Soft Skills

Will unions work in the IT sector?

Anand Chatterjee on how education and opportunities empower IT professionals who may not be inclined to join employee unions.

After much gibberish and pedantic arguments the first step has been taken finally. The dice has been casted and West Bengal IT Services Association, euphemism for Union, has been formed for the IT professionals which will work as a grievance redressal cell.

No brownie points for guessing it is Kolkata, which in past has nurtured and has been the harbinger of many such revolutionary movements has once again given birth to the unprecedented union movement in the IT sector.

I don’t want to get into pedagogic discussion of what it means for the IT sector and how does it affect the industry in West Bengal or the country as a whole.

The more interesting aspect is what prevented unions from taking a grip on the IT sector so far and if such a seed has been sown will it be successful in the near future?

With the advent of the BPO sector such a forum might have to work towards some of the concerns like long and odd working hours, job security, etc., but on the whole the IT sector (including BPO companies) has been quite employee friendly.

In a recent survey done by a leading business publishing house for best places to work for in India, it’s not surprising that most of the preferred firms to work for are from the IT sector.

Comparison with traditional sectors

Unions have been prevalent and are still quite strong in the traditional sectors like, manufacturing, mining, utilities etc., but the IT sector is quite different fundamentally from the traditional sectors. The basic objective of forming a union is to safeguard the workers’ interest by building the collective muscle power.

The first difference is the workforce itself which constitutes the IT sector and the biggest asset that an IT organisation has. They are knowledge workers and are quite different in terms of skills and qualifications from the workers of the traditional sectors.

Power of education

The term ‘worker’ conjures up an image of the mazdoor who is sweating and toiling to make his ends meet. Definitely an IT professional doesn’t fit into this picture.

Most IT professionals are engineers or post-graduates. The power of educational qualification gives them the ability to deal with the many issues that they might face in the workplace.

This means their ability to discern and take stock of the situation and look for avenues to wriggle out of uncomfortable situations is far greater than compared to their compatriots in the other sectors.

Supply vs demand

The other very important difference lies in the imbalance in supply and demand of IT professionals.

There are innumerable reports and studies which talk about the shortage of manpower in this sunrise sector. There is no dearth of opportunity in this sector and any good resource is lapped up by the market.

Thus, if a person feels that he has received a raw deal from his employer he can definitely look out for better opportunities and feels little motivated to fight against the management and correct the wrong done to him.

Also, given the transient circumstances and business requirements of the IT sector, it is very difficult to prove what is wrong and what is right, unlike in the other sectors where things are far more concrete and stabilised.

Let’s take the simple case of promotions. In this sector promotions are neither time-bound nor seniority-based. It is meritocracy which prevails and given the fact that the average duration of two to three years that an IT worker spends in an organisation, it is more likely that he will be on the roll even before he is eligible for a promotion.

Thus, if a person is denied a promotion, it will be very difficult for him to prove that an injustice has been meted out to him.

On the other hand, in other sectors it becomes quite apparent if someone has received a preferential treatment for a promotion. Under the given circumstances, if an IT professional feels let down by the management, he negotiates with them and looks for some other ways to wrench out a pie for himself by asking for an overseas assignment or increase in salary or some assurance for moving into a new and upcoming technology—plethora of options lie before him.

The management under most situations comes to the negotiating table knowing very well that they might loose a good resource in the wink of an eye if they try to dilly-dally.

Lack of time

Demanding project schedules and the quick pace of change of technology means that time is what an IT professional simply does not have.

He slogs for hours and looks forward to going home to enjoy the evening. He enjoys keeping himself busy and keeping himself abreast with new developments and technologies. Hence an IT professional simply does not have the luxury to spend time on activities for building up a collective body like union.

On the contrary, the situation is quite different for a worker in other traditional sectors. He is not armed with the educational qualifications; most of them would be diploma holders or graduates.

They do not have the kind of avenues that an IT worker has. This has resulted in unions being very effective for the workforce in such sectors and the collective bargaining power of unions have worked quite well for them.

IT professionals are into a different league altogether. They receive much higher compensation compared to the other industries, the work environment is quite comfortable and most organisations take good care of their employees and have employee-friendly policies.

So far because of these inherent strengths of the IT sector it has been successful in keeping the union movement at abeyance and I do not see the situation changing in the near future.

Nevertheless, a movement has been started and I hope sincerely that the intentions of such a movement will be honest and will work for the growth of the sector.

Anand Chatterjee is a consultant with a software MNC. The views expressed in the article are that of the author and do not represent the views of his organisation.