Corporate India temp hiring is back on track

Even though revival is bringing in cheer to the job aspirants, headhunters and industry experts believe that companies are looking for temporary hires or ‘temps’ as preferred option for employment. Firms like Reliance, Hewlett-Packard, Oracle, Infosys, Icici Lombard, Birla etc are looking at hiring temps.

According to Bangalore-based employment consulting firm Talentar Managing Director Abhishek Udayai, “ temp hiring is showing a steady growth with companies looking for temporary employees as it will help them in procuring right talent with less salary and minimum perks.”

A recent study ‘Temp Salary Primer 2010’ by TeamLease, an employee outsourcing firm, temporary staffing industry is poised to grow at 18 per cent over the next one year, while temp salary hikes likely to stay in single digit. It said infrastructure and essential services, as well as IT/ITES industry is expected to raise salaries between 7.5 per cent - 15 per cent.

TeamLease Vice- President Rajesh A R said, “Demand for temps has gone up by over 50 per cent on a quarter-on-quarter basis in sectors such as telecom, energy, FMCG, food and beverages.”

Project-based hiring

Temps are usually hired based on projects and their length of employment and incentives are also based on projects. It saves labour and other costs associated with full time employees. In many cases temps work in different location and payrolls are maintained by the employee outsourcing firm. The average salary paid to temps in India is between Rs 7,000 and 35,000 based on the industry. Recruiters say it is not only restricted to entry level jobs but companies are looking at hiring temps in certain senior positions based on requirements.

“Temp is just a stepping stone for employees who enter the industry. It creates an opportunity to work with industry giants which provides learning experience for beginners. Many of our clients absorb temps and this helps them become perm,” says Kelly Services India Managing Director Kamal Karanth.

For employees temping gives them an opportunity to enter into the corporate world and work experience in a MNC will help them to climb up the career ladder. A change in mindset is happening in employees and temp salary is also going up, the only problem with temping, as many see, is employees are not provided with permanent job track. However as companies hire more temps more job opportunities are being created which could be considered as a positive sign of market recovery.