All For The AI Label: IT Firm Staff Undergo Training Only To Find Jargon And No Game Changer Effect

With the advent of GenAI tools such as ChatGPT, Microsoft Copilot, Google Gemini, DALL-E, it’s now become a rite of passage for employees working in the Information Technology (IT) sector to undergo such training.

While these are useful daily use tools for writers, coders, students, and even journalists, The Secretariat sought to find out if employees, specifically in India’s IT sector, find any use for GenAI training.

State Of Play At The Top

“A majority of the companies want their workforce to upskill and want their employees to know what are the use cases of generative AI,” said Sudhanshu Saxena, an AI and genAI consultant and trainer, who conducts in-person corporate workshops for Big Tech companies.

Leading the pack is Tata Consultancy Services, which is planning to build “one of the world’s largest AI-ready workforces”. The company told The Secretariat it has trained 300,000 employees in AI and machine learning, including GenAI, out of its total workforce of over 600,000.

However, most companies don’t have a one-size-fits-all approach to such training. The GenAI training at TCS is divided into three categories based on proficiency, namely E0, E1 and E2. There is talk of an E3 level, however, its training content hasn’t been shared with employees.

E0 involves courses on how to use ChatGPT and GenAI to help create content. E1 involves prompt engineering and introduction to OpenAI API and ChatGPT API for developers.

E2, the most advanced course at TCS, covers new languages like Python and gaining new insights into natural language processing, large language models, etc, along with courses on AI paired with ChatGPT and Copilot.

TCS has made E0 mandatory for all employees, but, interestingly, has banned the use of ChatGPT in office, said two employees of the company. Why train over half your workforce in a particular tool and then ban its use? TCS did not clarify on this.

The training across all the three categories constitute a mixed bag of programmes either on the company’s content management systems or on platforms like LinkedIn Learning and Udemy.

“These are very basic courses and not technical at all. The courses have definitions and examples on how to use ChatGPT,” said a TCS automation engineer, who didn’t want to be named.

Employees of companies in and outside the IT industry The Secretariat spoke to refused to be identified since they weren’t authorised to speak to the media.

The TCS automation engineer said E0 training is “not useful at all” for their day-to-day work. “You simply cannot be GenAI ready by doing a course, this is something the world should understand,” said another TCS employee.

It’s unclear how many of the 300,000 employees are trained in E0, E1 and E2 GenAI proficiency levels respectively. TCS said they do not give that break-up.

Some TCS employees said that the company could be showcasing its 300,000 ‘AI-ready force’ to clients and partners to get more projects. TCS has signed multiple deals with big AI players in the last couple of months, and has identified potential business worth US$900 million related to AI and GenAI.

“With one of the largest pools of employees trained in AI and GenAI competencies, we're witnessing a shift towards larger, more strategic projects integrating cloud and AI technologies,” said K Krithivasan, Chief Executive Officer and Managing Director of TCS, in a statement to The Secretariat.

The latest has been a multi-year partnership with Amazon Web Services (AWS), which also includes upskilling 25,000 TCS employees in cloud and GenAI skills. AWS has recognised TCS with a ‘Generative AI Competency’ partner status.

In September 2023, TCS inked a deal with NVIDIA to utilise the world’s biggest semiconductor company’s AI infrastructure to build and process GenAI applications and upskill TCS’ workforce.

They have also partnered with Google and Microsoft, apart from AWS and NVIDIA, to train its employees in advanced AI technology, said TCS.

Shallow GenAI Training Is A Industry-Wide Problem

The Secretariat spoke to an Indian employee at the American IT firm Cognizant, who said they were being inundated with emails since November 2023 to undergo 30+ hours of training in genAI and a Udemy course on prompt engineering even though it has no bearing on their job profile. 

“It’s possible an employee might click on a training video and has then gone off to play cricket and come back when the training session got over. You never know. The employee will get the certificate but it will be of no value,” added Saxena.

Saxena, who teaches batches of 15-20 employees, said companies want their employees to undergo minimal training even though his services include hands-on training.

“The people I train are majorly workhorses (dependable employees who do a lot of work), some are managers and some are leaders,” added Saxena, who recently held an AI and machine learning workshop for Cisco. “It’s very, very important to train the middle management and make them understand that not everything can be solved via generative AI.”

Companies outside the IT industry are also finding value in training their employees in GenAI as a lot of work can be automated and speed things up.

“Take Know-Your-Customer (KYC) for example. A human probably can do 50 KYCs at max in a day. AI can do 50,000 in a day, that too with 80-90 per cent accuracy,” added Saxena.

As per a February 2024 report, jointly compiled by consulting firm Boston Consulting Group (BCG) and industry body NASSCOM, India has the second highest installed talent base with over 420,000 employees currently working in AI-related job functions.

The report also says that India has the highest AI skills penetration with three times more AI skilled talent than other countries. However, this is contrary to the feedback we got from AI start-up founders, who maintained there is a serious lack of AI talent in the country.

Outside The IT Industry

GenAI arguably is a great skill in one’s arsenal if they are a software developer or an AI engineer, as tools like ChatGPT can come in handy as a coding assistant. But what about people involved in client services or consulting?

These are people whose day-to-day job requirements are far from AI realms. The Secretariat spoke to a couple of Deloitte consultants, whose manager asked them to undergo training in GenAI-related programmes.

Even though one of the consultants completed the training, they found that the skills learnt wouldn’t directly help them in their current role. The common sentiment amongst consulting practitioners is that these training exercises aren't taken seriously and are completed only because they are mandatory.

"However, given the steep learning curve and nascent stage of AI tools being plugged into Management Consulting realm, over time these tools will end up becoming crucial in enhancing productivity and consultants would need to stay up to date on AI tools that can save them time and boost efficiency," added the Deloitte consultant.

“GenAI training is available to employees,” said the other Deloitte consultant who is yet to undergo GenAI training. “There is an internal swing to utilising AI in Deloitte. It has become a buzzword. Leadership wants to put AI into everything but that’s neither possible nor realistic. At the end of the day, Deloitte wants to be a market leader and hopefully they will realise that AI isn’t foolproof.”

Things at PayPal’s office in Bengaluru are different. A PayPal software engineer said, “PayPal isn't riding the hype train. Our engineers focus on making payments better. AI has nothing to do with most parts of it.”

“It (AI) is a long roadmap that starts with mathematics, statistics and ends with various flavours of machine learning/deep learning. The courses various organisations claim to have their employees trained on are nothing but definitions of various AI jargons and training on how to use AI tools,” added the PayPal employee.

The BCG-NASSCOM report suggests that while talent demand in India will rise by about 15 per cent, the market itself is projected to grow by 25-35 per cent.

This highlights the importance of upskilling current talent, but also raises the question: Is GenAI training benefiting employees or the business more? It seems the scales are tipping towards the latter, with perceptions suggesting it’s more of a response to the buzzword AI has become than a significant employee growth initiative.