Fujitsu Siemens to cut 700 jobs

FRANKFURT: Fujitsu Siemens Computers plans to slash around 700 jobs in Germany -- 12 per cent of its workforce in the country -- due to continue
d competitive and economic challenges, it said.

Fujitsu Siemens Computers Holdings (FSC) is Europe's biggest maker of personal computers and employs about 10,500 worldwide, most of whom are in Germany.

It said the job cuts were not a result of its new ownership structure but rather a move to improve profitability and competitiveness.

Management began talks with union representatives about the plans on Thursday, Fujitsu Siemens said.

Earlier this month, Japanese electronics conglomerate Fujitsu Ltd said it will buy Siemens AG's 50 per cent stake in the business for 450 million euros ($580.5 million).

Fujitsu had said at the time it had no plans for any job cuts.

Profit margins are thin in the PC business, which is largely commoditised and fiercely competitive on price.

Wipro to recruits: Join BPO for now

BANGALORE: India’s third largest software exporter Wipro is asking its latest batch of recruits from engineering colleges if they want to join its business process outsourcing (BPO) division instead of the technology services unit for which they were originally hired.

Wipro said it is offering the option because it sees delays in the joining dates for some batches of recruits due to the ‘current business environment.’ According to sources, the students have been given the option of working in the BPO division for a year and later they could be shifted to the IT services vertical. The salary from the original offer remains unchanged.

“Every year campus joining is spread out over the four quarters. This is done for logistical reasons of training and seating. Staggered hiring programme and timelines are also closely linked to our business. Due to current business scenario, we estimate delays in joining dates of some batches of recruits. We are providing them an option of a role in our BPO division. The objective is to let engineering graduates commence work without delay,” Wipro Technologies’ vice president-Talent Acquisition, Pradeep Bahirwani, said.

He declined to comment on the number of recruits who have been given the option or when they were due to join.

The company has made offers to a total of 14,000 students for the 2008-09 fiscal. Wipro said last month that it expects revenue from its IT services business for the October-December third quarter to remain almost unchanged from the $1.1 billion in the previous three-month period because of the deteriorating global economic situation.

Reacting to the slowdown in the key US and European markets, software industry grouping Nasscom is due to revise lower its forecast of a 21-24 per cent increase in IT services exports during the 12 months to March 2009.

There has been a lot of apprehension among students that the difficult economic situation may result in tech companies not honouring the job offer that have been made. But the country’s top three IT services provider--TCS, Infosys and Wipro--have steadfastly maintained that they will keep their word.

At the end of September, Wipro employed nearly 62,000 staff in its IT services business and about 21,000 in the BPO division. It also makes strategic sense for Wipro to recruit the new engineering graduates in the BPO unit as this vertical regularly witnesses higher attrition rates than the IT services division.

Courtesy: Times of India

IT sector high in education fraud

BANGALORE: Education-related discrepancies among the employees in the Indian IT industry has increased during the second quarter of the current
calendar year when compared to the first quarter, according to report by First Advantage.

The IT industry has experienced the highest increase (almost 3.5 times) in education related discrepancies compared to Q1 of 2008, First Advantage said in its second quarterly report ‘Background screening trends-India.’

First Advantage managing director (West Asia) Ashish Dehade said, “Background screening acts as a first line of defence against potential fraud and security breaches. More sectors taking it up actively would employ fewer candidates misrepresenting information and thus, concurrently, fewer likely to engage in frauds or security breaches.”

However, this is not limited to just the IT sector alone as educational qualification-related discrepancies in the banking and financial services (BFSI) sector was the highest in the last quarters.

First Advantage said all the key industries tracked have shown an increase in education-related discrepancies. The report said that maximum discrepancies in educational qualifications were related to institutions in Northern India at 34 per cent, followed by Southern India at 30 per cent.

Almost half (48 per cent) of all fake university cases came from Northern India; followed closely by Western India (43 per cent). Pune topped the city list for education-related discrepancies, followed by Mumbai and Delhi.

Courtesy: Times of India

Wipro too denies layoffs

MUMBAI: Employees with IT firms are spooked by fear of layoffs as demand for IT services slows down.


At some of the top IT firms, talk of layoffs among employees and repeated management clarifications are becoming a regular feature. The latest layoff buzz is coming from Wipro, the country’s third largest IT exporter.

Some employees believe the firm may ask as many as 3,000 to leave because of performance related issues.

Wipro’s HR head-Pratik Kumar has categorically denied this. “This is not true. We have no such plans,” he told ET, in response to a query on whether 3,000 employees with 2 and 2+ years of experience were under review for performance-related issues and could be asked to leave by December.

Wipro is not an isolated case. Recently, there was talk of Satyam laying off around 4,000 people and following reports in the media to that effect, the chairman Ramalinga Raju had sent a mail to all employees re-assuring them that prospects for the firm were bright and urging them not to pay attention to speculation in blogs and the media.

“The mail was sent out to reassure employees because there have been reports in the media that Satyam was handing out pink slips,” a Satyam spokesperson told ET.

India’s biggest IT exporter, Tata Consultancy Services, which has historically had the lowest attrition in the industry at around 10 per cent, reported a spike in its attrition rates to 13 per cent in its second-quarter figures.

The company’s global head-HR, Ajoyendra Mukherjee, was at pains to explain that the spike was not caused by any layoffs but because of certain BPO staffers it took on for a specific project.

“Normally, these staffers are taken on a temporary basis but because of the labour laws in South America we had to take them on our payroll. Th
ey were recruited for the duration of the project. Since attrition is calculated for the last 12 months, you will see a higher percentage even in the third,” he said.

At Wipro, the layoff ‘news’, which has been spreading through the informal grapevine, coincides with the performance-rating exercise the company does twice a year.

“These are not freshers but employees who have been given a ‘below expectations’ rating in more than a couple of appraisals. This is different from what was reported in the media in September--those people are still under review and the actual number is not 3,000 but closer to 1,000,” said one employee. A project manager with one of teams also had similar views.

Involuntary attrition rose to 2.5 per cent in the September quarter for Wipro. In the preceding six quarters, this figure was less than 1 per cent.

“Involuntary attrition of 2.5 per cent is due to performance and other aspects. Our process is very transparent, and employees are aware of where they stand. This is an exercise we do every year,” Kumar said.

To date, there have been fewer layoff rumours about Infosys but the company hasn’t been entirely insulated. Shortly after its Q2 results, there were rumours that it had asked 250-300 people to resign following the discontinuation or scaling down of a BPO project.

However, the top management denied the reports.

Courtesy: Times of India

Infy, TCS still upbeat on hiring

BANGALORE: Though the Indian IT services industry has been cautious in its forecast for growth, two of the country’s top three software exporter
s are not taking the foot off the pedal when it comes to hiring fresh engineering graduates for 2009-10.

Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), the country’s largest software company, has made 24,789 technical campus offers for 2009-10, a 13 per cent increase over its intake of 22,000 for the current fiscal. Its closest rival, Infosys Technologies, will be making around 20,000 offers, an 18 per cent increase. However, No 3 Wipro is lowering the number of campus hires to 8,000 from 14,000.

Typically, IT firms offer jobs to engineering students a year in advance, when they have completed the third year of their course.

Though there has been apprehension that a number of IT companies would not honour their hiring commitments to students, there has been no evidence yet of companies going back on their offers. But there have been reports of some firms postponing joining dates.

