http://www.itsmyascent.com/web/itsmyascent/career-advice/-/asset_publisher/W3x7/content/relieving-letter-as-important-as-other-certificates-a-study 
TeamLease releases 12th survey in ‘India's New World of Work' series on ‘Impactful Exits'

TeamLease Services, a composite staffing company, released the findings of its latest survey ‘Impactful Exits' as part of its survey series to understand ‘India's new World of Work'.

The survey conducted across major cities revealed that a majority (92 per cent) of employees and managements across all industries followed exit policies very seriously. This went up to around 99 per cent in Bangalore and Chennai, establishing Gen Y's preferences for policies and processes at workplace along with a good pay packet. Another startling revelation made by the study was the importance of relieving letter. Apart from a mere eight per cent, majority of the companies expressed apprehension in formalising recruitment without the relieving letter.

Aimed at mapping in-depth facts about the beliefs and practices of Gen Y, the current study tries to capture the importance of exit policy and its impact on exit process. According to the study, better prospects and salary hike motivated employees to quit the incumbent organisation. However, one third (33 per cent) of the employees surveyed said they would re-join their organisation if given an opportunity.

Further, according to the study except for a minor eight per cent, majority of the companies' still favoured manual exit interviews over online, emphasising the reliance on face-to-face interactions. Also another startling disclosure was unlike the popular notion Silicon Valley of India still lagged behind in terms of adopting online exit interviews. Only a mere four per cent of the companies conducted exit interviews online in Bangalore. The study also highlighted the demand for longer notice period. Around 78 per cent of employees stressed on having longer notice periods for the company, helping the employees to complete pending work as well as the companies to contract the right candidate.

Apart from the sentiments of employees, viewpoints of HR managers from a company perspective have also been captured in the study. Though salary deduction is the norm for non-compliance, companies did not hold back from taking legal action in cases of violation of integrity. With more than half of the HR managers in Mumbai (55 per cent) using the feedback as a resource, the study has further reinforced Exit interviews as an important data source for formulating HR policies.

Key findings

• Around 92 per cent of Indians across all industries and cities believe exit policies should be taken seriously and given lot of importance. Bangalore and Chennai with 99 per cent topped the list whereas employees in Mumbai did not care much
• A majority of around 76 per cent of the companies still conducted exit interviews manually only
• Better prospects and salary hike are the top two reasons for leaving the company.
• 23 per cent of companies surveyed said they do not proceed with employment due to unavailability of relieving letter
• Relieving letter is an important document while recruiting a new person for most of the companies across industries
• Overall, 78 per cent of employees surveyed feel that longer notice period (>30 days) is required for a company
• More than half (56 per cent) of HR managers opted for Salary deduction for not serving the required notice period
• Overall, 39 per cent of HR managers take legal action against errant employees who have violated any integrity or ethical boundaries
• Higher per cent of Mumbai employees has observed the change in behaviour from managers to resignee (17 per cent), from peers to resignee (9 per cent) as well as by resignee themselves (12 per cent)
• Resignee shows less responsibility and low interest towards work in their notice period 
• Fixed factors related to job profile, compensation, work environment, company policies are captured by higher per cent of companies during the exit interviews as compared to variable factors which are more dependent on people (e.g. support and guidance provided by the managers, training, timely feedback, clarity of communication, etc.).
• Exit policy mainly helps in future decision and policy making for HR managers

http://peoplematters.in/articles/cover-story/its-hypothesis-testing 

Feb 7th 2012

By Manish Sabharwal, Co-Founder & Chairman, TeamLease Services, Ashok Reddy, Co-founder & MD, TeamLease Services and Mohit Gupta, Co-founder & Director, TeamLease Services

Here is a unique story of the trio from elite academic backgrounds, who began their careers as investment bankers in Bombay, but found themselves in a core HR business, much as a result of their belief in the need to evolve the business idea per market demand. Manish Sabharwal, Mohit Gupta and Ashok Reddy are three friends from school, with very complementing personalities and work approaches, who decided to join hands in 1998, and haven’t looked back since.

