Along with the tech world, India’s Global Capability Centres (GCCs) are also evolving. GCCs are no longer low-cost work hubs, they have transformed into innovation, product engineering and global leadership hubs. The centres have transformed into strategic, AI-powered innovation hubs that shape modern workforce strategies through full ownership of work, continuous upskilling, and flexible operating models. Serving as global talent engines, a majority of GCCs now champion technology adoption, AI integration, and diverse hiring across various cities, including emerging tierII locations.
Also read: India’s GCCs: Smarter, Faster, Cloud-Driven, and AI-Led
With this change there is a need to relook at how we attract, develop and retain talent.
Key shifts in workforce strategy include:
- Campus to Industry: Improved partnerships with colleges and universities ensure the students are also exposed to live business use cases. Mentoring and early training programs focused on essential skills, in collaboration with these campuses, ensure that we have talent coming in with better understanding and knowledge of in-demand technologies.
- Geographic Expansion and Workplace Flexibility: GCCs are tapping talent beyond tierI cities by expanding into tierII markets, and are adopting flexible workspace models, with an estimated 65–80 million sq. ft. demand expected by 2030.
- Accelerated Upskilling: To build a resilient, future-ready talent pool, GCCs are also making significant investments in continuous learning, especially in GenAI and automation. Skills like Product Management, Cloud, and AI are becoming increasingly important for GCCs.
In travel tech the focus is largely on the following skills:
- AI and Automation
- Personalization with data
- Mobile-ready platforms
- Digital security
Organisations are working towards friction-free and ease of travel, which brings the need for upskilling and talent transformation to the forefront.
- Skills and Impactbased Compensation: GCCs are moving away from traditional role-based pay toward rewarding specialized skills, especially in AI, ML, Cloud, and Cybersecurity – and the measurable impact employees create.
- Hybrid & Inclusive Work Culture: Organizations are strengthening employee experience through hybrid work, more inclusive policies, and enhanced safety and wellness programs, to attract and retain skilled talent.
- Greater Accountability & Innovation: Building products locally for the world is how GCCs are increasingly being seen as value creators. They are transitioning from executing routine back-office tasks to delivering endtoend products, customer experience solutions, and strategic innovation. Developers who can build products with the customer and help achieve tangible business outcomes are in high demand. Therefore, GCCS are hiring talent who ask ‘why’ and ‘why not’ while developing products.
Overall, GCCs are emerging as core innovation drivers, with many of them actively implementing digital transformation strategies for their parent organizations.
The article has been written by Aloysius Vijay, Director Talent Acquisition India and APAC, Sabre India