“Last year, we made over 22,000 technical campus offers for FY09 employees. There is no delay in joining dates and employee additions are on course with our plans to add 30,000-35, 000 people in FY09,” TCS VP and head (global HR) Ajoy Mukherjee said. Infosys has said it will hire 25,000 staff on a gross basis this fiscal.

Adecco India CEO Sudhakar Balakrishnan says it is too early to comment on how campus hiring by the IT industry will be affected because there is no clarity on the impact of the current economic slowdown.

Courtesy: Times of India

Meltdown: Temping firms rejoice

NEW DELHI: Global financial crisis and the consequent knee-jerk reaction in India--retrenchment and layoffs have given temping firms a reason to
smile.

Amidst layoffs and cautious hiring as means of cost cutting, temporary and contract staffing is fast emerging as a lucrative option. The demand for temporary staff across sectors has been steadily growing at 25-30 per cent over the last six months.

India Inc is increasingly realising that contract or temporary staffing can help reduce cost of hiring, absorption, managing people and compliance. Currently, the top five employers in India account for nearly 1.20 lakh temporary employees in the organised sector.

“With the global crisis affecting almost all sectors in India, companies are now more keen on hiring temporary and sub-contracted staff,” says Kelly Services India country general manager Rajiv Mehrotra.

According to the industry estimates, organisations are saving anywhere between 20-40 per cent in their total wage bills by opting for temp staffing. It is also helping companies to identify requisite talent with specific skills as per their own requirements.

Most of the temp hiring is done by sectors which engage in numerous short-duration projects. Sectors like IT, ITeS, BFSI, aviation, hospitality, manufacturing and infrastructure are reported to have increased their contract staff considerably.

These include companies like Microsoft, GE Money and Big Bazaar, among others. Contract staff is being hired across levels in various sectors as it helps companies take on more time based assignments while reducing costs of permanent hiring.

“When it comes to conditions of working for temporary or sub-contracted staff, they differ across sectors, but primarily, legal obligations remain similar for contracted and permanent staff,” says e2e Business Solutions (a HR consultancy firm) director Yeshasvini Ramaswamy. “However, it helps the organisation because they are able to procure requisite and trained people.”

According to the fourth annual temp salaries primer report, compiled by staffing solutions company TeamLease Services, Bangalore, Mumbai, Kolko
ta and Delhi pay the best salaries in temping, with Bangalore paying the most in IT and HR, Mumbai in engineering and Delhi in sales.

Ahmedabad, Bangalore, Mumbai and Delhi offer the best wage hikes.

However, the positive aspect of the slowdown is that many organisations in the country have been able to control high attrition rates, which prevailed across sectors like IT/ITes, banking, financial services and retail.

Analysts say less productive employees seem to be getting removed, while those with proven capabilities would be valuable to the employers. Firms will find it easy to narrow down on requisite talent.

“History shows that in turbulent times demand for temporary workforce grows steadily. This is quite contrary to the perm business where only critical positions are hired irrespective of the economic barriers. As the global economy gains traction, we will see employers regain confidence and become more willing to add permanently to their payrolls,” says a Manpower India spokesperson.

Courtesy: Times of India

Hiring, attrition come to a halt

MUMBAI: It’s confirmed now. At the annual national human resources (HR) conference organised by SIES college of management studies (SIESCOMS), H
R managers across industries told ET that recruitment has come to a virtual halt.

Larsen & Toubro’s HR manager Karthik Narendra said, “We are only recruiting in our power business since it is an emerging sector. Recruitment for all other businesses has stopped. We are engaged in more internal reshuffling, to try and promote talent in-house.”

Voltas has also stopped recruitment as a result of the recent global financial meltdown. “The services sector has been hit badly by the recent meltdown. We have stopped recruitment but are engaged in training the talent that we have,” said a senior official at Voltas.

High attrition rates, a problem that was prevalent across sectors is no longer a serious issue for HR managers. With many companies laying off people to cut costs, those who haven’t been giving the pink slip are holding on to their jobs.

Ispat Industries, which was hit badly in the recent crisis, is fine-tuning its operations and is trying to cut costs. Ispat Industries human resources director B R Singh said, “We used to hire trainees every year from campuses which we have stopped. We are instead focusing on driving and motivating our workforce. Earlier, with many new plants starting, retention was an issue, but not any more.”

Johnson & Johnson, one of the largest global healthcare company, hasn’t been hit as much, according to Asia-Pacific regional head for labour and employee relations Vikas Shirodkar. He said that attrition will continue because people still want better salaries.

“We are trying to cut discretionary expenditure like travel and conferences. Unlike others, who won’t be hiring this year, we will continue to hire 20-25 students.

T V Rao, a management consultant said, “Instead of halting recruitment and firing people, companies can look at this as a time to indulge in more corporate social responsibility initiatives. Also, if they lay out the problems to the employees and ask for suggestions it will generate goodwill and loyalty. Employees might also be willing to take a temporary pay cut rather than face losing their job.”

Courtesy: Times of India

Job referrals: New hiring mantra

NEW DELHI: While campus recruitment continues to be the dominant mode of recruitment, IT/ITeS companies have substantially ramped up hiring thro
ugh employee referrals and internal promotions.

This could be the fallout of slow hiring phase that most companies are going through.

The slowdown has also led organisations to take stock of the situation and restructure their working conditions. The hiring plans in the IT/ITeS have been attracting much attention, since they are associated with massive hiring of fresh talent.

“Now, almost 40 per cent hiring is through employee referrals and 80 per cent of our promotions are internal,” says Genpact senior VP and HR head Piyush Mehta. “We are more inclined towards it, as apart from saving time on comprehensive background checks and scanning, it also helps in better camaraderie among employees.”

When a candidate is employed through a referral programme, there is a less probability of the candidate leaving the organisation in a small span of time--a fact well established at Genpact, which has a low attrition rate of 25 per cent. That apart, hiring through referral route also saves time searching, headhunting and calling candidates.

Recruiting people and retaining them is becoming a challenge for the HR departments across sectors. In such a scenario, IT/ITeS industry has chosen this mode to ensure effective hiring. “There has been an increase in hiring through employee referrals by 50 per cent across sectors, and at all levels,” says Expertus (a talent management and recruitment firm) sales and marketing VP A Sudarshan.

“The IT/ITeS sector takes the lead in it. At a time when most companies are looking at cost-optimisation, it is a definite tool of cutting on expenses, but it has an adverse impact on head-hunting and recruiting firms like us.”

There are monetary and intangible benefits for employees in case the referred candidate is finally selected. To ensure a successful referral sy
stem, it is important to suitably award employees who are bringing candidates. This is a strong motivating factor. MindTree Consulting, for instance, has an employee referral scheme ‘Each one bring one’. Infosys BPO is also focusing at maximum recruitment and promotions happening internally.

“It also helps in developing employee relations as the employee’s social needs are met and they have a feeling of belongingness,” says Gurukulonline Learning Solutions CEO Shailesh Mehta. However, headhunting and recruitment firms should not be affected to a major extent as there is always a skill gap or difference between the goals of the organisation and the personal goals of an employee.

“Although, there is rampant internal hiring, especially in the IT/ITeS, there would always be a need for specific talent and cross-border appointments. In such cases, it is necessary to leverage on expert recruitment and hiring firms,” said Mafoi management consultants CEO E Balaji.

Courtesy: Times of India

‘When others fire, you hire'

MUMBAI: As the competition hands out pink slips in a down economy, organisations should take advantage by hiring people. “Really good ones are b
eing laid off during times of recession,” says Robert Miller, co-founder of Miller Heiman and a renowned global sales practitioner.