Their first venture, India Life started with the idea to create an insurance company, specifically health insurance, but the government regulations then did not allow them to take it forward. But learning from starting an entrepreneurial venture was so attractive that they decided to evolve the business idea and substantially morphed the business over the years. And India Life first began as an investment advisory firm for pension fund benefits. But when they actually approached the market, companies explained to them the limitations of the scope of advisory in this space, being a regulated market, and that forced them to evolve their business further. As Ashok rightly said, “Starting a business is like hypothesis testing; you don’t know that is right until you do it.” The journey helped them understand that the real pain-points were in the administration of pension funds in the highly regulated market. Thus, through 1998-2001, India Life Pension Service was established to focus on pension administration, transaction processing and regulatory compliance.

As the business evolved, clients demanded that India Life also take care of their payroll processing, and once again they revised their business plan. And in 3 years, they built the largest payroll and pension administration company in India. India Life was fortunate to have initiated the right business at the right time, as there was a latent need for this service and India Life managed to get their first client, Siemens, within 3 months of starting business. Siemens was going through its VRS process at the time and wanted to cut down their employee count by about 4000, from its total 40,000 employees. India Life took on the task of settling the benefits for all 4000 employees. With no resources and experience, servicing Siemens was exciting and full of learning. They worked in partnership with Siemens as opposed to looking at it as a mere transaction. So together, they identified solutions, problems and resolved them. Churning out reports and calculations for each employee from decade old ledgers that came filled in cartons was a challenge that they delivered upon and that led to other clients like Levi’s, SAP, Wrigleys, etc., and then there was no looking back. India Life began its journey wanting to become a scale business, and the trust, conviction of the team and the idea itself brought them a venture capitalist, View Group which funded the business on day zero and they raised 2 million USD (then about 8-9 crores Indian rupees).

Alongside, India Life was also in dialogue with a Bangalore-based CA who had about 20 customers. India Life acquired his business along with the nine employees who then became its first employees. This base allowed India Life to make Bangalore its headquarters, along with the fact that Bangalore was an easy city that more people were open to migrate to when they set out looking for talent.

In the first 2 years, India Life never made any profits but ample investments were being made in technology, processes, people and office. By the end of year 1, they grew to 24-25 employees, since they soon acquired more clients. Attracting the right people to work for India Life was critical. And the fact that they, had their customers on board, were committed to the long run, were making investments, and had the money from the VC, helped attract people. The business took off early and became cash positive within the first 3 years.

By 2001, there were 250 members and India Life had extended their product offering from administration of provident fund, gratuity and superannuation, to actuarial valuation, to consulting, to conversion of defined benefits plan to defined contribution plan, and even ventured into payroll process outsourcing. Since most of the inputs for pension actually came from payroll, so it was a backward integration and became a greater lock-in on the customer. By 2001, India Life also grew to become the largest player in the country in that space. It was at this time that Manish, Mohit and Ashok knew that the way forward for India Life was to go global. But they personally did not want to venture out yet as they believed there was enough opportunity in India itself. This led to the merger of India Life and Hewitt, the second largest player then, which wanted to go global and required their processes, technology and people and the trio thought this was a good opportunity for India Life to spread its wings. When India Life got into the strategic partnership with Hewitt, Manish stayed on for the year to enable the transition, while Mohit and Ashok withdrew from the business.

Though extremely different personalities, the three have been absolutely effective when working together and that to a great extent, also allowed them the bandwidth to scale much faster. So, even as they were exploring on the deal with Hewitt, they were also evaluating what they could do next towards the end of 2000. A constant point of reference that they got from their customers was that while companies needed people, they were unable to necessarily hire them or find them. On studying this opportunity, they realized that temporary staffing was a 120 billion dollar business globally then. And India had no single provider. But the challenge again was that the concept of temp staffing never existed in India then, and therefore it was a concept sell, especially on the candidate side, as ‘temp’ is not a lifestyle choice in India unlike rest of the globe. So, TeamLease began its journey and once again they hit the ground running, given the latent need for temp staffing with no existing service provider. While the plan was to start business in June 2002, TeamLease had to pre-date its business date to April as their first client, Intel needed to migrate its employees with immediate effect.

