What’s slowing the next phase of GCC growth?

India’s global capability centre story is entering a new phase. After years of building scale, adding capabilities and becoming extensions of global operations, GCCs are now being asked to do more: drive artificial intelligence adoption, build new products, innovate, and take on increasingly strategic roles.

But there is a problem: the organisations themselves may not be moving as fast as their ambitions.

A new report by Great Place To Work India, The Zero Drag Experience: Navigating Why Culture Matters in the Next Era of Global Capability Centres Growth, suggests that 41% of organisations remain in the "frictional stage", while 46% are in the functional stage and only 13% have reached the accelerated stage of innovation.

The finding points to an emerging challenge: organisational drag—the friction created by bureaucracy, workplace politics, weak psychological safety and leadership gaps that can slow execution. This drag is showing up across three priorities that will determine the next phase of GCC growth: AI readiness, innovation and talent.

AI is moving faster than workforce readiness

GCCs are investing heavily in AI and future-ready capabilities, but the workforce may not always be ready to keep pace with change. Thirty per cent of CHROs anticipate significant AI-driven changes to roles, while AI and digital adoption have emerged as the top future workforce priority.

At the same time, 1 in 4 employees do not experience psychological safety at work, and mid-level managers emerge as the least supported cohort for upskilling.

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As AI reshapes jobs and workflows, employees are increasingly asking what these changes mean for their roles and their careers. Yet capability building often remains focused on the skills needed today, rather than those that will matter tomorrow. The result is a growing gap between the pace of business transformation and the workforce’s readiness to keep up.

The innovation problem is not ideas. It is friction

For GCCs aspiring to become innovation engines, the problem may not be ideas. It may be what happens after they appear.

Only 13% of organisations are in the accelerated innovation stage, while 41% remain in the frictional stage. The innovation velocity ratio rises from 4:2 in frictional organisations to 7:2 in functional organisations and 16:2 in accelerated organisations.

Among high-velocity innovators, 90% say management seeks and responds to suggestions and ideas, compared with 73% in the bottom quartile. Eighty-nine per cent report tolerance of honest mistakes, versus 73% among the bottom quartiles. Appreciation stands at 87%, compared with 71%.

But perhaps the most telling gap is workplace politics. Eighty-two per cent of high-velocity innovators report an absence of workplace politics, compared with just 63% among bottom-quartile organisations.

The findings reveal a clear innovation maturity gap. While most GCCs have moved beyond the frictional stage, only a small proportion have created the conditions for accelerated innovation. The challenge, therefore, is not whether organisations value innovation, but what enables some to move ideas from discussion to execution faster than others.

The gap between innovation leaders and laggards goes beyond processes and technology. When workplace politics, lack of recognition, or fear of failure become part of the employee experience, people may hesitate to speak up, experiment, or challenge established thinking, causing ideas to lose momentum long before they reach execution.

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The talent problem is no longer just attraction

As GCCs become more strategic, the talent challenge is shifting from attracting specialised and AI-ready professionals to keeping them long enough to create impact.

The report finds that the biggest gaps between talent-retention leaders and laggards lie in the everyday employee experience. Bottom-quartile organisations trail their higher-performing peers by 22% on workplace wellbeing, 16% on empowerment, 15% on leadership accessibility and 11% on career growth.

An employee may join a GCC for the opportunity to work on AI or global projects. Whether they stay, however, can depend on more basic questions: Can I access my leaders? Do I have autonomy? Can I see a career path here? Do I feel empowered to make decisions?

In a market where AI and specialised skills are scarce, employee experience could become a competitive advantage or a source of drag.

The next GCC advantage: Less drag

The next phase of GCC growth will depend not just on how much talent or technology organisations can add, but on how quickly they can turn skills into capability, ideas into outcomes and ambition into impact. The GCCs that pull ahead may be those that remove the friction holding their people back. The next competitive advantage may not be more horsepower. It may be less drag.