“It’s the hard truth,” he continues. “No company has ever been able to achieve long-term success on the basis of budget cuts. Every business that succeeds over the long haul knows that it needs to invest in order to grow. As the saying goes, you have to spend money in order to make money.”

Bob, as he is fondly called, was in the city to address corporate chieftains, HR and sales workforce on strategic selling in the global economy at the Indiatimes Strategic Summit.
With over 40 years of experience in sales, consulting, and executive management, Bob and his team have helped clients succeed in the sales arena.

The recognised expert in complex sales management said, “Leaders need to think twice before cutting back during a recession. In particular, the benefits of any layoffs can be deceptively elusive.”

Citing an example, Bob spoke about the early 2000s, when Bain & Company conducted a study of the S&P 500. It found that, among companies that had similar growth rates, those that had small or no layoffs during a downturn tended to substantially outperform those that had larger layoffs.

“The reason is simple: because recessions typically last less than a year, so any short-term wage savings obtained from a large layoff are more than offset by the considerable cost of severance packages, any subsequent declines in productivity, and the expense of rehiring and training employees once the economy rebounds,” says the expert.

Undoubtedly its a grim scenario, when prices rise, factory orders drop, unemployment surges and other economic indicators signal rough times. It is then that corporates need to redouble their efforts. A slow economy is an excellent opportunity to improve the quality and size of not just your sales force, but your key people.

“Double up your efforts to get people on the street and capitalise on the strength of your executive team,” he adds.

In the country for the first time ever, Bob Miller, who has developed and introduced Strategic Selling some 30 years ago, said his passion was to elevate the role of the sales profession.

His mentorship drives innovations in sales performance that are consistent with the vision for the company he started three decades ago.

“There are three stages to a downturn,” Bob said, looking dapper in a dark blue suit teamed with a sky blue shirt. “When there are storm clouds on the horizon, as the first signs of trouble appear; when it is wet and rainy weather, when sales plunge; and when the first rays of sunshine appear, when customers start to increase their buying again.”

Studies have found that at each of those stages, companies tend to do exactly what they shouldn’t. In stage one, executives try to exude confidence that their company will be okay (so as not to frighten employees).

In stage two, they slash costs like crazy, often laying off employees and cutting back on the quality of their products or services. And in stage three, they spend freely, partly to try to make amends to alienated employees and customers. All of that might sound reasonable, but studies have revealed that companies that have been better at weathering the downturns tend to do just the opposite.

In stage one, they start battening down the hatches by letting staff know of their contingency plans. In stage two, they treat employees and customers like partners

Courtesy: Times of India

AIG CEO's salary is $1; no pay hike for top executives

NEW YORK: Troubled insurance giant American International Group In (AIG), for which the US government doubled the rescue package to USD 150
billion earlier this month, on Tuesday said that its CEO would get a salary of only one dollar and there would be no pay hikes for its top executives through 2009.

Separately, leading German reinsurance company Munich Re said that it is interested in buying the life insurance business of AIG in Asia.

Announcing compensation restrictions that go beyond the government's directive as part of its bailout package, AIG said its CEO Edward M Liddy would be given an annual salary of just one dollar in 2008 and 2009.

There would also be no annual bonuses in 2009 and no salary increase through 2009 for AIG's top-seven-officer Leadership Group, AIG said.

Besides, AIG has decided against no salary hike through 2009 for the 50 next-highest executives, in addition to bonus, severance and retention award restrictions.

AIG, for which the US government on November 11 nearly doubled the bailout package to 150 billion dollars from 80 billion dollars previously, is planning to sell some of its assets, including life insurance business in the US, Europe, Latin America and Japan, to recover from a financial mess.

Announcing the pay restrictions for its executives, AIG also said that it is developing a funding structure to ensure that no tax payer dollar is used for annual bonus or future cash performance awards for AIG's "Senior Partners," or the top 60 management people.

Commenting on the move, AIG Chairman and CEO Liddy said, "AIG's senior executives recognize AIG's obligation to tax payers.

"We are extremely grateful for the assistance we have received, and we know we have an obligation to use hat assistance to help AIG recover, contribute to the economy and repay tax payers," Liddy said.

The initial compensation for Liddy, who joined AIG on September 18, will consist entirely of equity grants, showing his confidence in AIG and its team.

While he would not receive an annual bonus in 2008 and 2009, he might be eligible for a special bonus for extraordinary performance payable in 2010Liddy will also not be eligible for severance payments.

Besides, Paula Rosput Reynolds, Vice Chairman and Chief Restructuring Officer, who joined AIG in October, will receive no salary or bonus in 2008. In 2009 and beyond, other than her base salary, any other compensation she receives will be tied directly to the progress of the restructuring efforts.

The other five members of AIG's top-seven-officer Leadership Group will not receive annual bonuses for 2008 or salary increases through 2009.

AIG's Senior Partners will not earn long-term performance awards in 2008 and they will not receive salary hikes in 2009, and their 2008 and 2009 annual bonuses will be limited.

Besides the restriction against any severance payment for the CEO, there will be restrictions on severance payments to members of the top-60 management members.

Courtesy: Times of India

More working hours for techies

BANGALORE: Technology firms are increasing working hours and monitoring the hours worked far more rigorously than ever before in a bid to squeez
e more out of employees in these difficult times.

Some are even going to the extent of checking the recess hour of their employees, to make sure that lunch sessions and coffee breaks do not cut into their per-day productivity.

TCS has recently increased the working hours by an hour a day to 9 hours. From January 1, 2009, Accenture India will do the same, becoming perhaps the first MNC company in India to move to longer working hours.

Wipro employees already put in 9.5 hours (8.30 am to 6pm) a day including a brief lunch break, while it's 9.15 hours in Infosys. But these weren't implemented stringently; until now.

“It's sort of mandatory for us now to put in 9.5 hours of work a day. Our HR seems to be monitoring it very closely these days and even a 15 minute shortage/delay is being noticed,” said a Wipro employee who got a reminder for short-swiping a few days ago.

Infosys Technologies head (HR) T V Mohandas Pai said the company has stringent measures to make sure employees put in the required 9.15 hours every day.

An increase in working hours will directly impact productivity and revenues. For instance, by increasing work hours by an hour a day an employee works an additional 22 hours a month. If an hour of his/her work is billed at $20, the company makes an additional billing of $440 per employee. That means, in rupee terms, a single employee can bring in additional revenues of Rs 22,000 a month for the company.

Such work time extension works well for projects that are on what is called the ‘time & material' model. Around 70 per cent of tech projects are currently under this model, while the rest are fixed price projects where the service providers may resort to pruning the size of teams to bringing cost down.

“Companies, by and large, are targeting a per employee productivity enhancement of 15 per cent,” said a strategist working with an MNC firm. Employees are, understandably, unhappy. “Some people are good and are capable of finishing even the extra work that is given to them in 8 hours. So they are wondering why they should hang around for 9 hours,” said an employee of Accenture India.

Courtesy: Times of India

Citigroup to slash 52,000 jobs to reduce costs by 20 per cent

Courtesy: Times of India

NEW YORK: Vikram Pandit-led financial services giant Citigroup has said that it will cut more than 52,000 jobs in the coming months and reduce expenses by 20 per cent in 2009. ( Watch )

Citi said it intends to reduce the total head count to less than 3,00,000 in the near term as part of the plan. The financial services behemoth had a workforce of 3,52,000 in the third quarter of 2008.

