ASIAN CASE RESEARCH JOURNAL, VOL.
12, ISSUE 2, 249–273 (2008)
ACRJ
This case was prepared by
Professors Ram Subrama-
nian, Ram Misra, and C. Jay-
achandran of Montclair State
University and Professor
Tripti Singh of the Indian In-
stitute of Management, Ban-
galore, India, as a basis for
class discussion rather than
to illustrate either effective
or ineffective handling of an
administrative or business
situation.
Please address all correspon-
dence to Prof. Ram Subra-
manian, School of Business,
Montclair State University,
Montclair, NJ 07043, USA.
E-mail: Subramanianr@mail.
montclair.edu.
© 2008 by World Scientific Publishing Co.
00112.indd 249
Infosys Technologies Limited:
The Global Talent Program
T.V. Mohandas Pai, Director and Member of the Board for
Infosys Technologies Limited (Infosys), the Bangalore, India-
based information technology company, eased his six-foot
three-inch frame into his office chair and pulled up the latest
US recruitment report. It was Monday, October 15, 2007. He
had just returned from a meeting with Kris Gopalakrishnan,
the company’s CEO, where the two had discussed at
length the company’s overseas recruitment efforts. For a
company that obtained 98% of its revenues from abroad and
operated 17 development centers in five countries, a mere
3% of its nearly 70,000 strong workforce was non-Indian.
Gopalakrishnan had challenged Pai to increase the number
of non-Indian staff by 30% each year or around 1,000
annually.
To increase its foreign workforce, Infosys had started
an ambitious overseas recruitment effort called the Global
Talent Program (GTP). In 2006, a batch of 126 recruits from
US universities had been trained at the company’s training
center in Mysore, India prior to being deployed in various
US offices. Similar batches from the US had joined in
February and July of 2007, while the first batch from the UK
joined in September 2007.
As Pai perused the recruitment report, he recalled
his words from the interview he had given to an Indian
business magazine:
“For a company to be called truly global, what are the
metrics? Do we get the bulk of our revenues from the
international market; do we have a footprint in various
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countries across the world; does our board reflect a

transnational character; does the workforce also mirror
this? The answer, obviously, is ‘yes’ for the first three, but
‘no’ for the last one.”1
Gopalakrishnan had reiterated to Pai the need to step up
global recruiting, with future employees coming not only
from the US and the UK, but also from countries such
as China, Malaysia, Australia, and the rest of Europe. To
accommodate the increasing inflow of trainees, Infosys had
constructed a massive center in Mysore that had lodging
facilities for 10,000, 250 classrooms, and multiple conference
halls.
Pai’s concern about Gopalakrishnan’s mandate
centered on the Mysore facility’s ability to impart training
to a culturally diverse mix of recruits. While Infosys had
handled effectively a number of issues that arose with the
initial batches from abroad, the training staff had to learn to
handle multiple learning styles, diverse modes of interaction,
and varied classroom expectations on the fly that had caused
considerable tension. “As we step up the pace of overseas
recruitment with recruits coming from many foreign
countries and diverse cultures, can our training function
keep up with these changes?” reflected Pai to himself.
Pai picked up the telephone and asked his assistant to
set up a meeting of all the functional heads within the HR
department for the following day. He told his assistant that
the agenda for the meeting would consist of one item: issues
related to GTP training. To prepare for the meeting, Pai
asked his assistant to cancel all his morning appointments
and settled down to read and reflect on the company’s initial
experience in training overseas candidates.

THE INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY INDUSTRY2

There were two major categories in the global information

technology (IT) industry. The first, business services, included
business consulting and business process outsourcing. This
segment reported worldwide revenues of $178 billion in

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 INFOSYS TECHNOLOGIES LIMITED 251

2005 and was projected to grow at a 9.6% compound annual

rate till 2010. IT services, the second category, included
application management, system infrastructure, network
and desktop outsourcing, and related services. This segment
accounted for $443 billion in revenues in 2005 and was
expected to grow at an average annual compound rate of
5.6% through 2010. The US accounted for approximately 43%
of the worldwide market in this industry. Players in this
industry included independent providers (EDS, Computer
Services Corporation, Infosys), hardware and software
vendors who offered computer services (IBM, Oracle
Corporation), and hybrid firms (Accenture, BearingPoint)
which offered general consulting in addition to IT services.
Starting in the 1990s, India emerged as a major player
in this industry, with its three largest service providers,
Tata Consultancy Services Ltd (fiscal 2006 revenues of
$4.3 billion, over 100,000 employees worldwide), Infosys
Technologies Ltd., and Wipro Limited (fiscal 2006 revenues
of $2.385 billion, over 78,000 employees worldwide),
challenging their global rivals such as IBM and Accenture.
Standard and Poors expected the growth rates of the Indian
IT companies to be higher than the industry average due
to these companies aggressively taking away market share
from their larger competitors. To take advantage of the low
cost and technically qualified workforce that was available
in India, most industry players had a significant presence in
that country. For example, Accenture had slightly less than
half its global workforce of 53,000 in India, and of EDS’s
32,000 employees worldwide, 18,000 were located in India.
Competition for the Indian workforce had increased the
wage rates by 17.9% in 2006. Companies resorted to stock-
based compensation as a way to boosting both productivity
and retention. However, this resulted in an increase in the
overall cost of operations that put significant competitive
pressure on companies. IT companies were shifting to
a global sourcing model and recruiting employees from
countries such as Brazil, China, the Philippines, Vietnam,
and Eastern Europe.

