debjani Ghosh, the newly-appointed President of Nasscom, is not new to the technology sector. After having spent nearly two decades at Intel, including five years as the Managing Director of Intel’s India operations, Ghosh has moved into a role that has brought her closer to what she always wanted to do. But her appointment at Nasscom comes at a tricky time for the industry.

On the one hand, the industry faces the need to transform itself to adapt to evolving technologies and newer business models, on the other, the Indian IT industry has been hit by tightened visa rules as a result of political rhetoric influencing US policy decision making. In a candid chat with BusinessLine , Ghosh outlines her key focus areas and how she plans to take Nasccom to the next level. Edited excerpts:

What is the biggest challenge facing the Indian IT industry today?

This is one of those rare times in the industry where on the one hand you have the best of opportunities with the advancement in technology, the digital transformation opportunity; and on the other hand, you have never before had the political rhetoric for all the wrong reasons. That is the single biggest threat the industry is facing. It is not skills, it is not technology but really the political rhetoric.

We were with a delegation of US Congressmen last week. Both Republicans and Democrats agree that unfortunately there is no data to support the rhetoric. What scares me the most in this job is that it’s not the impact on Indian IT. If you look at Indian IT companies, only 13 per cent of H-1B visas are going to Indian companies. About 83 per cent is going to US companies.

In India, one area where we definitely have a surplus is STEM skills. Our education system does a fantastic job in creating the foundation.

Given the strength that we have, India’s focus should be to shift the rhetoric and amount of time we are spending talking about job losses to focus on skill development, job creation with the new technologies. We have the capability to create jobs with new technologies and these will be highly paid jobs. For other countries to catch up, it’ll take long. We have a golden opportunity.

Do you think this is a bigger crisis for US companies rather than Indian IT services companies?

It is both. But I think the US will hurt itself a bit more. Skill development cannot keep pace with the emergence of new technologies. There will always be a gap with what the technology opportunities are and the ability to use those opportunities.

H-1B intake has been going down every year. Are the same number of jobs being generated locally in the US? No. The skill gap is increasing.

The US has had the best strategy by becoming a talent magnet and creating an environment wherein the talent will stay back. When you bring highly skilled people, you create more jobs. If you stop that, your overall talent and economy is going to go down.

Therefore, I’m hopeful that sooner rather than later, the data will have to match their (US law makers’) thinking.

This was a big talking point for us with the US Congressmen last week. They identified skill gaps as their main concern. One was the quality and the other was the high dropout rate in STEM education. We were presenting to them the data to clarify the misconceptions around Indian IT. The biggest investment made by Indian IT is in schools and colleges in the US.

Given the geopolitical situation as it is do you think the rhetoric will go down anytime soon or should we take it as the new reality?

Accepting the current situation as reality will be dangerous. I think you just have to up the ante in terms of getting the data out there and at some point it will resonate. Historically, data have taken over emotions.

The new tech ecosystem is all about co-creation. At the centre of the new technology world is data, which has to flow across countries. Borders, therefore, need to go. You need to have cross-border talent mobility. These are short-term skill mobility and that’ll be the new world order. Wherever the work is required, they’ll move, get the work done and come back.

At this point, there are two big mistakes the country can make: one is treating high skilled movement as an immigration and not a trade issue. It is one of the costliest mistakes that the US can make because it’ll mean that they get left out of the co-creation. I’m quite sure the business community in the US will speak out on that.

Meanwhile, a lot of students here don’t want to get into IT education because they feel the door is shutting and there isn’t much scope left in IT...

I disagree. Banks are hiring coders, hospitals want algorithm creators. The demand for new skills is going up. Earlier, only the IT industry was hiring techies but now banks, hospitals, retailers, governments are hiring this talent.

Earlier most of the people we trained used to get hired by the IT industry. Now, the majority of the people are getting hired by the non-IT industry.

How are the re-skilling efforts paying off?

At Nasscom, our biggest priority for this year is to get our skilling platform running. We have already made a commitment that we are going to train a minimum of two million people in the next four years. We have identified around 40 new job skills. We are starting backward.

We’ve identified eight technologies, AI, robotics, cyber security, data analytics etc.

We’ve looked at what new jobs these eight technologies will create. These eight technologies will create 40 new roles that do not exist today. And these will be critical to companies’ success.

Since we’ve announced it, we’ve had a lot of interest from other countries. They want to work with us to take this platform to their country and to their employees. That tells me that we are on the right track.

When you’re looking at these new technologies, how do you deal with the social impact, such as with privacy?

As a country we need to insist on two things — one is simplified terms and conditions — a one pager. And you should have the ability to opt out. For a country where we have so many first-time tech users coming in, we need to have an opt-out option available and the terms have to be available in multiple local languages. If people realise their data have value, they’ll be careful sharing it. We also need a regulatory framework in place.

How do you see Indian start-ups in terms of IP creation? Do you plan to scale up Nasscom’s work with start-ups?

I plan to change it. I don’t think we need to do what everyone else is doing. We don’t need to build for mass scale because today governments and hundreds of accelerators are doing this. Nasscom’s biggest contribution will be to work with high-potential, big start-ups and take them to the next level.

What I want to do is to shift our focus from reach to quality. We are working towards changing the elements of the programme.

I would love to see the next AI or blockchain global disruptor to come from India. We have the skills and potential. I don’t see funding as a problem. Tech mentorship is where I see the value.

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