Information technology (IT) major Cognizant’s employees will see an average salary increase of up to 10 per cent this year.
On Monday, the New Jersey-headquartered software services firm started giving annual pay hikes to its staff, joining peers such as Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) and Wipro in rolling out merit salary increases (MSI) in the face of increasing macroeconomic headwinds and a tight labour market
Last week, Cognizant conveyed to its employees that “formal eLetters” with the new salary package would be out through the week, with the hikes taking effect from October for levels up to associate director, according to a report in ET.
However, the company mentioned that its employees in Germany and France may have to wait a bit more to get new salary hike letters because of local worker law rules.
Citing people familiar with the matter, the financial daily reported that the pay hikes are in the range between 7 per cent and 10 per cent.
The company’s voluntary attrition levels climbed to 31 per cent in the quarter ended June 30. However, the company executives have always highlighted that the calculations at Cognizant include BPO, trainees and corporate associates, emphasising the metric has been largely in line with the industry standards.
In June last year, Cognizant started an internal job moves programme, through which 33,000 staff switched roles within the company.
Recently, Indian peers have rolled out salary increases. Last week, TCS, the country’s largest IT company, said it would award 100 per cent variable pay for 70 per cent of its staff bringing in the festive cheer early.
In September this year, Wipro announced the annual increments for eligible employees for the financial year ending 2022. The Bengaluru-based IT behemoth was expected to cover 96 per cent of its employees.
Separately, the daily earlier mentioned that record salary hikes given out by IT majors over the last two years are likely to drop in the next fiscal year, as a global slump is compelling companies to balance hiring against rising expenses.