"The head count is expected to be down 20 per cent in the near term from peak levels," the company said today.

Aiming to have less than 3,00,000 people, Citi would have to cut over 52,000 jobs.

The plans to be discussed in the meeting with Citi staff in New York today are posted as a power point presentation on the company's website.

The firm, which has been severely battered by the financial crisis, has incurred huge losses in recent quarters. In the third quarter, Citi had a loss of USD 2.8 billion.

In terms of expenses, the financial services major aims to save USD 50 billion to USD 52 billion in 2009.

"Expenses are expected to be down 20 per cent from peak levels," the firm led by India-born Pandit said.

However, Citi pointed out that underlying business remained strong and that revenues were stable.

At the end of the fourth quarter of 2007, the company's head count stood at 3,75,000.

In the first three quarters of this year, the company has reduced its workforce by about 23,000 persons.

Earlier today, television channel CNBC in a report on its website, quoting people close to the company, reported that job cuts might go up to as high as 50,000.

"These people say these cuts will occur in a relatively shorter period of time, such as over the next five or six months," the report noted.

---

Courtesy: The Independent

Citigroup, the ailing US financial giant, shocked the market yesterday by announcing that it would cut 52,000 jobs by the second half of next year.

The planned 15 per cent cut in staff numbers comes on top of 23,000 jobs already axed since the bank's employee numbers peaked at the end of last year and are designed to cut costs by 20 per cent to about $50bn (£33.3bn). The bank warned that London and New York would inevitably bear the brunt of job cuts.

Sir Win Bischoff, the bank's chairman, admitted that, along with other banks, Citi had hired too many people during the long credit-driven boom and predicted a wave of cuts by financial services companies.

"What all of us have done – and perhaps injudiciously – we've added a lot of people over ... this very benign period," said Sir Win. "If there is a reversion to the mean ... those job losses will obviously fall particularly heavily on the financial sector. Certainly they will fall particularly heavily on London and New York."

Citi, which operates in more than 100 countries, employed 352,000 people worldwide at the end of September and has more than 11,000 staff in the UK, including many big-spending investment bankers. Vikram Pandit, the bank's under-pressure chief executive, said yesterday that the total number of employees would shrink to about 300,000 by the end of June.

Mr Pandit announced the cost-cutting measures at a "town hall" meeting for staff designed to set out a clear direction for the financial conglomerate, which has suffered big losses from exposures to debt securities and rising bad debts. Mr Pandit, who took over in December after his predecessor Chuck Prince was forced out, has faced investor attacks for not getting a firm grip on Citi's sprawling global empire.

About half the 52,000 cuts will come from sales of businesses, with 18,000 already in the pipeline from the sale of Citi's German consumer bank and an Indian outsourcing operation. The remaining cuts of about 25,000 are likely to include forced redundancies and to be heavily weighted towards investment banking, particularly businesses such as fixed-income which lie at the heart of the credit crisis.

A Citi spokesman yesterday declined to comment beyond Mr Pandit's presentation to staff.

Market observers expect further big job cuts in financial services, a key driver of the UK and US economies, as a sharp recession and the credit crisis weigh heavily on the once-booming industry. The Centre for Economics and Business Research predicts a loss of 62,000 City-related jobs in the UK by the end of next year from 2007's peak of 352,000 with big knock-on effects for other sectors.

Shaun Springer, chief executive of the City recruiter Napier Scott, said: "This is both a reaction to the paucity of profit this year and a proactive assessment of business next year. If there is little business to be had at Citi, that is a pretty fair reflection of top-tier financial institutions in general."

Citi shares shed 19 per cent last week, falling below $10 for the first time since its formation from the merger of Travelers Group and Citicorp in 1998.

Citi was already under fire from investors before the credit crunch started due to out-of-control costs and a series of mishaps across its network. Sir Win signalled yesterday that Citi's bosses would follow Goldman Sachs and UBS by going without bonuses for this year. "Watch this space," he said.

Mr Pandit has faced calls for Citi to be broken up but, though further minor disposals are in the pipeline, he defended the company's "global universal bank model", telling staff that the core strategy remained unchanged. He also highlighted the bank's strong capital position after the US government's $25bn injection, bringing Citi's tier one ratio to 10.4 per cent, just behind JPMorgan and ahead of Bank of America and Wells Fargo on 9.8 per cent each.

The bank's job cuts are already bigger than any other financial institution, according to Bloomberg. UBS, Merrill Lynch and Wachovia have all revealed more than 5,000 job reductions.

The bank has lost about two-thirds of its market value this year after four quarterly losses totalling $20bn. The bank's shares lost a further 6.6 per cent yesterday, closing at $8.89. Citi was last week forced to deny reports that Sir Win, the City grandee, had lost the confidence of some of the bank's directors.

Banks and brokerages worldwide have announced more than 200,000 job cuts since the credit crisis started in August last year. Goldman Sachs is cutting about 3,200 employees, or 10 per cent of its workforce.

Philips to lay off 1,600 workers

THE HAGUE: Dutch electronics giant Philips will cut "about five percent" of its 32,000 strong workforce in the medical division worldwide,
affecting 1,600 workers, a company spokesman told on Saturday.

"In this sector, about five percent of all workers will be laid off. There are a total of 32,000 employees in this division so that means 1,600 jobs will be lost," said Arent Jan Hesselink.

"We want to take all possible measures despite the sluggish economic scenario at present to maintain our profit levels and even improve them if possible," he said.

Most of the medical division employees are based in the United States "but this does not mean that workers will lose jobs where they are most in numbers."

Hesselink said the company wanted to be "as best prepared to face the effects of reduced economic growth or even recession, which many people are predicting will follow soon.

"The next step will be for us to see what eventually happens and when. We then have to negotiate with the people."

Philips head Gerard Kleisterlee said earlier this month: "Given the limited scope of the present economic scenario we have taken certain measures to maintain our profits."

Philips reported net income of 357 million euros in the third quarter of this year, 7.8% higher than the previous quarter, and sales of 6.3bn.

Courtesy: Times of India

Layoffs not to affect India ops: British Telecom

NEW DELHI: The UK-based British Telecom (BT), which announced 10,000 job cuts last week, said, "India will not be affected by any of the job cut
s elsewhere."

"India is a productive market and we are going steady in the region," BT Innovate and Group chief technology officer Matt Bross said on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum-India Economic Summit here.

The three-day economic summit, organised jointly by the Geneva-based World Economic Forum and the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) started on Sunday amid fears of recession in major economies of the world.

BT has currently employed over 22,000 people in its business process outsourcing (BPO) operations in the country.

Last year, BT had obtained licence for international long distance (ILD) and national long distance (NLD) services from the Department of Telecommunications (DoT).

Bross said the company expected to post $2 billion in revenues by 2011 from the Asia Pacific region, one of the biggest emerging markets which currently contributes about “just a billion.”

Operating in over 170 countries, BT is one of the world's leading providers of communications solutions and services. Its principal activities include networked IT services, local, national and international telecommunications services, and higher-value broadband and Internet products services.

Meanwhile, global IT software provider CA announced it will invest $30 million for an additional facility in Hyderabad, which will house almost 1,000 people.

Regarding the job cuts, CA senior vice-president and general manager (India) Lokesh Jindal said, "We are upbeat about the company's progress and there will not be any job cuts." This investment will be raised from internal accruals, he added.

Companies operating in India are "upbeat" about the economic growth and the country's job market is totally insulated from the effects of the global financial crisis, industrialists said at the summit.