TeamLease began operations with the exit money from India Life and by the end of its first year, it had about 1200 employees who were temped out. The strength of the three friends once again afforded them the bandwidth to initiate operations out of Delhi, Mumbai and Bangalore in the first year itself. And with three initial employees, they began to grow their second venture, and today TeamLease is a 750 member organization, which includes many people from India Life days, who returned to join the trio. While TeamLease has grown to become a large business, it continues to be entrepreneurial in nature with its features of quick on decision making, absence of red tape, organizational hierarchy, and a risk taking approach.

A critical aspect that has worked for TeamLease in growing its business and team, is that the three founders always told their people that their ‘chair is on offer’. Each time someone has made Manish, Mohit or Ashok redundant in their respective roles, it was an opportunity to concentrate on other aspects of the business. As Ashok affirms, “The only way you can grow the business is if you view the people who are below you as those who can grow to take on the role that you are playing. If you view them as competition, you will never nurture that element of bandwidth within the organization.”

The reality of the sickened state of ‘employability’ dawned upon TeamLease when, while they hired a person every 5 minutes of their existence, less than 5% of those who came in, got a job. This became even more evident during the downturn when rejection rates began to soar, as while candidates had the necessary qualifications, they did not have the skills for the job. And this led TeamLease to explore the possibility of entering the training space. The downturn also took a hit on the temping business and from 80,000 employees, the number fell to 45,000 employees in 2008. TeamLease used this time to overhaul their IT system, processes and training, which helped them prepare for its growth phase when the market bounced back. Presently, TeamLease is back to having 65,000-70,000 employees and growing on a healthy margin.

While India Life and TeamLease were B to B businesses, where they serviced and earned revenue from the corporate side, training was a B to C model. But since training would address the employability aspect, it was a backward integration to the TeamLease business. Therefore, a Greenfield venture was initiated until the opportunity to acquire IIJT came. This was funded by a first round of fund raised from Gaja Capital. IIJT was a company that had grown fast but did not invest right in building its basic framework, but TeamLease saw it as a platform to speed up learning on the training side. The last 20 months have seen a huge focus on the training front, in terms of building the team and bandwidth.

The business idea saw a full circle, when along with employment and employability, they also saw a huge need to address the education part to meet the larger need to address the issue of skilling in India in a macro sense. While, ‘employment’ is catered to through TeamLease which focuses on matching the problem of bringing the element of supply and demand together, the element of ‘employability’ is addressed by IIJT through its focus on ‘repairing’ the people for the job requirement. The latest inclusion is the ‘education’ part, which aims at ‘preparing’ people to bridge the gap of inadequate vocational education in India. The TeamLease University, due to start in Gujarat, is the new venture which is vocation-oriented and will aim to prepare talent for the element of the job market and skills required by the industry.

Keeping in mind the additional funding required at the time, that is, more investment for IIJT and funding to set up the TeamLease University, the group raised the second round of fund with ICICI Venture and Gaja Capital in April 2011. For TeamLease, the growth and scale has been possible all through because of their ability to gauge the market need and make the right investments in infrastructure, technology and people. Their continuous focus on treating the business idea as a hypothesis testing, which allowed them to redefine the business focus with the changing customer demand, is perhaps what led to their success in every new venture. While the business idea continued to evolve to cater to customer needs that changed over time, certain elements like transparency, hard work and growth for its people did not change. Even today, the belief that the growth of the business is a result of the effort of its people, drives TeamLease and IIJT to reserve upto 20 percent of their share holding for ESOPs to its employees.

