Infy needs to give CEO search mandate soon

Mumbai: In the interest of good

corporate governance

, Infosys will have to initiate an external search process for a

CEO

soon, even if the company identifies internal candidates to replace Vishal Sikka, sources from the executive search firm industry said.

A senior official from a leading executive search firm said on conditions of anonymity, any internal candidate will have to be benchmarked against the best options available outside of Infosys and globally, before the company zeroes in on a new leader.

A global search of such stature usually takes six months to complete, which means Infosys has just about a month left to give a

search mandate

to a professional search firm — a mandate that could easily run into Rs 6-10 crore.

Sikka, who resigned from the post of CEO, was appointed executive vice-chairman of the company and will hold this office till March 31, 2018. The Infosys board has entrusted the

Nominations and Remuneration Committee

(NRC) to start work immediately on the task of finding a successor to Sikka.

The NRC, however, is yet to give a search mandate to an external agency.

On CEO succession, Ravi Venkatesan, co-chairman, Infosys said at a recent conference call, “We have to get that right. Clearly, we are going to apply our minds to that but we need somebody who is transformational.” He said given that Infosys has 2 lakh people spread out across the world, the leader has to be somebody with an incredible people connection.

Sources in the executive search firm industry said the specifications for Infosys’ CEO have not really changed from the last time when Sikka was appointed, three years ago. However, they added, that the successor, in addition to being a world class leader from the same industry, would also require qualities of having cultural sensitivity in handling issues more professionally and not emotionally. To that extent, a generalist, these sources said, would be the right fit for an Infosys CEO.


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