Courtesy: Times of India

GlobalLogic lays off 125 employees

NEW DELHI: In another hit to the IT sector, GlobalLogic, one of the largest outsourced product development companies in India, has laid off abou
t 125 employees.

While 108 employees were asked to leave ‘due to poor grading in the appraisals’ concluded in October, another 17 were told to leave because their ‘skill sets fell obsolete’.

The over $100-million company, which has delivery centres in Noida, Nagpur and Pune, confirmed the layoffs but said the figure is 115.

GlobalLogic CEO Peter Harrison, who flew in from the US this week, called an emergency townhall meeting to announce the drastic steps. “We believe in sharing the numbers (of layoffs) with employees as we don’t want to create any anxiety. A transparent organisation is the most productive one,” said its marketing head Rohit Sharma.

Over the last two years, Global-Logic reduced its headcount to 2,000 from 3,000. The company has also consolidated its verticals into three --B 2B, B2C and telecom--to reduce flab and overlap.

In another interesting twist, one of the co-founders and partner Rajul Garg has resigned from the executive management team as the HR head to pursue entrepreneurial activities ‘outside the company’. He now just has a position on the board. The company is now on a lookout for a new HR head.

Business flow from start ups and emerging product companies has been impacted due to the slowdown. To reduce its discretionary spend, GlobalLogic has done away with paper or plastic tumblers and provided coffee mugs to employees. Single employee pick or drops even at night are now curtailed.

The company has also restructured its management team under which the Indian operations head Mukul Jain will now become the global head. The new India country manager and the existing Ukraine and China heads will report to him.

Courtesy: Times of India

Chipmaker Lam Research cuts 600 jobs

LOS ANGELES: US chipmaker Lam Research Corp will shed 15 per cent of its workforce, or 600 employees, joining the list of technology companies t
rying to cope with declining sales and rising costs by cutting jobs.

The circuitry-etching tools company expects to save about $60 million a year through the job reductions. The company will be reducing other costs to achieve further savings of about $20 million annually.

The job cuts will affect regular, temporary and contract employees, and are expected to be completed by the first quarter of next year, the company said.

Last month, Lam Research posted a sharp drop in earnings and projected slow demand for the rest of this year.

A teetering economy and slumping consumer confidence have hit the semiconductor industry hard.

With demand in electronic goods plummeting, the semiconductor industry has made large-scale layoffs. Top chipmaker Applied Materials announced a 12 per cent cut of its workforce. National Semiconductor Corp cut up to 10 per cent, KLA-Tencor Corp up to 15 per cent, and Akamai Technologies Inc 7 per cent.

Courtesy: Times of India

Jet likely to announce a 20% cut in staff salaries

MUMBAI: With recession eating into its bottom line, private air-carrier Jet Airways is likely to announce a 20% cut in the salaries of its
pilots, engineers and some other staff.

"Chairman Naresh Goyal has convened a meeting of airline officials, pilots and engineers here tomorrow, to discuss the issue of salary cuts. An announcement to this effect is also likely," a source close to the development told reporters today.

The meeting is to be held at a five-star hotel in the metropolis, the source added.

Pilots and engineers to be affected by this move are understood to have expressed their opposition to it and are considering their response, the source said.

The airline employs around 13,200 personnel with around 2,000 of them drawing a salary of more than Rs 1 lakh a month. These officials comprise mainly pilots and maintenance engineers.

Despite repeated attempts, Jet Airways officials were not available for comment on the likely meeting tomorrow.

The air-carrier's move comes in the wake of steep losses and rising operation costs coupled with falling passenger demand.

According to aviation analysts, Jet Airways, which posted losses to the tune of Rs 384 crore in Q2 of the current financial year, is likely to post a net loss of Rs 1,890 crore in 2008-09.

In October, the airline had announced a lay-off of 1,900 employees as part of its drive to prune costs but had to retract, following political pressure.

Jet had, a few weeks back, terminated the services of 35 out of 240 expatriate pilots.

While taking back the 1,900 staff, Goyal had described them as his "children" and said that though cost-cutting initiatives would be pursued, there would be no lay-offs.

He had also said that he would sit with all of the airline's stakeholders to ensure that the airline was not grounded.

Courtesy: Times of India

Ten Best Tech Employers (India)

Courtesy: Times of India

Which are the best IT companies to work for and what is it that makes them so? Which are the companies which are setting new paradigms with their HR policy? The recent Dataquest's annual Best Employers survey, done in association with research firm IDC, has a few answers.

The survey sized up IT companies on various parameters, including employee strength, salary structure, training days, tenure of top management, growth opportunities etc.

Not surprisingly, the survey too felt the tremors of the present global economic turmoil troubling IT companies, with many of the tech biggies including Capgemini, IBM, Infosys, Wipro, Cognizant, CSC and Cadence refusing to be a part of the survey. Incidentally, it is for the first time in the survey's eight-year history that these companies have refused to participate.

Here's over to the winners.

1) iGate Global Solution


The top spot in the DQ Best Employers' ranking goes to iGate. Nasdaq-based iGate ranks high on infrastructure, policies and procedure, pride in saying that ‘I work for this company and work undertaken is crucial for the company's growth’.

The company has branded HR programmes like HAP-PSY-CAP (happy psychological capital) and I Love iGate to help boost employee satisfaction and instill a pride for working in the company. The company also has communities within iGate based around skills, regions as well as hobbies.

As for the challenges, company ranks at lowly #25 on the ‘independence to take decisions by the employees’ parameter. Also, according to the survey, ironically, while the company is seen by employees as an employer to be proud of, the outsiders give it a low score on a dream company to work for parameter.

2) RMSI

Next on the ranking is Geographic Information System (GIS) solution provider RMSI. The company which started as a joint venture with US-based Risk Management Software Inc (RMS) in 1992 has been a part of DQ Best Employers since 2003.

The company ranks no. 1 on salary hikes and at no. 2 on transparency of appraisal system and relevance of perks and benefits. During the past year (2007-2008) year, the company undertook distinct orientation towards leadership development, career development and open communication, according to the survey.

The company was also able to bring down its attrition rate from 14 per cent in the year previous to 11 per cent. The company also boasts of fourth highest rate of retention among the surveyed companies. Among the challenges, the company ranks `relatively poor' at no. 15 on HR front.

3) HCL Infosystems

At no. 3 in DQ Best Employers' survey is HCL Infosystems. Part of one of the country's largest IT group, HCL Infosystems is an IT products and infrastructure major.

The company ranks at no. 2 on recognition of initiatives and efforts at the time of appraisal and constructive feedback from manager/superior. The survey also gives the company second position on people, company image and job content. The company's two broad HR programmes include iLearn and iLead.

On the challenges front, the survey says that there seems to be dissatisfaction brewing among employees with the kind of work, with many employees terming it monotonous. The company recently announced plans to expand its systems integration (SI) business, with three new verticals defence, security and education. HCL Infosystems is also beefing up its exports portfolio.

4) Rolta India



Here's an IT company termed ‘outperformer' by a leading stock broking company recently. Rolta offers engineering design and geospatial information services (GIS) to clients in the infrastructure, oil & gas, power and defence sectors.

The company ranks at no. 4 on fairness of appraisal system and appropriate salary hikes. Last year the company invested heavily in training and infrastructure development according to the survey.

On the challenges front, as the company's employee base grows, it is foreseeing automation of its HR process. With the Indo-US nuclear deal back on track, the Mumbai-based technology company aims to double revenues from its power plant design and automation (PDA) practice by 2011.