It is the mindset of a large organization despite being an entrepreneurial venture that has today led them to address the macro aspect of skilling in India. Their focus on transparency and believing that sunshine is the best disinfectant encourages an environment of open discussion, which enabled them to take quick decisions and create a resilient workplace. As an organization, they strongly believe in not waiting for all the lights to be green to initiate something. A learning they nurture is that action must come before approval, for it is impossible to convince the authorities until they can be shown what is possible. While in the early stages, people called TeamLease an illegal business, today that business has led to a new industry in staffing.

http://www.thehindubusinessline.com/industry-and-economy/economy/article2879849.ece?homepage=true&ref=wl_home 

BANGALORE, FEB 10: 

With most companies facing attrition upwards of 20 per cent, the ‘exit interview' has assumed greater importance in employer-employee relationship.

Staffing solutions company TeamLease Services's countrywide study found that almost 92 per cent of employees and managements across industries took exit policies very seriously, with 99 per cent doing so in Bangalore and Chennai, and 85 per cent in Mumbai.

‘RELIEVING LETTER'The ‘relieving letter' from the current employer was becoming an important requirement for formalising employment in a new organisation. Only about eight per cent disregarded it.

About 76 per cent of the employees preferred a personal exit interview rather than an online one, attributing ‘reliance' to face-to-face interviews.

The study found that Bangalore, the Silicon Valley of India, lagged in online exit interviews, with only four per cent of companies adopting them, compared to Mumbai (29 per cent) and Kolkota (26 per cent).

Titled ‘Impactful Exits', the survey found that better prospects and salary hikes motivated employees to change jobs.

Around 78 per cent of employers insisted on longer notice periods and helping the employees to complete pending work.

EXIT INTERVIEWThe growing importance of the exit interview also shows that employees are recognising that the labour market is a small place and ungraceful exits can have negative consequences later. “Adherence to a professional and clean exit is increasingly being seen amongst the workforce today. But we don't anticipate relieving certificates becoming a deal breaker for new employers until the skill crisis eases,” says Ms Surabhi Mathur Gandhi, Senior Vice-President, IT Sourcing, TeamLease Services.

The study covered 800 respondents in eight cities: Ahmedabad, Bangalore, Chennai, Delhi, Hyderabad, Kolkata, Mumbai and Pune. Respondents were aged 21-45 years, across industries and functions.

http://www.dnaindia.com/bangalore/report_todays-youth-says-no-family-business_1622946

The movie Wake Up Sid is a perfect example of the new phenomenon in India. Just like Sid (Ranbir Kapoor), who chose not to join his father’s lucrative business despite daddy’s numerous attempts, today’s youth prefer to tread new roads in the multinational corporate world. A similar story is unfolding in many of India’s business families.

“I respect my father for the huge business empire he has built. Though I was never too inclined towards joining my family, after acquiring a degree from Oxford, I realised I wanted to get into investment banking abroad,” said a banker whose family is in 
the mining and shipping business.

Youngsters, today, have the right credentials. They are educated at Ivy League institutions and prefer to test their mettle beyond the family comfort zone. Vishesh Jayawanth is starting his new venture OnlineGuru, which aims to make education affordable and accessible through online portals. “I chose not to join my family business because it doesn’t give me a kick. I want to be responsible for making my own life,” he said, adding that being the owner’s son would invite differential treatment towards him from employees of the firm. “This will not give me the space to make mistakes and learn the business.”

Most conventional family businesses in India, operating in a traditional space like trading and manufacturing, are seen as unglamorous. “Youngsters today want to see and experience the outside world. Many a time, they do not relate to their family business. They want to work in a field that is more up to date,” said Sangeeta Lala, vice-president, Teamlease.

Nandini Vaidhyanathan, a travelling professor, who teaches entrepreneurship at London School of Economics, Princeton University and IIM-B, said one of the biggest concerns youth are faced with is that of the organisation’s culture in family businesses being feudalistic.

