By Siddhi Nawar
As India faces geopolitical turmoil and a rupee crisis, its greatest strength—recognized even by global competitors—remains its vast pool of skilled talent. In recent years, the country has solidified its position as a leading hub for Global Capability Centers (GCCs), which drive innovation and global scalability for multinational corporations. Today, industry giants like Amazon, Microsoft, Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan, Deloitte, and HSBC leverage India’s GCC ecosystem to enhance their global operations.
At the recent Economic Times GCC Summit in Hyderabad, global leaders JP Morgan Chase & Co., Warner Bros. Discovery, and Morgan Stanley shared their insights on navigating and expanding in India’s GCC landscape.
The discussion featured Genevieve Dsouza, Managing Director, Head of Finance & Business Management India, JP Morgan Chase & Co.; Jaideep Agarwal, India Global Business Services (GBS) Leader, Warner Bros. Discovery; and Manoj Menon, MD & Chief Administrative Officer – India Global Centers, Morgan Stanley.
Moderated by Amol Dethe, Editor of ETBFSI & ETCFO, the discussion highlighted India’s pivotal role in the global business ecosystem, along with necessary steps to drive sustained growth in the GCC space for the future.
Investing in Talent & Leadership
Listing the core qualities responsible for the scaling of GCCs, Genevieve Dsouza from JP Morgan Chase & Co. stressed on leadership, strategic thinking, technological expertise, and risk management as critical for organisational success. Beyond cost efficiencies, GCCs must build decision-making influence and develop strong leadership to sustain growth, she said.
While uncovering Warner Bros Discovery’s standpoint on the same, Jaideep Agarwal emphasized on its legacy in entertainment but newcomer status in GCC.
Agarwal further added that India’s talent ecosystem has enabled rapid scaling, with success hinging on a differentiated product strategy, quality output, and innovation.
Manoj Menon from Morgan Stanley highlighted collaboration as essential, while focusing on learning from younger industries.
We have been in the GCC space in India since 2003, but there’s still much to learn from newly established GCCs. As a financial services company, you feel like you move the world’s money, but many other industries here operate equally mission-critical systems.Manoj Menon, MD & Chief Administrative Officer – India Global Centers, Morgan Stanley.
Collaborations and Operational Efficiency
Speaking on GCCs and operational efficiency, Genevieve broke down on how GCCs benefit from partnerships with service providers. These collaborations ensure cost-effective, high-quality, and timely service delivery, reinforcing operational efficiency as a major attraction for global organizations.
Offshoring is already a market reality. What global organizations seek in countries like India is operational efficiency, something that partnerships with service providers reliably deliver.Genevieve Dsouza, Managing Director, Head of Finance & Business Management India, JP Morgan Chase & Co.
Despite this, other challenges like infrastructure, sustainability, and talent alignment remain cumbersome.
Jaideep highlighted the importance of Grade A infrastructure, proximity to transportation, and hiring local talent that fits the global brand image.
Genevieve added that cultural alignment between the GCC workforce and corporate objectives is crucial for long-term success.
Positioning India’s Talent beyond Back-Offices
While speaking on processes of scaling up GCC set ups and leveraging India’s young talent to operations beyond back-office operations, Menon explained the process of GCC evolution and the subsequent advancement of operations. He outlined four key stages of GCC evolution to elaborate his point, namely-
- Set-up: Establishing operations with cost arbitrage as an initial driver.
- Scale-up: Expanding business expertise and aligning with client needs.
- Impact: Moving beyond execution to business transformation.
- Transform: Taking ownership of critical functions and innovating global service delivery.
Within this, he explained the shortening duration of each stage in recent times.
What I’ve observed is that the lifecycle of each stage has drastically shortened. During scaling up, the focus shifts to business expertise, understanding client and customer needs, and adapting to industry changes.Menon noted.
Elaborating further upon this, Menon explained how the pandemic accelerated the transformation of GCCs, with companies at the fourth stage experiencing the deepest impact. Today, GCCs are no longer just cost-saving units, they are strategic hubs driving business innovation and global decision-making, he mentioned.
GCCs & Job Creation in India
The panel spoke passionately about India’s strong technical talent pool, which has positioned the country as a global skills hub. This has reduced the need for companies to emphasize “must-have skills” in hiring, noted Dsouza.
Agarwal echoed this opinion while also adding the need for soft skills for India’s growing corporate environment.
India is a powerhouse for hard skills, but we lag in soft skills. There’s a clear gap between graduating college and becoming workplace-ready, an area where focused efforts are needed.Jaideep Agarwal, India Global Business Services (GBS) Leader, Warner Bros. Discovery
He added that, to truly integrate into global business leadership, India must develop middle management leadership skills, enabling local teams to handle global roles and strategic decision-making from India.
Opening up the conversation for more such pointers on how India Inc should navigate the GCC space, Menon emphasized the need for GCCs to integrate deeply with their parent organizations rather than functioning as separate support units.
A crucial objective for a GCC is to be deeply integrated into the parent firm. Strong positioning and stakeholder buy-in are essential to establishing it as a high-quality talent hub. In the early stages, specialization in key service capabilities and deep functional knowledge of the business lays the foundation for long-term success.Menon added.
