20% Paytm staff to continue WFH post-pandemic, hiring from smaller towns to increase

Paytm has doubled down on its efforts to hire staff from smaller towns and allow them to continue working from those locations even after the pandemic situation eases, founder Vijay Shekhar Sharma said.
“We figured out that we could now recruit from cities where we were previously not going and people don’t have to move to the big cities,” Sharma said during ClearTax e-Invoicing Leadership Conclave on Wednesday. “We are doubling down on that… (People) can now work from wherever they are — Chandigarh, Jalandhar, Orissa… Our plan (is) that we will recruit in small cities and not ask them to join (offices) in the big cities.”
According to Sharma, while Paytm has not zeroed down on a specific model, about 20-25% of its staff could continue to work remotely in the future.
The Covid-19 pandemic and the consequent nationwide lockdown had forced companies across sectors to allow employees to work from home. IT and IT-enabled services companies are now looking at bringing in a hybrid model to allow a percentage of staff to continue working remotely.
The government has also announced simplified guidelines for other service providers (OSPs), including BPOs and ITeS companies, to reduce the compliance burden on them and to facilitate ‘work from home’ and ‘work from anywhere’ framework.
These steps will help promote new job opportunities (especially in smaller towns), encourage innovation ecosystem, and support the development of an inclusive and diverse workforce.
At the Cleartax event, Sharma also talked about how India’s prowess in software can be leveraged to build software to enhance productivity levels. “I am enamoured by the opportunity to serve the common citizen of this country using software technology at a scale that when it says software will eat the world, India’s software will eat the world’s unproductivity… We, in India, will make ourselves productive and solve our customers’ needs which will be never possible in another part of the word.”
Sharma said India will remain Paytm primary market. “In two-three years, we will add the dimension of more international markets. The intention is to build an Indian technology company which is loved and regarded in the international market.” he said.