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BACKGROUND ON INFOSYS3

Incorporated in 1981, Infosys was a $3.090 billion (in fiscal

2007) in revenues company with net income of $850 million
(Exhibit 1 contains the company’s financials in summary
form) that provided consulting and information technology
(IT) services to clients globally. The company was listed in
the NASDAQ stock market. Infosys was headquartered
in Bangalore, India and had offices in 57 major cities in 23
countries, with its US headquarters in Fremont, California.
In September 2007, Infosys employed over 80,000 people
worldwide.
In 1981, seven software engineers working for Patni
Computers Limited resigned from their jobs to start Infosys.
The partners pooled their savings (that amounted to $250)
to fund the company. Led by the company’s first CEO and
current Chief Mentor, N.R. Narayana Murthy, Infosys sought
to leverage the difference in low wage rates for technical
staff between India and the western world (principally the
USA and Europe) to build a competitive advantage in the
IT industry. Initially, Infosys acted as an on-site developer
of software for US customers through a partnership with
a company called Data Basics Corp. The company’s first
employees (other than the partners) were three engineers
who were hired in 1982 and immediately sent to work in
client sites in the US. The company’s headquarters was a
converted bedroom in Murthy’s Bangalore apartment. In
1987, the company formed a joint venture (since terminated)
with Kurt Salmon Associates to market its services in
the US.
Infosys found itself at a critical juncture in 1989 when
the severe restrictions on foreign exchange imposed by the
Indian government constrained the company’s growth.
Company legend has it that all the partners except Murthy
voted to dissolve the company. Frustrated by a business
model that was restricted by government laws, the partners
wanted to go their separate ways. Murthy offered to buy
out all the partners, but proposed that if they chose to stay
together he would ensure that the company went public
within five years. The liberalization of the Indian economy

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 INFOSYS TECHNOLOGIES LIMITED 253

in 1991 allowed Infosys to raise capital in the IPO market

in 1993. It parlayed the capital raised to become a high
growth business that averaged annual sales increases of
approximately 64% between 1994 and 1998 and around 30%
per year since then.
Upon reaching the age of 60, Murthy stepped down as
CEO in 2002 and was succeeded by Nandan Nilekani, one
of the co-founders. Nilekani ended his CEO tenure in March
2007, at which time Kris Gopalakrishnan (another founding
partner) took over the leadership role. Infosys won the first
of its several “India’s Most Admired Company” awards in
1999 in the Economic Times survey. Since then it had also
won several “India’s Best Companies to Work For” awards
in surveys conducted by Business Today, the most recent
award being in 2006.
Infosys pioneered the global delivery model (see
Exhibit 2) as a way to obtain a competitive advantage in
the global IT industry. In 2007, Infosys obtained 63.6% of
its revenues from North America, 26.4% from Europe, 1.6%
from India, and 8.4% from the rest of the world.

GLOBAL RECRUITMENT

In early 2003, Infosys developed the vision of becoming

a global company. Pai reflected on how this mandated a
change in the recruitment policy:
“Our business is all around the globe, we happened to
be headquartered in India for historic reasons. We source
the great majority of people from India because India has
the largest pool of young, technically qualified people.
But as we get only about 2% of our revenue from India,
it is very essential that in local markets we have local
nationals interfacing with our customers. They can speak
in the manner that the customer understands. It makes
great business sense to hire globally. In addition, our
explosive rate of growth made us realize that we cannot
just rely on the Indian talent pool, but that we have to
reach out elsewhere.”
Since the majority of the company’s customers were
in the US, the US became the first choice for overseas

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recruitment. Infosys created a recruitment team for the US

(Exhibit 3A has the organization chart for Infosys and 3B
has the organization chart for the recruitment function).
The six-person team spent the Fall of 2005 and Spring
of 2006 making presentations at various US universities.
Recruitment team member, Jharna Thammaiah, spoke about
the differences in campus hiring in India and the US:
“One major difference is the day status. In India there
is the concept of limiting oneself to 1–2 job offers and
not more. It is imperative, therefore, for recruiters to get
the privileged first day status at campuses so that their
offer is the first or the second one for the candidate, as
otherwise they might lose good candidates. It took us a
while to realize that such a concept did not exist in the
US. Also, unlike in India, the placement office in the US
does not have any control over the career choices of the
candidates. They provide the infrastructure and the rest is
up to the candidate. If an engineering major wants to end
up as a musician, there is nothing the placement office
can do. Not so in Indian campuses.”
Since Infosys was an unknown name in the US job
market, the company had to take a two-step approach to
recruitment. They first had to make themselves visible to
candidates by sponsoring career fairs where the company
distributed information leaflets about the opportunity. They
also distributed marketing collaterals such as pens and
writing pads to stimulate interest as well as recall. Jharna
reflected on this:
“Our recruitment costs were significantly higher in the
US. The first thing that happens when we contact a US
school is the placement office wanting to know if we are
participating in the career fair. For a career fair we have
to rent a stall, hire staff to manage the stall, and pay for
marketing giveaways. Aggressive promotion at career
fairs will get us 20–30 attendees at a formal presentation
about Infosys. This was a big change from one of earlier
efforts when a recruiter went for a campus presentation
and nobody showed up! This is in contrast to standing
room crowds of 300–400 at presentations in India without
the time and expense of career fairs. We have two hiring
sessions in the US (Fall and Spring) as compared to just

