The term “CEO factory” is often used to describe companies that have a track record of producing successful CEOs who go on to lead other organizations.
In the case of Infosys and Cognizant, these companies have indeed been recognized for nurturing leadership talent and producing executives who have taken on leadership roles in various industries.
Infosys is turning out to be the CEO factory in 2023
Infosys is a global IT consulting and services company based in India. It has a reputation for cultivating a strong leadership pipeline.
Several Infosys executives left the company this year in 2023 and became MD/CEO/Business Head of other companies, contributing to the notion of Infosys being a “CEO factory” in the technology industry.
- Ravi Kumar S– Joined Cognizant as Chief Executive Officer
- Mohit Joshi– Joined Tech Mahindra as MD & CEO
- Gopikrishnan Konnanath– Joined Cybage Software as President
- Kapil Jain– Joined eClerx as CEO & MD
- Vishal Salvi- Joined Quick Heal as Chief Executive Officer
- Charles Salameh– Joined Sangoma as Chief Executive Officer
- Nageswar Cherukupalli- Joined Cognizant as Senior Vice President & BU Head
- Richard Lobo joined Tech Mahindra as CHRO
Such frequent changes in the top management at some IT behemoths have earned them the moniker “CEO factories.” These companies generally produce a good number of CEOs because they are well-managed, well-governed companies. Additionally, such systems will always produce leaders with leadership qualities.
Previously, Cognizant was also known as a CEO factory, executives groomed at outsourcing giant Cognizant have been picked up by other companies seeking to scale up their businesses having produced. Several executives who now lead other companies such as LTI Mindtree CEO Debashis Chatterjee, Firstsource’s Vipul Khanna, among others.
Collabera, Hitachi Vantara, Zensar, Qualitest, and Virtusa have handpicked ex-Cognizant leaders as their CEOs. Others have joined as managing directors or CEOs of large private equity firms and startups.
IT companies are facing slow growth because of macro headwinds and tech spends being pulled by clients. In the last quarter, Infosys has seen a dip of 7,530 in its headcount over the second quarter of FY24, taking the total headcount to 328,764.
