Source: 2011-2012 Aon Hewitt Salary India will post the

Robert Walters, says the official website, 'is one of the world’s leading specialist professional recruitment consultancies with 47 offices spanning 23 countries'. One country that has escaped its wid e coverage is India. It seems a shade odd because when it comes to jobs, India is the happening place. But for some people India is still the back of beyond. They are the ideological descendants of former US ambassador Patrick Moynihan who once famously said: 'What does India export but communicable diseases.'

The Robert Walters survey says a rapid salary growth is expected in 2012. The bigger increases will come in the emerging markets such as Malaysia (20-35 per cent), Vietnam (15-20 per cent) and Thailand (10-20 per cent). In China too, the jump will be in the 15-30 per cent region. In Japan, on the other hand, it will be less than 10 per cent. Absolute salaries, however, are considerably higher in Japan. As a country with a difficult language to master — which means reduced labour mobility across borders —the difference between Japan and its neighbours will continue. (China too has a difficult language. But it has a huge pool of rural labour. At executive levels, you can get along in English.)

The other survey out recently — the 2011-2012 Aon Hewitt Salary Increase Survey — does not make the mistake of ignoring the biggest job market. In fact, it gives India pride of place as the country posting the highest pay increase. The average hike in this country is expected to be 11.9 per cent. This is somewhat less than the 12.6 per cent notched up in 2011 and the 15.2 per cent recorded in 2008. But it is more than the 8.2 per cent in 2009 when the Lehman Brothers meltdown was still casting an aura of gloom. Following India this year are China and the Philippines.

The pharmaceutical sector will have the biggest hikes of around 13.3 per cent, with the engineering design and services sector coming next at 13 per cent. As is expected, junior staff will get 12.3 more, with middle management not doing too badly at 12 per cent. The information technology sector might be disappointed.

Indian job portal naukri.com has also conducted a survey and it is probably the most bullish of the lot. According to its findings, around 32 per cent of the respondents said the range of increments would be between 10 per cent and 15 per cent while 31 per cent put it higher at 15-20 per cent. About 61 per cent of the recruiters surveyed expected a talent crunch.

“There is a problem in all this optimism, however,” says Mumbai-based HR consultant D. Singh. “Companies have not been doing too well financially. The economic slowdown in Europe has had an impact here. Companies are not really in a position to increase the wage bill too much. But they are being forced to do so because of competition for talent. This could hit them hard if the economy doesn’t recover as expected. The problem is that the salary hikes are being given before the event and not after.”

The other issue that Singh points out is the growing disconnect between the employees and the HR department. All too often, it happens that the HR folks offer a 15 per cent pay hike, perhaps the best in the industry, and expect cheering from the rooftops. They get a glum silence instead. Like tired husbands, employees are wont to say: “My HR department does not understand me.”

Too many surveys — and HR bosses — seem to believe that money is what makes the world go round. For many of us, it’s the intangibles that matter more.