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 INFOSYS TECHNOLOGIES LIMITED 255

one in India. We also have our recruitment managers

building relationships with campus placement offices
throughout the year by sponsoring career workshops and
supplying information brochures.”

To overcome the unfamiliarity of interviewing American

candidates as well as ensuring compliance with local
laws, Infosys hired a US firm that specialized in training
recruiters to train and certify Infosys recruiters. Infosys
used the recruiting message of “Go East, Young Man”
and emphasized the cultural diversity in India as well
as the chance to be involved in the growing outsourcing
industry in its sales pitch. In addition, in subsequent
batches, recruiters were accompanied by US recruits who
had completed the training program and were employed
in Infosys offices in the US. Recruiters looked for three
attributes in candidates: open mindedness, learning ability,
and the spirit of adventure. A written test of analytical skills
and a face-to-face interview identified recruitable candidates.
For the first US batch, Infosys’s conversion rate (the number
of acceptance to the number of offers made) was low,
typically 1 in 4. It improved to 1 in 3 in subsequent batches.
Somnath, a recruitment team member described a key reason
for the low conversion rate:
“In the global delivery model, Infosys has offices in
various US cities. Take Chicago for example. We work
with clients not just in Chicago but in various mid-west
cities. This means that a Chicago office staff member
has to be able to work in Chicago and when the project
is over, relocate to a different city and work on a project
there. We found that not all people are comfortable with
this model, they want to be rooted to a city. They also
have to be prepared to stay on the bench (an industry
term for employees not currently working on a project)
because their skills don’t meet the client’s requirements or
there is not enough work. When you are uncomfortable
with this approach, you tend to seek employment in a
more traditional company.”

Jharna spoke about the type of candidates recruited in

the US:

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 256 ACRJ

“Our entry level position is that of a software engineer.

In India we hire students with engineering backgrounds,
though they may come from the electrical or the
mechanical side. In the global recruitment program, we
have extended the hiring to include not just engineers but
also liberal arts majors. This was an experiment for us,
because we don’t hire liberal arts students in India.”
Infosys hired 126 candidates in the first US batch. Of these,
17 were liberal arts graduates. Their training called for 16
weeks of classroom instruction at the Infosys training center
in Mysore, India, followed by eight weeks of on-the-job
training at Infosys offices in India. Candidates were posted
in offices in various US cities after the completion of the
24-week training.

TRAINING

Training foreign candidates was not entirely a new area

for Infosys. In 2002, the company got a request from the
government of Mauritius to train 25 of their government
employees in project management. The following year, the
company got similar requests from governments in Japan,
Australia, and Thailand. At first, there was skepticism within
the company about the importance of this venture, but this
was quickly overcome when top managers reiterated the
need to globalize Infosys. Dr. M.P. Ravindra, the then head
of Education and Research (E&R), reiterated the importance
of these early training initiatives:
“The training for various foreign governments was all
done to foster goodwill. But the important outcome
was that it gave us the confidence to take people from
different environments and education systems and train
them successfully. It enabled us to take on the much
bigger challenge involved with the GTP.”
GTP training involved pre-training orientation, much of
which was done via newsletters and emails, and the training
itself, which was a 16-week training in technical and non-
technical skills at the company’s Mysore training facility.

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 INFOSYS TECHNOLOGIES LIMITED 257

Pre-Training Orientation

Infosys ensured that the new hires were in constant touch

with the recruiters prior to their departure for training in
Mysore. The company’s HR staff talked to the new hires
via video conferencing. These video conferences were used
to answer questions about the nature of training, living
accommodations in Mysore, and about the company’s
culture. The Campus Recruitment Team (CRT) provided the
point of contact for the new recruit prior to departure for
training. New hires received periodic electronic newsletters
that informed them of Indian visa procedures and
documents necessary for international travel. Infosys block
booked airline tickets for the trainees. US trainees reported at
a hotel in Washington D.C., one day prior to their departure
for India. Infosys organized a “kick off” party in the city to
enable the trainees to get to know each other. The trainees
departed for India the following day and training started
two days after arrival. The Employee Relations team, a unit
of the company’s HR function, coordinated the recruits’
arrival in Bangalore, India. A fleet of buses transported the
trainees to the company’s Mysore training center, about 80
miles away.

