After job cuts, Cognizant halts hikes for senior employees

BENGALURU: The Nasdaq-listed firm, to contain costs partly has been deferring increments and promotions, which has been causing more trouble to the senior employees at Cognizant.

Brain Humphries the CEO of Cognizant has said in an email to its employees, "We are making changes to the manager-plus annual salary revisions and promotions process. We are refining the process not simply to contain costs, but to drive greater career mobility, just in time promotions and more meritocratic culture. Therefore, for this population, we are deferring all decisions on salary increases and promotions until next year."

Uncertainties of hikes in the salary of the employees in the IT sector has been deferring at several companies, especially with the mid to senior executives. This has occurred due to varied, reasons for fall in revenue growth to declining margins.

According to Cognizant, the current cost optimisation drive will be ending by 2020, which will result in total charges of approximately $150-200 million in severance and exit costs, bringing an annualised gross savings to run rate of around $500-550 million by the year 2021.

Humphries had said, Cognizant, has made plans to invest over $200 million in four digital battlegrounds – cloud, IoT, digital engineering and data.

Humphries in his email had also mentioned and said that "the previously announced hiring of approximately 500 revenue-generating associates over the coming year, a combination of customer-facing and sales support professionals who will help us in expanding existing accounts as we generate new ones. Significant investments in Cognizant Academy and in technical skills as we aim to reskill and redeploy our talent towards digital imperatives. Accelerated investments in tooling and automation and increased investments in marketing, branding, as we aim to strengthen our international operations and our digital brand."