RANK 15: HCL Technologies: The Big Fall

This was a big fall–from a position among the top five best IT employers at
# 4 last year to #15. Some HR parameters, including attrition and retention
rates, improved (HCL Tech ranked fifth on both). The company’s attrition rate
at 9.1% was good compared to the industry average of 12.3%. Even its retention
rate at 82.3% was just below the industry average of 88%. The setback came from
low comparative overall satisfaction (ranked 14), peer satisfaction (13th) and
average salary (13th).

The biggest hit was on preferred company and preferred employer scores. Only
1% of all IT employees voted for it as their dream   company,
compared to 6.5% last year. The number of its own employees voting for it as
preferred employer also came down drastically–from 65% last year to 19.4%–the
lowest among the Top 20. Of the rest of its employees, 27.8% voted for Infosys,
16.7% for Cisco, 11.1% each for IBM and Microsoft, and 8.3% for Wipro. However,
most employees said they were happy with the technology they were working on.
Ashok Bhattacharya is the vice president, human resources.