PSUs run short of R&D talent

NEW DELHI: It’s crunch time again for the public sector companies and this time it’s the research and development (R&D) space that has been hit hard by the talent crunch. R&D centres in public sector undertakings (PSU) are now finding it difficult to get access to the highly skilled talent pool of scientists and researchers and at times losing them to competitors in the private sector.

Attributed to less attractive pay packages, slow growth and an increasing thrust on R&D in the private sector in recent years, the trend is now leading PSUs, such as ONGC, to set up a separate trust for deciding compensation and progression path to counter the problem.

Take for example NTPC. The public sector biggie is facing a huge problem in hiring senior scientists for the full fledged R&D centre that’s coming up in Greater Noida. The company aims at hiring a total of 250 plus people for the centre, mostly senior scientists. Already a hunt for hiring around 40 senior scientists has not had very encouraging results. This despite NTPC being one of the best paymasters among PSUs.

The effort to hire the best has even led them to try sources abroad. Says GK Agarwal, executive director, HR, NTPC, “We are trying to get the best available talent from the market here and are trying to persuade researchers and scientists who are settled abroad and want to come back to India. The constraint on deciding the compensation packages according to market situation is posing a big challenge for us." NTPC has till now got 500 applications for its 40 seats.

To counter a similar problem, ONGC has decided to set up a separate trust to give direction to its upcoming and ultramodern Energy Centre in Vasant Kunj, New Delhi. The trust will have eminent individuals like Dr RK Pachauri, director general, The Energy Research Institute and will give directions on the kind of projects that are needed to be taken up, decide on compensation packages and so on. This is being done to avoid the issues that bar public sector companies to get the best talent.

AK Balyan, director HR, ONGC validates the points, “Institutions like these can’t be regulated like normal PSUs.” The R&D centre is expected to come up in the next two years. BHEL on the other hand is hiring experts on a project-to-project basis where they are paid the market rates.

These are people with a high level of knowledge, with expertise in niche areas and who complement the company’s internal resources with their expertise. “We are not constrained when it comes to paying external experts. They are not paid monthly wages but are paid on a project to project basis.” explains SK Jain, director, HR, BHEL.

CSIR, which has a ready pool of talent, has its own issues as people are said to be leaving for better opportunities, higher salaries and huge perks in the private sector.

Says KP Rajan, MD and CEO, Ma Foi, Management Consultants, “The R&D space in PSUs are facing a huge talent crunch and institutions like CSIR are losing their highly qualified resource pool to private companies. This was not the case five years back. Apart from other issues, companies in the private sector have aggressively taken up research and as a consequence, there is large-scale poaching happening.”