Evernorth’s Hyderabad Innovation Hub is no longer just a backend arm, it’s now driving full product delivery for Cigna. In a recent interaction, Yadhu Kishore Nandikolla, Human Resource Senior Director, Evernorth Health Services India, shares how the company is building a 1000-strong tech team, tapping into untapped talent pools, and upskilling engineers on US healthcare through initiatives like in-house bootcamps, shadow programs, and a custom healthcare university.
Evernorth is building a 1000-strong tech team in Hyderabad. In such a competitive healthcare tech market what has been your strategy to attract, retain, and nurture top talent, especially when you’re looking for both technical skills and healthcare domain understanding?
We currently have over 1700 employees, with almost 95% of them being technology professionals. Our strategy is a multi-pronged “build and buy” approach. From a “buy” perspective, since we are building foundational teams from scratch, we’ve invested significantly in acquiring experienced subject matter experts, some of whom are quite expensive, particularly in niche skill areas.
Our core strategy, however, is driven by our Employee Value Proposition (EVP), which revolves around three key aspects: first, the quality of work or the kind of work that we offer to our talent. Our centre is called the Hyderabad Innovation Hub, and true to its name, the work our talent gets to do here directly impacts the global healthcare ecosystem. Our vision is to transform healthcare, and joining us offers an opportunity to contribute to this significant purpose. Second, the culture. We’ve built a culture characterised by inclusivity, minimal bureaucracy, and a product-centric mindset. We invite prospective employees to experience this culture firsthand. Third, compensation and benefits. We’ve designed our compensation and benefits to be highly competitive without overpaying or saturating the market. We don’t put all our eggs in one basket; we invest heavily in comprehensive health benefits, including OPD and insurance, which is fitting for a healthcare company.
These three elements are the primary drivers of our talent attraction and retention strategy. From a retention standpoint, beyond the challenging work, we focus on providing extensive learning and development opportunities and a superior workplace experience. Our office space offers a generous 120 square feet of workstation area per employee, providing a nice, decent space unlike a typical call centre environment, which is also part of our EVP. As we are just one year into our journey, we are also actively developing programs around retention bonuses, stock options, and career progression for the coming years.
Do you think that GCCs coming to India are actually bringing about a culture change in the work environment?
The technology leaders we are bringing on board are individuals who have “been there, done that.” They bring valuable experiences from other GCCs, enabling us to accelerate our growth journey by replicating successful strategies. They understand how to quickly scale operations, attract and retain talent, ensure effective technology delivery, and create enterprise value at an accelerated pace, all while maintaining cost arbitrage.
Many of our teams have started owning full capabilities from here. This means for certain product lines and work programs, the entire delivery is managed from Hyderabad, reducing reliance on expensive US talent or third-party contractors. Our teams here have full accountability and responsibility, making them empowered to make decisions and work directly with the business. This transforms our GCC into a true extension of Cigna’s global operations, rather than merely an offshore delivery or staff augmentation centre. We see our Hyderabad office as another Cigna office, on par with those in Denver or St. Louis.
Evernorth recently launched bootcamps for early career talent and “Manager 101” programs for leaders. Could you share some insights on these initiatives?
Absolutely. As a new organisation, our initial focus was on hiring experienced lateral talent. However, after much convincing, we onboarded our first cohort of 56 early career professionals for a six-month internship program in January this year. These interns are typically final-year engineering students.
We partnered with Vardhaman College of Engineering and CBIT, two reputable tier-two/tier-three engineering colleges. With Vardhaman, our partnership is more extensive; we’ve set up an Innovation Lab there. The college provides a 25-30 seater computer lab, while our seasoned subject matter experts from Evernorth visit weekly or bi-weekly to interact with students, providing real-time healthcare case studies and problem statements. Students get four weeks to prototype and develop software solutions, followed by review sessions where they present their demos. This program, launched last November, has been very successful, and some of these students received internships with us.
The 50 interns who joined us this year underwent an 8-week bootcamp program. Phase 1 focused on soft skills, behavioural skills, and corporate transformation. Subsequently, they were divided into five batches, each trained on a different technology stack. For the next four months, they worked as shadow resources on live projects. I’m proud to say that as of July, we’ve converted about 50-52 of them into full-time employees, a great success rate! Our hiring managers are now requesting more interns. Last week, we completed interview drives for our next batch of 45 interns, joining us in two weeks. This time, we also opened referrals to our employees. We’re also exploring direct hiring from tier-one and tier-two institutions like IIIT Hyderabad, IIT Hyderabad, and BITS Pilani Hyderabad for key initiatives, albeit in smaller volumes initially.
Beyond technology, we’re building the centre for finance roles. We’ve connected with ICFAI, IBS, and IMT Hyderabad to develop curricula for financial talent, though it’s still early days. We also have a Campus Outreach Committee, sponsored by a business leader. This group of 10-15 passionate employees voluntarily engages with universities, delivering guest lectures, providing case studies, and helping design curricula based on industry requirements.
Regarding “Manager 101,” as we bring in many external managers from diverse organisational cultures, this is a two-day immersion program for all new people managers, regardless of their career level. It’s structured into four or five modules: first, People Processes and Policies, covering everything from talent acquisition, hiring, onboarding, performance management, and compensation planning to learning and development, all specific to Cigna. Second, Company Policies, a comprehensive understanding of global and Hyderabad-specific policies. Third, Corporate Functions, including corporate security, information security, and finance processes like budgeting and team productivity measurement. Fourth, Technology Tools, an overview of tools used by project teams. Fifth, Behavioural Competencies, an overview of Cigna’s eight leadership competencies (e.g., strategic thinking, empathetic leadership) to ensure managers demonstrate these behaviours.