5) Microsoft India


At no. 5 on the list is the Indian subsidiary of global software giant Microsoft. First MNC in the list, the company ranks at no. 1 on overseas opportunity and company image parameters.

The company employees also rank it fairly high on ‘relevance of perks and benefits' and quality of training parameter. On the challenges front, the employees rank the company low on `manager genuinely cares about my professional and personal growth' and `manager is always available when I need help or advice' parameters.

However, Microsoft India claims that it is replicating some of its global practices to resolve these issues. The company recently announced the appointment of ex-Dell chief Rajan Anandan as its MD.

6) Tata Consultancy Services



At no. 6 is India's largest IT services company TCS. Mumbai-based company gets top marks on overseas opportunity and company image parameters. The company also scores high on job security/stability parameter.

Last year saw the company go full stream ahead on its HR digitisation plan. The company also automated its appraisal system SPEED and learning system iCALMS (integrated competency and learning management system).

The company has also put in place a role-based structure that aims to capture the job profile across various functions. On the challenges side, the company seems to be under strain due to the current global economic crisis. The employees also gave the company low marks on salary, fairness of appraisal system, relevance of perks and benefits parameters.

The company's recent decision to delay promotions too seems to have created anguish among employees.

7) SAS India



Among the best workplaces to work for globally, SAS's India subsidiary seems to have successfully implemented its global HR practices in India.

The company scores highest on (1) job content parameter. The employees also rate the company relatively high on relevance of training (3), relevance of training to professional and personal growth (4) and relevance of perks and benefits (4).

Some of the global HR practices implemented by SAS India include flexible working hours, day-care benefits, concierge services and adoption assistance policy. The company also has a global online recruitment portal which helps employees seeking intra-company transfers across the globe.

On the challenges front, the employees rated the company relatively low on growth opportunities (9) and freedom to speech at meetings (9) parameters.

8) Synechron



At no. 8 is Synechron, a software solutions and service provider for capital markets, mortgage banking and insurance. The company gets top marks on salary and compensation parameter. The employees also rank it high on overseas opportunity parameter.

Last year company automated its HR repository by implementing HRMS system across all branches. The company also managed to reduce its attrition level and revamped its training module.

On the challenges front, the employees rated the company low on manager's concern about employee's professional; positive work environment; and personal growth and encouragement from managers to speak and express freely during meetings parameters.

The company plans to enter new geographies such as the UK, European Union, Australia, Gulf and South East Asia markets targeting BFSI clients.

9) Tavant Technology



Tavant Technologies, an IT solutions and services company ranks at no. 9. Tavant has been ranked no. 9 in the overall ranking and no. 2 in organisation culture/work climate and interpersonal relationships.

According to the survey, the company follows a fun-at-work model and lays stress on fulfilling the interests of employees. The company also has a forum called M-team that aims to take the employee feedback and raise various employee-related issues to the management.

On the challenges front, the company is rated low on company's leadership's contribution to the growth of the company, training and relevance of benefits and perks parameters by the employees.

Tavant specialises in building solutions and providing end-to-end services in the domains of service operations, consumer lending, ebusiness and trading and securities.

10) Span Infotech India

Next in the ranking, at no. 10, is outsourcing services company Span Infotech. EDB, a Norway-based IT company, recently acquired 50.1 per cent stake in Span Infotech.

The company is ranked highest (5) on exciting growth opportunities parameter, followed by amount of training; training and its relevance for professional and personal growth; company image; and company culture parameters. The employees give the company a rating of 7 on all these parameters.

The employees seems to have grouse over fairness of the appraisal system, transparency of the appraisal system and relevance of perks and benefits, with employees rating the company low on these parameters.

Span has been offering specialised services to ISVs and is strong in the insurance and financial services sector along with serving system integrators (SIs) and start-ups.

What makes BPO jobs hot?

NEW DELHI: Today freshers have multiple options, ranging from the IT industry to BPO, from retail to telecom to banking. So what should they cho
ose and why?

The BPO industry is among the most attractive industries. First, the industry changes personalities for the better. There are numerous examples of people who have been armed with life skills exuding confidence about their future after being in a BPO.

While functional skills can be acquired in any profession, developing life skills is a significant leap. Second is the exposure to the global best practices.

BPOs provide the headstart in terms of ‘process maturity’ and hence helps shape the thinking of young workforce. The third is the opportunity to learn international cultures.

Interacting everyday either with customers as in a call centre or being part of a team that works with international teams, today’s youngsters get the opportunity to experience what it is like to work as a global professional.

The fourth is the opportunity to grow in the industry itself. An interesting aspect is that many employees grow on to managing multi-million dollar businesses at a young age. From an entry-level position to a managerial position there are several examples of growth.

Then there are benefits of travelling outside the country, as part of the functional requirement. All this is in addition to the benefits of a good pay.

So why, then, are many freshers still not clear about making BPOs a career choice? One cause is the perception about the industry.

For an industry that has grown to Rs 50,000 crore in eight years, there has been a lot of talk about what this industry has to offer. There are always many positives and some negatives.

However, the negatives have caught the attention of people. One is the fact that unlike retail or IT which was largely associated with technical qualifications, higher pay and travelling abroad, the BPO industry came as a huge shock to society.

Here was an industry willing to pick up freshers, not requiring specialised educational qualification, paying them Rs 15,000 as starting salary, working at different times of the day and night and creating massive employment.

It defeated all conventional norms of employment. It was a contrarian industry which created quite a stir. The larger society could not digest the pace and quantum of change.

Instead of good things getting highlighted, the focus went on to some of the drags like rash driving BPO cabs, possible health issues of late night working and whether the social fabric will change with so much money at the disposal of a young workforce. This got highlighted rather than the huge good that the industry has created.

The consequence, BPOs got positioned as good for a stop-gap, not for a long-term career. How untrue. With over 8 lakh people employed, it represents a vibrant India. This is the place of action.

Courtesy: Times of India

IT cos to go slow on hiring

BANGALORE: As the first quarter results for FY09 start pouring in from IT companies, starting with Infosys Technologies on July 11, expectations on the human resources front would be very muted.

Despite being one of the largest employers of formal education sector, the mood in the Indian IT industry is frozen in terms of hiring, on account of weak economic signals from US, its largest market.

It is expected there will not be any 'big' hiring numbers for the first quarter from the large IT services companies. The curiosity in hiring numbers is because any organisation’s revenue growth is directly related to number of people employed.

Some of the HR belt-tightening steps that large IT firms are keenly following are lower increments, slimmer bench (as low as 5 per cent in many cases against an average 20 per cent in the heydays), greater operational efficiencies in hiring and, in some extreme cases, even outplacements.

HR industry watchers say companies are not rushing to hire and are keeping an external bench instead. For instance, if a project requires 1,000 people over a period, they would hire 300 and guage the progress.

In the meantime, they would engage recruitment agencies to keep a database for the remaining numbers for hiring at short notice.

The current situation has led to the growth of innovative models and greater focus on recruitment process outsourcing (RPO). Today, providers o
f outsourced IT services are seriously looking at outsourcing their HR requirements.

This has started with companies asking recruitment agencies to be more aligned with their requirements and keep a talent pool ready. Wipro Technologies, for example, has aligned its recruitment agencies, to a particular business vertical so that they could also share the risks and rewards of hiring.