Facilities

Infosys’s Mysore training facility, called the Global Education

Center, occupied 315 acres of land. Dubbed the “Taj Mahal
of training centers” by Fortune magazine, it had two
helipads, a professional grade cricket stadium, an employee
center with a laundromat, medical center, supermarket,
bank, book store, salon, movie theatres, basketball, tennis,
shuttle badminton and squash courts, an 8-lane Brunswick
bowling alley, snooker tables, yoga classrooms, meditation
rooms, a steam bath, and a swimming pool. The training
facility had 10,000 rooms, 250 classrooms, 650 faculty cabins,
and several large and small conference halls.
A food court featured Indian, European, and American
food kiosks. A Domino’s Pizza kiosk served pizzas with

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 258 ACRJ

American toppings as well as with Indian variations, such

as the keema do pyaaza pizza — onions, minced meat, and
jalapenos. Infosys encouraged its employees to take time out
and eat at the food court rather than take food back to their
desks. When the first batch of US hires were trained at the
Mysore facility, the American food kiosks were exclusively
for the US hires. The company’s training staff was of the
opinion that new US hires preferred American food, at least
during the initial part of their Indian stay. This exclusivity
was removed after the first US batch and subsequently all
food kiosks were open to all trainees. Facilities Manager,
Jairam Madhav Rao spoke about the living arrangements:
“We had people from HR who coordinated with the
US recruits to find out their eating preferences and we
made sure that the supermarket carried the items that
they were familiar with. We already had a French chef
working for us who came up with an array of menu
items that was both nutritious and tasty. We were
proactive in training the housekeeping staff. Because the
training facility until recently had a limited number of
rooms, we gave single accommodation to the US hires
and shared accommodation to the Indian trainees. From
now on, though, we have ample rooms to offer single
accommodation to all trainees. All trainees are given
cleaning and maintenance schedules so that they are
aware of when the housekeeping staff would be in their
room. We made it mandatory that no laundry or any kind
of delivery service would be offered to trainees.”
Infosys had a policy of prohibiting trainees from bringing
their personal computers while at the training facility. This
created a problem when the first US batch arrived at the
facility. Security officers prevented the trainees from taking
their computers into the facility. The trainees argued that
they needed their computers to keep in touch with their
families in the US. A potential stand off was prevented when
senior Infosys managers quickly decided on an exception to
the policy. The result was that the US trainees were allowed
to use their computers only in their rooms and not carry it
around to their classes or to the food court.

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 INFOSYS TECHNOLOGIES LIMITED 259

A two-day induction program covered all aspects of

the training facility for the trainees. Facilities Manager, Rao,
described this program:
“The program, which is mandatory for all trainees,
covers everything about their stay. We talk about the
maintenance and cleaning schedule, the security system,
the logistics of getting around the city, and what they
can do and cannot do during their stay. As examples
of what they cannot do, they cannot smoke or drink
on campus, they need to register their vehicles with
security, and they cannot walk on lawns. We also have
strict curfews — 11:00 p.m. on weekdays and 1:00 a.m.
on weekends and trainees have to check out and check
in with security when they leave campus. For foreign
trainees, overnight stay outside of campus requires prior
written permission from HR because of security reasons.
We find American trainees generally following rules in
contrast to Indian trainees. My feeling is that once you
explain the rules clearly to the American trainees, they
follow them diligently.”

Training Objectives

Prior to the recruitment of the first US batch, Mohandas

Pai identified the operational challenges relating to training
foreign hires:
“Our challenges were multifold. We had to develop a
training program that catered to the different learning
styles of foreign recruits. We had to introduce the
trainees to the global delivery model. For most hires,
this was either their first job, or their first job in a big
organization, and their first job in a foreign country.
In addition, most were not exposed to the IT industry’s
model of working in place A with the client in place B,
where the interaction with the client was almost exclusively
through telecommunication channels. We also had to
instill in them the notion of globally distributed work,
where work was parceled out to teams in different
geographic locations, which called for not only the ability
to work independently but also the ability to integrate
work done elsewhere.”

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The 16-week on-campus training was divided into technical

and non-technical (soft-skills) parts. Technical training
centered on imparting in-depth knowledge in various
computer programming languages (Java, C++, etc.) as well
as in systems analysis and design. Rigorous homework
assignments and examinations were used to assess learning.
The E&R unit was responsible for this part of the training
program. Infosys used in-house trainers to do the technical
training.

Soft-Skills Training

Infosys created the E&R unit in 1991. The unit was

charged with the task of providing technical training to the
employees of the fast-growing company. Dr. Ravindra spoke
about the need for soft-skills training and the creation of the
Infosys Leadership Institute:
“Till 1999, all the training that we did was technical. The
market dictated our investment in training. Customers
decided what had to be done and we had to do the
job and deliver it to them. After 1999, and in particular
after the dotcom bust, the whole scenario changed and
customers were pushing us to take on more respon-
sibilities for various reasons. We wanted to move to a
“trusted partner” status, where we would develop long-
term relationships with clients and do multiple and
varied jobs for them. The company’s leaders realized the
importance of training employees in leadership, diversity
management, communication, and team working skills.
Toward this, the Infosys Leadership Institute (ILI) was
created in 2001.”
Infosys identified a pool of internal trainers to conduct the
training program (both technical and non-technical) for
foreign recruits. Diversity Officer, Srimathi provided the
rationale for using in-house trainers:
“We typically go with Infosys facilitators because we have
competent people working for us in the ILI. We believe
that for such training, we need people who understand
the organizational perspective, have an exposure to how