This comprehensive program prepares them to be effective people managers within the company. Our plan is to build “Manager 102” and “103” programs tailored for senior managers and directors.
Indian talent isn’t just clustered in metros; it’s split across tier-one and tier-two cities. Do you have any approach or thoughts on tapping into this broader talent pool?
When we began planning our GCC, we evaluated numerous locations, including metros like Delhi NCR, Mumbai, Bangalore, and Chennai. We ultimately chose Hyderabad for several reasons, with talent availability being predominant. Hyderabad offers a vast pool of talent across various skills and technology stacks. It’s also a growing city with robust infrastructure and high talent mobility; approximately 30% of our new hires in the last year relocated from different parts of the country to join us here. This is partly because Hyderabad offers a decent cost of living and an inclusive, cosmopolitan culture.
Even after 14 months of operations, we feel there’s still immense untapped potential in the Hyderabad market. Looking ahead, we are considering whether to concentrate all our resources in one location or expand to other cities for business continuity and disaster recovery purposes. That said, our existing talent includes individuals from tier-three and tier-four cities like Indore, Jaipur, Salem, and Coimbatore, underscoring the relocation trend I mentioned. Notably, these are primarily experienced lateral hires, with about 70% of our current workforce being from Hyderabad itself.
As a team working on predictive health and pharmacy benefit platforms, how are you ensuring your talent is not only future-ready but also deeply aligned with the healthcare space you operate in?
That’s a great question; we were just discussing this morning how to enhance our talent’s business knowledge here. US healthcare operations are vastly different from India’s, and our local talent wouldn’t inherently know the nuances. We are addressing this through two or three key initiatives: first, U-Help (University of Healthcare Learning Platform). We’ve white-labeled an e-learning platform with approximately 1,500 courses on US healthcare. These range from fundamentals to payer/provider dynamics and interoperability. It’s a foundational learning path with assessments and certifications at the end of each course, compulsory for every employee. We have 1,400 licenses that are rotated, and content is continuously updated. Second, US Subject Matter Expert Engagement. We frequently have US colleagues and subject matter experts travel to Hyderabad. During their visits, we organise brown bag sessions and town halls covering behavioural health, pharmacy benefits, basic health plans, and AI/GenAI. These sessions are recorded and made available on our learning platform. We also send some of our high-performing talent from India to the US for two-week shadowing programs with our US SMEs, after which they conduct knowledge transfer sessions here. All learning materials from these sessions are hosted on our Confluence (SharePoint) portal, serving as a central repository. Third, the Nipuna Program. This is a recent initiative where we’ve identified internal high-performing talent with significant US healthcare experience from previous roles. We put them through a “train-the-trainer” bootcamp to equip them with effective training and presentation skills. These internally certified facilitators now conduct monthly training programs for our employees. Initially, we handpicked about 25 individuals based on nominations from HIH directors, followed by panel interviews to assess their commitment. The one-week bootcamp includes pre- and post-assessments, and we track participant feedback quarterly. These trainers acknowledge that subject matter knowledge alone isn’t enough; effective delivery, presentation skills, body language, and audience engagement are crucial. This program is successfully building an internal pool of trainers.
With AI being such a hyped topic, how do you see their benefits within the HR domain?
AI is transforming every industry and workstream, and HR stands to benefit significantly in two or three key areas: first, Talent Acquisition. AI will streamline processes like profile screening and interviewing, reducing turnaround times, especially where we don’t have enough in-house subject matter experts. It can automate the entire offer process, from pre-onboarding to onboarding. Second, HR Operations. AI can help create chatbots and provide automated solutions for employees’ repetitive queries, improving the employee experience without requiring constant human intervention for routine tasks. Third, Performance Management. This is a major area for AI’s effective use. AI systems can help team members draft measurable goals and assist managers in evaluating performance for mid-year or year-end check-ins. An LLM, for example, can analyse all of a team member’s efforts captured in systems (like emails or SharePoint) and generate a summary analysis to facilitate performance conversations.
With hybrid work now being the new normal, how do you balance team flexibility, cohesion, and performance? Secondly, how does Evernorth’s larger purpose of improving health outcomes help retain and motivate people in the long term?
Let me address the first part of your question about flexibility. We’ve aligned with market standards for hybrid work, as it’s now an expectation. Initially, for the first six months, we adopted a four-day in-office model (Monday-Thursday) with Friday as a full remote day. This was essential for new teams to learn, transfer knowledge, and build rapport. From October last year, we transitioned to the market-standard hybrid model: three days in the office, with two days of remote work. Managers roster teams at the beginning of each month to decide which days team members come in, ensuring office presence throughout the week and preventing Mondays and Fridays from becoming consistently long weekends. Our peak days are Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays.
While offering flexibility, we also empower employees. For instance, we provide additional flexibility for women employees, especially during their first three months of joining, to work from home and log in, given the limited two-to-three-hour overlap with US colleagues for knowledge transfer. Our culture emphasises that employees are responsible for their delivery. We don’t micromanage by tracking hours spent in the laptop, in the office, or at home. What truly matters is delivery. If performance lags, flexibility will be constrained. This is a global philosophy we follow.
Regarding Evernorth’s larger purpose, I briefly alluded to this earlier. Our culture is rooted in a bigger purpose and vision: to transform the healthcare industry. We reiterate this from the very beginning of the onboarding experience for every employee, emphasising how the Hyderabad Innovation Hub plays a critical role. This message is consistently reinforced during every town hall. We also invite senior leadership from the US to reiterate this vision. We showcase impact stories of colleagues who have made significant contributions, sharing them on our SharePoint and company newsletters to inspire employees. Our culture also includes investing in manager effectiveness, ensuring our managers can effectively retain talent by providing them with meaningful work, like developing impactful products.