Indian employees in banking, financial services, and insurance (BFSI) Global Capability Centers (GCCs) are receiving 1.5 to 2.5 times higher salaries due to a significant 42% skill gap in AI and data roles, as per a report by Quess Corp. Replacement hiring has notably increased, constituting 40% of all recruitment activities in India’s GCC ecosystem, driven by Gen Z employees with shorter tenure expectations below 24 months.
Hiring within India’s GCC ecosystem witnessed a substantial 12-14% quarter-on-quarter growth in Q4 FY26, a significant rise from the previous quarter’s 4-6% growth. The momentum picked up notably towards the fiscal year-end after a cautious start to the quarter, transitioning from selective optimization to broader recovery-led expansion.
The report highlights the evolving recruitment cycles and employee retention challenges, compelling GCCs to balance aggressive expansion with organizational continuity needs. Emphasizing the shift towards long-term capability building for sustained growth, Kapil Joshi, CEO of IT Staffing, stressed the importance of balancing rapid scale with strategic global hub evolution.
Despite the demand for AI-driven capabilities, platform engineering, and infrastructure modernization, talent shortages persist, significantly affecting scaling efforts. The AI and Data domain face the highest talent gap with a shortage of 38-42%, followed by platform engineering and cloud infrastructure with shortages of 32-36% and 28-32% respectively.
The bottleneck lies not in job availability but in the scarcity of specialized expertise, particularly in areas like AI/ML Ops, necessitating internal upskilling initiatives. The expansion in GCC hiring is supported by an increased active GCC footprint, indicating a resurgence in enterprise confidence.
While hiring is primarily concentrated in Tier-1 cities, accounting for 88-90% of GCC recruitment, Bengaluru and Hyderabad lead the way. Tier-2 cities have seen a growth in their share to 10-12%, yet a significant portion of complex technical mandates remains in Tier-1 hubs. This underscores a “hub-and-spoke” model, where Tier-1 locations drive innovation while Tier-2 cities focus on execution and operational scale.