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 INFOSYS TECHNOLOGIES LIMITED 261

teams work, and have experience dealing with non-

Indians.”
Exhibit 4 provides brief profiles of three facilitators
employed in the program. Dr. Ravindra recalled the initial
training given to the trainers in preparation for the technical
skills part for the first batch of GTP recruits:
“We selected nine members of the training staff and they
were given a quick tutorial of 20–25 minutes on cross-
cultural issues. We then asked them to simulate teaching
a class. We recorded their teaching and played it back on
high resolution T.V. ILI staff critiqued their teaching and
developed parameters that all educators used. Selected
educators were then given a whole day of cultural
sensitivity training prior to deployment in the classroom.
M.R. Narayana Murthy (one of the founders of Infosys
and its current Chief Mentor) was involved in this initial
assessment because he was aware of the magnitude of
what we were trying to do. Indian students went to the
US for higher studies or training. It was never the other
way around. Americans never came to India for studies
or training. Murthy wanted us to gain the confidence of
American trainees so that it would be easier for us to
recruit globally.”

Managing Cultural Differences

Since the 2006 US batch of 126 hires was the first group in
the GTP, both E&R and ILI spent more than six months
preparing the training program. A number of Infosys
personnel who had worked in the company’s US offices
or with US clients were debriefed to understand cultural
and learning style differences between the US and Indian
cultures. The entire set of training materials was sent to
a leading university in the US where professors vetted the
documents to suggest changes for words or phrases that
would be more suitable to the Americans. Harvard Business
School cases were selected to make training sessions more
interactive than they currently were. In addition, trainers
culled business situations specific to Infosys from operating
personnel and created a bank of “live” cases. Trainers were

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 262 ACRJ

given a repository of words that were not to be used during

training because of culture-specific meaning attached to
them. One example was the use of the word “marks.” The
word was commonly used in India to indicate how a person
did on an assignment or test. Since this was not used by
Americans the same way, trainers were told to use the word
“score” or “grade” instead of “marks” when assessing the
American group.

Separate batches

Infosys deliberately chose to train the first US batch

separately. Since the Mysore training facility typically was
the training home to 12,000 to 15,000 Indian employees, a
number of batches of Indian recruits were trained separately
at the same time as the 2006 US batch. The trainees met at
the food court and socialized after classes, though they
attended classes separately.
When the first US batch was deployed at various
Infosys offices in the US after training, the feedback from
field operatives reiterated the need for increased cultural
assimilation. Therefore, from the second US batch onwards,
the US and all GTP trainees were mixed together with
Indian trainees in training classrooms.
While the soft-skill content taught in training classes
for the Indian and non-Indian batches was the same,
covering areas such as managing diversity, interpersonal
communication, leadership, and team building, the method
of delivery varied occasionally. An ILI facilitator reflected
on how she taught interpersonal communication to the two
different groups:
“For foreign trainees, behavioral concepts have to be
made very clear. If I am teaching communication, I won’t
talk about transactional analysis (TA)* for the Indian
batch because I believe that it will be really heavy for

*Developed by Eric Berne, transactional analysis (TA) is a psychoanalytic theory

of psychology that emphasizes the importance of interactions rather than internal

psychological dynamics. Wikipedia, extracted on October 31, 2007.

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 INFOSYS TECHNOLOGIES LIMITED 263

them to digest. I would talk about TA at length to the US

batch because I think it provides important background
for them to understand communication.”
The training day was also broken up differently for the
US and Indian batches. Lecture sessions averaged three
hours for the Indian batch, while they were limited to one-
hour sessions for the US batch. An educator described the
motivation for the dissimilar length of sessions:
“We noticed marked differences in learning styles
between Indian and US trainees. US students ask a lot of
questions during the lecture and tend to get restless after
about an hour. They have very good probing skills but
they also require a lot of clarity to be comfortable with the
subject matter. They are very honest in giving feedback.
They wanted more hands-on work to apply the lecture
concepts and so after an hour of lecture, we stop and give
them problem solving and other interactive exercises. The
Indians, on the other hand, can sit through a three-hour
lecture and not feel restless. We found that for Americans,
silence means they have grasped the material, because if
they haven’t they are not bashful to ask us to repeat the
lecture. Whereas in the Indian case, the silence may mean
things are not very clear, but they are uneasy to ask for
clarification lest they appear dumb in front of their peers.
We didn’t know this at first, and so when the Americans
were silent in class, I tended to repeat the lecture over and
over till they got frustrated and talked to me about it.”