Ambletek Solutions Group CEO, Kannan Ramaswamy, says companies under pressure to reduce hiring costs are actively looking at RPO solutions. He feels there is a skilled talent pool available at costs lower than current levels. Companies are borrowing from manufacturing best practice, just-in-time (JIT) inventory for staffing.

Satyam’s HR head, SV Krishnan says, “We are looking at a lot of new models and JIT is one of them. Besides, we are also keen to have a diverse employee profile and our global workforce is increasing.”

Today, some companies are employing the concept of outplacements. Under this, a company retains a recruitment firm to actually headhunt its own employees it no longer needs and this applies to corporations on a rightsizing drive but focussed on staff welfare.

Outplacements is still quite a new concept in the Indian labour market. While outplacements is not a trend in the IT sector so far, there are some stray cases that recruitment firms report. Says Kris Lakhshmikanth of the Headhunters, “We have been engaged with a few such cases in the last quarter.” And, it will pick up momentum if distress signals continue, they add.

Courtesy: Times of India 2 Jul, 2008

Cost cutting starts at Google

SAN FRANCISCO: Internet search giant Google Inc is known for hosting the most extravagant holiday parties in Silicon Valley, often drawing crowds of over 10,000 and prompting some employees to post ads for party dates on classifieds website Craigslist.

But even Google has decided to scale back its holiday celebrations this year due to a global economic downturn and an ever-expanding workforce that had grown to 20,000 in October, according to a person familiar with the matter.

Silicon Valley has few reasons to celebrate this year as companies, including Hewlett Packard Co, Yahoo Inc, Sun Microsystems Inc and Applied Materials Inc, have cut over 140,000 jobs in the last few months because of the bleak economy, according to Challenger, Gray and Christmas consulting group.

Google has fared better than most tech companies, but departments at the Internet company will have smaller events this year to encourage camaraderie between employees and celebrate more economically, said the source. Team holiday activities will include spending an afternoon volunteering followed by evening social activities such as dinner parties and museum outings in San Francisco.

This is a striking difference from previous years, when Google holiday parties included ice sculptures of the company's logo, virtual reality video game stations, karaoke booths, sushi buffets and burlesque dancers.

Last year a party crowd of 10,000 spread throughout the Shoreline Amphitheater, near Google headquarters in Mountain View, California, said workers -- called Googlers. A handful used the Web to find dates.

But this year only one looked for a companion in a recent search on Craigslist. Google declined to comment on this year's change.

Courtesy: Times of India 22 Nov, 2008

Microsoft to add jobs

PERU: Not everyone is slashing jobs in these grim economic times. Microsoft Corp has no plans to cut back on research spending and plans to add workers in the coming year, senior executive Craig Mundie said.

“Right now we're still on a plan to complete 100 per cent of our college recruitment plan globally,” he said. “The ability to get top talent has actually improved” as the world enters what could be a punishing recession.

Nor is Microsoft, which has 90,000 employees and more than $20 billion in cash on hand, decreasing its global budget for educational programme -- which affects 100 countries, said Mundie, the software giant's chief research and strategy officer.

Mundie said in an interview during a 21-nation Pacific Rim economic summit that top management decided a few weeks ago it would slow hiring. But he said its $8 billion research budget wouldn't be trimmed.

“Our position at this point is that we hope to continue to actually still have some growth in our employment through the course of the year. But we're monitoring the situation carefully,'' he said.

Mundie said he believed Microsoft could actually benefit from the global downturn as people decide to hold meetings online rather than get on airplanes -- or save on phone costs by relying more on voice-over-Internet technology.

“I think we might see some movement toward those things that have an almost immediate payback in terms of productivity or cost containment,” he said.

Mundie was attending the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum, whose members account for half the global economy and include China, Japan, the United States and Russia.

Courtesy: Times of India 22 Nov, 2008

Tech biggies that are still hiring

You thought pink slips are the flavour of the season, especially in the technology industry? Read this: Satyam hiring 15,000, TCS to add 12,500, Infosys headcount to be up 25,000...

Yes, you are reading it right! Contrary to the fears of a hiring freeze due to global economic slowdown, IT majors in India have their hiring plans intact.

While initial reports indicated that the slowdown could nibble revenues of IT firms, followed by a spate of pink slips, delayed joining dates and promotion postponements, here comes the good news that the companies are still hiring.

However, the slowdown has led to a review of the hiring policies with companies adopting what they term as 'stringent quality measures'.

So, have a look into the hiring plans of tech biggies at

http://infotech.indiatimes.com/quickiearticleshow/3590315.cms

11 SSH Tricks

X11 Forwarding

You can encrypt X sessions over SSH. Not only is the traffic encrypted, but the DISPLAY environment variable on the remote system is set properly. So, if you are running X on your local computer, your remote X applications magically appear on your local screen.

Turn on X11 forwarding with ssh -X host. You should use X11 forwarding only for remote computers where you trust the administrators. Otherwise, you open yourself up to X11-based attacks.

A nifty trick using X11 forwarding displays images within an xterm window. Run the web browser w3m with the in-line image extension on the remote machine; see the Debian package w3m-img or the RPM w3m-imgdisplay. It uses X11 forwarding to open a borderless window on top of your xterm. If you read your e-mail remotely using SSH and a text-based client, it then is possible to bring up in-line images over the same xterm window.
Config File

SSH looks for the user config file in ~/.ssh/config. A sample might look like:

ForwardX11 yes
Protocol 2,1

Using ForwardX11 yes is the same as specifying -X on the command line. The Protocol line tells SSH to try SSH2 first and then fall back to SSH1. If you want to use only SSH2, delete the ,1.

The config file can include sections that take effect only for certain remote hosts by using the Host option. Another useful config file option is User, which specifies the remote user name. If you often log in to a machine with ssh -l remoteuser remotehost or ssh remoteuser@remotehost, you can shorten this by placing the following lines in your config file:

Host remotehost
ForwardX11 yes
User remoteuser

Host *
ForwardX11 no

Now, you can type ssh remotehost to log on as user remoteuser with the ForwardX11 option turned on. Otherwise, ForwardX11 is turned off, as recommended above. The asterisk matches all hosts, including hosts already matched in a Host section, but only the first matching option is used. Put specific Host sections before generic sections in your config file.

A system-wide SSH config file, /etc/ssh/ssh_config, also is available. SSH obtains configuration data in the following order: command-line options, user's configuration file and system-wide configuration file. All of the options can be explored by browsing man ssh_config.
Speeding Things Up: Compression and Ciphers

SSH can use gzip compression on any connection. The default compression level is equivalent to approximately 4× compression for text. Compression is a great idea if you are forwarding X sessions on a dial-up or slow network. Turn on compression with ssh -C or put Compression yes in your config file.

Another speed tweak involves changing your encryption cipher. The default cipher on many older systems is triple DES (3DES), which is slower than Blowfish and AES. New versions of OpenSSH default to Blowfish. You can change the cipher to blowfish with ssh -c blowfish.

