TCS offers quirky titles and little else in recruiting revamp to attract 40K hires

Like many in south Indian states, folks in parts of Latin America affectionately call their grandfather “tata”. That was enough for Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) to attempt a gentle tug at the heartstrings in hopes of boosting hiring in the Spanish-speaking region.

In a self-proclaimed nod to its nearly six-decade information technology (IT) presence, TCS launched a campaign there from 2018 onwards, urging prospective recruits to join the grandfather of all IT firms.

So in 2020, TCS launched a three-tier framework to attract freshers in India. At the centre of this is its entrance exam, the national qualifier test (NQT). Depending on their scores on the six-year-old test, new hires are placed into quirkily-named brackets—Ninja, Digital, and Prime.

However, unlike its supporting sector, the IT industry has an evergreen supply of students from engineering colleges across India. This begs the question: why do IT services companies feel compelled to rebrand their hiring efforts?

To explain this, S Pasupathi, chief operating officer at recruitment firm Careernet, drew inspiration from India’s automotive space, likening the cost-efficient and dependable nature of Maruti Suzuki to that of IT firms.

He detailed how India’s top carmaker tapped a higher-paying category of customers by merely adding Nexa—a provider of premium sedans and hatchbacks—as another tier to its existing broad base.

Similarly, the IT companies added roles with higher salary slabs to signal to clients and colleges that, although they are known for cost-efficiency, they can roll out the big bucks to capture top talent, added Pasupathi.

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