Mixed batches

For the second US batch that started its training in

February 2007, Infosys decided to mix up the trainees so
that there were both Indian and American trainees in each
classroom. The class was divided equally between Indians
and Americans. E&R staff member, Rashmi Balakrishnan,
reflected on the mixed batches:
“When answering in class, Indians have the tendency to
answer in groups. The Americans were unhappy about
this as they typically answered independently. The
Americans spoke out about this tendency of Indians and

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our trainers had to tell the Indian trainees not to speak

in groups but individually. Also, when the trainer posed
a question to the class, the Indians tended to get the
question very quickly and were always the first ones to
reply. This is because they are used to the trainer’s accent.
When the Americans complained about this unfairness,
we had to tell the trainers to hand pick the person to
respond to a question. We also had issues with specific
phrases. An example is the phrase “you should not do
it.” The Americans felt that it was a very strong statement
and also aggressive. So we had to change it to “You
need not do it.” Also, we changed the emphasis from
60% theory and 40% application to 30% theory and 70%
hands-on work at the behest of the Americans.”
E&R staff member, Sundar, made the following observation
with regard to assessment of group work in mixed batches:
“Our trainers assessed group projects with a single grade
for the entire group. The Indians were comfortable with
this type of assessment. But the American students told
us that it was quite possible in a group to have members
contribute unequally. They wanted individual assessment
of each person’s contribution to the group project. We felt
that there was some merit in their criticism and so now
we divide the grade for group projects into a group grade
and an individual grade.”
Exit surveys of the mixed batches indicated that while the
Americans were satisfied with the 50:50 make up of trainees
in a classroom, the Indians wanted a 30% Americans and
70% Indians split, because in their opinion Americans tended
to dominate classroom discussions and an equal split made
it difficult for the Indians to be heard in the classroom.

Post-Training Assessment

All trainees were asked to assess the training via formal

surveys. In addition, ILI periodically sought informal
feedback from the trainees. One American trainee made the
following observation in his developmental assignment:

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 INFOSYS TECHNOLOGIES LIMITED 265

“My culture is monochronic. I am used to strict sequences

in everything from my to-do list to driving to everyday
conversation. The biggest difference I found in the two
cultures (American and Indian) was that while we are
monochronic, Indians are polychronic. My first experience
with this polychronic idea was my trip to the Indian
Consulate in Chicago to pick up my visa. The man I dealt
with interrupted me to allow another man in to speak
with him, and interrupted that man in the middle of a
sentence by answering his phone. Although some people
told me this was part of Indian culture, I thought this was
just a peculiar habit of this man. When I got to India, I dis-
covered how very commonplace that type of behavior is.”
A female American trainee had this to say:
“The Indian men don’t normally greet any of us when
they pass, but if I smile or say “hello” first they always
respond the same. The women on the other hand are
different. It’s rare to find one walking alone. They travel
in groups. If you smile or say “hi” to them, they either
don’t respond, or they just giggle to each other. Someone
told me that the reason is because it’s not normal for
them to be greeted so they just don’t know how to
respond. I don’t know if that’s true or not, but it sounds
reasonable.”
Exhibit 5 provides a summary of the recurring observations
that came out in the exit surveys and group discussions.

THE DECISION

As Mohandas Pai read and reflected on Infosys’s experience

with the GTP, he realized that he and his training staff faced
immense challenges. The GTP had brought foreign batches
from the US (three batches) and from the UK (one batch).
Trainees in these batches were predominantly Americans
and Britons, but there was also a smattering of Chinese,
Japanese, Latinos, and Australians. In all, these batches
accounted for roughly 500 foreign trainees over a two-
year period. Upon completion of their training program,
Infosys classified the trainees into three categories: high

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 266 ACRJ

performers, average performers, and poor performers. High

performers were able to hit the ground running once they
were deployed in the field. The average performers had
to go through additional field training (often 1–2 months)
prior to being deployed in the field. Poor performers needed
considerable additional field training (an average of six
months) before being allowed to interact with clients. GTP
candidates fell predominantly in the high and average
category. Dr. Ravindra of E&R assessed the performance of
GTP candidates:
“We pick candidates from a number of universities in
India because of the large numbers needed. Some of
them come from good institutions while others are from
average ones. Not so with our foreign recruits. In the
case of our GTP trainees, we have picked from the top
universities in each country. It is no surprise then that
our GTP candidates are rated “high” or “average” when
they complete training. Will that continue when we
expand our training groups and have to go to second tier
institutions in each country?”
Given the need to increase foreign intake to around 1,000
a year, Pai wondered if a dilution in quality of candidates
would need to be addressed by the training staff. More
importantly, given the mixed results of the separate and
blended batches in the training program, what would be the
better option? Should the company conduct parallel training
sessions for Indian and GTP candidates or should they offer
blended batches? In either case, trainers had to contend with
varying learning styles and cultural values of candidates
from many foreign countries.
“Are we prepared for this,” asked Pai aloud to himself.
He quickly corrected himself, “No, that’s not a question that
we should wrestle with. We don’t have that luxury! For
Infosys to succeed with the GDM, we need GTP candidates
along with Indian trainees. Our business is growing so we
are poised to take in more candidates now than in the past.
Given the necessity of the GTP, what changes should the ILI
and E&R do to the training program?”
Pai wanted to use the next day’s meeting to address
these issues in detail. But he realized that, as the leader of

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 INFOSYS TECHNOLOGIES LIMITED 267

the Human Resources function, the others would look up

to him to provide the direction. He wondered what that
should be.