Cipher changes to your config file depend on whether you are connecting with SSH1 or SSH2. For SSH1, use Cipher blowfish; for SSH2, use:

Ciphers blowfish-cbc,aes128-cbc,3des-cbc,cast128-cbc,arcfour,aes192-cbc,aes256-cbc

Port Forwarding

Ports are the numbers representing different services on a server; such as port 80 for HTTP and port 110 for POP3. You can find the list of standard port numbers and their services in /etc/services. SSH can translate transparently all traffic from an arbitrary port on your computer to a remote server running SSH. The traffic then can be forwarded by SSH to an arbitrary port on another server. Why would you want to do this? Two reasons: encryption and tunneled connections.
Encryption

Many applications use protocols where passwords and data are sent as clear text. These protocols include POP3, IMAP, SMTP and NNTP. SSH can encrypt these connections transparently. Say your e-mail program normally connects to the POP3 port (110) on mail.example.net. Also, say you can't SSH directly to mail.example.net, but you have a shell login at shell.example.net. You can instruct SSH to encrypt traffic from port 9110 (chosen arbitrarily) on your local computer and send it to port 110 on mail.example.net, using the SSH server at shell.example.net:

ssh -L 9110:mail.example.net:110 shell.example.net

That is, send local port 9110 to mail.example.net port 110, over an SSH connection to shell.example.net.

Then, simply tell your e-mail program to connect to port 9110 on localhost. From there, data is encrypted, transmitted to shell.example.net over the SSH port, then decrypted and passed to mail.example.net over port 110. As a neat side effect, as far as the POP3 dæmon on mail.example.net knows, it is accepting traffic from shell.example.net.
Tunneled Connections

SSH can act as a bridge through a firewall whether the firewall is protecting your computer, a remote server or both. All you need is an SSH server exposed to the other side of the firewall. For example, many DSL and cable-modem companies forbid sending e-mail from your own machine over port 25 (SMTP).

Our next example is sending mail to your company's SMTP server through your cable-modem connection. In this example, we use a shell account on the SMTP server, which is named mail.example.net. The SSH command is:

ssh -L 9025:mail.example.net:25 mail.example.net

Then, tell your mail transport agent to connect to port 9025 on localhost to send mail. This exercise should look quite similar to the last example; we are tunneling from local port 9025 to mail.example.net port 25 over mail.example.net. As far as the firewall sees, it is passing normal SSH data on the normal SSH port, 22, between you and mail.example.net.

A final example is connecting through an ISP firewall to a mail or news server inside a restricted network. What would this look like? In fact, it would be the same as the first example; mail.example.net can be walled away inside the network, inaccessible to the outside world. All you need is an SSH connection to a server that can see it, such as shell.example.net. Is that neat or what?
Limitations/Refinements to Port Forwarding

If a port is reassigned on a computer (the local port in the examples above), every user of that computer sees the reassigned port. If the local system has multiple users, tunnel only from unused, high-numbered ports to avoid confusion. If you want to forward a privileged local port (lower than 1024), you need to do so as root. Forwarding a lower-numbered port might be useful if a program won't let you change its port, such as standard BSD FTP.

By default, a tunneled local port is accessible only to local users and not by remote connection. However, any user can make the tunneled port available remotely by using the -g option. Again, you can do this to privileged ports only if you are root.

Any user who can log in with SSH can expose any port inside a private network to the outside world using port forwarding. As an administrator, if you allow incoming SSH connections, you're really allowing incoming connections of any kind. You can configure the OpenSSH dæmon to refuse port forwarding with AllowTcpForwarding no, but a determined user can forward anyway.

A config file option is available to forward ports; it is called LocalForward. The first port-forwarding example given above could be written as:

Host forwardpop
Hostname shell.example.com
LocalForward 9110 mail.example.com:110

This way, if you type ssh forwardpop you receive the same result as in the first example. This example uses the Host command described above and the HostName command, which specifies a real hostname with which to connect.

Finally, a command similar to LocalForward, called RemoteForward, forwards a port from the computer to which you are connected, to your computer. Please read the ssh_config man pages to find out how.
Piping Binary Data to a Remote Shell

Piping works transparently through SSH to remote shells. Consider:

cat myfile | ssh user@desktop lpr

tar -cf - source_dir | \
ssh user@desktop 'cat > dest.tar'


The first example pipes myfile to lpr running on the machine named desktop. The second example creates a tar file and writes it to the terminal (because the tar file name is specified as dash), which is then piped to the machine named desktop and redirected to a file.
Running Remote Shell Commands

With SSH, you don't need to open an interactive shell if you simply want some output from a remote command, such as:

ssh user@host w

This command runs the command w on host as user and displays the result. It can be used to automate commands, such as:

perl -e 'foreach $i (1 .. 12) \
{print `ssh server$i "w"`}'


Notice the back-ticks around the SSH command. This uses Perl to call SSH 12 times, each time running the command w on a different remote host, server1 through server12. In addition, you need to enter your password each time SSH makes a connection. However, read on for a way to eliminate the password requirement without sacrificing security.
Authentication

How does SSH authenticate that you should be allowed to connect? Here are some options:

*

By hostnames only: uses .rhosts file; insecure; disabled by default.
*

By hostnames and host-key checking.
*

The S/Key one-time password system.
*

Kerberos: private-key encryption with time-expired “tickets”.
*

Smart card.
*

Password prompt.
*

Public key.

The most common authentication method is by password prompt, which is how most SSH installations are run out of the box.

However, public key encryption is worth investigating; it is considerably more secure than passwords, and by using it you can do away with all or most of your password typing.

Briefly, public key encryption relies on two keys: a public key to encrypt, which you don't keep secret, and a private key to decrypt, which is kept private on your local computer. The general idea is to run ssh-keygen to generate your keys. Press Return when it asks you for a passphrase. Then copy your public key to the remote computer's authorized_keys file.

The details depend on whether the computer to which you are connecting uses SSH1 or SSH2. For SSH1 type ssh-keygen -t rsa1, and copy ~/.ssh/identity.pub to the end of the file ~/.ssh/authorized_keys on the remote computer. For SSH2, type ssh-keygen -t rsa, and copy ~/.ssh/id_rsa.pub to the end of the file ~/.ssh/authorized_keys on the remote computer. This file might be called ~/.ssh/authorized_keys2, depending on your OpenSSH version. If the first one doesn't work, try the second. The payoff is you can log in without typing a password.

You can use a passphrase that keeps the private key secret on your local computer. The passphrase encrypts the private key using 3DES. At no time is your passphrase or any secret information sent over the network. You still have to enter the passphrase when connecting to a remote computer.
Authentication Agent

You might wonder: if we want to use a passphrase, are we stuck back where we started, typing in a passphrase every time we log in? No. Instead, you can use a passphrase, but type it only once instead of every time you use the private key. To set up this passphrase, execute ssh-agent when you first start your session. Then execute ssh-add, which prompts for your passphrase and stores it in memory, not on disk. From then on, all connections authenticating with your private key use the version in memory, and you won't be asked for a password.

Your distribution may be set up to start ssh-agent when you start X. To see if it's already running, enter ssh-add -L. If the agent is not running already, you need to start it, which you can do by adding it to your .bash_login, logging out and logging back in again.
Authentication Agent Forwarding

If you connect from one server to another using public key authentication, you don't need to run an authentication agent on both. SSH automatically can pass any authentication requests coming from other servers, back to the agent running on your own computer. This way, it never passes your secret key to the remote computer; rather, it performs authentication on your computer and sends the results back to the remote computer.

To set up authentication agent forwarding, simply run ssh -A or add the following line to your config file:

ForwardAgent yes

You should use authentication agent forwarding only if you trust the administrators of the remote computer; you risk them using your keys as if they were you. Otherwise, it is quite secure.
Traveling with SSH Java Applet

Many people carry a floppy with PuTTY or another Windows SSH program, in case they need to use an unsecured computer while traveling. This method works if you have the ability to run programs from the floppy drive. You also can download PuTTY from the web site and run it.