Enjoying the work...

My days now go mostly in talent hunting. Almost everyday, I see at least two candidates for different positions like Practice Leader, Project Manager, Technical Lead, Sales Leader, Marketing & Communication Manager, HR Leader so on and so forth.

I do enjoy these discussions with the candidates, as there is a lot to hear from them on market, competition, recent trends etc. and learn thereof. But the most interesting thing is to hear about their perception about the role that we are offering and their expectations from the company.

In one of the discussions, the candidate said that he wants to remain in technical field only and do not want to be a people pusher. I tried to understand little bit in detail what he meant by that statement. And believe me, whole IT service industry, especially Indian IT biggies’ practice unfolded, though known but from the perspective of younger generation.

There is a lot of pressure on profitability on the biggies as all of them are now listed companies, where they have to report better profitability quarter on quarter. Being a linear model, they push all delivery units to improve utilization and that too at junior level so that the salary expenses are kept to minimum. Anyone with more than five years experience is expected to play the role of project coordinator which entails primarily customer communication, but mostly supervising the work of the team. Some of them like this role, as it is an elevated position, a managerial one, and looks good in the organization hierarchy. But most of them hate it, as it takes away their opportunity for them to hone up their technical skill through practice.

They do not enjoy anymore what they do. They look for other companies, where they can get opportunity to roll up their sleeves and engage in true technical work, be it specification, architecture, design, tool, code walkthrough or testing. They feel satisfied with their daily dose of experimentation and gradual rise in the learning curve.

Welcome the new syndrome!  People, especially the young generation will look for and stay for the work content rather than position within hierarchy; which they will be enjoying in their daily life.