ENDNOTES

1. Venkatesh Babu, “Incredible Infy,” Business Today, November 1,

2006, p. 90.
2. This section is based on Standard & Poor’s Industry Surveys,
“Computers: Commercial services,” May 3, 2007 and websites
of Tata Consultancy Services (www.tcs.com) and Wipro Limited
(www.wipro.com).
3. Information for this section was obtained from www.infosys.
com and “Infosys Technologies Limited,” Wharton School case
study, 1999.

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 268 ACRJ

Exhibit 1

Infosys Technologies Limited

Company Financials

Summary Income Statement (US$ million)

2007 2006 2005

Revenue 3,090 2,152 1,592
Operating Income 970 698 522
Depreciation 118 99.0 66.0
Pretax Income 936 630 491
Net Income 850 555 419

Summary Balance Sheet (US$ million)

2007 2006 2005

Cash 1,403 889 410
Current Assets 2,098 1,509 1,060
Total Assets 3,073 2,066 1,454
Current Liabilities 355 209 175
Common Equity 2,717 1,837 1,253
Total Capital 2,717 1,852 1,253
Infosys sold ADRs (American Depository Receipts) in the US in 1999.
Source: Standard & Poor’s Stock Report.

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 INFOSYS TECHNOLOGIES LIMITED 269

Exhibit 2

The Global Delivery Model

Even though today in the USA outsourcing is synonymous with off-shore sourcing, it started as
on-shore sourcing in 1984 when American companies started giving out their IT work to other
American companies. This mode of outsourcing is known as onshore sourcing model. A few
years later, another model evolved — an offshore model — in which companies gave their IT
work to companies located offshore — mostly Indian companies. The limitation of the offshore
model was that only a subset of the work that did not require direct interaction with clients
could be outsourced. Realizing this, Infosys, in its efforts to grow and become a global company,
developed a third model that was a combination of the onshore sourcing and offshore sourcing.
This model now is popularly known as the Global Delivery Model (GDM).
The basic premise of the GDM is to break pieces of work into logical components, and
distribute these components geo-locationally, to perform them where it creates the maximum
value. Under the GDM, a service provider such as Infosys will have work centers all over the
globe, some onshore and some offshore. As more and more developed nations started using
outsourcing, it made sense to service providers such as Infosys to have onshore or near-shore
centers in various countries and to connect them so that the work can be distributed to one or
more centers that are most logical in terms of matching the resources needed. Another variation
of the GDM that is evolving uses the work centers of the service company’s partners in addition
to its own centers. This allows a service company a truly global access and flexibility to get the
work done in many places.
One of the best ways to understand the distinction between the work done by the
onshore centers and the offshore centers is to think of the work that requires interacting with
clients and customers (end user). This could be the initial planning of the project that involves
understanding the problem, developing possible solutions and selecting the best solution that
the client can afford, field testing of the system/solution, and providing support in the initial
installation. The work done at the offshore development centers may include the detailed design
specifications, software development, and system testing. The Hispanic computer interface
project for the American bank portrayed in the figure below illustrates this.
The global delivery model is particularly suited for fast turnaround projects or large
projects. Fast turnaround projects typically require a lot of people doing different parts of the
project at the same time, which can be easily achieved by pooling together the complementary
resources available in various work centers around the globe. Large projects often require a lot
of skilled resources typically not available in a single work location. It can also result in reducing
the risk of project completion since even if some offshore centers face a disaster, the work can be
distributed to other centers without much discontinuity in work.
Infosys has client site locations, near-site locations and offshore centers. As can be seen in
the table below, the near-shore centers have duplicate service capabilities some that are common
to the onsite centers and some common to the offshore centers. This redundancy in the service
providing capabilities in the near-shore centers makes the entire global delivery concept so
powerful. The near-shore centers serve as interface points for the onsite and offshore centers.

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 270 ACRJ

Project: To develop a computer system for an American bank that would handle a loan program for Hispanic
customers. The system should have Spanish interface and be attuned to the cultural nuances of Mexican
customers.

Bank
Client ••Analysis
Analysis and ••Detailed
Detailed design
design
•Client interface and
synthesis ••Background
Background
•Project review synthesis
••Design
Design and research
research
and
•Project leadership
prototype building
building ••Code
Code
prototype
development
development

Infosys Office Infosys Office

Infosys Office

Client-Site Location Near-Site Location Offshore Location

USA Monterrey, Mexico Bangalore, India

Source: Casewriters’ visualization based on Anand Giridhardas, “Outsourcing Works, So India is Exporting Jobs,” The
New York Times, September 25, 2007, nytimes.com.

