IT companies give out 100% variable pay to retain employees

IT services companies are now doling out 100% variable pay to their employees. This is being done to address rising attrition rates, at a time when they are signing up new clients and expanding existing contracts amid a surge in digitisation by global corporates.

In the last two quarters, many IT companies had stepped up hiring and gave back-to-back pay hikes. The pay-out this quarter is more than the last two, when the variables were not paid out in full in many companies.

Fear of attrition pushing IT companies to raise hike

The Economic Times reported that India’s largest IT services company Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) is giving 100% quarterly variable to all employees who have it as a component of their package, irrespective of their performance. Other companies that gave 100% variable payouts to employees include Infosys and Mindtree Consulting.

According to the publication most of the top IT services companies in India are giving 100% variables for the first quarter of fiscal 2022 and even better pay hikes.

As companies across sectors are accelerating digital transformation, the order books of IT companies are almost full, unlike 2020 when their business had slowed down. Owing to all this, many companies feel that rewarding employees at the moment is the best strategy to retain talent, as the fear of attrition going back to pre-Covid benchmarks, which was at 15-20% on the back of a healthy business pipeline is imminent, said the publication.