TCS, Infosys, HCL Work from home to finish? Learn how IT companies are planning for office reopening

Even though the COVID-19 situation in the country has improved significantly in recent months, companies have started to encourage their employees to visit the offices gradually. Large IT companies such as Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) and Infosys have also encouraged their employees to come physically to the office. Do you know the work-from-home plans of the two big IT companies:

Infosys phased plan

Infosys started calling people to offices as early as this month. From now on, only executives will come into the office. After announcing its March 2022 quarterly results, Infosys chief financial officer Nilanjan Roy told reporters that 95 percent of the workforce is currently working remotely, while only 5 percent of executives are coming into the office.

He said the company has a three-phase plan for working from home. “We rolled out the first phase back in April and as part of this people who are in their home locations where DCs (development centers) are located or in the upstate town near the DCs are encouraged to do twice a year to come to the office week. We’re already seeing traction on it. Older executives come in. The teams already have huddles etc.

In phase two, he said, the company will encourage people outside of the DC cities to begin preparations over the next few months to see if they can return to their grassroots development centers. “It depends on individual circumstances etc.”

In the long term, we are aiming for a hybrid working model, depending on clients, the regulatory environment and a number of other considerations. This will be a phased approach and we will review it every quarter. Currently, 95 percent of the workforce is at home, while only 5 percent of executives come into the office.

Richard Lobo, Infosys executive vice president and head (HR), previously said the company expects a hybrid model where about 40 to 50 percent of employees are likely to work in the office after subsequent periods of return to the office.

TCS work-from-home model

TCS also encourages employees to return to the office. The company said it will continue to adopt its futuristic and groundbreaking 25X25 model and introduce hot desks.

This 25×25 model requires no more than 25 percent of the company’s employees to be working from an office at any given time, and they are not allowed to spend more than 25 percent of their time in the office.

“But an important part of the journey to the 25/25 model is first getting people back into physical offices and gradually transitioning to the hybrid work model,” TCS said.

In the occasional operating zones (OOZ) and hot desks, the company says it has set up flexible workspaces around the world, allowing its employees to work and interact with other team members from each TCS office.

“Our agile workspace is an intelligent, automated, and cloud-based digital infrastructure that adapts to changing security policies and regulations, is resilient to the onslaught of cyberattacks, and supports operating models for working from anywhere. In addition, we have established occasional operating zones (OOZ) and hot desks, it said.

HCL plan

Another IT major, HCL Tech, said: “One of our top priorities is the safety and well-being of our employees and their families. We remain strongly committed to maintaining our business normality, thereby ensuring uninterrupted services to our customers. We are currently monitoring the situation and continue to operate in a hybrid model.”

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