Nationalism as India's Talent Retention Strategy

The best Indian engineers are leaving. Not because they want to, but because staying makes no sense.

The Talent Retention Problem

We need our talent to stay back and build. We need exported talent to come back and build.

But we lack on all fronts to retain talent:

• No capital — Funding ecosystems pale in comparison to the US or China
• No quality of life — Infrastructure, air quality, urban planning still catching up
• High taxes — Disincentivizes high earners and risk-takers
• Small prize if you win — Billions vs crores. The upside simply isn’t there

The Only Lever We Have

All we have to hold them back is nationalism.

Nothing else has a stronger pull at this moment. There might be a tipping point in the future, but that’s far off. We are very much behind the US and China, or other developed economies for that matter.

So all the propaganda, brain washing, dhurandhar — the only upside is it might trigger someone to stay back and do the hard work for future generations.

#india #talent #nationalism