Attrition at the junior level has always been high in e-commerce start-ups (according to some estimates, it is close to 50-60% for smaller companies), employee turnover, particularly at the higher level, is one of the softer factors that many Indian internet companies are struggling with in recent times.
While a good idea, capital and robust technology are enough to start off a new venture but to grow it to a certain level, a larger management team with significant experience in various processes will be required to continue to scale up the business. And even as the larger companies hire personnel with significant international experience, turnover has risen as well.
For example, the chief product officers of Flipkart and Snapdeal resigned earlier this year and the CFO of Flipkart (Sanjay Baweja) resigned recently barely within a year of joining the company. Many of the senior-level resignations have been due to entrepreneurial
ambitions. However, at the same time, there have also been issues with the way entrepreneurs run large companies.
Flipkart's chief product officer Punit Soni (and was considered a big hire by the Indian e-commerce sector), referred to the inability of the Indian ecosystem to retain international talent during an interview after his resignation from Flipkart. The erstwhile chief product officer of Snapdeal has recently joined Facebook.