“Youngsters with Ivy league schooling find it difficult to adapt to the situation, having been exposed to the professional culture in multinational companies.” She said these businesses have been running in a particular way for years and are not amenable to change their working models in tune with today’s context, which deters the youth.

For instance, in 2005, Kavita Sabharwal decided to move out of her father’s $600 million company Lupin to set up her first branch of Neev, a popular pre-school in Bangalore. She saw an opportunity in the pre-school segment in the country.

Similar is the case of Arjun Balijee. The 30-year-old got roped into his father’s hotel empire, Royal Orchid, soon after completing his education. However, in time, Balijee noticed the need for more budget hotels.

He branched out to launch Peppermint chain, which bagged the ‘Best Budget and Economy Hotel’ award at this year’s Hotel Investment Conference South-Asia held in Mumbai in April. 
“I worked with my dad before starting out on my own. It is very easy to work in a family business as you already have a base. The kick to start you own brand that leaves a lasting impression is more gratifying,” said Arjun.

Closer to home, Infosys founder NR Narayan Murthy’s children have decided to gain experience outside Infosys.

However, there is another group of youngsters who, after gaining work experience, join their family business to take it to the next 
level.

With a degree from Harvard, Rishad Premji worked with firms like General Electric and Bain & Co before joining his father at Wipro in 2007.Likewise, Sunil Mittal’s son, Shravin Mittal, has joined as manager at Bharti Airtel International-Netherlands.

“Children of renowned families such as the Godrej, TAFE, Zydus, Dabur, etc, have returned after a few years of experience to join family business. However, they have often driven the growth, introduced new businesses or added new sectors to the conglomerate,” said K Ramachandran from Indian School of Business.

“This rarely happened earlier. Today, even if they are joining their family business, there is a certain level of professionalism that is expected of them,” said Lala.

http://www.mydigitalfc.com/opportunities/every-second-indian-looking-jobnxt-637

Indian industry is going to see an upheaval in employment rolls over the next five years if the workers and other staff do as they intend to do, that is, quit their current jobs and look for greener pastures in other companies. And when it happens, it won’t just be a switch from one job to another similar but more paying one; it will more likely be jettisoning one career in favour of another.

This worrying scenario emerges from a survey which says over 50 per cent of all Indian workers want to switch careers with­­in five years — mainly on money and lifestyle considerations. A better work-life balance is what they are looking for, says a survey conducted by the global workforce solutions firm Kelly Services. A part of a larger exercise in 30 countries, the sur­vey in India took in a varied sample of 2,000 respondents from varied sectors and work levels.

Opinion of experts is divided. Some agree with the findings. Others, mainly companies, don’t foresee an exodus, even as some of them admit they are working on sorting out important employee issues.

Kamal Karanth, managing director of Kelly, sees two clear trends emerging from the survey his company conducted: 1) that job-holders are willing to take risks of switching jobs and careers and 2) that they are becoming less tolerant of expectation mismatches.

The main reason for the restiveness, cited by 36 per cent of the respondents, is the need for better work-life balance.

A significant 23 per cent are willing to job-hop for more pay. A little over fifth of all respondents would switch jobs in keeping with changing personal interests – this, in other words, implies a willingness to change career altogether.

That this means making a fresh start and another log plod is not a deterrent to many. In fact, according to Karanth, their numbers are “surprisingly large”, all actively thinking of a career change. They are willing to go through another uphill struggle if that ensure a better future for them.

This may happen even as a natural course, says E Balaji, MD and chief executive director of Ma Foi Randstad. Because five years is a long span it’s quite possible that half the workforce may make a career switch.

He sees the possibility of the biggest switch happening at junior levels, which see most recruitments and where job roles and opportunities are higher than at mid-to-senior levels.

It will be worrying if this change is to come about within one or two years. Attrition will obviously go up and companies will be hard pressed to retain staff. Balaji agrees that the yearning more money, better job roles and working for better brands is what may propel job hops.

