Flipkart’s proposed plan to delay the joining dates of its fresh graduates hasn’t gone down well with India’s top B-school. IIM Ahmedabad has sent a strongly worded email to Flipkart CEO Binny Bansal asking him to guarantee that their graduates will have a job when the date of joining is finalized.
OfficeChai had first broken the news of Flipkart delaying the joining dates of its campus hires from June to December.
In the email, IIM Ahmedabad suggested that the delay should be shortened and said the compensation of Rs 1.5 lakh offered by Flipkart was “utterly unacceptable.” Compensation should be in the form of a monthly payment starting June and not as a lump sum as joining bonus or arrears, it added. IIM Ahmedabad claims that students need to repay loans and had turned away “multiple opportunities that the campus had to offer”, adding that most students had chosen Flipkart over other well-reputed recruiters because of the strength of its brand.
“The decision to defer the date of joining, coming as it does so close to the earlier promised date of June 2016, is sure to make this talent pool regret their decision of joining your company. Talented students fresh out of campus, on the eve of starting successful careers, feel cheated,” it said.
The email had a note of warning as well. “Future engagement of Flipkart with B-school campuses is bound to get affected as a relationship based on mistrust and lack of transparency can never be mutually beneficial.”
Flipkart, for its part, has replied saying that that it’s taking on all the students it has hired but it wouldn’t be able to increase the compensation. IIM Ahmedabad has suggested a conference call with placement committees of other top B-Schools, including IIM Calcutta, IIM-Bangalore, IIM Indore, FMS Delhi, TA Pai Management Institute and Tata Institute of Social Sciences, to reach an amicable solution with Flipkart.
These graduates of these top schools had been hired by Flipkart at salaries of upwards of Rs. 20 lakh. A delay of joining by 6 months would translate to losses of around Rs. 10 lakh for these students, and make it harder for them to repay their education loans.
Flipkart had said that it had delayed the joining dates of these students due to an organizational restructuring. The company has had a tough couple of months, having seen its valuation marked down by three investors and the exits of several high profile executives.