Services Client-Site Locations Near-Site Locations Offshore Locations

Strategy and roadmap Client interaction, Analysis and Background research,
definition interviews, reviews, synthesis thought leadership,
program leadership, and information
and goal setting support
Development and Architecture, Requirements Detailed design, code
integration requirements, change analysis, high development, testing
management, and level design and and integration
implementation prototype building,
and implementation
support
Systems integration and Client interaction, Prototype building, Custom components,
package implementation process mapping, high level design, integration interfaces,
solution definition, and implementation and report building
architecture, change support
and program
management
Information Technology First-level support, Near-site support Large offshore
Outsourcing; Business facilities support, centers, service centers, core service
Process Outsourcing; and program redundancy delivery
Application Maintenance management
Outsourcing
Source: www.infosys.com/gdm/.

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 INFOSYS TECHNOLOGIES LIMITED 271

Exhibit 3A

Infosys Organization Chart (Adapted)

Co-Chairman
Nandan M. Nilekani

CEO & Managing Director

S. “Kris” Gopalakrishnan

Head Director & Head Director & Head

Worldwide Sales & CDG,IS, E & R & HRD CFO
Customer Delivery Quality and Productivity Mohandas Pai

Administration
Administration,
Infrastructure, and
Infrastructure, and
security
security

Commercial &
Facilities

Education & Research

IBU
IBU-- Finacle
Finacle

Human Resources
Development

Infosys Leadership
Institute (ILI)

Source: Infosys.

Exhibit 3B

Infosys Technologies Limited

Organization Chart for the Recruitment Function
Global Entry Level Hiring & Campus Relations
Global Entry Level Hiring & Campus Relations

Head – Global Entry Level Hiring &

Campus Relations

Head – India Hiring Manager – US Hiring Manager – UK Hiring Manager – Geo Hiring

Regional
Regional Regional Regional Recruitment
Recruiter – Mid
Recruiter – West Recruiter – South Recruiter – East Coordinator
West
Source: Infosys.

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 272 ACRJ

Exhibit 4

ILI Facilitator Profiles

Facilitator #1
• Began his managerial training career with Dale Carnegie Associates (DCA) and worked
with them for over eight years, both as an apprentice and employee. Conducted both public
programs and corporate consulting for DCA in the US, Singapore, and Hong Kong.
• Has worked with a number of clients of Infosys across geographies in order to build more
collaborative teams across multiple cultures.
• Is certified in a number of psychometric tools like the MBTI.
• Published two papers in an international conference related to the field of cross-cultural
competence.
• Overall, about 10 years experience in this field.

Facilitator #2
• A gold medalist and rank holder during graduation, also holds a Management degree, a Post
Graduate Diploma in Training & Development, and a Master Facilitator certification.
• Designed interventions and trained Infosys employees and clients on a continuum of skills
ranging from effective communication to managing diversity.
• Has facilitated over 500 programs.
• At Infosys, has also anchored a number of roles and initiatives — learning management in
business units, continuing executive education, training in non-India locations, etc.
• Is certified in a number of psychometric tools like Belbin.
• Has also facilitated workshops with client teams to get the best out of multicultural teams.
• Overall, about 10 years experience in this field.

Facilitator #3
• Has developed people in both technical and behavioral areas.
• Published two papers in an international conference related to the field of cross-cultural
competence.
• Has been an invited panelist speaker at an international conference on diversity.
• Is certified in a number of psychometric tools like the MBTI.
• Specializes in the field of cultural differences and has run a number of surveys to assess
cultural orientations in people, some of them in workshops with clients.
• Overall, about 11 years experience in this field.
Source: Infosys.

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 INFOSYS TECHNOLOGIES LIMITED 273

Exhibit 5

Pre-Training Due Diligence and Post-Training Feedback

US Batch 1
Pre-Training Due Diligence
• Did some form of needs analysis before they joined.
• Allotted trainers who had previous cross-cultural experience.
• Got the training material upgraded with higher order skills.
• Ensured material review by senior American colleagues and faculty from Duke University in
the US.
Post-Training Feedback
• Some of the material was too simple.
• The batch was quick to say what was not OK, but did not have any constructive suggestions
on what could help.
• Cross-cultural comfort came across as the primary need.
• The discomfort about not knowing their exact roles spilled over into the sessions.

US Batch 2
Pre-Training Due Diligence
• Eliminated some of the elementary training modules on listening, etc., and strengthened the
cross-cultural piece.
• Did a number of focus group discussions and one-on-ones with the previous batches, ran
surveys, etc., to further flesh out areas of comfort/discomfort.
• Reworked the “Working in Teams” and “Client Orientation” pieces to bring in more business
and real-life focus.
• Mixed Indian and US trainees in the same session (50–50) to bring about higher cultural
immersion.
Post-Training Feedback
• Duration of the programs tends to become a dissatisfier.
• People do not mix despite being in the same room. Silos continued.
• More productive learning vehicle needed.

US Batch 3 and UK Batch 1

Pre-Training Due Diligence
• Turned the design of the curriculum upside down — just the bare minimum in the class and
most of it as an assignment.
• Spoke to some of the managers of the previous US batches.
• Did a more comprehensive needs analysis and identified operations in daily life as a need.
• Brought in the real-life assignment that enhanced cultural understanding as well as forced
interaction with other cultures.
• Introduced the shadowing project for four days to get a sense of a real-life project.
Post-Training Feedback — None, sessions still in progress.
Source: Infosys.

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