What is your take on the current situation of the ITeS segment?

It looks like the clients of the Indian IT companies are demanding more value for their money, and we see some steps as a response – like Infosys announcing mandatory employee certifications (http://www.rediff.com/money/2008/may/22infy.htm). With the current market conditions and all the side-effects of recession, do you think the technical competency of the typical 'Indian software guy' has to eventually increase and a new breed of "senior developers" will emerge?

I fully support Basab’s observations. I have 8+ years of experience ( 5.5 with one of the SWITCH ( Satyam,Wipro,Infy,TCS,Cognizant,HCL) and 3 with an MNC. In SWITCH when I was a fresher our leads with 3+ years of experience were asked to do “management” not “coding” – it is a different story that those clowns were absolutely inept. In fact we asked our Lead to help with coding and he baltanly refused to help us out. So – the entire project was coded by freshers – and this reflected on the quality of the deliverables.
In MNC – my team of 20 had 1 Lead with 6+ years and 1f freshers. Again the quality of the deliverables suffered.
But things were better than SWITCH and technical competency was appreciated. Now I am in US on deputation and I found folks with 12+ years experience doing coding – and I DID notice a difference in the quality of deliverables.
The problem is that once a person accumulates enough experience to achieve a good quality of code, he is made a manager. So effectively all learnings are lost. And the poor folks who are passionate about technology are made to work under the so-called PMs who became a PM because they were inept at coding. Strange !!!

But in most cases ,the person ends up in dealing with some sort of resource management only…

What would be better is to have remove those day to day activities from PM bucket and have him spent more time in technical work.

One of the things i found studying offshoring trends (the focus of my Masters degree) is that many PMs dont go on to become the next generation of leaders in the IT services company.

This creates a bottleneck at senior-top management transitions on two counts.

1. The PMs ‘freeze’ in the IT services industry when they touch 14-16 years of experience. and they block the growth prospects of PMs below them in the pyramid

2. The leadership pipeline in the company starts to look fragile. and rightfully so ? When you see your Senior PMs lacking skills in the areas of risk mgmt, change mgmt, portfolio mgmt, strategic planning, talent management, conflict management, marketing, deal management, customer engagement…..why would you (as a shareholder or customer or employee) trust the future of your organisation to such a generalist – who has merely walked the trail of increased span of control ?

Taking the argument further, the time when there will be a surplus of middle-senior PMs in the market is not far away !

This would, hopefully, act as a counter-weight to the early-promotion-to-PM model.

I read this post of yours now and found some of the points interesting. I have worked for about 5.5 years (with TCS and Infy) before I decided to pursue my MBA and here is my take on your post:

First, the techies in the Silicon Valley usually work on products. The IT companies in India follow a service oriented industry. The work involves some “original creation” but most of it is usually enhancements or modifications. You are one of the key persons behind this off shoring industry and am sure you’ll agree with me on this.

Second, not all the freshers joining the Indian IT firms have a computer science background. Folks from different streams of engineering join these IT organizations. Yes, they all are recruited after an aptitude test but this does not check if they have the technical competency. They lack the basic fundamentals. Some of them usually move out of the organization within the next 2 years and those who decide to stick to the organization feel that the PM role is the easy way out for them. They choose to be business analyst understanding client requirements, or become a onsite co-coordinator and feel that the PM rule suits them.

Third, I personally feel that we lack role models – Folks who have made it big and are yet passionate about technology (or coding).Bill Gates still loves programming. I was always impressed when a Group Leader at our firm (somebody with 10-12 years of experience) would ask me the technical details as well as the deliverable details.

My verdict is clear. In the Indian IT circuit, a technical person with project management skills will be a better role model for his subordinates than a person who is a PMP certified and does not have good tech skills. This is based on my experience and observations.

Pride might be a more subtle driver than money so I disagree with Sandip’s monetization of management. what’s the use if that person is not making maximal impact on product development. Infy is spending a lot when it comes to training but can it train managers better than the IIM’s. Not true, else infy would’nt be recruiting from IIM’s but rather would be turning on the assembly line.