Tech, Talent and Triumph: Success Strategies for GCCs in India

In the realm of Global Capability Centres (GCCs), India leads with over 1,500 centres spanning diverse sectors, including banking, retail, automotive, pharmaceuticals, and technology, hiring more than 1.6 million skilled professionals.  

Progressing through 2024, GCCs are set to grow exponentially in this region. It is projected that by 2030, more than half (55%) of the world's GCCs will be in India. The country remains a preferred destination for global companies to set up their operations due to safety, availability of skilled workforce at competitive costs, and strong economic outlook.  

As these new GCCs establish themselves in India, effectively managing talent, including acquiring, engaging and retaining high-demand resources, can become a major challenge.  

Essential Strategies for Global Capability Centres  

GCCs must show strategic agility, technological innovation, and operational resilience to meet their parent organisations' expectations. Since people are at the core of their existence, it is crucial for GCCs to modernise and transform their human resources management.  

Creating a positive and productive environment for employees to work in and adopting advanced HR technologies that support localised, optimised, and scalable talent management is essential. Partnering with the right HR technology leaders, therefore, becomes the catalyst for rapid progress, utilising proven platforms tailored to the specific needs of GCCs.

HR Tech Essentials for Growing GCCs

Amid rapid growth, HR teams in GCCs encounter challenges in balancing ever-changing regulations, technology, and the continuous search for the right people. ADP has been an HR Tech service provider to many of the GCCs in India. Fast-growing GCCs could deploy the following three strategies:

Make It Easy – Streamlining and Automating HR Processes  

HR departments of large GCCs are often overwhelmed by a high volume of tasks such as managing employee leave requests, processing reimbursements, and handling payroll. By automating workflows and streamlining these processes, companies can reduce errors and improve compliance accuracy. Digitalising these efforts can simplify administrative processes, making them easier and more efficient.  

Additionally, GCCs are subject to strict data security and privacy laws based on the countries of their origin. Streamlining, simplifying, and automating these transactions, which involve employees' sensitive information, helps ensure rigorous data checks to comply with multiple data security and privacy protocols.

Make It Strategic - Utilising Intelligence for Informed Decisions

Incorporating analytics into workforce data, particularly payroll data, can provide valuable insights into compensation benchmarking, talent mobility patterns, and diversity goals.  

This enables informed and data-backed decisions, particularly in compliance-related aspects. Simple analysis can help HR teams make timely decisions around strategic themes like diversity, rewards and compensation, performance schemes, and pay equity, which are critical for attracting and retaining talent.

Make It Human - Personalising the Employee Experience

Improving the employee experience stands as a key priority for GCCs to offer a competitive edge in the talent landscape. Substantial efforts are dedicated to ensuring the financial well-being of employees, including educating them on pay structures and tax literacy while providing quick query resolution.  

Tools like self-service payroll dashboards and interactive chatbots enhance transparency, fostering engagement and empowerment. Organisations must strive to strike a fine balance between digitisation and keeping a human touch to constantly raise the bar for employee experiences.

The future holds great promise for GCCs that embrace the technology-driven revolution in human capital management. With the right platforms and partnerships, they can efficiently attract and develop high-quality talent, engage employees more deeply and achieve remarkable milestones in both human and organisational growth. This isn't just about transforming India from being the back office of the world; it's about turning it into a global innovation powerhouse.

Rahul Goyal

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Rahul Goyal is Managing Director, ADP India & Southeast Asia.