Demand for talent a key dependency for growth: Wipro

The demand for talent will outpace supply and become a "key dependency" for growth as enterprises globally accelerate digital adoption with virtual, Wipro Chairman Rishad Premji said.

The Bengaluru-based company has effected "bold changes" in the last six months to help serve customers better and is well-positioned to leverage as well as enable digital transformations for its clients, Premji said in the company's annual report for FY21.

The former Nasscom chairman noted that technology is often at the forefront of economic recovery, but especially now, as the pandemic precipitated structural changes across industries and challenged established ways of working.

Whether it is digital commerce, online education, or telemedicine, technology-enabled business models have emerged across the board, with cloud technology as the cornerstone of this transformation, he added.

"With the rapid shift to digital, the demand for talent will outpace supply, and become a key dependency for growth. Already we see new delivery models, such as 'work from anywhere' and 'Crowdsourcing', become the mainstay. We expect virtual, remote, community-based, and distributed work models to be the future of work," Premji said.

He added that as vaccination efforts ramp up globally and economies start seeing a rebound, clients keen to invest in and accelerate their digital transformation and the key to success for IT players would be "to respond to this opportunity with speed and agility".

Premji said the company had triggered its business continuity plans to quickly enable remote working as the pandemic broke out, and less than three per cent of its global workforce currently is working from office.

"We have settled well into this new way of working and have continued to make our customers successful. We enjoy their confidence, and I have no doubt that a hybrid model may well be how we work in the future," he added.