Another finding of the survey is that even in a career change three-fourths of the respondents are confident of resuming at the same level after a break taken for a variety of reasons that include maternity/paternity leave, illness or extended holidays.

Ashok Reddy, MD of TeamLease, is not sure that five years from now, companies will see half their people gone and replaced. True, a significant number switch careers every year, but a quantum jump in their numbers will take time.

Companies Financial Chronicle spoke to will go along with Reddy. For example, Sanjiv Goenka, chairman of the RP Sanjiv Goenka group, says there is no denying that quality of life is an important issue for everyone, be it the employer or the employee.

“There are and will be switching of careers,” asserts Goenka, for people will always like to work in a city with congenial infrastructure and atmosphere and a social life. But exactly what proportion of workers will switch is something he refuses to get into.

Even before the survey some companies have given it a thought. The Tata group is expanding what it calls the “second innings career programme” for women who have a career break.

Tata Services’ VP for talent acquisition, Radhakrishnan Nair, says career change or career break for woman happens. Women take leave for starting a family or meeting other personal commitments. This is a way to achieve a work-life balance and the group encourages them to come back.

The Tatas’ special programme helps professionally qualified women with at least four years of work experience who may have taken career breaks of as even eight years and now want to restart. Nair says the programme is working well and will be extended to more cities.

Job-hops are nothing new. Joydeep Dutta Gupta, COO of Deloitte India's consulting business, says that over the past five years the average attrition rate in Indian companies has been around 15 per cent. This implies, a churning of 75 per cent has already taken place in these five years.

At junior levels job switches happen mainly because of the lure of more money. Mid-level switched happen because of career concerns and the quest for a fatter CV. At senior levels people switch jobs in search of a proper functional role for themselves – what matters most is the scope to function independently and whether a job gives them decision-making powers. All this comes out in a perusal of exit interviews and exit forms in a cross-section of Indian companies, says Dutta Gupta.

What’s the solution? “Employee engagements,” according to Suresh J, CEO of Arvind Brands and Retails. Companies are laying increasing importance on this aspect. Arvind does so, providing growth avenues and good pay, and therefore does not foresee job-switches on a large scale.

Generally speaking, however, Suresh sees the retail industry having controlled attrition to a great extent. But a few companies still face severe attrition issues. The reason being that ambition levels are very high and even if the compensation is good, workers aspire for still better roles and higher pay – something, he admits, “is at times difficult to match.”

HR people at Convergys are aware that lifestyle preferences are changing. Late night shifts in these companies put off many of the older generations. So the companies look at the young who go to sleep at 3 pm.

The day-night cycle being different in BPO jobs, this can be a long-term proposition for staff if they feel connected to the industry and its impact. Younger staff are not so much worried about night shift as they are about the need for a higher education. “Everybody seeks career growth and are ready to work hard,” says Ashish Garg, Convergys director of recruitment.

It is not that IT companies are not trying as hard to retain people as the people themselves are to further their own growth. Last week Phaneesh Murthy, CEO of iGATE and Patni, spoke of how his companies try to reduce attrition. Responding to a question on lower attrition trends, Murthy said: “…. the resolution on the Patni side is dramatically helping. Plus…. we have started rolling out a number of education and learning opportunities for employees in both companies…. I don’t think there’s any one factor, but ….a combination of all of that and the resolution on the deal. I think all of that is really helping.”

