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Senior managers, working at startups like <a href="http://www.businessinsider.in/searchresult.cms?query=Flipkart%2C+Snapdeal+and+Amazon">Flipkart, Snapdeal</a> and Ola, are no more interested in these top consumer Internet companies in India. They are heading for the exit door, with many citing a mixture of low job satisfaction and poor work-life balance. 
 
This change is seen at a time when <a href="http://www.businessinsider.in/searchresult.cms?query=Indian+startups">Indian startups</a>, boosted by soaring valuations, are on an aggressive spree to hire new talents. So are these mangers hungry to start their own companies? Lets’ read and know! 
 <keyword id="3019928" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="Swaminathan-Seetharaman">Swaminathan Seetharaman</keyword>, who earlier worked as the vice-president for engineering at taxi app firm <a href="http://www.businessinsider.in/searchresult.cms?query=Ola+">Ola</a> and quit after about a year at the company, said: "There are multiple levels of decision-making as an organisation grows and individual contributions to make impact get diluted." 
 The 41-year-old Seetharaman, who led the development of consumer mobile interfaces while at Ola, teamed up with former colleagues <keyword id="2047443" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="Ganesh-Subramanian">Ganesh Subramanian</keyword> and <keyword id="576027" type="PERSON" weightage="60" keywordseo="Nitin-Agarwal">Nitin Agarwal</keyword> to launch an on-demand services marketplace Pianta. 
 
Termed unicorns — or companies valued upwards of a billion dollars — Flipkart, Snapdeal and Ola have all witnessed exits of senior managers in recent months. 
 The latest exit was of <keyword id="843670" type="PERSON" weightage="60" keywordseo="Ravi-Vora">Ravi Vora</keyword>, the head of strategic initiatives at Flipkart, who quit this week. Others to have quit the country's largest <a href="http://www.businessinsider.in/searchresult.cms?query=online+retailer+">online retailer</a> include engineering head <keyword id="6518849" type="PERSON" weightage="60" keywordseo="Sameer-Nigam">Sameer Nigam</keyword>, who left in July. 
 Chief Technology Officer <keyword id="1937803" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="Amod-Malviya">Amod Malviya</keyword> transited to an advisory role in July. In February, Delhi-based Snapdeal saw its then CTO <keyword id="2049459" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="Amitabh-Misra">Amitabh Misra</keyword> leave to start his own firm. 
 
Restaurant listing guide <a href="http://www.businessinsider.in/searchresult.cms?query=Zomato+">Zomato</a> has seen the exits of marketing heads <keyword id="499896" type="PERSON" weightage="60" keywordseo="Alok-Jain">Alok Jain</keyword>, and subsequently <keyword id="584823" type="PERSON" weightage="60" keywordseo="Rameet-Arora">Rameet Arora</keyword>, who quit within 10 months. Jain has started an ondemand food venture Yumist. 
 The Gurgaon-based company's chief product officer <keyword id="3019927" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="Namita-Arora">Namita Arora</keyword> left within a year of joining the firm. 
 
Let’s know the reasons behind leaving the billion dollars companies. 
 
Seniors being relegated: Experts tasked with finding fresh talent for these high-growth startups say several exits stem from seniors being relegated when hierarchies alter. "Shrinking interactions with the founders coupled with decreased influence on impactful decisions are two most frequently cited reasons for individuals to move out of startups," Harish Kumar, founder of headhunting firm Wenger &amp; Watson, told ET. 
 
Volatile work environment, long working hours, and high levels of stress are also wearing out several senior executives at startups. "The culture of having beds for technology teams in offices can backfire and hurt emotional health," said a senior technology executive who quit a Delhi-based startup. 
 
Bid to lock in talent: Dissatisfaction with compensation is also leading to exits in several cases. Startups typically offer employee stock options aimed at locking in talent from a year to four years. Often, employees can cash in about a quarter of their holding after a year. "After that, shares can be redeemed on a pro rata basis every month or quarter, depending on the contract," said Seetharaman. 
 
