chennai top level leadership churn continues at cognizant it giant cognizants chief people officer becky schmitt has resigned and will leave the organisation effective may 5 cognizant ceo ravi kumar s informed employees of her resignation in a note which has been reviewed by toi kathy diaz senior vp of rewards and hr mergers and acquisitions will serve as interim cpo of the companyresponding to tois query cognizant said becky schmitt chief people officer will be leaving cognizant effective may 5 for another professional opportunity we thank becky for her dedication and lasting contributions to improving our employee experience and wish her well we have launched a comprehensive search for our new chief people officer and are excited to continue building on the success we have had in advancing our people strategy in his note to employees kumar said that a global search is on to replace schmitt and it will include both internal and external candidates kumar who was appointed as cognizants ceo in january said that the it giant will continue building on the strong progress in recent quarters to boost retention the entire leadership team and i remain focused on helping cognizant become the employer of choice in our industry he added he credited schmitt for bringing in various initiatives to make cognizant a more employeecentric company schmitt joined the organisation in february 2020 the executive who was earlier at walmart and accenture oversaw cognizants hr function at a time when the firm clocked one of the worst attrition rates of over 30 during 20212022this is an indication that new ceo ravi kumar is making rapid changes to improve the quality of his leadership and reduce some of the bloated costs morale is fast improving and focus on talent is critical to kumar hence the change phil fersht ceo and chief analyst hfs research saidschmitts resignation follows the exit of outgoing ceo brian humphries who had a tumultuous tenure since 2019 under humphries the 19billion cognizant lagged peers in revenue growth saw numerous top level exits and had one of the lowest organic growth rates in the it industry cognizant reported 48 billion in revenue for the octoberdecember 2022 quarter