India’s largest IT major, TCS has the target to get vaccinated all of its 5 lakh employees by September this year and bring them back to office on a regular basis. said Rajesh Gopinathan, CEO.
While responding to media on July 9 after the Q1 results announcement, Gopinathan said, “We are all hoping to get our folks vaccinated with a second shot by September. Once people get the second shot, we will be getting back to the office on a more regular basis.”
“This will be the first step in implementing the company’s 25×25 vision, where the firm does not expect more than 25 percent of the employees to work in office only 25 percent of the time,” he explained the return to workplace model.
“For our longer-term vision, while we laid out the vision 25×25, it needs to be done in a very deliberate way,” he said.
“We can’t directly go to 25×25. So the path to that will be first to get back to the regular operating model and then systematically roll out,” Gopinathan added in the statement.
TCS CEO Gopinathan also responded to queries about if employees are willing to come back to work, he said that there is a balance of both, those wanting to come back and initial workplace fear, that will get down as vaccination gains pace.
“There was a significant surge in the number of people wanting to come back and the second wave was a big dampener. People got really scared about what unfolded,” he said.
Responding to the queries on third wave of coronavirus pandemic and its adverse impact on workforce, Gopinathan said that even the first dose of vaccine can take the edge off severe infections.
He added, “The biggest problem in every wave was a sense of helplessness. If you can ensure that the intensity of it is managed and it can be taken care of at home that would be a big part of the war that is won. Even in the third wave if we can reduce the intensity I think as a country we will be able to go through it later.”
