Quess Corp scales up general staffing amidst pandemic

Quess Corp's general staffing division has crossed the 250,000-associates mark, the business-services firm informed stock exchanges on Monday.

Its general staffing division grew 25 percent despite the second wave of COVID-19 infections in the country. It has added more than 50,000 associates in the past 12 months, Quess Corp said in its exchange filing.

“We see the combination of post-pandemic market recovery, the impetus of the government’s Atmanirbhar Bharat agenda and PLI schemes for various manufacturing segments, and the implementation of the new Labour Codes in the coming year as tailwinds that will further fuel formalisation across tripartite staffing,” said Guruprasad Srinivasan, COO-India Region, Quess Corp.

Quess Corp has a total headcount of 369,000 employees, as of June 30, 2021, and generated Rs 10,837 crore in operational revenue in financial year 2020-21. More than 65 percent of this revenue comes from workforce management.

India has been struggling with a tough job environment in the past few years, which got particularly worse since the outbreak of the COVID-19 virus in March last year. In the first half of FY 2021, Quess Corp saw an 18 percent drop in headcount.

However, its general staffing division grew in 11 out of the 12 months last year, “despite fluctuations in demand and supply of talent in a highly volatile market,” said Lohit Bhatia, President of Workforce Management, Quess Corp.

The general staffing division provides resources to over 900 clients across more than 400 cities and towns, according to its annual report.

BFSI, telecom, manufacturing, industries and public enterprises, agriculture, and IT / ITeS sector grew by more than 25 percent over the last year, while fast-moving consumer goods and durables grew between 10 percent and 24 percent in the same period, according to Quess Corp in the exchange filing.

Quess Corp owns job-postings website Monster India, which it acquired in 2018, and Excelus, which helps in skill development and training. “Efforts towards building industry-leading technology platforms to complement our physical capabilities are paying off,” Bhatia added.

The company has invested in digital solutions over the years. “Quess General Staffing has always been technology-led, and at the forefront of digital revolution in the staffing space,” the company said. 

Earlier, in January this year, Quess said it would buy 49 percent stake in Taskmo, an online marketplace for gig workers with more than 20,000 users, owned by Stellarslog Technovation.

Quess’s blue-collar jobs application, QJobs, has over 9,00,000 active screened candidates. The application was launched last year in November to connect  blue collar and grey collar candidates with companies.

The company launched POP - Paperless Onboarding in 2017, an app that allows swift digital onboarding of employees, and has clocked more than 1 million downloads.

Quess’s WorQ, an application to manage workforce and a productivity tool, has more than 300,000 active users. It provides human resource services, such as payslips, and leave management on mobile.

Though the company has more than 100 training centres, it is slowly replacing them with "new offerings like digital e-learning skills and training solutions,” Quess Corp said in its latest annual report, referring to the impact of the pandemic on operations.