However, this is only at an ideal startup. At several others, founders allow only a tenth of promised stock to be sold at the end of a year, with vesting periods rising incrementally to 40% at the end of four years. "There can be additional harsh lock-ins, which make the packages unfair," said the Delhi-based founder of an executive search firm who works with companies such as Flipkart, Zomato and Snapdeal. 
 
Senior employees are realising that they too have a chance of making big returns from India's unprecedented startup boom where the top Internet companies have between themselves soaked up some $6 bn of funding so far. 
 
(Image: Indiatimes)

Top executives are leaving startups like Flipkart and Ola. Are they hungry to start their own ventures?

With a mounting number of consumer Internet companies in India, the latest hold-up, which is keeping the firms on their toes, is attrition. The top-most Internet firms are in a scuffle with the management executives who were recently hired from the <keyword id="6357722" type="COMPANY" weightage="20" keywordseo="silicon-valley">Silicon Valley</keyword>. 
 Top <keyword id="436047" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="20" keywordseo="Ecommerce">eCommerce</keyword> firms, including <keyword id="6354742" type="COMPANY" weightage="20" keywordseo="Flipkart">Flipkart</keyword>, Zomato and <keyword id="6354720" type="PERSON" weightage="20" keywordseo="Ola">Ola</keyword>, recently made headlines for their hiring spree and splurging millions of dollars on their executives, are now troubled due to heavy migration of skilled professionals. 
 Sunit Mehra, managing partner at <keyword id="3077520" type="COMPANY" weightage="20" keywordseo="Hunt-Partners-India">Hunt Partners India</keyword>, which is an executive recruitment company, says, Consumer Internet companies in India "are growing so rapidly that they haven't built the fundamental concept of retaining people, especially at the top-level." 
 Flipkart, one of India’s largest eCommerce firms, recently lost Srivals Kumar after he resigned as general counsel and legal head due to organisational restructuring. The firm, then, immediately hired Rajinder Sharma, former director and general counsel – South and West Asia, at <keyword id="10591" type="CITY" weightage="20" keywordseo="Samsung">Samsung</keyword>. 
 Not just this, but around four other senior executives have quit Flipkart this year including Mekin Maheshwari (chief people officer), Ravi Vora (chief executive of strategic brands group), <keyword id="1937803" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="20" keywordseo="Amod-Malviya">Amod Malviya</keyword> (chief technology officer) and <keyword id="6518849" type="PERSON" weightage="20" keywordseo="Sameer-Nigam">Sameer Nigam</keyword> (engineering head). 
 Flipkart, the firm which is valued at $15 billion, however, have been hiring a number of skilled professionals like it recently hires former <keyword id="6355629" type="CITY" weightage="20" keywordseo="Google">Google</keyword> executive Punit Soni as chief product officer, as reported by The Economic Times. 
 
In a similar episode, Zomato’s Durga Raghunath too left the firm as senior vice-president after after a six-month stint to find an online publishing company. Hence, he also joined a list of senior executives who have quit the venture this year. 
 The former chief product officer <keyword id="513563" type="PERSON" weightage="20" keywordseo="Namita-Gupta">Namita Gupta</keyword> and former chief marketing officer <keyword id="3077519" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="20" keywordseo="Ramneet-Arora">Ramneet Arora</keyword> also quit the firm in less than a year’s time. 
 
Prateek Srivastava, founder and CEO of talent acquisition firm Basil Advisors, says, "A lot of the hiring (at Indian internet companies) is pushed by the investors, and while the companies have hired top-notch people from the Valley, the culture here is very different." 
 
Arvind Singhal, the former CEO of Ola’s TaxiForSure unit, also joined the listings along with Swaminathan Seetharaman, who resigned as vice-president for engineering. 
 
"(The resignations have) less to do with compensation. You can attract the best talent with money, but you're not going to always retain them with money," Srivastava added.

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