Citigroup Plans To Hire 2,500 Professionals In India This Year

Citigroup is planning to increase its headcount in India by hiring 2,500 professionals in 2014, though globally the bank does not plan to increase its people’s strength from a net add point of view.

“India is a place we are investing in. Last year, we hired around 2,500 people in India and this year we will hire about the same number of professionals,” said Paul McKinnon, head of human resources at Citigroup.

“India is an important market for Citi. It is one of our high growth countries where we plan to invest in the future,” he said, in his first ever media interaction in India since he joined the global group in February 2008.

“Some of these hires are based on in house growth in the business while others are for the various centers of excellence we have set up around the country,” said McKinnon in an exclusive interview to ET. India is one of the eight markets in Asia with revenues of over $1 billion for the group.

The hiring will be across functions and businesses, including consumer banking, investment banking, transaction services and treasury business. A significant number of the recruitment will be for the consumer banking business and the group’s offshore units coming up in the country. The bank’s consumer banking business has turned around in the last two years with growth across all segments including home loans, credit cards, wealth management and basic retail banking. It was primarily due to a slew of launches in the market in the past 18 months.

In the human resources function, for example, Citigroup has decided to have a single point of contact globally for all reporting and analytics within HR. “We started a ‘Reporting Center of Excellence’ here in India. I will spend some time meeting the team to know what progress they have made,” says McKinnon.

“One of the first things that struck me when I joined Citi was the number of senior executives we had around the world that came from India and I think that is because we are a global company and offered great opportunities to learn. So we drew a lot of very talented senior players from India into the company as a whole. India is a place we will continue to come for great talent,” said McKinnon.

The proposed hiring will mostly be at the entry level or within a year or two of experience. Also Citi will hire about 200 from different campuses, including the business schools (IIMs and others), engineering colleges (IITs and others) and undergraduate (UG) college campuses.

“We hire a lot from campuses. In 2014, we have plans to hire a little over 200 people from campuses in addition to doing some lateral hires,” said McKinnon.

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