Salaries in India will rise 13.7 per cent (net of inflation) in 2006, according to Hewitt Associates' 10th annual salary increase survey.
The global human resources services firm said today India's average salary increase in the range of 11.4 to 15.4 per cent in 2005 was the highest in the Asia Pacific region.
Of the five employee levels - senior management, manager, professional/supervisor/technical, clerical support and manual - the professional/supervisor/technical level is projected to receive the best pay hike of 15.1 per cent in 2006. This group of employees led the pack last year too with a salary increase of 15.4 per cent.
Amongst sectors, asset management companies are projected to hand out the best pay hike of 16.6 per cent in 2006, followed by IT companies (16 per cent), accounting/consulting/legal companies (15.5 per cent), IT-enabled companies (15.4 per cent) and entertainment/communication/publication companies (14.6 per cent).
Non-profit organisations are projected to report the lowest salary increase of 8.8 per cent, followed by banking (10.7 per cent), airlines/travel related services and hospitality (10.9 per cent), chemicals/petrochemicals (11.3 per cent) and consumer durable goods/electronics (11.6 per cent).
Retail, airlines/travel related services and hospitality, banking, entertainment/communication/publications, NBFC and semiconductor sectors are expected to buck the trend to report a higher rate of salary increase in 2006 against 2005, according to the survey.
Companies are increasingly becoming performance-and market-oriented in their reward strategy. An employee's performance and capabilities, along with the competition's reward strategy, were some factors considered important by the companies polled for the survey.
The survey also notes that attrition rates have fallen slightly from 14.5 per cent in 2004 to 14 per cent in 2005.
