TCS, HCL Tech and Wipro ring the bell – It’s time to return to office

• After over two years of work from home (WFH), Indian IT companies are “encouraging” employees to return to offices.
  
• While TCS and Wipro have mandated their employees to work three days a week from offices, HCL Tech says it has not made it mandatory yet.
  
• The golden period of WFH, moonlighting and big wage hikes seems to be over for IT employees.
  

Indian IT majors Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), HCL Technologies and Wipro are ringing the bells and alerting their employees to return to offices. While some have used language like “encourage”, others have said that this will allow employees to learn from their seniors and peers.

Work from home (WFH) gained prominence during the Covid-19 pandemic, forcing companies and employees all over the world to change the way they work. This required digitalisation of workflows on a large scale, and during this time Indian IT companies witnessed strong growth.

What this episode also showed was that companies could function with their employees working from their homes – a good internet connection and a workspace was all that was needed.

WFH challenges

However, WFH also poses security and collaboration challenges.

In light of this, companies like TCS and HCL Tech said during their Q2 earnings calls that they were “encouraging” employees to return to offices.

“We have been encouraging our associates to return to offices for some days in a week. A significant number of our employees are already doing so,” TCS said in a statement. During the company’s Q2 earnings call, TCS’ HR head, Milind Lakkad underlined that 30-35% of the company’s employees have already returned to offices.

The company is reportedly implementing a roster-based attendance system from December. Earlier, media reports suggested that TCS wanted 85% of its employees to return to office at least three days a week.

Wipro and HCL Tech join the chorus

TCS’ peer Wipro has also joined the chorus now, wanting its employees to show up at offices.

Wipro sent out a letter earlier this month asking its employees to return to office at least three days a week, following in the footsteps of TCS.

It also said that its offices would be open four days a week, with employees having an option to attend any three out of those four days. Curiously, the offices would remain closed on Wednesdays, the company said.

In its earnings call, HCL Tech said it is “encouraging” employees to return to office thrice a week like its peers, but it has not made the practice mandatory yet.

‘We have 45,000 employees in the office at any given time’

Infosys CEO and MD Salil Parekh revealed that the company had 45,000 employees in its offices at any given time – that is about 13% of its total workforce of 3.45 lakh at the end of Q2.

“My sense is, over time, we will make all the support necessary to employees so that more and more employees can return to office. There are, of course, several client situations, which require specific action. Those will be followed as per clients' requirements but wherever we are able to provide some flexibility, we will continue to provide flexibility,” Parekh said, adding that this approach had worked well for Infosys so far.

He also said that the number of employees returning to offices was increasing over time.

The future may very well belong to hybrid working, and for now, it looks like IT companies are trying to understand how much they can stretch their employees who have figured out that WFH is feasible – so much so that home loans are now growing at a faster rate in Tier 3 and Tier 4 districts.

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