John Deere Case Study – IT Hiring & Tech Center Setup

Introduction

John Deere is a world leader providing advanced products, technology, and services for customers revolutionizing agriculture and construction worldwide.

Initial Engagement & Business Challenges

• Alp Consulting started engagement in 2007 with 60 IT positions to showcase sourcing expertise.
• Initial assignments included IT Security, Product Design, Data Analytics, SAP, Hydraulics Design, Operator Station, and Simulation.
• Challenges:
  • John Deere was not well-known for IT hiring, leading to low brand awareness.
  • Business expectations were not aligned due to lack of market data.

Alp Consulting’s Approach

• Created detailed recruiter pitches to promote John Deere’s brand.
• Developed business presentations highlighting technology groups and their work in India.
• Conducted market intelligence mapping of IT security talent across India and Pune.
• Presented market insights to set realistic hiring expectations with global stakeholders.
• Successfully closed all 60 positions ahead of time, winning the end-to-end RPO engagement for IT business.
• Supported Digital Customer Experience (DCE) group setup in India with 2 group managers and 6 scrum teams.
• Helped transfer entire US work to India via an insourcing project.

Bangalore Centre Setup

• In 2019, Alp Consulting supported John Deere’s plan to grow outside Pune by analyzing location and talent availability.
• Bangalore was shortlisted based on multiple rounds of market intelligence and salary benchmarking.
• SAP Security was selected as the first skill group to build in Bangalore.
• Alp Consulting hosted interview drives and provided infrastructure for global teams during hiring.
• Facilitated continuous talent availability resulting in 3 scrum teams set up in Bangalore.
• Over the last 3 years, helped establish 7 engineering groups.
• Currently, Bangalore has a 100+ member team with 90–92% hiring done by Alp Consulting.
• Alp Consulting also hired the current Bangalore location leader and supports new business setup there.

Talent Acquisition Initiatives in Pune

• Implemented talent pooling across multiple business groups with similar skill requirements.
• Initiated video interviews and third-party technical panels during COVID-19.
• Managed common panel drives improving time to hire.
• Supported hacker rank tests and ensured candidates completed technical assignments.
• Supported various groups including Technology, Embedded Systems, Advanced Engineering, Product Engineering, Advanced Manufacturing, ISG, Industrial IoT, Advanced Analytics, Shared Services, Sales & Support.

Business Metrics & Achievements

• Addressed 94% of additional roles in 2021 and 90% in 2022.
• Maintained a consistent 30% diversity hiring ratio.
• Reduced candidate decline ratio from 62% to 40% in 6 to 8 months.

Grade-wise Positions Closed and Major Skills

Major Skills Supported:

• Polyglot programmers: full stack (Java, AWS, ReactJS, NodeJS), mobile (iOS & Android)
• SAP solutions, machine learning, data analytics, data science, big data
• Cloud engineering, IT security, application security
• Embedded engineering, automotive, product architecture, systems design
• Agile roles, scrum masters, agile coaches, product owners, technical architects

Summary

• Over the past 35 months including the pandemic period, Alp Consulting adapted with virtual interviews and weekend drives.
• John Deere showed strong commitment to onboarding.
• Alp Consulting adopted multiple tools and technologies for hiring success.
• Due to the quality of work, Alp Consulting was shortlisted for leadership hiring at John Deere.