Patni hands pink slips to 400 'non-performers'

MUMBAI / BANGALORE: After Tata Consultancy Services and IBM Global Services, Patni Computer Systems has laid off close to 400 employees citing non-performance issues. The country’s sixth-largest exporter said it was part of a routine appraisal exercise, carried out every year to weed out non-performers, and not related to any slowdown issues.

“This was an absolutely regular appraisal that is important for any performance-driven organisation. It is something standard we do every year. Employees who have got 0-1 rating on a scale of 5 typically form the basis for the first-level shortlist. These are performance-based resignations; we’ve not issued any termination letters,” said Rajesh Padmanabhan, executive vice-president and head – global HR, Patni. He said the comparable figure for last year was 148.

In February this year, in the backdrop of a pronounced slowdown in the US, TCS had asked about 500 employees to leave for non-performance. Shortly afterwards, IBM was reported to have laid off 700 freshers. In case of TCS, the figure was about 0.5% of its total workforce and for IBM, about 1% of its India workforce. For Patni, the figure is closer to 3% of its 14,800 workforce.

A Patni spokesperson said the company continued to be a net hirer. “Retrenchment is a word used when you are facing negative growth or no growth and cutting down on your labour costs. We continue to recruit — the number of new employees we intend to hire, according to our quarterly results communication, is about 2,000,” said a Patni spokesperson.