(With inputs from Ritwik Mukherjee in Kolkata, B Krishna Mohan in Hyderabad and Kumar Shankar Roy in New Delhi)

http://epaper.timesofindia.com/Default/Scripting/ArticleWin.asp?%20From=Archive&Source=Page&Skin=TOINEW&BaseHref=TOIBG/2011/07/20&PageLabel=17&EntityId=Ar01703&ViewMode=HTML

New Candidates Exert Pressure On Training Infrastructure Of IT Companies
Bangalore: Urban-bred, English-speaking tech talent is limited. So, vast numbers of those joining the IT workforce now are from tier II and III towns, and though they are technically good, many of them do not have adequate knowledge of English, and they lack what’s called soft skills – etiquette, proper conduct in different settings. 
For an international business like IT, this is a huge challenge, and it is placing new requirements on their training infrastructure. If the employability was about 60% among urban applicants, it is a mere 10% among those who come from smaller towns around the country. 
“These candidates have good academic records and possess sound technical knowledge. But they are lost in transition. They try to translate their vernacular thoughts into English. As a result, the entire meaning gets distorted,” says Nirupama V G, MD, AdAstra, a hiring and training firm. 
Geetha Kannan, an independent HR practitioner, says when she joined Infosys in 1990 most of her colleagues were from the IITs. “Today, the industry is rapidly expanding its employment base, and we have no option but to look at the available talent pool, where employability is the biggest issue,'' she says. The inability to express in English shows up sometimes as an attitude problem. For instance, when a candidate was asked to speak about himself, he said, “All there in my CV, please read it.” A senior job seeker who was asked what was his salary expectation was had this to say, “You say you give job, then I say compensation.” Even if they are cleared by hiring firms, they are rejected at the final interview at the employer end. Companies see clarity in communication as being critical at the workplace for individuals and teams to function seamlessly. 

Sangeeta Lala, co-founder of manpower firm TeamLease Services, says, “Candidates may be academically and technically sound, but certain level of aptitude, articulation and attitude are required to bring out their functional skills to the fore. Many candidates look great on paper, and that's it.” 

To deal with the issue, external hirers have stepped up or freshly set up communication training activities. IT companies too have increased the time spent on training on soft skills and communication from 10% to 30%. The scenario has also spawned an ancillary industry for employment-training. 
Says Romi Malhotra, CEO, Linkage India, a leadership development firm, “In the US, children need to speak and make presentations right from Class 3. But an Indian student's English speaking ability is tested only if he/she is doing a PhD. Our culture is about being silent, about listening. No one is allowed to challenge the status quo. Tolerance is a virtue. All these controls are taught at a tender age and children's speakingability gets choked.''

http://www.indianexpress.com/news/india-incs-hiring-dips-in-april/789513/0

Posted: Thu May 12 2011, 13:40 hrs New Delhi:India Inc's hiring activity witnessed a marginal decline in the month of April, owing to the ongoing appraisal season, but overall industries are upbeat about their hiring sentiment and 2011 is expected to be a landmark year for job creation, job portal Naukri.Com says.

The Naukri Job Speak index for April this year stood at 1062, 2 per cent below the March 2011 index and 4 per cent above the April 2010 levels.

Commenting on the results, Info Edge India, which runs job site Naukri.com, CEO and MD Hitesh Oberoi said: "hiring tends to slowdown a little in the first quarter every year because of the appraisal cycle. We expect hiring to pick up again by June/July this year".

An industry-wise analysis shows that all the top industry sectors witnessed minor dips in their hiring activity.

Sectors like auto, banking, oil and telecom saw their indices dipping by 2 per cent in April this year over March 2011, while the BPO sector saw a 16 per cent dip in the hiring activity in April, 2011 when compared to the last month.

Meanwhile, the construction and engineering sector witnessed maximum movement in the employment front both monthly as well annually as the index moved up by 9 per cent in April, 2011 over March, 2011 and by 13 per cent over the same period last year.

Both IT and Capital Goods sector maintained steady hiring levels over the month, the report said.

A city-wise analysis shows that most cities have experienced a lull in hiring activity in April, 2011.

Among the metros only Mumbai maintained steady hiring levels, while Delhi and Hyderabad saw dips of 2 per cent, respectively in April, 2011 over March, 2011.

Bengaluru and Chennai saw dips of 15 per cent and 12 per cent, respectively in April, 2011 over March, 2011.