A report says the median salary increase in India is predicted to rise by 9.8% in 2024.
What’s it all about?
This makes it very slightly less but close to the actual salary increase of 10% in 2023
Willis Tower Watson’s latest ‘Salary Budget Planning India Report’ conducted a survey in April and May 2023.
In this, approximately 32,512 responses were received from companies across 150 countries worldwide.
This included 708 participants from India.
APAC
In Asia Pacific, 7,372 organisations from 22 markets responded.
As an emerging market, it is striking that salary increases in India remain the highest across Asia Pacific (APAC).
In comparison, the 2024 salary increase for Vietnam is projected at 8%, followed by China at 6%, Philippines at 5.7% and Thailand at 5%.
How’s it going at IT?
“Companies across industries are still closely monitoring their cost structures.
Within the IT sector, a noticeable correction is expected with salary increments reducing from approximately 11 to 12% in the past to a projected 10% for 2024,” said Rajul Mathur, Consulting Leader, Work and Rewards, WTW India.
Sectors like manufacturing, pharmaceuticals, media, gaming, and global captive centres (GCCs) are expanding.
Why is it happening?
Mathur said this is evident from their hiring plans and salary allocations for 2024.
The report further remarked tighter labour markets and rising inflation have been cited as some of the major concerns influencing salary increase budget changes for 2024.
However, compared to last year, over half of the companies have increased their salary hike budgets this year, while a quarter have raised their budgets from earlier projections in December 2022.
As per the survey, slightly more than one-third (36%) of the companies have projected a positive business revenue outlook for the next 12 months in Q2 2023 compared to 42% in Q2 2022.
Potential positive outlook?
Coming to hiring, nearly 28% of companies said they intend to recruit in the next 12 months while about 60% companies have increased headcount in 2023, as compared to the previous year.
The report also identifies ‘hot jobs’ for recruitment in the next 12 months.
These include, particularly, roles in information technology (61%), engineering (59.8%), sales (42.9%), technical skills trade (38.6%), finance (11.8%), marketing (10.6%) and human resources (3.1%).
Voluntary attrition rate in India has gone down from 15.3% in 2022 to 14.6% in 2023.
However, this is still one of the highest among the APAC markets, the survey said.
Which sectors will witness the best hikes?
Per the sectoral trends, technology, media and gaming, financial services and retail sectors are expected to see the highest salary increase at 10% in 2024.
“Companies in the financial services, retail sectors and captive setups have projected marginally higher increases for 2024, as compared to the actual salary increase in 2023 due to the continued talent demand,” the survey said.
