Infosys' in-classroom training drops as online activity grows

BENGALURU: Training in the IT industry is shifting dramatically to online modes. Infosys has a massive training infrastructure in Mysuru, but its employees now spend more time training online and much less in the classroom.
The number of in-classroom training days per employee has dropped sharply to an average of 8.3 days in 2018, compared to 19 days in 2015. In the latter year, Infosys’ nearly 1.8 lakh employees spent 3.4 million days in the classroom.Last year, its 2 lakh employees spent just 1.7 million days in the classroom.
“Previously, 90% was classroom training, now about 40-50% is classroom and the rest is online. There is a definite shift towards online as the industry is adopting these agile methodologies,” said Thirumala Arohi, head of education, training and assessments in Infosys.

Infosys’s learning and development platform has 50,000 learning modules and it has seen 35% of its employees access these programmes on iPads/iPhones and Android devices and 65% using desktops. Infosys has 10,000 people learning these newer technologies for 40-45 mins every day.
It has trained 1.8 lakh employees out of the 2 lakh on newer skillsets. “We are creating a learning path for our employees who want to be future ready. For instance, if you want to be a AI professional, you should spend a minimum of 160 hours of learning the way we have curated the programme. It’s blended learning with in-classroom training,” Arohi said.
Technology platforms are key to reskilling employees at scale. The company has launched an on-demand learning platform called Lex. There is training on skills that are core to the firm, there’s skilling in areas like design, and there’s training in skills of the future.
Infosys has tied up with multiple MOOC (massive open online course) platforms. Udacity is used to train 100 people on autonomous technology. Coursera has integrated their content on to the Lex platform. “We are working with Upgrad for curated domain-specific skill upgrades. We have also tied with Purdue University to collaboratively create cyber security programmes,” Arohi said.
Pareekh Jain, founder of Pareekh Consulting, said with structured training programmes, IT companies are able to transform young engineers and graduates into billable resources. The success of these training programmes are reflecting in the financial results of Indian IT services companies in recent quarters.
Infosys’s training module is a three-tiered approach. A foundation programme trains fresh or campus recruits for 19-24 weeks. The continuous education programme focuses on reskilling employees who are possibly working on legacy technologies and who the company wants to upskill to digital. And then there’s the refactoring programme that’s structured on the lines of the bridge programme, where people take time off their assignments to go through the programme. “The duration of the foundation programme has increased to 19-24 weeks, from 15-18 weeks five years ago. The continuous education programme has gone up to 4.5 days from 3 days on an average,” Arohi said.
Infosys has a similar learning calendar for recruits in the US. It is now replicating that model in Germany, Australia and Japan.