Anyway, setting up an IT subsidiary in India is a pretty smart thing to do. It really is. And it can work. It really can. Just follow the list below :
Point I. Education in India means nothing
This is an actual conversation from a job interview ... "
(interviewer) So, it states here that you learned to program Java in school and did a project in it during your last year ?
(interviewee) -shakes head in Indian confirmation- ... Yes sir.
(interviewer) So how many lines of code did you write in that project ?
(interviewee) None sir.
(interviewer) -looks blank for a moment- ... None ?
(interviewee) None sir.
(interviewer) But it says here ...
(interviewee) Yes sir, it was a team effort sir. There were four of us on that project sir.
(interviewer) And your task was what exactly ?
(interviewee) -proud- Documentation sir !
(interviewer) I see. And in class, how many lines of code did you write there ?
(interviewee) None sir.
(interviewer) -looks like he has to swallow a frog- ... None ?
(interviewee) No sir. We studied Java in week 15, after C++ in week 14 and before Python in week 16. But I have a very thorough grasp of it sir !
After four or five of such interviews you realize that things are not going to improve and you restart from scratch. Still, you do want freshers. Do not hire experienced Indian IT staff ! The word experience will take a completely new meaning. No, take freshers and teach them everything (and that includes speaking, writing and reading English, how to behave in public, etc. ...). Follow your gut and weed ruthlessly during the training period ...
Point II. Your HR manager and Finance manager must be Indian
And experienced. This is the single exception to the above rule. The Indian legislation is complex, the Indian administration is corrupt. If you want things to move on, you want people that know their way around. A good HR manager will know how to split up the salaries so that you pay very little (literally speaking) and the employee gets quite a lot (relatively speaking). A good Finance manager will know who's hand to shake (and especially if his own hand should contain some banknotes during that shake).
Pick experienced people you like and pay them well. You will want them to stay.
Point III. You do not want Indian management to start with
No, you really do not. It may seem a good option to hire Indian team-managers and department-managers and so on. For otherwise you would need expats for quite some time. Say three to four years while your freshers get some experience, learn the company culture and grow into management positions. For higher management it will be more like ten years. And expats are expensive.
So let me tell you why it is not a good idea to hire Indian management :
- before you know it, the number of employees will have doubled ... but hey, India-ans are cheap ... we can get lots ...
- before you know it, they will have pulled every single one of their friends from their old company into your company, actually blocking every single growth-path for your freshers
- before you know it, productivity will drop, for "no Indian company works this hard and we should not be an exception"
- before you know it, you will have a birthday-committee, a party-committee, a team-building-committee, a you-name-useless-activity-committee that will all have meetings in work-time
- before you know it, you will have a bench (a line of employees being paid for sitting on a chair against the wall doing nothing until another employee is absent)
It has to be said, my company did not do bad on Point I, understood Point II (and has those core people) ... but failed miserably on Point III. The results after two years :
- A lot of core people in the Belgian mother company have left.
- The subsidiary has 200% more people today than it should have, resulting in the need for more - costly - office space.
- The backlog of work which should have started to show signs of getting smaller, is actually still getting bigger.
