92% freshers agreed to join Wipro at half salary, reveals HR head Saurabh Govil

Saurabh Govil emphasised that Wipro's decision to reduce the compensation packages for freshers was taken with 'transparency'. (File photo)

Wipro's Chief Human Resources Officer (CHRO) Saurabh Govil recently revealed that 92 percent of the freshers opted to join the tech giant at a half salary to fast-track the onboarding process. Speaking to Moneycontrol, Govil said that the new recruits were given the choice to accept or reject the lower salary.

He emphasised that Wipro's decision to reduce the compensation packages for freshers was taken with "transparency", Govil added that they were given the option to either accept or reject the significantly slashed compensation to opt for faster onboarding after which 92 percent chose to take the job.

"We onboarded the first batch of Velocity candidates, and then we realised that we didn't have a requirement at that point in time for such resources," the Wipro HR head said. "However, we were onboarding people at the lower band. So we gave them a choice, in all transparency. Their old option was still valid, and they could wait to be onboarded. Or, there was another option: they could join a lower band."

"Ninety-two percent of the candidates chose to join at the lower band because they were raring to go. There is a handful of those, who have chosen to wait," Govil told Moneycontrol. "When they are onboarded, they'll be onboarded at Rs 6.5 lakh. We have been most transparent and fair. We have not cut anybody's salary. But unfortunately, that’s how it got picked up."

He further explained that the company hired people from campuses at a salary of Rs 3.5 lakh, then Wipro bore the cost of training them into becoming full-stack engineers. "We had said that they will be onboarded at a higher salary of Rs 6.5 lakh after they completed the training and cleared the assessment," Govil told Moneycontrol.

Referring to the criticism that the company has been facing ever since it decided to slash freshers' salaries, Wipro HR head said, "Assessments have been happening for years. People are away from actual work (from the time they graduate to when they are onboarded). It is to help them get trained and again make an investment in them. I don't know why it's becoming an issue."

"I was reading somewhere that 58 percent of freshers have not been onboarded yet. It's unfortunate that we are being targeted because it's happening all across and we are being most honest and fair," Govil said. "In fact, we were the only ones to invest Rs 30,000 in training each candidate before they even became our employees."

In February, the tech giant wrote to candidates it previously made a job offer of Rs 6.5 lakh per annum (LPA), asking if they would be willing to take up the offer at Rs 3.5 LPA. It came in an uncertain demand environment, margin pressures, and recessionary concerns, which caused Wipro to delay onboarding for the 2022 batch of graduates for several months.

Read more: Unfortunate that we’re being targeted, have been transparent and fair: Wipro HR head on fresher onboarding delays