India’s Sell-Side Researchers Should Say What They Mean

[k1976]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/busi...1a1408-72bf-11ee-936d-7a16ee667359_story.html


The sell-side research community in Mumbai has to be the world’s most polite. Rare is the analyst who will use an unkind word if a more painless and pointless alternative can be found — or invented.

But tactfulness extracted a price six years ago, and it may come to bite again. Last time, trouble erupted in banking. This time, it is brewing in outsourcing.

 

[k1976]

As George Orwell said in Politics and the English Language, the decline of language ultimately has political and economic causes.

Stockbrokers in India use empty phrases as a tribute to corporate power. So, sales and profit don’t decline for large Indian outsourcing companies, they “degrow.” A workforce doesn’t shrink; the addition of employees turns negative.

The motto is simple: Present the good news, boldly, clearly and upfront in plain English; then, and only then, slip in the bad news, but after obscuring it with jargon.

Like in the Monty Python sketch, the parrot may be nailed to the cage, but it’s never dead. It’s always resting, pining for the fjords.

 

[k1976]

From the outside, it’s hard to tell. The Big Four of Indian offshoring giants — Tata Consultancy Services Ltd., Infosys Ltd.,

Wipro Ltd. and HCL Technologies Ltd. — have hired half a million engineering graduates in the past three years. Two of the companies have indicated they won’t be going to campuses this year, according to an article in the Mint.

This is a big blow. It seems, the industry is mimicking its clients by employing generative artificial intelligence tools like ChatGPT to boost productivity.

If AI is going to permanently reduce the number of entry-level programming jobs in an average year, then youngsters need to pick up other skills to improve their chances.

It’s better to let them know when they’re yet to hit the job market.