It?s that time of the year to take stock of what?s happening on the salary front and where the jobs? action will be in 2005. The surveys have begun coming in; as usual, everyone is optimistic. Cerebrus Consultants CEO Anita Ramachandran, whom her website describes as ?the country?s foremost authority on compensation and reward management?, says that we haven?t seen anything yet. The real salary increases will happen only now.

A survey by Businessworld says that the growth areas are the familiar suspects ? IT, ITeS, retail, media, financial services and hospitality. That?s in keeping with the pattern of the past few years. Some observers, however, see manufacturing as the dark horse. ?Lines in which mass production is required will inevitably go to China,? says Mumbai-based HR consultant Shashi Rao. ?But India will overtake the dragon wherever you need an intellectual input.?

ITeS ? the lower-end variety ? will eventually move out of the country, to poorer places like Bangladesh. That?s stuff like medical transcription. It isn?t as easy to mass produce call centre facilities; they need a human touch.

Besides, in China at least, English is still a problem. But the government is addressing it by spending big bucks on teaching the language. In India, on the other hand, some antediluvian state governments are sponsoring the primacy of regional languages.

While ITeS and IT will hold their own, the real boom will be in the services sector. The big hitch in that is that many Indians still feel it is demeaning to serve. At the same time, many look upon people employed in this sector as servitors. That mindset must change.

There is huge growth coming up in manufacturing too. You won?t find organised sector companies agreeing to this. The reason: thanks to labour laws that prevent layoffs, they are not adding to their rolls. What they are doing instead is outsourcing labour.

?We are extending loans to some of our senior managers to help them set up a variety of units next door to our factory,? says the CEO of a large textile-to-fabrics manufacturer. ?That way, we don?t add staff we can never sack.?

?The manufacturing opportunity that is coming up is huge,? says Rao. ?But it will never be captured in any data or survey of employers. You have to read between the lines.? She says some manufacturing jobs will be lost as automation makes headway. This will be recorded in the data. But it is a totally misleading picture.

What about salaries? If we are to go by surveys, India will record the highest growth amongst Asian countries. Given that salaries in the West are increasing at a slower pace, this would probably be the highest in the world.

INDIA CALLING

Biggest salary hikes in Asia (%)

India 11.6 China 6.4-8.4 Philippines 7.4-7.7 Korea 6.4-6.8

Figures relate to 2004, based on corporate estimates

Source: Hewitt Associates

The key question as far as Indian employees are concerned is: how much? A Hewitt Associates survey puts the increase at 11.5 per cent for 2004. (This is based on corporate expectations.) Bank employees have already negotiated a 13.25 per cent increase. At Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) salaries were hiked between 10 and 30 per cent from April 1, 2004. Check other individual examples and you will find that the Hewitt estimate seems very low. This is more so because corporate India is getting increasingly upbeat about its prospects.

?The wage bills of the better performing companies are likely to go up by 10-15 per cent,? says Rao. ?But this tells only half the story as highly-paid people who are retiring are not being replaced. On an individual basis, you should ask for a 25 per cent increase. If you are indeed a performer, don?t settle for anything less than 20 per cent.? HR managers had better be prepared.