India’s Global Capability Centre (GCC) ecosystem has entered a decisive new phase. With over 1,900 GCCs employing more than 2 million professionals and contributing nearly USD 60 billion annually, India has become a centre where global work is being designed and scaled. As GCCs evolve into centres of innovation and enterprise transformation, one factor increasingly determines success: how effectively organisations move and integrate talent across borders.

For the last decade, cost efficiency has defined GCC’s strategy. Today, capability, leadership depth, and innovation velocity are the real differentiators. The shift is evident. A majority of new GCCs are prioritising AI and GenAI capabilities from inception, embedding Indian teams into global innovation cycles, and building dedicated centres for advanced analytics, cybersecurity, and digital transformation. This evolution has placed unprecedented pressure on global mobility frameworks.

Why Global Mobility Is Now a Business Lever, Not an HR Process?

In modern GCCs, talent mobility is directly tied to outcomes. Leadership rotations enable faster decision-making. Short-term global assignments accelerate capability transfer. Cross-border exposure strengthens cultural alignment and long-term retention. Research consistently shows that well-supported assignments shorten time-to-productivity, improve assignment success rates, and enhance employer brand credibility.

Yet, many GCCs still manage mobility reactively. Immigration, relocation, housing, and family support often operate in silos, with each handled by multiple vendors and lacking effective coordination. The result is visa delays, compliance risks, confused assignees, and HR teams occupied by escalations instead of strategy. In an environment where AI-led initiatives and global collaboration demand speed, fragmented mobility frameworks become a silent but major bottleneck.

The Real Cost of Fragmented Talent Mobility

Cutting corners in mobility may appear cost-effective in the short term, but the downstream impact is significant. Delayed start dates disrupt project timelines. Poor family settlement affects employee engagement. Compliance gaps increase regulatory exposure. In many cases, these issues culminate in early exits or failed assignments eroding both financial investment and leadership momentum.

As outbound assignments from India rise, particularly short-term and rotational deployments to the US, Europe, and Southeast Asia, the margin for error has narrowed. Visa delays, document authentication challenges, and inconsistent policies can derail even the most strategically planned deployments.

Integrated Mobility: A Competitive Advantage in Action

Forward-looking GCCs are addressing these challenges by adopting integrated global mobility models. Instead of managing multiple service providers, they are partnering with single-window experts who bring together immigration, relocation, compliance, and destination services under one unified framework.

This approach delivers tangible benefits:

• One accountable partner, reducing HR firefighting and governance gaps
• Proactive compliance, with real-time visibility into documentation and regulatory changes
• Improved employee experience, with end-to-end handholding for assignees and their families
• Cost efficiency, reduced indirect costs driven by accurate planning, faster execution and successful assignments

Technology plays a critical role by offering transparency and tracking, but it is human expertise and empathy that ensure successful transitions, especially for senior leaders and families.

Mobility in the Age of AI-Driven GCCs

Talent and leadership culture account for nearly half of all GCC success factors. The ability to move the right people, at the right time, and integrate them seamlessly into the organisation is what separates high-performing GCCs from the rest. In GCCs, talent mobility is business mobility. When done right, it strengthens engagement, accelerates innovation, and future-proofs global operations.

The question for GCC leaders is no longer whether they can move talent but whether they are moving talent right. Because every seamless move strengthens the GCC’s global impact, and every misstep quietly undermines it.