Why TCS told employees to return to office 5 days a week

Employees were asked to return to work 5 days a week starting October.

India’s largest private sector employer Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) was the first among the large IT sector players to mandate at least some of its employees to return to work on all days of the week. According to the company’s Chief Human Resources Officer Milind Lakkad, TCS “strongly believes” that people need to come back to the office.

This marked a shift in work-from-home policies for the IT sector, signalling a return to pre-pandemic style of work.

The reason for this, according to the CHRO, is that a large number of people who have joined the company in the last three years have either worked virtually or in a hybrid manner.

“We strongly believe that they need to come to work so that the new workforce gets integrated with the larger workforce of TCS. That is the only way they will learn, understand, and internalize TCS values and the TCS way,” Lakkad said.

Employees were asked to return to work 5 days a week starting October, and Moneycontrol previously reported that emails were sent out to various units.

This is also a change in policy for the company, which, since September 2022, had asked employees to come into the office three days a week and mandated that they adhere to a roster. Lakkad has also previously said that while working from home was more convenient for everybody, there were drawbacks to the system.

Chief Operating Officer NG Subramaniam said on October 11 that the company has been advising its employees to work from the office, and are realising its advantages.

“People feel that it is better to be in the office.  About 70 percent of our employees have started to come to office at this stage which is a very good thing. Given the large-scale hiring that we did and the kind of attrition that we experienced…we believe that it is advisable to get everybody back to the office at this stage, which is the need of the hour for TCS,” NGS said.

“The TCS way of working, the membership that they experience and the kind of interactions that one typically has in a collective with customers, these things are not taught anywhere. These things are observed and learned and it's better in a collective workplace,” he added.

This is at odds with the company’s previously announced 25x25 plan. In 2020, under former chief executive officer Rajesh Gopinathan, the company had announced its plan where, by 2025, only 25 percent of its associates will need to work out of its facilities at any point of time. Also, it believes employees will not need to spend more than 25 percent of their time at work.

In response, the COO said that it can be said that for now, this plan is defocused and it’s not necessary that the company will adhere to this plan.

“The important thing is do we have the right systems processes and procedures to adapt ourselves to the needs of things? Our focus is to get everybody back to office, and for that the people who have joined us in the last two years or three years get the full feel of TCS. I think that's more important,” he said.

According to CHRO Lakkad, the company will assess its future work models as they go forward but did not commit to anything. “We will adopt based on what works for our employees and our customers,” he said.